The dilemma of alcohol abuse in free modern era societies

Capt Lightning said:
The Scottish parliament has on two occasions imposed a minimum price tariff on alcohol. This is not a tax, but a bit of extra profit for the seller. This is supposed to be for health reasons, but I think it is a simply thinly veiled attack on the majority of responsible people who enjoy a drink.

There is a problem with excessive alcohol consumption in Scotland, but the number of those with alcohol dependency is largely unaffected by price, with some evidence that they will prioritise drink above other costs. There also seems to be a difference between the report on the effect of the price tariff which quotes a significant reduction in alcohol related deaths, and the National records which report deaths being at an all time high.

This is another typical example of Scottish policy making.... punish everyone because someone might be guilty. It's easier than solving the problem.
Click to expand...
This closely follows United States policy. We call it a sin tax. I don't think it has any effect on helping a problem, but it does generate revenue. I don't drink so it has no effect on me monetarily or health wise. If they want to tax alcohol, that's fine with me, just don't try to convince us it's for our own good. Canada taxes liquor heavily, but I've been told the tax revenue is used for alcohol rehabilitation. I don't know if that's true or not. I'd like to think so.
 

Just to clarify, a minimum price has been set for a unit of alcohol. Drink cannot be sold for less and so what were cheaper, but relatively high alcohol drinks, are now more expensive. This was supposed to target alcoholics who would buy the cheapest drinks.
Drinks that were more expensive to start with are not affected. Some shops help to offset the price rises by reducing the price of higher priced drinks and making them more affordable.
 
I could write a book on the ills of alcohol...wish there were a way to tamp down its destruction. Without belaboring the subject here are some things that could help:

Parents (model that it's ok...they could not drink at home)...wishful thinking, I know.

Media could stop glamorizing it and show its ill effects....hangovers, domestic abuse, etc. It's staggering how prevalent it is in every TV show.

Schools could educate about the percentage of alcohol-related deaths/domestic abuse/links to health issues (even cancer)/how they're being socially engineered by alcohol companies and the gazillions of dollars they make from their destructive product...show it for what it really is...a poison (and call it a DRUG) since it is. Granted, it's "fun" and an escape (from everything)...and it works until it doesn't...unfortunately once the brain has been changed by it there's no way to have "fun" or "relax" without some kind of mind-altering substance and it's a tough road to recovery (if one even makes it...the odds are low once you're hooked...something like 2 out of 10).

Getting kids into something that shows reverence for their body (athletics/dance/meditation techniques for stress relief) would help too. My understanding is that drinking before a certain age really sets you up for addiction, so...keeping your kids away from it at least until they were older would help too.

I could go on...and on....and on... (unfortunately) :cry:

No small problem...causes more issues than all other drugs combined (in my humble opinion of course although I think the research bears this out).
 

Oh dear Liz120118, you'll be wanting prohibition next - and just look what happened the last time.
It is not alcohol per se ,but excessive use that is the problem. It would seem that alcohol has been part of society as long as there were humans on Earth. If you are to believe the Bible, even Jesus turned water into wine.

I recall when Mrs L and I got married, moderate drinking while pregnant was perfectly OK. Now it's an absolute No No and I suspect many of those who tell us that might be the products of parents who drank. As for parents keeping kids away from drink till they were older - that was what my folks did - and I just couldn't wait to get a drink. Try telling kids that they shouldn't do something, and that's probably what they will want to do.

By all means tackle the problems of alcoholism, but leave the rest of us to enjoy a responsible drink.
 
David777 said:
You two are generally correct. I should not have used "most" without specifying the high amounts I was considering. So have changed that to "some'. Medical websites use the 400mg maximum daily safe threshold consumption of caffeine for most people that is maybe 10 cups of tea and 5 cups of coffee. The result of even drinking twice that amount probably won't bother many people and the negative symptoms are much less than those of other popular drugs. My point was meant to be, even the drug caffeine can cause issues if excessive in some people that has been addressed in online articles. I should have not pointed to tea drinkers but rather high level energy drinks. Thus just condemning any and all drug use as some do is too broadly stated.
Click to expand...
If I had a third cup of coffee in a day that would probably put me over the limit - I've reduced to a cup of tea when I get up (far less caffeine) and then a coffee later. And quite possibly another later on. My coffee consumption was putting me ahead of the average Finn, where they get through on average 12 kg of coffee a year - the highest consumption in the world by quite some margin. I still get it by mail-order but have reduced from 250 g (a bit more than 8 ounces in the US?) a week to the same every two weeks.
 
My niece who is a GP said we should have one cup of regular coffee in the morning and decaf the rest of the day. On the other hand,
a drinking buddy who was a medical officer in the navy said that he needed 4 or 5 cups of strong coffee in the morning before he was any use.
 
JustDave said:
A Clockwork Orange was Stanley Kubrick's satire on behavior modification. Not knocking behavior modification, however. But forced modification does bring up some moral questions.

With alcoholism, there are drugs that will make you sick of you consume alcohol. Some alcoholics have found them useful. Others just stop taking them so they can drink without the side effect. It is generally understood by recovering alcoholics that an alcoholic will only stop when he wants to be sober more than he wants to get drunk. I believe this to be true, but it's only my belief.
Click to expand...
From personal experience, you are spot on. It is possible to stop drinking one day and never take another drink, but it is hard to do. Support from family and groups like AA are necessary to keep going until sobriety has been firmly established. However, one needs to remember that one drink is too many, and a hundred drinks are not enough, so do not pick up, no matter how much you want to.
 
Warrigal said:
From personal experience, you are spot on. It is possible to stop drinking one day and never take another drink, but it is hard to do. Support from family and groups like AA are necessary to keep going until sobriety has been firmly established. However, one needs to remember that one drink is too many, and a hundred drinks are not enough, so do not pick up, no matter how much you want to.
Click to expand...
Once I embraced the idea that my solution was to never have another drink, my life changed in a hurry. Not my whole life of course. We all still operate in a reality where much is beyond our control, and adjusting to that takes more time and some growing up.

But not drinking anymore is not really hard. What was hard was getting away from ideas like 1)someday I may be able to drink again, 2)I just need to be sober for a while, 3)I need to do something (unspecified, but it can't exclude drinking entirely). In our support group we see new comers who say they want to stop, but don't. I can't read their minds of course, but I had been there.

For me, there was a wide psycho dynamic span between saying I needed to fix this and understanding that it required quitting, and that was the hard bridge to cross. I clearly remember that night, and the exact moment I felt myself making that giant leap in my head. The shift took only seconds, but I remember that moment from 29 years ago in great detail. Not drinking became possible because of that shift.

Further down the road, I began fixing the rest of my life. Well, I'm still working on that, but it's fun an rewarding work. I'm no longer spinning my wheels in the mud and expecting things to change by spinning my wheels faster.
 
Last edited:
this has been quite an "addictive" experience - wots good for us wots bad ? do we need more religion to straighten or spinal cords and make us good citizens - if as someone said even Jesus turned water into wine then its ok by me! !
 
smiley said:
this has been quite an "addictive" experience - wots good for us wots bad ? do we need more religion to straighten or spinal cords and make us good citizens - if as someone said even Jesus turned water into wine then its ok by me! !
Click to expand...
Don't mock people who find strength through prayer. My son is addicted to alcohol but is too stiff necked to surrender to any power higher than himself. He will die an alcoholic.
 
I have difficulty figuring out whether it is alcohol that is the problem specifically. Meaning, alcohol is most prevalent because it is easily available.

I am convinced that there is a part of our society that simply wants to take mood altering drugs for recreation purposes. Alcohol is the easiest to get.

That said, alcohol sales have actually fallen in the UK. And if you talk about the younger demographics, by quite a bit. However, a good number have traded alcohol for other recreational drugs such as Ketamine. We have an increasing number of younger folk having to go to their doctors because of bladder problems - Ketamine use destroys the bladder lining by scaring it, meaning it can no longer stretch.

Then you look at all the drug use in the US, and it's difficult to deny that mind-altering drugs are simply something that is mainstream at this point. A lot of people don't think it's a big deal at all.
 
Capt Lightning said:
By all means tackle the problems of alcoholism, but leave the rest of us to enjoy a responsible drink.
Click to expand...


I agree.

Certainly support people who are alcoholics and promote responsible alcohol usage - but alcohol in moderation is not a risk and most people drink sensibly and no reason for that to be demonised.

If anyone wants to be a teetotaller that is perfectly fine - but so is sensible in moderation drinking
 
VaughanJB said:
I have difficulty figuring out whether it is alcohol that is the problem specifically. Meaning, alcohol is most prevalent because it is easily available.

I am convinced that there is a part of our society that simply wants to take mood altering drugs for recreation purposes. Alcohol is the easiest to get.
Click to expand...
Yes, you can't blame alcohol for what it does. It's not sentient, has no mind of its own or plans for others. It is not cunning or baffling. It's a chemical substance, and a rather simple one at that. And you're right. Society at large likes to alter it's mind, and alcohol makes that happen without any intention of addicting parts of society or even realizing that it is doing anything at all.
 
Della said:
If you were broke and someone said "I'll give you a hundred dollars to hold your breath for three minutes, you might have a really strong desire to do that, but at about the 90 second mark your body will come up for air without even discussing it with your willpower.
Click to expand...
Thank you, Della, I think that is very well said
 
David777 said:
Although removing alcohol abuse fully is impossible, society could do much much more to make it more difficult for abusers to obtain alcohol. Our supermarkets have huge isles full of alcohol products. Adult entertainment venues serve massive quantities of alcoholic drinks with very little effort of availability of non-alcoholic drinks. And when they do, are usually unnecessarily priced as high even if something as basic as clean water. Of course our media and advertising strongly push alcohol use.
Click to expand...
Yes and because so much of our population cannot live without booze, the problem becomes increasingly worse. When driving on the highway or walking along a city street, I have little fear of other drivers that have had too much greasy food at a meal. And I doubt if I'll be run into or over, by a high coffee or tea drinker (due to their intake of same) But here we are in this discussion with many of US trying to minimize the use of alcohol because we suck it down on a daily basis.
Having a birthday party for your 7 year old ? Break out the cake, ice cream, and goodies for the kids but break out the beer and wine for the grown-ups. Wonder where familiarity with liquor breaks out, among the kids. Most of it starts at home but few parents like to admit it. JMHO
 
Is drink driving a major part of the issue with alcohol in the US? I don't think it is here, it's more about alcohol-fuelled violence and the health impacts. Minimum pricing is probably a good thing - I well recall local off licences (booze shops) doing 3 for 2 offers on bottles of wine - an offer which might sometimes have attracted people hosting a party but on a day to day basis is more useful to people with an alcohol issue. It would be a good idea to discourage such 'offers.'
I'm not 100% sober myself but haven't had a drink for two weeks, and the time before that was a couple of weeks before - I just feel too rotten the following morning. In my 20s to 40s it was another matter.
 
VaughanJB said:
I have difficulty figuring out whether it is alcohol that is the problem specifically. Meaning, alcohol is most prevalent because it is easily available.

I am convinced that there is a part of our society that simply wants to take mood altering drugs for recreation purposes. Alcohol is the easiest to get.

That said, alcohol sales have actually fallen in the UK. And if you talk about the younger demographics, by quite a bit. However, a good number have traded alcohol for other recreational drugs such as Ketamine. We have an increasing number of younger folk having to go to their doctors because of bladder problems - Ketamine use destroys the bladder lining by scaring it, meaning it can no longer stretch.

Then you look at all the drug use in the US, and it's difficult to deny that mind-altering drugs are simply something that is mainstream at this point. A lot of people don't think it's a big deal at all.
Click to expand...
many start off with a perfectly formed body and then proceed to destroy it with alcohol and other drugs - it's called "devil worship"
 
We could all be under 24 hour surveillance to arrest us if people had a second beer at a game, or the diet police could arrest us for eating potato chips instead of an apple, or the sleep police for staying up too late at night. The list of police agencies could be endless. The thing is we are all cranky, cantankerous, pains in the butt humans who insist on doing what we want when we want, and screw you.
 
smiley said:
many start off with a perfectly formed body and then proceed to destroy it with alcohol and other drugs - it's called "devil worship"
Click to expand...

No need for a devil. Ultimately it boils down to chemistry, and social factors. Addiction hides in our genetics, our minds, and in social interactions and environments.

Let me give you an example. In the UK, going to a pub to do business was common. I'm talking lunch time meetings, and evenings sometimes too. I'm talking drinking a lot of alcohol as simply part of the normal business interaction. When I switched to the US, I was a little surprised that, in effect, it was the exact opposite. Going for a couple beers during lunch was frowned upon, if not thought a little mad. So, the societal norm was entirely different, with the UK norms vastly increasing alcohol intake.

I can remember sitting in a pub with a bank executive one lunch time. I asked him how things were going, and he replied, "Good, but my gout is really playing up." This guy was in his 40's, and we'd just ordered our first beers. Think about that.

I also don't want to ignore the vast marketing campaigns put together to sell alcohol either. When I was growing up, Joe the Camel was a commonly known character, and was a bit of fun. UIltimately though, he existed to sell more cancer sticks.

There are many ways to fall into alcoholism. Business dealings as explained, genetic propensity for addictive behavior, societal pressures, peer pressure, etc. At the end of the day, alcohol isn't something any of us need - but we like how it makes us feel.
 
Warrigal said:
Don't mock people who find strength through prayer. My son is addicted to alcohol but is too stiff necked to surrender to any power higher than himself. He will die an alcoholic.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry to hear about your son, Warrigal. It has got to be dreadful and heart rending for you and your family. In an odd way, it's even more stressful on him, knowing the problems he has. At the end of the day, whatever works in effecting a cure is the right path. Be it God, being locked away, getting an epiphany, or a sudden shock of awareness. What works is what works best.

Of course, AA is built around a God belief, so if that's his path he might stand a chance.
 
Since this thread has run its course, I will reiterate that IMO using recreational neural substances that alter one's existence is not in all cases to be condemned or a negative for society as I've noted with the caffeine example. And that includes some substances that are often abused. In other words, society ought not ban some recreational substances simply because a minority of users don't have adequate self control. That noted, there are also substances like opioides, that require outright bans or restrictions like prescriptions that society ought regulate thus not allow easy access to.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top