Drunkenness: a British tradition

Rod, this is a very interesting question, especially in light of the recent move by a number of college presidents to open a dialogue regarding the appropriate drinking age.

To support the 21-year-old limit, mustn't one argue that there is some element of American culture or psychology that is meaningfully different from the various European countries in which there is either no drinking age limit or a lower drinking age limit, since it appears that those countries (with the apparent exception of our fellow Anglophones in Britain) do not have anything like the teenage/college age binge drinking problem that we have? If this is not the case--if one contends that there is nothing distinctive in American culture that creates the problem--wouldn't it be true that one is left with the conclusion that the under-21 drinking age limit is itself part of the problem? As I understand it, this is essentially the contention of the college presidents -- or at least it is their contention that the issue merits further inquiry for that reason.

I do think you're onto something with the comparison to binge eating and binge everything else. Perhaps we are a uniquely consumptive culture, and therefore we, unlike our more moderate neighbors across the Atlantic, must have our consumptiveness constrained by force of law where the consequences are truly deadly (drunk driving) since we are incapable of self-regulation?

I personally find the drinking laws in this country utterly ridiculous, and most of the arguments from the typical pressure groups to be less well-supported than they hysterically contend. But if it is the case that we can't govern ourselves responsibly and with moderation, perhaps the paternalism is necessary?

"And so, I wonder to what extent overindulgence in booze and grub is particular to Anglophone cultures -- and why? Thoughts?"

You know, it had actually occurred to me that when you think of stereotypes of drunk people---Irish, Scottish, Australian---if does seem being ruled by England tends to do that to people.

And I agree with Rod; whenever people point out, for example, that France lets anybody drink and has fewer alcohol problems, meaning that America should loosen or eliminate its drinking age, it always strikes me that just because it works there doesn't mean it works here. Laws like France's or Holland's work there because they always have; in theory they would work in America in the long term, but I think drug abuse/alcoholism would jump up for many years before anything evened out.

God bless.

There are some all-you-can-eat places in Holland, but they tend to be expensive ($40-$50 a person), have much higher quality food than you'd find at an American place, and are usually for special occasions. I've seem some heroic eating contests among Dutchmen that would put American overeaters to shame- at Grandma and Grandpa's 50th wedding anniversary party. Its not something that's done on a regular basis- probably connected to the Calvinism of the culture (which may also be why drugs have never taken off- even if you don't believe in God being a druggie is a sign you have bad karma). As one of my uncles says, I am a Calvinist atheist!- and that has a real cultural meaning.

"But America has even stricter drinking laws, and I rarely hear Americans boasting about drinking until they throw up and fall over, as if unconsciouness was a badge of honor."

Spend a few days on an average college campus and you will.

Well, Jacobus/anonymous, maybe that's the problem - the Americans I hang out with tend to be people around my age (41), who left college a long time ago, or their children, who haven't started yet. But in Britain, such boasting isn't just confined to college students, you hear it from men (and sometimes women too) who are well into middle age.

I take on board the point about England being more of a boozy culture than America in certain ways. People used to note the difference between pubs - friendly places with light and comradery - and bars - dark places one was supposed to be feel slightly guilty about being in.

But this drinking-by-all-social-classes-until-you-throw-up habit is recent. Occasionally yes, all students have done that since Universities were invented. But persistently and regularly coming into morning classes with severe hang-overs? By otherwise devout Catholic students, some from Opus Dei families? That I have only seen in the past five or six years.

So I still think it may be connected to price. An OK bottle of wine costs less than a packet of cigarettes.

What I'd like to know is where this idea came from that heavy drinking is peculiar to Anglophones. The World Health Organization has collected lots of data on alcohol use around the world (readily available on its website) and a quick survey of its data suggests that most cultures (barring Islamic ones) have roughly the same drinking habits as the British and that many drink even more. One might start by comparing the standardized death rates for alcohol dependence syndrome for Germany (4.8 per 100,000), France (2.8), the United States (1.6), and the United Kingdom (0.8). For comparison, per capita consumption of pure alcohol in litres for 1996 for the same countries, respectively: 11.67, 13.74, 8.90, and 9.41. So by what measure exactly is heavy drinking peculiar to the British and their descendants?

One might start by comparing the standardized death rates for alcohol dependence syndrome for Germany (4.8 per 100,000), France (2.8), the United States (1.6), and the United Kingdom (0.8). For comparison, per capita consumption of pure alcohol in litres for 1996 for the same countries, respectively: 11.67, 13.74, 8.90, and 9.41. So by what measure exactly is heavy drinking peculiar to the British and their descendants?

The British and their descendants are drinking that amount on Friday and Saturday night. The Germans and French are drinking it moderately throughout the week.

I read someplace (sorry, I know that's the last refuge of the lazy intellect, but I've had a long day) that alcoholism and depression are much more common in dark northern climates than on the rest of the planet and that it has something to do with the shortage of daylight and the resulting level of melatonin in the blood. Which accounts for the UK, Ireland, Russia, and Scandinavia, as well as the northern US. The other closely related theory is that there is an E-W line across Europe that divides beer-drinkers from wine-drinkers, and that beer drinkers tend to have more problems with overimbibing.

Marian Neudel might be right. Southern Europeans report lower rates of drunkenness than Northern Europeans. African Americans, whose descendants are largely tropical, are less involved in alcohol related crimes than Caucasians. Alcohol consumption is lowest however in Southeast Asia. I don't know if this pattern holds with Southeast Asian Americans, but I've not heard a great deal about drunkenness among Laotians or Vietnamese.

The pattern doesn't entirely work though as Norway, Sweden, and Iceland reportedly have lower alcohol consumption rates. The Dutch are also below the British.

However many nations in Europe drink more than the British and I believe are more likely to have drunks. Hungary, Czechs, Lithuania, and Latvia stand above the UK in alcohol consumption. Belgium is placed quite high in "binge drinking."

It seems like a factor is if alcohol is viewed as part of a meal or primarily as an intoxicant. In the US I think alcohol is viewed largely as an intoxicant or as a part of a party or celebration. That also seems to be true in the northern parts of Eastern Europe and, to an extent, in Japan. In Italy or Malta it seems to be more often seen as something to go with a meal. This probably does not entirely predict behavior, but it might play a role.

http:

//ec.europa.eu/health-eu/doc/alcoholineu_chap4_en.pdf

The cheapness of wine seems to be a cause, not of drunkenness, but of sobriety .... People are seldom guilty of excess in what is their daily fare .... On the contrary, in the countries which, either from excessive heat or cold, produce no grapes, and where wine consequently is dear and a rarity, drunkenness is a common vice.

Rod, you're right about the portions in Dutch restaurants except when ordering pancakes. I was in Amsterdam a couple of years back and was pretty surprised when my banana pancakes were the size of a turkey platter. They were really good too. I was talking about them when I got home and my wife asked me to make some Dutch style pancakes. I told her we didn't own a pan that big.