Denormalisation of alcohol

[seeformiles]

I read Third chimpanzee - and I have to say - Jared Diamond doesnt half talk some bollocks. His argument that people get shitfaced in order to impress is, frankly, bizzare. Its such tosh, based on no evidence at all and ignores the glaringly obvious answer (that people find it pleaseurable and/or meets a deeply felt need to blunt life's spikes). It makes you question a lot his other arguments.

Yep - the only people impressed by heroic alcohol consumption are other pissheads. Everyone else just sees a sad alcoholic. Oliver Reed (& alcoholism) has a certain amount of posthumous fandom that’s pretty pathetic.

 

[Elpenor]

What wines does your dad like, generally speaking, some wines do tend to be stronger, so if he's looking at New World, they will tend to be stronger, for reasons I mentioned in my previous post about wine strength.

I'd say something like a Pinot Noir, Gamay or Grenache might be lower alcohol than what he's been drinking, but they're probably going to be lighter-bodied than what he's used to.

Because it's a balancing act and the stronger alcohol level acts as a counterfoil to full-bodied elements in a wine. If you drank a medium or light bodied red wine that had a high alcohol level, it would be out of whack, similarly a full-bodied wine with much lower alcohol levels would be out of balance.

So if he's looking at bottles of the same style of wine hoping to find one of lower alcohol level, that's probably not going to work, he's going to need to look at different styles (country/region/grape varieties), maybe more Old World, like the ones I mentioned before, or maybe a younger Tempranillo or Garnacha, steer clear of fuller-bodied Crianza, Reserva, Gran Reserva, or a Merlot rather than a Shiraz.

French, generally Bordeaux or Spanish I think. Has never been a fan of new world stuff. He will know more about wine than I do, has been into it since the 1970s, and knows what he likes

 

[RD2003]

Yep life isn't fulfilling and neoliberalism drives people to drink.

But this by itself isn't much of a class analysis of alcohol consumption - it doesn't take into account the corporations profiting off that misery, and your post is only looking at this in a very individualised way - not taking into account the broader harms done to communities through excessive consumption.

But I agree any policies to denormalise alcohol have to be part of a broader liberatory agenda not just finger wagging prohibition.

Perhaps, but it's being done right now in the complete absence of any such liberatory agenda.

And even then, that such an agenda would inevitably fall short of its goals (which isn't a reason not to attempt one) leaves the very same problem of people regularly wishing to temporarily blot out an unsatisfactory reality. Not least among these would be the substantial number of those for whom the liberatory agenda would, rightly or wrongly, be regarded as abhorrent.

 

[newme]

I still feel quite strongly that unless I am controlling any kind of vehicle, heavy goods, anything remotely dangerous to anyone else then why should what I put into my mind and body be regulated by someone else? What happened to bodily autonomy? Going to call all substances drugs cos they are, no one can even agree on how bad this one or that one apparently is, the lack of cohesion over what should be a scientific output has been mostly packed with the US's extremely badly thought out and rapidly exported drugs policies based on racism after they tried prohibition and that didn't work either. How about some evidence based policy looking at Portugal, the US states opening more up for research and medical treatments with eg mushrooms, legalisation of THC, removal of criminal funding, increase tax base, stop people being arrested for relaxing costs less too.

Anyone got a spare bus and some paint?

 

[brogdale]

Wait...what? The fuck...

 

[Kaka Tim]

the campaing agasint booze is not new though is it? The termperance movement was huge within working class communities in the 19th centuary - found out today that man city's old ground, maine road was named in honour of the state of maine introducing prohibition.
IMO all intoxitcants should be viewed the same - they are something that people have always indulged in and can be fun but do have serious risks attached. Alchohol - and alchoholism - shouldnt be glamourised. Policy should be based on risk managment whilst accepeting that getting mildly high and maybe getting shit faced from time to time is not a moral faliure. And they should recognise that most people are able to enjoy drugs and booze without having any serious health consequences.

 

[RD2003]

the campaing agasint booze is not new though is it? The termperance movement was huge within working class communities in the 19th centuary - found out today that man city's old ground, maine road was named in honour of the state of maine introducing prohibition.
IMO all intoxitcants should be viewed the same - they are something that people have always indulged in and can be fun but do have serious risks attached. Alchohol - and alchoholism - shouldnt be glamourised. Policy should be based on risk managment whilst accepeting that getting mildly high and maybe getting shit faced from time to time is not a moral faliure. And they should recognise that most people are able to enjoy drugs and booze without having any serious health consequences.

It was the road on which the football ground was built that was named after the Maine law, fifty-odd years earlier.

 

[bellaozzydog]

The thing that annoys me about the pricing scheme in pubs is that non-alcoholic drinks appear to be extortionately priced.

This

 

[Ted Bunting]

To reduce the harm done by alcohol FFS

But as someone who is clearly a problem drinker from your regular late night postings I'm unsurprised you have this attitude.

You’re out of order there. Attack the argument or the comment but not the poster.

Lot of us struggle with addictions, I mean look at krtek a houby, he’s addicted to being a wally.

 

[krtek a houby]

You’re out of order there. Attack the argument or the comment but not the poster.

Lot of us struggle with addictions, I mean look at krtek a houby, he’s addicted to being a wally.

Jesus, Jay. Get a grip.

 

[Ted Bunting]

Hard as well when a plate of pasta tastes so much more delicious with a glass of red, or a bowl of sashimi is exponentially improved with a draught beer in a frosted glass. How do you stop at one or two though once you start riding that wave?

That’s what my uncle used to say when we’d go out on the lash: ‘don’t ride the wave too quickly’. Essentially rationalising what was going to turn into a heavy intake of alcohol that night. Coincidentally he’s teetotal now he’s married and has kids.

He’s Gen X and I’m Gen Y FWIW. I dunno which out of the two are the biggest cainers.

when i was at university

Bologna at the turn of the 13th century ?

My girl has a lot of Muslim friends and her boyfriend is Muslim, but then my boy also has Muslim friends and non-Muslim friends who don't drink and is still an absolute booze hound so I don't know.

Nuff British Muslims tell their parents they’re going to Morocco for an exotic Salah and get blotto.

getting them home without injury or incident, stopping them burning the house down when they get there.

My Dad burnt a lovely little listed cottage down putting the chip-pan on one night after coming back from the pub and conking out. He wasn’t even much of a drinker. Maybe that’s why That might well have been my inheritance now

 

[Ted Bunting]

Mocking somebody because you think they might have a drinking problem is not cool and it doesn't seem in keeping with the tone of this thread

These two need to give their heads a wobble and all:



and the other two who thought it was okay to bully someone for problematic drinking.

Not quoting anyone cos don’t wanna derail but they love having a below the belt pop these two in the screenshot.

 

[emanymton]

Just read the thread then saw this which at first glance challenges the idea drinking is going out of fashion with kids

But it seems to be about how many kids have had alcohol ever not how much or how often, so I'm not sure it tells us a great deal.

Great Britain has worst rate of child alcohol consumption in world, report finds

Study by World Health Organization shows more than half of children had drunk alcohol by age 13

www.theguardian.com

 

[Rimbaud]

Well that’s obviously bollocks isn’t it. If self sustained damage signals status and fertility, why would we do it in a way that impairs judgement. People would be carving patterns onto their faces, inserting stones under the skin, engaging in elaborate rituals involve pain etc.

Oh, wait....
And you need your wits about you to undertake such practice.

Impaired judgment doesn't indicate high status, quite the reverse. I can’t imagine our ancestors had enormous respect for the staggering drunk any more than we do.

Altered states is about access to alternative realities, the spirit realm etc. Traditionally even tobacco is about entering an altered state for spiritual reasons.

Alcohol was probably always about celebration, feasting etc.

That's the point isn't it? Being able to imbibe without your judgement being impaired too much signals status and resilience/overall health. Becoming a staggering drunk during a collective drinking session indicates the opposite.

It's a plausible theory IMO and there is definitely still a competitive element to drinking, consider drinking games etc, mocking people for being "lightweights". It's cross cultural too, in China which is less of an alcoholic culture than Europe aggressively toasting people seems to be a form of asserting dominance, and getting someone drunk is a fairly common form of group initiation/hazing ritual with a specific name, 灌酒 (means something like to irrigate alcohol). Prehistoric humans probably behaved in a similar way.

 

[Pickman's model]

Jesus, Jay. Get a grip.

He's only got a gripe

 

[Rimbaud]

the campaing agasint booze is not new though is it? The termperance movement was huge within working class communities in the 19th centuary - found out today that man city's old ground, maine road was named in honour of the state of maine introducing prohibition.
IMO all intoxitcants should be viewed the same - they are something that people have always indulged in and can be fun but do have serious risks attached. Alchohol - and alchoholism - shouldnt be glamourised. Policy should be based on risk managment whilst accepeting that getting mildly high and maybe getting shit faced from time to time is not a moral faliure. And they should recognise that most people are able to enjoy drugs and booze without having any serious health consequences.

There's an irony in that the absurd amount of sweets consumed in the UK dates back to attempts by Quakers (e.g. Joseph Rowntree) to introduce alternatives to booze. However, the result was a country addicted to sugar as well as booze.

 

[Silas Loom]

You’re out of order there. Attack the argument or the comment but not the poster.

Lot of us struggle with addictions, I mean look at krtek a houby, he’s addicted to being a wally.

These two need to give their heads a wobble and all:


Not quoting anyone cos don’t wanna derail but they love having a below the belt pop these two in the screenshot.

Don’t implausibly new posters usually wait a little longer before jumping in to resurrect ancient grudges? Just as a matter of etiquette.

 

[kabbes]

That's the point isn't it? Being able to imbibe without your judgement being impaired too much signals status and resilience/overall health. Becoming a staggering drunk during a collective drinking session indicates the opposite.

It's a plausible theory IMO and there is definitely still a competitive element to drinking, consider drinking games etc, mocking people for being "lightweights". It's cross cultural too, in China which is less of an alcoholic culture than Europe aggressively toasting people seems to be a form of asserting dominance, and getting someone drunk is a fairly common form of group initiation/hazing ritual with a specific name, 灌酒 (means something like to irrigate alcohol). Prehistoric humans probably behaved in a similar way.

All you’re doing is describing a plausible process of sociogenesis, which is powerful enough to recur in multiple types of culture. It’s a hell of a leap from that to suggesting there is some kind of phylogenetic propensity.

 

[Rimbaud]

All you’re doing is describing a plausible process of sociogenesis, which is powerful enough to recur in multiple types of culture. It’s a hell of a leap from that to suggesting there is some kind of phylogenetic propensity.

Fair enough.

Edit- I was more disagreeing with the logic of "that can't be true because nobody is impressed by heavy drinking"

 

[kabbes]

Just read the thread then saw this which at first glance challenges the idea drinking is going out of fashion with kids

But it seems to be about how many kids have had alcohol ever not how much or how often, so I'm not sure it tells us a great deal.

Great Britain has worst rate of child alcohol consumption in world, report finds

Study by World Health Organization shows more than half of children had drunk alcohol by age 13

www.theguardian.com

Yeah, big play of this in the news. But if you asked my 10 year-old nephew if he’s ever had an alcoholic drink, he’d say yes. And this is true, because his parents let him have a sip of their beer in the rare occasions they have a beer. Frankly, I’m surprised that the number of kids that say yes to this question isn’t way higher. I’d certainly had an alcoholic drink by the time I was 11.

 

[Silas Loom]

All you’re doing is describing a plausible process of sociogenesis, which is powerful enough to recur in multiple types of culture. It’s a hell of a leap from that to suggesting there is some kind of phylogenetic propensity.

Are you prepared to accept any types of inherited propensity? Almost any aspect of human behaviour could be ascribed to sociogenesis, and in the sociological heyday of the 70s, when academics tried raising chimps as humans, it usually was. But the argument has moved on rather since then.

 

[Rimbaud]

Yeah, big play of this in the news. But if you asked my 10 year-old nephew if he’s ever had an alcoholic drink, he’d say yes. And this is true, because his parents let him have a sip of their beer in the rare occasions they have a beer. Frankly, I’m surprised that the number of kids that say yes to this question isn’t way higher. I’d certainly had an alcoholic drink by the time I was 11.

Also my Grandma used to give me and my cousins Appletiser on special occasions and tell us it was champagne, some of us were in our 20s before we realised that we probably weren't actually drinking champagne.

 

[Elpenor]

He's only got a gripe

And had too many grape based beverages

 

[kabbes]

Are you prepared to accept any types of inherited propensity? Almost any aspect of human behaviour could be ascribed to sociogenesis, and in the sociological heyday of the 70s, when academics tried raising chimps as humans, it usually was. But the argument has moved on rather since then.

If there are inherited propensities then the epigenetic pathway through which these are expressed are wildly complicated, and do not just come as a kind of programmed destiny. Humanity’s primary survival characteristics are our extreme plasticity, allowing us to adapt to almost any environment, and our extraordinary sociality, allowing us to thrive rather than just survive wherever we go. You can’t divorce any observed cultural developments from those fundamentals. So yes, I am deeply, deeply suspicious of all pseudoscientific claims of evolutionary psychology that are based on nothing but supposition and an ontological model of the human as some kind of atomised, ahistorical, culturally-neutral bag of genes.

 

[Pickman's model]

And had too many grape based beverages

Yeh he's full of whine

 

[Silas Loom]

If there are inherited propensities then the epigenetic pathway through which these are expressed are wildly complicated, and do not just come as a kind of programmed destiny. Humanity’s primary survival characteristics are our extreme plasticity, allowing us to adapt to almost any environment, and our extraordinary sociality, allowing us to thrive rather than just survive wherever we go. You can’t divorce any observed cultural developments from those fundamentals. So yes, I am deeply, deeply suspicious of all pseudoscientific claims of evolutionary psychology that are based on nothing but supposition and an ontological model of the human as some kind of atomised, ahistorical, culturally-neutral bag of genes.

For me, the interesting thing about humans en masse, for any level of complexity above clans, and as far back as we have written records or archaeological evidence (which admittedly isn’t very far) is how limited our supposed plasticity is.

 

[Ted Bunting]

Don’t implausibly new posters usually wait a little longer before jumping in to resurrect ancient grudges? Just as a matter of etiquette.

I’ve no truck with bourgeois etiquette. Plus yer man there has been gunning for me since day 3

Do us both a favour and stay out of it.

 

[Ted Bunting]

And had too many grape based beverages

You’re several hundred vitis vinifera short of a vinyard, mate.

 

[kabbes]

For me, the interesting thing about humans en masse, for any level of complexity above clans, and as far back as we have written records or archaeological evidence (which admittedly isn’t very far) is how limited our supposed plasticity is.

How many other animals could be born into any of New York City, the tundras of Siberia or the jungles of the Amazon and thrive either way? It’s pretty much only bugs, humans and animals that depend on humans. And the way humans manage it is via their society and culture, not by being innately programmed to cope.

 

[Ted Bunting]

Pickman's model , Elpenor , krtek a houby a.k.a.