Jump to content

Recommended Posts

This guilt talk reminds me of when I got taught my nuns at school. The reason the ads are affecting you is because you personally have thought these thoughts before (OR for me I was rammed full of roman catholic guilt from an early age. Both my primary and high school was run by nuns and they made me feel guilty about everything that made me feel good). I don't want to start a massive religous debate - this is just my opinion about why I don't like the ads.

I've got to say I'm with Jah on this one.


This 21 units a week malarky is nonsense. They invented the figure. As in "we've got no fookin clue but this seems about right".


If you look worldwide no one can even decide what a "unit" is:


UK - unit = 8g alcohol

Iceland - 9.5g

Netherlands - 9.9g

Canada - 13.6g

Hungary - 17g

Japan - 19.75g!!!!


And that's Japan people...not a nation renowned for dropping dead in their 50s. Yes, yes, they eat fish 10 x a week but you ever see a Japanese businessman on the lash and you'll see what drunk is.


Second, the "recommmended daily/weekly amount" figure is also hotly disputed:


USA - 196g/week (male)

UK - 168g/week

New Zealand - 210g/week

Australia - 280g/week

Japan - 276.5g/week


Now why should I be concerned about units and allowances again?


Man needs three things to live a happy life. Bread, bacon and beer. I'm buggered if I'm giving up any of those.

annaj Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I think the point of the current campaign is to

> make people aware of how many units are in each

> drink as research has shown that most people

> underestimate how many units they drink.

>

> I don't think that's unreasonable. Whatever you

> view on whether the the government should interfer

> in our health related decisions, surely they have

> a duty to inform.

>

> Let's see if the research behind the campaign is

> reflected on the forum...

> Answer this: If a woman drinks half a bottle of

> wine each evening with dinner, three large glasses

> in the pub on Friday and Saturday and a bottle of

> lager on a Sunday afternoon how many units has she

> had?


@ 51! Thats a lot of alcohol in a week!

david_carnell Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

>

> USA - 196g/week (male)

> UK - 168g/week

> New Zealand - 210g/week

> Australia - 280g/week

> Japan - 276.5g/week



David - love your figures but do find it surprising that the US has a higher recommended limit than the UK - I thought that they were totally paranoid about drinking over there - mmmm time to move to Australia I think - do you have figures for European countries for comparison?

Regards the drunk Japanese businessmen, I believe that's because their livers aren't very good at metabolising alcohol.

In the East they've boiled their water and added infusions to prevent dirty water issues.


Round this part of the world we've traditionally fermented our water to prevent infections/impurities.

Our livers evolved to cope with this, whereas your oriental liver never got enough practice in.

Ok, putting units to one side for a moment, but sticking with the guilt (sorry CamberwellOz!) another way to assess your drinking is the CAGE questionnaire...


Do you think you should Cut down on your drinking?


Has anyone Annoyed you by criticising your drinking?


Do you feel Guilty about drinking?


Have you ever had an Eye-opener?


A score of two or more suggests you may have a problem, 3 or more strongly suggests a problem.


I'll start. I score 1 now, but used to score 3.


Oh and MW74, if you're referring to me, I don't think I'm "the font of all bloody knowledge" I just happen to have quite a lot of experience, both professional and personal, of the adverse effects of alcohol.

I think I should also point out here that it's moderation in all things. As a former problem drinker myself (ok, alcoholic if you like) it took me a very long time to know my limitations.


Between the ages of 28 and 35 I had eight attacks of acute pancreatitis which was caused by my excessive drinking and not eating. Drink had become my food. If you ever have the dreaded pancreatitis the medical profession will tell you that you can never drink again or it will surely kill you and it is a killer, people do die from it so I guess I'm rather lucky to still be here. But I don't believe in total abstinence and I love a drinkpoo and shall continue to do so without some government twerp or man in a white coat telling me I can't.


I did my time of abstinence, I first went nine months, fell of the wagon and then did a year without drinking and after a few more attacks and a bit more abstinence finally got my drinking under control. I'm hardly a paragon of virtue I'll admit as I still on occasion like to drink to excess as the Right Honourable Sir Mockney has kindly pointed but I know my limits and having now gone 15 years without being ill I feel I must be doing something right.


I no longer drink every day and indeed do try go through the week without one. I don't always succeed but I do try and I've even gone weekends without a drink to but when Friday comes along I do get the feeling of letting the tigers out of the cage especially after a particularly shitty week in the office. It helps me relax and wind down.


Anyway I'm rambling a bit here so I'll let others carry on and join the debate again bit later.

Cassius Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> David - love your figures but do find it

> surprising that the US has a higher recommended

> limit than the UK - I thought that they were

> totally paranoid about drinking over there - mmmm

> time to move to Australia I think - do you have

> figures for European countries for comparison?


Many Euro countries only give daily limits so you'd have to "do the math" (Or I'll do it for you)


UK - 168g/week


Austria: 24g/day = 168g/week

Czech Republic 24g/day = 168g/week

Italy: 40g/day = 280g/week

Netherlands: 29.7g/day = 207.9g/week

Portugal 37g/day = 259g/week

Spain: 30g/day = 210g/week

Sweden: 20g/day = 140g/week

Switzerland: 24g/day = 168g/week


What's Portugal like this time of year/life?

The Japanese thing was a bit of light hearted banter but the fact remains that the Japanese government (not renowned for their dim-wittedness) seem to think it entirely acceptable to drink nearly twice what the UK govt does. Now both cannot be right but both certainly can be wrong.

ooh yes, I like those.

When camping in france we often would finsh the remains of the previous night's bottle of red before packing up.

When in Rome (or France).....



Since the beginning of this year I've cut down a lot on the consumption. I was the bigger half of a bottle a night but now tend not to drink during the week or just have a little stubby of pissy lager. I really miss having wine with my evening meal but am unable to restrict myself to one glass.


My name is Asset.....

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Latest Discussions

    • Oh yes, it could have been about there, I can't remember exactly. At one point there seemed to be a load of pizza places opening on NCR. I vaguely remember the one we used to use was put out of business by another one which opened. Wasn't Grace and Favour's food offering more of a tea shop at the back of the actual shop? If memory serves the owner, whose name escapes me now, was one of the earliest people I know to move to Hastings. Which must now be crammed with South East Londoners 🤣
    • That Neal Street veggie cafe was great. Food For Thought ❤️
    • Hi Dogkennelhillbilly, You won't be aware that i proposed infill sites for housing in East Dulwich - the garages on Bassano Street and Henslowe that respectively became 1-4 Dill Terrace family houses and the 78, 80, 80A Henslowe Street family houses. These were council owned garages and it was frustrating how slow the council was to go from my idea to completion (roughly eight years). East Dulwich has some other vacant WW2 bomb sites I'm guessing that the private land owners have been sitting on.Owe for a land tax for vacant land.  WRT to the builders yard by East dulwich station. Southwark Council has an agreed policy the area should remain suburban 2/3 storeys maximum. But the approved scheme is 9 storeys of student accommodation. Very hard to put this genie back in the bottle. The council has recently publicly stated lower ratios of social housing will be required. I will be amazed if the developer doesn't submit another application now they have the 9 storeys approved but with significantly less social housing. The less social housing the higher the land values. The higher the land values the less social housing viability reports state are possible.  If we really want to increase home supply - Southwark have over 6,000 empty homes. Vancouver charges a low % of the value of empty homes and rapidly eased this problem. Parts of Wales have introduced under Article 4 planning permission is required for second homes seeing within 12 months a dramatic decrease in property prices. Southwark Council have Article 4 requirements - why not add this one? It takes National political will to solve this AND regional and local authorities such as the second home council tax premium and these being used promptly. 
    • https://www.letslinkuk.net/ I'm interested to know why the OP didn't find this sort of scheme to work, as I would have thought it was much harder to find someone to do a direct exchange with? Does anybody else have experience of a scheme like this? Happy to be persuaded! 
Home
Events
Sign In

Sign In



Or sign in with one of these services

Search
×
    Search In
×
×
  • Create New...