Do you think it sad how in the UK / West we have a dependency on alcohol to have a good time ?

[KidKruger]

This was brought home to me most significantly when I was at a huge festival in India a few years ago (Pushkar camel fair, Rajasthan, in the desert), 100,000+ folks having a great time and very little alcohol in sight. Dancing and singing and good humour everywhere.

This was not a festival for bands/music it was for camel and livestock trading over 4-5 days, nevertheless at other big gatherings elsewhere in India I saw the same thing, people happy just to be out and about and mixing with new people.

It's so common to see people (here in UK at least) necking as much as they can as soon as they can seemingly to remove themselves from their sober state, be it at home, in bars or festivals, whatever.

Don't you think it's a litle sad ?

I am not shy of a few pints myself so I am NOT being holier than thou !!

..just realised this is posted in the wrong section of EDF, apologies up and down for that.

[SeanMacGabhann]

Assuming you want it in here rather than the Lounge KK?

Good question tho'

I'm fond of a few pints myself but also suspect that, on a general level and only an opinion, people here (Uk, and Ireland in my case) do drink too much. But that's not recent - many laws have had to be passed over the last few centuries to stop the people of these islands drinking themselves to death

Fair play to cultures who party without alcohol - but given a choice, I will stick with a drink thanks

[fractionater]

Frank Skinner wrote an article about this subject in the Times a couple of months ago:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/frank_skinner/article6829662.ece

But then he is an ex-alchoholic.

[The Eye]

"But given a choice, I will stick with a drink thanks."

Likewise.

[KidKruger]

Fractionater - interesting read.

I have no agenda either way TBH, I just had pangs of sadness when I reflected on our drinking habits and how ingrained they are into our culture.

The interesting point Frank Skinner raises, although it's an obvious extension of my original question, is that we drink to 'loosen-up' the social dynamic.

But the obvious follow-on question from that is do we really live in such a hard and harsh external environment that we have to insulate ourselves from it when socialising ? And if we do, does that not reflect badly on social behaviours in our society ?

[PeckhamRose]

No, I don't, because I don't think we do. Depends who 'we' are. Those attracting the news media attention are not the larger part of the population, are they?

[Timster]

Northern Europeans have been getting drunk to have a good time for hundreds of years (check Thomas Hardy, Shakespeare, Chaucer etc) and English men have been getting drunk and having a fight on a Friday night as a matter of course since time immemorial. I'm not saying it's a good thing, but it's unlikely to change in the near future and it's nothing to do with opening hours etc.

I have an Albanian friend who speaks fondly of his time in a provincial English town when, after he'd been clubbing on a Friday night, him and his mate would sit on the steps in the town square to watch some drunken fights. He regarded it all as a quaint English ritual.

And I am sure one of the reasons that English people drink more than the French, Italians etc is we work longer hours and need a bit more of a wind down on a Friday night.

Who's for a alcohol free New Year's Eve?

[PeckhamRose]

Also, as kids we are treated as kids, and not allowed by government to drink till we're so old. Yet me and friends I know had parents who responsibly allowed us to drink a little when we were young teenagers so it was no big deal. Like the French.

[KidKruger]

PR - I am hoping in my OP I am making clear that I mean generally our society in the UK / West as contrasted against what I witnesed on the subcontinent. It would be futile for me to suggest there are no exceptions as you have pointed out there are always some. No I am not saying Frank Skinner's represent anything wider than his own opinion and I don't really care what he says however his views align in some respects with mine (though I am not advocating any change on health grounds !).

[katie1997]

KK i know exactly what you mean, I have lived and worked in India for several years; on my return to the UK I saw how ugly the western/UK drinking culture has become. However, there are so many more differences to take into account - India is an amazing country with so many people living relatively harmoniously side by side (take religion out of the equation) and they are happy to meet new people, you cannot compare the cultures in some respects.

I found it weird to return to lagerlout/ladette territory (and I am guilty as anyone here) and it seemed like we had gone down the wrong path with our boozing culture. But in India they DO love their whisky and there is a very male-dominated middle class who get absolutely trashed.

As other posters say, the Northern Hemisphere countries historically have a stronger tendency to dependency on hard liquors for sure....no idea what the answer is.

The peeps who advocate introducing children to alcohol earlier (like France) possibly have the answer..

[KidKruger]

Good points katie1997.

I have no issue with the difference between the cultures and am not tryigto overtly compare the per se, and I understand the historic reasons for why things are how they are now in UK/West.

But looking at the general use of alcohol in our culture, especially after many months away where it's use was minimal in my experience, we seemed like a sad lost people.

After a few pints I was fine though.

[The Eye]

"After a few pints I was fine though."

 

[katie1997]

hey kk yup i can identify with that feeling you had of us being a sad, lost people....after a few beers I was fine too LOL..

the eye - v funny

happy new years peeps :)) *champagne chilling as I type*

[plimsoul]

no, it's not sad

[womanofdulwich]

It is a real eye opener if you have to stop drinking for a while and go out with drinking mates. You can enjoy their company for a while but sometimes you just have to go ( pregnancy and breastfeeding did it for me, shame men don't have to do this too).

[Keef]

The thing that makes me most scared of not drinking, is the fear that life will be unbearably dull.

That is very sad, I know, but true.

[Chick]

No its not sad, who's round is ti? Hic

[bob]

I'll drink to that

Bob S

[huncamunca]

getting drunk is fun.

the religious squares and johnny foreigener dont realise this

Go to a french bar or cafe and see how many smiles & laughs you can count in a hour. Go to a British bar and do the same.

No contest

The cool cats drink because its great. The cubes are too uptight to make a wanker of themselves now and then.

[huncamunca]

There is a flip side to the consumption of alchohol in both quanttity & more importantly, the manner in which it is consumed, that is direct relevance to the UK.

Far from it being a definate societal negative, the cynic could argue that the use of alchhol as a state controlled and dispensed drug has allowed the UK to remain probabaly the most stable of European societies. Not that stability is always a good thing of course.

Whulst the rest of europe spent the 20thC formenting revolution, overthrowing dictators and rioting, we grumbled all week long, then went out and got leathered on a weekend & blew off steam.

There would have been no Mai'68 if the Frenchies had spent their time geting ripped in the Union bar and being sick on the landing of their accomodation.

There would not have been an October revolution of Lenin had made a habit of geting off his tits on local ales whilst in exile hanging around western europe & waiting for his moment.

Imagine if Herr HItler has indeed gone to the beer hall , and instead of a sorting out a putsch, he got riotously pissed and started a fight with another punter, ending up in the krankenhouse with a broken nose.

Imagine if Red Robbo & the various tankie striking groups of the 70s had actually got organised and brought the country to its knees, rather than decamping each night to the works social club with its fine selection of ressonably prices beers and continental lagers.

The UK & Japan have the longest serving monarchies in the world IIRC and both use Alchhol as a release valve.Interesting similarities.

Alchhol is a blessing, not a curse, for those who want to retain the UK status Quo.

[KidKruger]

Hunca:

"getting drunk is fun.

the religious squares and johnny foreigener dont realise this

Go to a french bar or cafe and see how many smiles & laughs you can count in a hour. Go to a British bar and do the same.

No contest

The cool cats drink because its great. The cubes are too uptight to make a @#$%& of themselves now and then.

"

Your comment:

"Go to a french bar or cafe and see how many smiles & laughs you can count in a hour. Go to a British bar and do the same. No contest "

Is exactly my point !

It seems sad that the British bars 'smiles and laughs' are produced through intoxication. As if one can only be achieved through the other.

[Keef]

I think what Hunca is getting at, is that you don't see many smiles in French bars. So, we obviously drink lots, and it makes us happy. The French just sit and drink wine whilst discussing art, and then they eat food, and then they go to bed, and then they eat more food, and then they take some photos, and then they look sombre, and so on, and so on...

I'd rather be alcoholic than French!

[Sanne Panne]

What on earth is wrong with the French all the time? I really don't see it. Is it some form of suppressed jealousy? Maybe worth another thread. And no I'm not French...

Back on topic - I think people generally drink more in crappy places with crappy climates. Chemical oblivion my husband calls it (as he opens his second bottle of wine).

[????]

mais oui

...but France actually has a Cirrhosis death rate twice as high as ours..

Salut

[Mick Mac]

Good point Quids.

The moral is - if you insist on introducing your kids to alcohol give them Stella not Bordeaux.