Who hates drunk people?

In My Humble Opinion
41

Okay. I’ve got to put my 2 cents in here…this might get a long…

I drink. I drink quite a bit. I started drinking pretty young, about 15 years old, and have drunk regularly for about the past 10-11 years. By “regularly” I mean that I drink nearly every night (2-3 beers or a few glasses of wine, maybe a gin and tonic, whatever I’m in the mood for…) and drink heavily probably twice a week.

It so happens that I am also a student that has a great full time job as well. I excel in my studies. I excel at work. I am a community volunteer and have a very active life. I am responsible and intelligent. I live in New York and so rarely drive, certainly never drunk. I have an awful lot going on…it just so happens I like getting drunk. Some people like to unwind by jogging in the park at 5am. I prefer to get drunk, play some Scrabble and hit the hay by about 1am.

My father fought in two wars, put himself through college and worked a 17-year stretch without taking a sick day. He holds several patents, speaks 5 languages, is a published author and has received several awards from his colleagues and peers. My father has spoken at several prestigious universities, been married to the same woman for 46 years and is a very religious man (an active and treasured member of his church). Not to mention he helped raise 4 children, always kept a nice roof over our heads and nice meals on the stove. Also, he gets drunk every night. No less than several beers and a couple martinis (and oftentimes much more) a night. Drunk or sober my father is erudite, charming, kind and utterly fascinating. He is in impeccable health, especially for a man in his 70s and in fact, I can’t remember the last time he was ill. After meeting my father when he is drunk, many people have commented to me that he is a remarkable and special man. I sometimes tell people that I’m lucky because I have two dads - a drunk one and a sober one - and I love them both.

My best friend is a graduate of Harvard Law School and now a lawyer with a very respectable firm in our nation’s capital. He is one of the best read and most knowledgeable people I have ever met. He too drinks every night, as a matter of fact; we have very similar drinking patterns. Great many of the people he works with and for (that I have met) I notice share our love of booze.

My roommate is one if the top students at the Juilliard School. He drinks like a madman and is one of the funniest, most quick-witted and truly artistic people I’ve ever come across. He’s fantastic.

My girlfriend drinks. She is exuberant, beautiful and fun. One of our favorite bars has boxes of Trivial Pursuit cards and we love to pop in after work and throw questions around with the rest of the gang. We actually met in a bar! On weekends we work together at the community garden.

I’m sure some of you will assume that I am in denial and need some sort of help. That is fine. I just wanted to get the word out that not everyone that drinks often and until they are drunk are unruly, stinking, blathering, slurring, violent, stumbling fools. Those types are certainly out there…but there are some drinkers that are great people with great things to say, lead interesting, active lives and have terrific futures. They work hard and play hard. Some call us functional alcoholics. I say “functional” is the operative word.

If you don’t like to drink. That’s no big deal. Don’t drink. If you don’t like drunk people, I would advise that you stay away from places where drunk people are likely to be such as bars, parties, Mardi Gras or Richard Buckner concerts. If it is unavoidable and you must go to places like these and a drunk person starts annoying you…excuse yourself and walk away. It’s that simple. If they are persistant or they are making a scene simply be honest and tell them that they are way ahead of you in the drink department and you’re just trying to have fun with your friends or be alone or whatever and would they please excuse you.

Man…I just know I’m going to get flamed for this… :slight_smile:

42

felix, my dear. I raise my glass to you.

43

**

But I’m not generalizing everyone into one horrible personality. I made two points:

  1. I don’t like being around drunk people.

  2. I particularly dislike being around drunk people who are extroverted and act in a particular fashion.

You, not I, turned this into an overgeneralization. I never said I hate people who have a couple of drinks. I never said I hate people who unwind with a drink with their friends. I never said I hate anyone who allows alcohol to pass their lips; in fact, I stated that I myself drink on occasion. What I said was, quite simply, that I dislike being around people who are really drunk, so much so that they no longer act in an acceptable fashion. Most people here knew exactly what I meant- or erred on the side of assuming I was talking about alcoholics.

**

It’s not psychoanalyzing you to point out the obvious. Look at it this way: all I said was that I dislike drunk people, and you became very defensive and got up on a soapbox about how having a drink with friends now and then doesn’t mean you aren’t a good mother. Since I’m not attacking you or your drinking habits, and I have never done so, I don’t see why you have to be so defensive about it.

Think of it this way. Suppose in one of the “I hate people who vandalize library books” threads I were to tear into the OP, saying that sure, I vandalized a few library books in my youth, but I learned from my mistakes, and the fact of the matter is that I may underline in MY OWN books every once in a while, but I’m still a conscientious, healthy, athletic, and responsible person, and how DARE you have the pomposity to state that you hate everyone who even so much as underlines in their own books. Oh, and by the way, I hate smug people who don’t mark up their books and who look down on me in cafes when I underline in my books or when I read Stephen King instead of something classy. Would it be “psychoanalyzing” me for people to point out that I was acting a little… weird? And if I said that it’s entirely natural for me to act that way when someone makes generalizations about everyone who underlines or takes notes in books being equivalent to horrible vandals, how would you view that?
-Ben

44

I hate being around people when they are acting in certain ways. Sometimes people are like this naturally. Sometimes people who aren’t naturally like this become this way when drunk. But I hate the behavior, not the drunkeness. When my husband gets drunk (once every few months or so, always at home on our couch while watching tv or something) I never even know until he tells me. I get drunk on occassion, even less often than he does… and I doubt people would usually be able to tell either. I just sit at the computer and do my thing, or watch tv, or whatever. I don’t really behave differently.

I recall a party in Chicago that I attended at which I got fairly toasty and danced on the pool table along with a whole group of other people … which was all caught on film by a film crew from Fox Files. Some may say that this is drunken behavior… they don’t realize that I’d have done the same thing totally sober :slight_smile: Hey, I used to dance on stage for a living, it don’t bodda me.

Alcoholism bothers me quite a bit, but I don’t hate alcoholics. I just feel sad that they have that addiction and I feel bad for their families. My mother in law is an alcoholic, and it really steams me when I hear that she used to drive my husband around drunk, when he was a child. She’s on her 12th year or so of her new liver and she still drinks. She is a mean drunk, too. We don’t talk to her anymore, and haven’t more than twice in something like 7 years. I do blame the alcohol for her behavior to an extent, but only because her + booze = bad. That doesn’t mean that anyone else + booze = bad neccessarily.

45

You’re right. My generalization of drunks being gross certainly is a gross generalization, but at least my over generalization about drinking was not made while over drinking in general.

46

Ben,

sorry if I over reacted. The fact is, I have two friends who don’t drink, and yet feel it necessary to sit out at bars with me and my friends and stare at us and say “I’m so glad I don’t drink…drinking is bad for you, do you know what you’re doing to yourself? I feel better because I don’t drink…”

And I pictured you as one of them.

For the record, I’m not usually one to overreact negatively…you caught me on a bad day. And actually, it was your post coupled with zensi’s venomous:

that made me angry.

I’d like to have a drink with ya sometime if that’s ok…but don’t get mad when I order a second one.

jarbaby

47

**

Apology accepted.

**

Ah, like Hitler’s vegetarianism. Apparently it was impossible to eat meat around him, because he’d always say things like, “How can you devour that disgusting flesh?”

Anyway, if they bother you too much, you can always light up a cigar… (Come to think of it, Hitler didn’t like those, either. You know something? I think Hitler was the anti-Twain. Think about it.)

-Ben