stayingpositive

I wish I knew more about alcohol abuse before I was in my 30's. I wonder why I learned in school and on tv as a child that drugs where dangerous and smoking was adictive, but never learned much about alcohol. I didn't know what alcohol withdraw was till I was going through it. I never knew it could be physically adictive. I can't say for sure if it would have made a difference in the choices I made, but I do wish I would have known. Where is that warning label on the bottle??

Serenidad

I DO agree with this. ^^^ Schools talked about drugs, cigarettes, stds etc but never alcoholism or the dangers of alcohol.

Heck...I just wish my own family would have admitted to having a problem and warned me. I wish they would have explained my risk instead of all the "family secrets". If I would have known maybe I would have been more careful....maybe not. Who knows...

I DO plan to inform and educate MY children about it though and have already begun. My husband is not an alcoholic but it's all over his side of the family too. Knowledge is power.

anattaboy

I would be interested in what percentage of conceptions were under the influence. Maybe I should do a poll?

Notmyrealname

I try not to get caught up in what other people are doing. There are millions of people in my country. At any given time a whole lot of them are doing unwise stuff. I can keep myself from being a drunk if I work at it. I can't keep other people from being drunks.

While public health is certainly an open topic for discussion (for example, why haven't we banned cellphone use while driving? statistics indicate the level of cellphone-related "impairment" is equivalent to drunk driving.. or why do we sell cigarettes at all? and leaving that topic for a moment, why haven't we banned sale of cigarettes in grocery and convenience stores where children have access? we could relegate them to liquor stores, which tend to card everybody), its relevance to recovery is tangential at best.

Good morning everyone! Time to get to work now..

mns1

It think it ultimately is on parents to do all they can to try to steer their kids down the right path, no matter what public campaigning their is against any particular substance. I firmly believe that our behavior as adults is influenced by how we are raised more than anything else, barring any neurological or neurochemical disorder. But kids will always want to do things that they see as adult behavior or simply do them because they know it's against the rules.

Growing up, my father had regular talks with me and my two brothers about drugs and drinking. He would always mention the risks and what could possibly happen to us in graphic detail if we messed around with those things and he always told us to stay away from people who did them. And we really did stay away. None of us, not even my older brother who liked to frequently disobey my father, ever drank until we were adults. I none of us ever smoked or did drugs of any kind. I myself was pressured into all sorts of things, and I would always refuse with unshakeable resolve.

I have no doubt that my drinking issues began in part with the people I hung around in my early 20s. I spent a lot of time hanging out in bars, drinking several nights a week. I had a girlfriend at the time who would always want to stay and "have a few more". But I chose all of those things. I chose to go to those bars, I chose to associate with those people, and I chose to see that girl.

I'm not saying that anyone here should blame their parents for their drinking issues. In fact, we shouldn't point fingers at all. Most of us just simply made a wrong turn at some point and it likely had something to do a [I]choice[I] that we made ourselves. But if you are a parent, and if my upbringing is any indication, then I believe it would be well worth your while to have regular chats with your kids about these things.

philly76

Have you ever seen the Temperance campaign from the late 1800s/early 1900s called The Drunkard's Progress?

File:The Drunkard's Progress - Color.jpg - Wikimedia Commons

I'm certainly not suggesting we update this or that much of what it claims is accurate (it's a century old), I just always found it amusing. I want to find a copy and frame it for my kitchen wall, just as an inside joke and a campy morning reminder.

Soberwolf

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Soberwolf

Awareness is critical there is this report in the uk '10 million' nhs drink admissions | Daily Mail Online

In the same way there is drug awareness campaigns there should be more alcohol awareness campaigns in the uk there is alcohol concern that raises awareness https://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/

ru12

Well I think I read that about 90% of adults in Western countries drink alcohol. I can see why most would be to keen on adds that tell the dangers of drinking... Getting a little too close to home perhaps. Plus as others have mentioned the amount of money in the alcohol industry and the taxes are staggering sums.

MIRecovery

The Devils greatest accomplishment is convincing the world he doesn't exist.

My favorite line from my favorite movie The Usual Suspects

Alcoholism is the dirty little secret that is so much easier to pretend doesn't exist. It is an inconvenient truth because it forces people to look at their own drinking

FeenixxRising

Maybe I'm alone on this, but I'm a 55 US citizen and I've known about the dangers of alcohol since I was very young. All the major institutions I've been involved with over my lifetime (public school, athletics, church, military, university, the workplace etc.) have offered copious amounts of information on the dangers of alcohol and drugs. I simply chose to believe those dangers applied to others, not me

Any reasonably aware American should be well aware of the dangers of alcohol and drugs by a very young age. Seriously, assuming they aren't living in a cave, any citizen of a contemporary Western society should know that alcohol and drugs are potentially dangerous.

philly76

I think the "dirty little secret" concept is what I was getting at when I started this thread. I don't need a campaign to tell me to stop drinking. But there's little awareness amongst those who aren't alcoholics as to what alcoholism is.

When I told friends I wanted to stop smoking, they were all for it, even the smokers. I've helped friends get over cocaine addiction, even though I've never done an illegal drug in my life.

But when I said I was thinking of going to AA, I was met with, "that's a cult," or "you can moderate," or "just detox for a while."

And all of those comments were from friends, not bar buddies. These are people I see regularly outside bars, people who don't need an excuse to drink.

That's what the public thinks of alcoholism.

Again, I don't need a campaign to tell me I have a problem, but I think the non-alcoholic public could benefit from a campaign that tells them we're not cultists or freaks. Quitting tobacco or drugs is a perceived as a good, healthy thing because of national campaigns, but going sober is still perceived as a negative weakness.

None of that has any barring on me personally. I think going sober is insanely healthy, and I'm looking at my sobriety as a positive thing. But when it comes to the general public, I get the impression that they see me as someone with an illness or a disease. I have a problem.

ScottFromWI

You arent alone at all.

Fly N Buy

I understand what you're getting at philly, but honestly - when I was drinking and doing other things no amount of advertising or "just say no" programs would have slowed me down.

I suppose on the margin for those who truly don't understand the dangers, perhaps. It seems to me that as people we should take some responsibility for ingesting things which obviously aren't healty for us.

Paint/Gas huffing is an example and it not uncommon - very deadly and ubiquitous in poverty stricken areas = cheap high. It is not that folks don't know, they just don't care.
Seem likely this is the case for alcohol mostly as well.

Punitive taxes are the major reason cig's are on decline - though education at kindergarten age indoctrinates today's youth. As taxes on alcohol rise there will continue to marginally drive down demand. However, only on the margin -

We cannot legislate morality nor simply advertise it away IMHO.

philly76

And I don't think we should.

I guess the internet kind of muddled what I originally meant. I wasn't really referring to campaigns directed at the dangers of alcohol abuse, but more at the general public's impression of what alcoholism is.

Like I said earlier, when I told friends I wanted to stop smoking, I was met with applause. When I said I wanted to stop drinking, I was met with confusion at best. As alcoholics, yeah, we get it, and we get coaching from each other.

But the general public doesn't really know what alcoholism is. Many think recovery is a cult or a period of detox. No, it's a new way of looking at life. A good one that doesn't threaten our friends who still drink.

FeenixxRising

Ok, I misunderstood what you were getting at.

Yes, many normal or non-drinkers don't quite understand alcoholism/addiction/problem drinking. However, I've found that many people do understand that a certain percentage of people can't simply cut back back or moderate, and that the only real option is to quit drinking.

As for what the public can do to help people understand what alcoholism is? I don't really know; it's an issue I'm personally not too concerned with at the moment. I'm too busy securing my own sobriety and attempting to live a normal sober life right now.

philly76

I'm right there with ya, buddy. I just get bored and curious about certain topics and like to explore them.

Soberwolf

There is a young persons campaign to monitor drinks companies targeting under 18's with advertising

https://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/wh.../young-people/

in the uk compared to the rest of europe there is a diffrent mentality in attitudes towards drinking and
that is through awareness in one way shape or form and i think the uk could benefit greatly from it BBC NEWS | UK | Attitudes to alcohol in Europe

Im not saying tv adverts posters will help and im not saying its the answer i am simply saying that there needs to be more awareness there is hardly any in the uk

Should Cocaine be legal because there are those who can take it and are not addicted ? why should we stop thier fun...

And thats my point the shift in awareness

Fly N Buy

I would be in favor of legalizing most drugs, yes. Legislating morality and the by products of crime including incarceration is accelerating
The push for increased sentencing by private prisons leads the way.

Economics aside - there is little evidence to suggest that legality would have long term spikes on usage.

https://www.erowid.org/psychoactives..._effects.shtml

philly76

Good points. Illegal activity tends to have an allure for a lot of people. We like what's bad for us. We want to be James Dean, not Steve Urkel.

I definitely think some drugs should be illegal just because they're as dangerous as some of the most toxic chemicals (namely meth, heroin, etc.) But decriminalizing, even legalizing, lesser drugs has a lot of benefits. They can be controlled and regulated by the FDA. It essentially shuts down the "War on Drugs" because it renders smugglers irrelevant. And it strips the drugs of their allure.

Prohibition backfired in many ways. It inadvertently created crime syndicates that the nation spent a century battling. Speakeasies made alcohol "sexy."

Try as they might, municipalities can't legislate morality. It always backfires. The only time it seemed to have worked is in regard to tobacco. But that wasn't necessarily legislated morality, rather it was a reaction to communities and organizations targeting tobacco use, fifty years of medical research, and a national community largely in favor of curtailing unhealthy behavior. The same seems to be occurring in regard to the obesity epidemic. Campaigns have been largely successful at convincing us that junk food and smoking is not sexy, "bad-boy" behavior. In those two instances, legislation is reacting to our evolving morality, not attempting to foster a morality we didn't ask for.

As for alcohol, I don't think there's a place for legislation that parallels tobacco and obesity. As many on this thread have pointed out, such a small percentage of people are alcoholics. It doesn't make sense to nanny entire nations for the sake of a few. Unlike drunk driving, alcoholism just isn't a national problem. But I do think the public's general attitude towards alcoholism is.

While I don't think that alcohol and tobacco beg for the same legislative reaction, I do think they deserve the same cultural/community reaction. Someone choosing to abstain from any unhealthy substance - addict or not - is gaining health, not losing a vice, but alcohol and tobacco don't share the same parable in the national dialogue.

I still think there is room for a campaign that targets non-alcoholics' attitudes towards alcoholics and alcoholism. It's hard enough to deal with cravings without having to ignore the "AA is a cult" and "moderation" comments. If someone wants to quit drinking, they should be met with the same public reaction as someone who wants to stop smoking or doing drugs. Not necessarily applause, but at least acceptance.

Telling your friends and family you're an alcoholic is about as stressful as coming out of the closet. When someone stops smoking, they look strong. When someone quits drinking, they're pitied. Sobriety shouldn't be met with such derision. Tobacco and alcohol addiction aren't exact equivalents, but the reaction to one's decision to quit either shouldn't be so starkly opposite.

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I'm not speaking for anyone's experience but my own. These are just the reactions I've personally come across or interpreted.