Wouldn't it be funny if..

[Mongo Skruddgemire]

I'm lucky in a sense. I am hypersensitive to the taste of alcohol. When someone takes a sip of wine and go and describe the flavor notes (full bodied, fruity, hints of oak, etc) I'll take as sip and taste jet fuel.

Since I get no pleasure from the taste of alcohol at all I don't drink. There's no damn point to it.

When anyone gives me grief about it I tell them that it's wasted on me since it ALL tastes like JP5 jet propellant to me.

And yes I've been around JP5 and the fumes leave a taste in my mouth similar to what alcohol tastes like to me so this is not hyperbole or exaggeration. This is literal.

So when I told someone that I didn't drink and wasn't going to drink since I was their designated driver and the asshole spiked my drink anyway...I kinda got pissed off.

They handed me a drink, I sipped it and said "this has been spiked". He said that it hadn't. I pulled out my zippo lighter and set the drink on fire (I later found out that it had been spiked with everclear) put it into his hand and drove home.

If they were willing to get their DD plastered...it wasn't my problem how they got home.

AND! Before anyone starts into me, they all came in *my* car are didn't have any cars of their own to drive home in. So I didn't create a drunk driving problem. I just made those assholes scrape up the cash for a cab ride or beg someone else to pick them up.

[Andara Bledin]

Gah. Anyone who would try to get their own designated driver drunk are a bunch of dipshits who deserve to be abandoned by said DD.

[Nekojin]

I'm lucky in a sense. I am hypersensitive to the taste of alcohol. When someone takes a sip of wine and go and describe the flavor notes (full bodied, fruity, hints of oak, etc) I'll take as sip and taste jet fuel.

Since I get no pleasure from the taste of alcohol at all I don't drink. There's no damn point to it.

When anyone gives me grief about it I tell them that it's wasted on me since it ALL tastes like JP5 jet propellant to me.

While "jet propellant" isn't the description I'd use, that describes me to a T. I've explained this many times to many different people - some get it, some don't. All alcohol tastes the same to me - at least, at the first impression. I can sometimes tell aftertastes, but not always.

Andara gets it. Some of my family members accept it, even if they don't "get" it.

[Cats]

I'm lucky in a sense. I am hypersensitive to the taste of alcohol. When someone takes a sip of wine and go and describe the flavor notes (full bodied, fruity, hints of oak, etc) I'll take as sip and taste jet fuel.

Since I get no pleasure from the taste of alcohol at all I don't drink. There's no damn point to it.

When anyone gives me grief about it I tell them that it's wasted on me since it ALL tastes like JP5 jet propellant to me.

Same here, but all I taste is the actual ethanol after the 2nd sip. Nothing will mask that taste for me once I've gotten a hold on it.

My parents used to make mixed drinks on occasion when I was in my early 20's (but legal), and I'd partake because I wanted to at least TRY it. Have it a few times, never acquired a taste for it. Heck, less than 2 onces of a mixed drink would be enough for me to get a buzz going on, along with a minor headache and a feeling I did not like.

People I know I tell them flat out why I don't drink. Random stangers I tell them I'm allergic.

[AccountingDrone]

Back in the day I would claim to be the designated driver because I was pregnant and couldn't drink, that worked on strangers who didn't know I wasn't pregnant

I was friendly with most of the regular bartenders where my band played or places I hung out at regularly, and they knew that I didn't normally drink in bars so I got my fill of coffee or tea as I don't really do soda.

I really miss The Riverboat, the Penny Arcade and Maxwell's Silver Hammer [and if you are from Rochester NY, I really dated myself!]

[crashhelmet]

As someone who is of the older crowd I also beg to differ Crash.

Back when I was in college for the first time back in the late 1970's, The fraternaties and sororitites were, shall we say, VERY heality into sex, drugs and rock and roll.

I roomed with an (not sure what they are called) ex-frat guy. Some the the stories he told were just ......

I "rushed" for a fraternaty and got a tour of some of the houses on campus. IN-house beer taps, private "party" rooms, hints of other not so legal happenings, little sister programs for a smallish "female boarding school" in town.

Some of the houses at that campus made Delta Tau Chi look like a conservative church group. HEY let's back up a truck FILLED with kegs of beer and announce OPEN CAMPUS PARTY ON FRIDAY at letter-letter-letter

I know that in the subsiquent years the Greek system has tried to "clean up its act" BUT as is still the case on college campus's accross the country booze, drugs, and sex still have a significant presence.

YES there are some decent houses but I suspect not all is what it seems.

You can't compare college life in the 70's to college life today, or even the Greek organizations. There are many things that happened on college campuses back then that are frowned upon and grounds for expulsion today.

While on the topic of comparing your generation to the current generation in school, lifestyles in the 70s were far more about casual sex, drinking, and drugs than they were in the 80s and 90s and possibly more than they are now.

[crashhelmet]

Hate to burst your outrage bubble, Crashhelmet, but people in Fraternities/Sororities are 10-20% more likely to engage in binge drinking and other alcohol-related problem behavior than other college students, particularly those who are not old enough to drink.

[edit to add]
Aslo, while college students are no more likely to develop alcohol-related issues such as addiction or the like, they are significantly more likely to be involved in binge drinking.

The causal factors are, ultimately irrelevant. The college environment, and the fraternity/sorority environment in particular, are places where binge and pressure drinking are more likely to occur.

The article is written by the same guy that wrote the paper and in his paper he cites evidence that was from 1995 as well as 2001. As I said in my reply to Racket man, you can't compare studies or experiences this old. Times they have been a changin'

They cite a lot of commonalities and insist that college and Greek organizations equals more drinking instead of looking at the root cause of it. What's the old saying? Oh yeah...

Correlation Does Not Equal Causation

If it was, you could argue that being in the Military promotes and encourages heavy drinking

Like I said in my original reply, drinking is a social interaction.

If people drink more in college than they do out of college, it's because they "party" more. Most people that don't go to college, or aren't in college, don't have the opportunity for as many social events as college life offers. People in Greek organizations tend to have more social events than those outside of them. Hell, you can go to college and not touch a single drop of alcohol your entire time.

But go to any alcohol serving bar, a BBQ for a national holiday, or a sporting event and you'll find people from all walks of life "binge drinking."

[bainsidhe]

OP, anyone that would say that to you is a Grade A asshole and deserves karma for that line of thinking.

One New Year's, the local paper had a story describing the first ambulance call of the new year and that it was because of alcohol poisoning. I later learned it was a coworker from another department, and that my coworker had only one drink that night. It was the first time she'd ever had alcohol and she learned the hard way that she was allergic. Much to her embarrassment, a picture of her house was plastered on the front page of the newspaper and she had to keep explaining she wasn't drunk, she was allergic.

[Rageaholic]

Anyone who pushes drugs and alcohol is an asshole. I don't care if people to drink, but leave me out of it.

[HYHYBT]

I virtually never go to a "sit-down restaurant" by myself. I might go inside for fast food on rare occasion, and often use drive-thrus, but "real" restaurants just feel awkward alone. But a couple years ago, I did stop at an Outback. This was towards the end of a long drive, and about an hour from home. The waiter was insistent that I order alcoholic drinks. Asking is one thing; not taking "no" for an answer is quite another. Even if asking why not had been OK, "I don't drink" should have been enough of an answer, but it wasn't. Look: I don't drink. I don't enjoy drinking, so there's no reason for me to do it. Also, I'm clearly here alone, and the only way to get here from where *anybody* lives is to drive. I have an hour to go before I get home, and because I never drink, I don't even have any way of knowing how much one would affect me. My drinking *anything* stronger than iced tea right now would, therefore, be a bad idea. I don't remember how much of that I wound up telling him, but since he did eventually give up and bring me a delicious steak and garlic potatoes, it was still a pretty good ending to a great day.

[Hyena Dandy]

If people drink more in college than they do out of college, it's because they "party" more. Most people that don't go to college, or aren't in college, don't have the opportunity for as many social events as college life offers. People in Greek organizations tend to have more social events than those outside of them. Hell, you can go to college and not touch a single drop of alcohol your entire time.

Wait, what are you trying to argue?

Because it sounds like you're trying to argue counter to the argument of "People drink more in college, and even more in fraternities/sororities."