Since alcohol has always been allowed, it was really not fair not to let everyone know up front that “This get together is going to be a little different than the usual.”
Also, if I were going to such a party, I’d have probably already shopped for the food and drink that I planned to take. I’d be irritated if I bought alcohol for the party that I couldn’t really otherwise use.
I think your relative handled this badly.
Maybe the turnout was getting much larger than expected and this is a ploy to get people to cancel.
Explain it like you did here, and I see no problem.
No idea about the dynamic of your family but I would assume if that happened someone in the extended family has recently started treatment for alcoholism, and the host found out, though its not widely known in the full extended family (my extended family is massive so its not like we know every intimate detail of whats going on in the various cousin’s lives)
This.
Someone maybe went overboard and discovered they had a problem during the pandemic but they don’t want to deal with all the questions and so forth. I would just accept this with grace and do as you plan, show up a bit late, leave a bit early. Eventually, that person may feel comfortable enough to talk about it but I suggest staying away from the topic during the picnic. Be grateful you found out and be grateful that the person in question isn’t you (as far as you are aware).
There’s nothing wrong with having an alcohol-free get-together, just with announcing it at the last minute.
Some people need to be mildly sauteed in order to tolerate a big bunch of relatives up close for hours.
This, 100%. Especially in given that this was inexplicably announced as something that should already have been known.
Yeah, regardless of the reason, it was very poorly handled.
Liquids at their boiling point do not evaporate instantly. How long does it take a pot of water to “boil off” if it is at the boiling point? The boiling point of ethanol is 173°F, not that much lower than water. It will evaporate faster than water, but there is a misconception that it somehow just disappears when you heat it. (BTW you have to add boiling water to make Jell-O.)
That’s pretty much 100% of the way I feel about it as well. I’m happy to have alcohol, but I’m equally happy having iced tea or a soda. In fact, if it’s a hot weather event I tend to opt more for non-alcoholic drinks anyway.
But it’s a little bit weird I agree to mandate that a potluck would be dry without any explanation. I mean, if everyone knew that Uncle Bob got ornery when he’d had a few, or that Aunt June has a tendency to drive home drunk, or some other alcohol-related bad behavior like that, I would totally understand.
But a generic family pot-luck that’s been wet in years past? Definitely weird to send out the addendum mandating that it be dry, and doubly so the day before. Personally I wouldn’t be pissed off though, unless maybe I’d spent money on beer/wine that I really would have preferred to spend on something else- that aspect of it could be irritating to people whose money is tight.
Actually, if you have to drink to find me tolerable, I’m just not inviting you. Problem solved on my end.
Realistically if they’re good friends or close relatives you should already know they’re going to have dry parties.
Certainly. Then again I can’t think of the last party I went to that was dry and 2 of the last 5 parties I’ve been to were 6 year old’s birthday parties
I was invited to a dinner party this evening. I considered bringing wine, but decided to bring a berry pie, instead. No booze was served. I guess it was a dry party, although i suspect if I’d brought wine the bottle would have been consumed.
I did mention what i planned to bring, so if it had been a problem the host could have warned me not to bring it.
I’d guess 2/3 of the parties i go to are dry.
I’m shocked nobody has mentioned the workaround. Take a six pack of Lipton Green Tea. Open the bottles and pour out 1/4 to 1/3 of each. Fill bottles with vodka and recap.
We’ve done this to get around alcohol prohibition in parks and such.
I’ll go sleep it off now.
Probably because those are obvious work arounds that any seasoned drinker knows. That, have a flask on you (more risky), keep a bunch of booze in the car and excuse yourself when you need to (can’t really do this more than once without raising suspicion), etc. Plus you have to be careful, as you can smell that vodka if you overdo it. Carry some Altoids around.But the point of this thread wasn’t how to keep yourself soused at a dry party.
It’s seems more like an alcohol problem too if your sneaking booze at a family event. I get not going or short timing it (obviousoy) but sneaking in booze against the hosts wishes seems like an action that crosses a line.
Yeah I’m gonna say if you are doing this at a dry family party, you have to consider the fact you may be the reason the family made it a dry event.
There seems to be an awful lot of assumptions being made about the reasons for enjoying a drink, There is a massive excluded middle.
“Enjoying a drink” can and does often mean exactly that. No intention to get rat-arsed, no aspect of self-medication. Many people just have a preferred beverage to consume with food and if you are invited to bring along your favourite drink for your own consumption I think it ceases to be anyone elses business what that is.
I don’t actually see any assumptions about “enjoying a drink”. What I do see some assumptions about is the refusal to attend an event if it is alcohol-free, which is something very different.
I see that as well, my point was that the discussions of drinking v not drinking always seems to often assume that there is only concerning reasons to fancy a drink or only problematic outcomes from someone having a drink. It seems a very “all or nothing” view to take.
My point is that I’m not seeing much of that “all or nothing” in this thread. There have been people who mentioned that they would likely stay longer at an event where alcohol was served than at a dry event , people who say they drink but would be fine with going to a dry event. I have not seen anyone say that anyone who wants a drink has a drinking problem or that a person drinking always results in problematic outcomes.