# When and why did casual daytime drinking become unacceptable? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 9, 2012, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-and-why-did-casual-daytime-drinking-become-unacceptable/612269 "2012-02-09T03:04:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2012, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-and-why-did-casual-daytime-drinking-become-unacceptable/612269/81 "2012-02-13T12:52:33Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > Just to provide a non-US perspective, I’ve had a few jobs where after-drink works were a regular thing … You’re not as think as you drunk you are. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2012, 8:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-and-why-did-casual-daytime-drinking-become-unacceptable/612269/82 "2012-02-14T08:37:25Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > You’re not as think as you drunk you are. All I’m saying is that the high-pitched buzzing/whining sound CRT TVs emit is intolerably loud- especially a shop full of them- when you’ve had a big night out with the lads. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![velomont](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/8491ac/32.png) [@velomont](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/velomont)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2012, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-and-why-did-casual-daytime-drinking-become-unacceptable/612269/83 "2012-02-14T21:06:18Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#): > > Alcoholic drinks were a dietary staple in the medieval world, but that doesn’t mean they were all drunk. [Small beer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_beer#Small_beer) contains very little alcohol, and wine was typically mixed with water. In about 1995 I read an article in Scientific American which stated that, in the interest of having germ-free water to drink, that most of the [I don’t recall if it was only the western world] population was probably slightly buzzed [not the words of the article] most of the time until sometime in the 19th century. I was in the Cdn navy from 1979 - 2011 and drinking at lunch was not uncommon until the mid-90’s. It would be very unusual today in most places ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2012, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-and-why-did-casual-daytime-drinking-become-unacceptable/612269/84 "2012-02-15T18:05:40Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Ah, yes, journalism. When I started working in the 1990s, all the old-timers would talk about the glorious days of the 1970s, when every bottom drawer had a bottle of whiskey and a stack of porn magazines. > > Someone told me once about his experience working at the _Philadelphia Inquirer_, where, every Christmas, every law firm and other bigwig in town would send crates of booze to the newsroom. > > There was no porn or booze in the newsroom when I started, but I was there for the phase out of indoor smoking. When I worked at Time Inc. in the late 1980s they were just phasing out having bottles in desks. You would tell the mail clerk what you liked to drink and they would get you a bottle and you’d keep it in your desk. A little cart would go around in the late afternoon with ice and mixers. It was all very civilized. They also allowed cigarette smoking in the building in those days and so you could have quite a nice little social time. Then over one weekend the booze closet was raided and emptied. (The Time-Life Building had thefts like that from time to time, stuff would get broken into and things would vanish, sometimes large amounts of things. Now it’s computers, no doubt.) The decision was made not to restock it and that pleasant custom passed into history. The cart stopped making its rounds. Smoking was banned in the building not long afterwards. I think it’s more accepted in publishing – or at least it was in that time – maybe not so much now. (I’m not in a publishing office now so I dunno.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-and-why-did-casual-daytime-drinking-become-unacceptable/612269.md?page=4)