Unintegrated drinking culture
Un-integrated drinking cultures, such as the United States, set alcohol apart and place it at odds with other cultural values. Such cultures exhibit higher rates of alcoholism and alcohol abuse. By setting alcohol apart from normal everyday life, un-integrated drinking cultures exacerbate the problematic drinking behaviors that spawn from desiring that which is forbidden.
August 14th, 2008 at 10:33 am
On what evidence do you base this assertion?
August 22nd, 2008 at 3:49 pm
Not sure what the author used but there’s a decent amount of literature on the topic. A good source could be Ruth Engs’s site, at Indiana University. One issue is that, because media coverage focuses on knee-jerk reactions, there has been a lot of what Stephen Jay Gould has called “advocacy masquerading as objectivity” from those who are taking sides. The Amethyst Initiative itself is advocating a much more reasonable approach through “informed and dispassionate discussion.”
In case it matters: I’m not connected to either the Amethyst Intitiative or the Choose Responsibility group. I’ve learnt about their existence the day before yesterday. I simply care about the impacts of irresponsible drinking.