To rant about alcohol and the way it's normalised?

[CheapSausagesAndSpam]

It's EVERYWHERE and it's poisonous. People normalise it..."Oh...wine o'clock already tra la la!"

And all that shite.

It's responsible for thousands of deaths and injuries and trauma every year and yet it's the first thing people think of when they want to celebrate something.

Get this

3 May 2017: New figures released today show that hospital admissions due to alcohol are at their highest ever levels.

The data, summarised in a release from NHS Digital, shows that alcohol-related hospital admissions in England have increased by 64% over the last decade, with an extra 430,000 people being admitted due to alcohol-related causes in 2015/16 compared with 2005/06.

This takes the total number of alcohol-related hospital admissions to over 1.1 million in 2015/16.

And this

Alcohol is linked to over 60 illnesses and diseases, including heart disease, liver disease and cancer. Figures from the local alcohol profiles for England show that admissions due to liver disease have gone up 57% over the last decade, and that the number of people diagnosed with alcohol-related cancer has increased 8%.

How is this a lovely drink? How is this something that is ok to do in front of children and even to allow children to partake of?

People on MN often say "Oh I let my 12 year old have half a glass of wine...it's a good way to introduce it!"

WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO!?

And new research points to the fact that it causes irreversable damage to stem cells, scrambling DNA and eventually causing cancers.

www.theguardian.com/science/2018/jan/03/alcohol-can-cause-irreversible-genetic-damage-to-stem-cells-says-study?CMP=fb_gu

Think about it. Society is not doing itself any favours.

My daughter's father died a month ago, mainly due to alcoholism. He was in his late 30s. Alcohol was the main reason we split up. He always picked alcohol and going with his mates over his family. Most of his friends are also heavy drinkers.

I drink about once a year. I don't really like the taste. That makes me abnormal and I have no social life.

I really wish the culture would change. I don't want my daughter growing up thinking the only way she can have a life is to drink alcohol. I really worry about it.

@NameChanger22 same here. don't want to drink or spend time with drunk people =there are no options for me to have friends

I agree with the OP. I am a non drinker by choice, not because I am an alcoholic or because of a medical condition or because I am always driving. I get sick fed up with people always asking for all sorts of explanations as to why I don’t drink. Someone actually “jokingly” said “but how do you ever have fun” 🙄

I’m not looking for prohibition or anything like that but it would be nice if not drinking was considered just as normal. If a night out didn’t start with me having to convince everyone that no, really, I don’t want a drink. If I wasn’t constantly on guard for someone who might think I actually do want a double vodka in my fresh orange and decide to spike it.

Yes, it might be a minority of drinkers who abuse alcohol, but it’s the majority of drinkers who seem to want to judge me for being a non drinker or assume I am judging them for drinking. Normalising a non drinking culture would be great.

I have friends who don’t drink and it wouldn’t stop me going out with them. I don’t understand if you don’t drink you don’t have friends.

If your friends are arsey about you not drinking, you need new friends. Don't blame the rest of us!

If your friends are arsey about you not drinking, you need new friends. Don't blame the rest of us!
Not friends. Work colleagues, or friends of friends, mums of daughter’s school friends. I’ll blame the rest of you because it is not my friends who do this.

I agree with namechanger to a certain extent. Coming from a culture where alcohol consumption is not so predominant I can tell you that there are far more social occasions that are probably denied to me just because I do not drink as much. Nobody will tell me off or look down on me but most will be a lot merrier in a way that Someone who is not cannot enjoy iyswim.

I also don't like how a drink dignifies losening up and relax and open up and be more funny and interesting. It is never true to be honest and it is not a great thing for teenagers to learn: that you are at your best with a drink.

If your friends are arsey about you not drinking, you need new friends. Don't blame the rest of us!
Not friends. Work colleagues, or friends of friends, mums of daughter’s school friends. I’ll blame the rest of you because it is not my friends who do this

I never experience issues with not drinking with anyone I go out with, work colleagues included!

I drink once a year on Christmas and that is becuase I enjoy a Baileys with my coffee but it’s so high in Cals I don’t have baileys throughout the year!

I go out all the time, regularly in a kebab shop at 3am, no one badgers me and if they did they would be told to fuck off pretty sharpish!

I hate how having a cake sale is normal, it's horrific and damaging to health, even if it's done in the name of charity. How. Very. Dare. They.

Quite a substantial problem in society is the number of people addicted to whining and criticising and poking their noses in to what is none of their business. (This can be true of both those who like a drink and those who are teetotal BTW). We live in a culture where, increasingly, surveillance and meddling are encouraged, and this is actually quite damaging to public mental health.

Back to the France/ Italy/ sensible drinking on the continent point- honestly, I think this is related to them being “behind” us more than anything else.

I remember 20 years ago how the British used to look at obese Americans with horror. With increased portion sizes (yes that includes wine measures) the British are also now waddling round obese.

5 years ago mainland Europe was looking at us in horror and we heard all about their simple peasant food and prevalent food culture and how we should be more like them to cure obesity.

Now, obesity, junk food, increased portion sizes etc are well ingrained in mainland Europe and they are also waddling around as their food culture dies around them.

Give them 20 years and we’ll be looking on smugly as they roll around the streets on a Saturday night puking And fighting whilst camera crew from “binge drinking Athens/ Paris/ Rome” follow them publicising every move.

Cherrycoke - this thread is about alcohol, not about food. A food addiction is nowhere near as damaging as an alcohol addiction. Heavy drinkers tend to die really young, all the overweight people I know are in their 70s and 80s. Food (even sugar) is not a poison, alcohol is.

The problem with a heavy drinking culture is that it makes it almost impossible for an alcoholic to quit because giving up alcohol means they have to give up all their friends and social life and that can seem far too much of a sacrifice. The heavy drinkers associated with the alcoholic usually enable and defend the heavy drinking and fail to see or deny there is a problem. I've seen this happen. Alcohol starts off as fun in a young person's life, but hardly ever ends up that way.

It’s about the change in culture, not food specifically

"all the overweight people I know are in their 70s and 80s"

All the overweight people I know are in their 30s and 40s. So?

People you know depends on your social circle. I don't know anyone in their 70s and 80s except my parents and very few of their friends.

"Alcohol starts off as fun in a young person's life, but hardly ever ends up that way"

Oh please. It's almost as if you are talking about heroin

Most people who enjoy alcohol are not addicted to it and don't have a problem with it.

I don't see being a bit overweight as a problem. It is very difficult to stay super slim as you age. It doesn't mean you're not healthy and won't live a long happy life.

Just to remind you, this thread is about alcohol. If you want to start a new thread about how fat everyone is in the UK go ahead. It won't be the first.

Most people who enjoy alcohol are not addicted to it and don't have a problem with it.

Any stats on that?

Isn’t it obvious name changer? Most people drink and most drinkers are obviously not alcoholics or problem drinkers. Why would you need stats to realise that?

Nobody needs to drink, everyone needs to eat. Alcohol is a poison, food isn't. It's very difficult in your 20s and 30s to have a social life and not drink, in this country. Alcoholism is a huge problem in this country, look it up if you don't believe me. Lots of early deaths could be avoided if there were more opportunity for a social life which didn't revolve around alcohol. Lots of people's lives could be better if we didn't have the drinking culture we do.

That is what seems obvious to me.

But you do realise most people aren’t problem drinkers?

Btw I’m sorry you didn’t understand my point about food culture in Europe changing. I thought it was clear

I don't drink either and get asked why sometimes but not a lot anymore. Probably because if someone says to me 'you can't have any fun without alcohol', I reply back with 'it's sad you can only have fun with alcohol and yet not remember the fun happening'.

I don't mind if people drink as long as it's not excessively. I know I can be easily addicted to something and should my body get addicted to drink like it's done with chocolate, I'll be in a lot of trouble. I avoid it because of that, but I don't really like the taste either other than shots.

"I reply back with 'it's sad you can only have fun with alcohol and yet not remember the fun happening'."

Silly reply. It's rare for people to drink so much that they forget the whole evening.

There are over half a million alcoholics in the UK. Over 7% of adults regularly drink above recommended guidelines. In 2016 there were over a million admissions to hospital which were alcohol related.

Not everyone has a problem with alcohol, but many people do. Those people aren't being helped by our drinking culture.

"A food addiction is nowhere near as damaging as an alcohol addiction. Heavy drinkers tend to die really young, all the overweight people I know are in their 70s and 80s. Food (even sugar) is not a poison, alcohol is."

Not sure I agree with that. What about very obese people? Overweight people might be more equivalent to someone who gets drunk sometimes. The equivalent to an alcoholic might be an obese person and obesity is a huge societal problem at the moment.