[shrubby]

This.

In a healthy society there would be no need for intoxicants with so severe harms (BBC list for substances by harm is a good reference) and thus no exposure for a addictive substance.

Now the norm decides that, almost without exceptions, we must all be exposed.

[hnlmorg]

What’s healthy isn’t complete abstinence, it’s moderation.

This is true of coffee, sugar, alcohol, social gatherings, work, play, and everything else in life.

[TylerE]

That is true of some things, but the modern evidence is quite clear on the healthiest amount of alcohol being zero.

[hnlmorg]

You've completely missed the point. People don't drink alcohol because it's healthy. Just like people don't eat cake because it's healthy, nor drink coffee because it's healthy.

They do it because the unhealthy effects are desirable.

Which is why moderation is the key. There's absolutely nothing wrong with someone enjoying a drink. But there is with people who need to drink. And that's just as true for sugar addition and caffeine addition too.

Now I'm not suggesting that the negative effects of all vices are equal, because clearly they're not. But suggesting that total abstinence is the answer completely misses the point of why people enjoy a drink to begin with. You're setting an unreal expectation that will never work with society. Just like telling people that they shouldn't ever eat cake or drink coffee would be an unrealistic demand on society.

We already have a mountain of evidence that prove the removal of said vice without solving the underlying problem only drives people will just switch to something else. Often that "something else" can be much much worse. So it's far better to give people outlets but ensure there is support to ensure they descend into dependence (and the vast majority of people do consume in moderation).

[TylerE]

I was only using your own framing. You're the one who lazered in on health.

> What’s healthy isn’t complete abstinence, it’s moderation.

With alcohol this is well established to be false.

https://www.who.int/europe/news/item/04-01-2023-no-level-of-...

https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-h... (Headline: "Drinking alcohol is a health risk regardless of the amount.")

[hnlmorg]

> I was only using your own framing. You're the one who lazered in on health.

Actually no I wasn't. It was shrubby who mentioned "health" in the medical sense. I was replying to them using "health" in the social wellness sense. ie making the point that "health" is a nuanced term and shouldn't be used in an absolute way like they, and yourself now too, have done.

Health isn't just about physicality. There are social and emotional benefits. For example, enjoying a beer, or glass of wine, with my wife on a Friday evening when we rant about work is a great way to unwind for the weekend. It improves our mental health to have that shared experience. Our relationship is closer for spending time together. It has a net benefit despite it being an unhealthy treat.

You could replace the `wine` with `cake` in statement and have a similar point. But I don't personally enjoy cakes. Also take notice of how I'm not telling you that you shouldn't eat cakes because I don't personally like it ;)

> With alcohol this is well established to be false.

Again, you're missing the point. People enjoy stuff that isn't healthy, but sometimes that can still promote other benefits. Such as mental health. "Health" is a broader term than you give credit for.

Also the links you shared do not prove your point. There's no actual data in either of them. It's just pop-science articles with zero substance designed into scaremongering people. For example their arguments that it takes just one drink to become an addict is just laughable. The real statistics they don't print show a very different story where occasional to moderate drinking is not going to significantly increase your risk of cancer nor anything else. You're talking about fractions of a percent in the change of risk -- and that risk was already a low percentage to begin with. This is where understanding how statistics actually work makes a difference ;)

For example, some studies studies only show a correlation in 5% of cancer cases being related to alcohol consumption and that was proven against heavy drinkers. And the percentage of drinkers who have that cancer are < 1%. eg

https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/a...

And a lot of these studies exaggerate what I'd classed as a "light drinker". Take that link I shared:

> Even light drinkers can be at increased risk of some cancers. For example, women who have just one drink per day have a higher risk of breast cancer than those who have less than one drink a week, and risk is increased even more in heavy drinkers and binge drinkers (3-7).

If you're drinking 1 drink per day then you have a dependency. That isn't occasional consumption. I would not class that as demonstrating moderation. If you need to drink every single day then you fall into the category I described in my previous comment when I said there is an underlying problem that needs addressing.

Most people do not drink every day.

---

So to summarize:

- light and occasional drinking is a rounding error of 0 in terms of physical health risk. But it can have much more significant positive effects on mental health.

- understanding the actual statistics and how they work matter if you're going to argue about the risks to health

- people don't become alcoholics from one glass of wine

- if you don't want to drink then I agree nobody should force you. But please don't share bullshit pop-science articles claiming we're all going to become cancer-riddled addicts from an occasional drink just because you don't understand why some people do enjoy the occasional glass of wine. That just demonstrates you don't understand the subject matter.

- and please don't ignore the parallels I made about coffee and cake. They demonstrate the hypocrisy of comments where people claim absence is the only smart choice.

(and no, those bullet points were not AI generated)

edit: sorry for all the crappy grammar. I'm multitasking...badly it seems haha

[shrubby]

I'm tempted to start the full deontology and Jellinek model on substance abuse on this, but don't have the effort now.

If we perform a cost benefit analysis on alcohol the downsides are plentiful and then some.

And the pluses are practically masked versions (taste, buzz,...) of the two major things that make human do anything: what others are doing and what I'm used to (which are pretty shit reasons to do anything IMO) it basically boils down to addiction. Not chemical, but functional and social.

Then we return to the cost benefit analysis and start figuring out how far the lying disease has progressed. The fierceness of the debate feels like a good indicator of this usually.

I'd be tempted to explain this more in depth, but I have stuff to do.

[lelanthran]

If alcohol was only discovered in 2026, there isn't a country in the world that would legalise it.

It's legal only because it's been grandfathered in, from before legal systems were created.

[hnlmorg]

That’s an impossible to prove opinion without changing the laws of physics. But there are some precedence we can refer to as a counterargument.

1. There have been plenty of other substances that have been banned which were legal and widely taken since before such laws existed. Demonstrating that governments are willing to control substances that were previously legal.

2. There have also been other drugs that have been legalized after they were previously banned. Proving that governments are willing to accept the risk of people taking drugs.

3. And your augment about alcohol specific actually did happen in some places. It is commonly referred to as "prohibition". And that decision never stuck.

The reality is drugs aren't legal nor illegal based on solely the harm they do. They are judged based on how easy they are to regulate (read: monetize and tax) and the subsections of society which enjoy them.

To expand on that last point: there's a reason cannabis was illegal in most countries while cigarettes weren't. And that reason wasn't because cannabis was considered more dangerous than tobacco. It's was because certain leaders wanted us to think that the people who smoked cannabis was more dangerous than the people that smoked cigarettes.

[red-iron-pine]

> 3. And your augment about alcohol specific actually did happen in some places. It is commonly referred to as "prohibition". And that decision never stuck.

sticks pretty well in muslim areas.

[hnlmorg]

Not as well as you'd think:

1. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-68085190

> Saudi Arabia to get first alcohol shop in more than 70 years. [...] Saudi officials said the shop would counter "the illicit trade of alcohol".

2. https://www.rferl.org/a/farda-briefing-fatal-alcohol-poisoni...

> Since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, alcohol has been strictly banned in Iran, where consuming, producing, or selling alcohol is punishable by prison, floggings, and fines. Despite the official ban, Iranians still drink foreign and homemade alcoholic beverages that are sold on the black market. Over the past year, there has been a spike in the cases of fatal alcohol poisoning, according to medical officials in Iran.

And I'm pretty sure few Europeans nor Americans would want to mimic the laws seen in those Islamic countries. Even putting aside the depressing rise of nationalist parties in the west, Saudi and the US and EU are just culturally very different. So what works there isn't necessarily going to work here.

[joe_mamba]

>In a healthy society there would be no need for intoxicants with so severe harms

Yeah but we don't live in a healthy society. We have more abundance and more advanced healthcare and drugs than ever before, but we are sick in terms of missing social connections and family unit, even in big cities. Hence why mental illnesses and substance abuse are going up.

People don't thrive on GDP line go up and cheap large screen TVs. People need friends, family, and a support network.

[shrubby]

Yes. 100 percent agree. The addiction industry requires us to be desperate and wanting an escape, so that they can brainwash us into complicity and brain fog from hangover or doomscrollin.