{"id":86483,"date":"2022-12-14T12:43:00","date_gmt":"2022-12-14T16:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=86483"},"modified":"2022-12-19T11:57:42","modified_gmt":"2022-12-19T15:57:42","slug":"alcoholism-myths","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/alcoholism-myths\/","title":{"rendered":"The Top 4 Alcoholism Myths\u2014Debunked"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What are the most common myths about alcoholism? What is the real truth about alcohol<\/a>?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Quit Like a Woman<\/em>, Holly Whitaker claims that she and many people took so long to recognize their alcoholism because we’re conditioned to believe drinking is normal. In her book, she debunks the most dangerous myths about alcoholism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let’s explore these alcoholism myths and learn why they’re so harmful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Myth #1: Alcohol Isn\u2019t <\/em>Bad for Us<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

According to Whitaker, alcohol companies invest heavily in marketing that encourages people to continue drinking<\/strong>. This marketing portrays drinking as a normal part of adult life. Particularly for women, alcohol companies stress the normalcy of drinking at every stage in life: motherhood (de-stressing with a post-bedtime drink), career years (happy hours with friends), and retirement (pampering yourself with wine and liquor).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alcohol companies must market so heavily because most alcohol brands are owned by one of only 16 companies, so competition is fierce. In 2016, alcohol companies spent $2.3 billion on marketing and advertising<\/a> in the US. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whitaker adds that not only do alcohol companies promote a lie to sell more product<\/a>, but they also specifically target vulnerable populations they can transform into lifelong drinkers, like low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), women, and even children<\/strong>. LMICs are fresh terrain for alcohol companies, and they can turn these populations into lifelong drinkers. Women are susceptible to marketing that frames drinking as a powerful, masculine activity (representing the power they\u2019ve been historically denied), and children can be turned into drinkers early through appealing advertisement characters, like Bud Light\u2019s Spuds MacKenzie. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Myth<\/strong> #2: Individuals Should Be Able to Control Their Own Drinking<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

To justify continuing to sell a life-threatening product, alcohol companies promote the concept of \u201cresponsible drinking\u201d: the idea that it\u2019s the <\/strong>individual\u2019s <\/em><\/strong>responsibility to drink moderately<\/strong>. They claim that if you can\u2019t drink in moderation, it\u2019s your fault because you have an intrinsic weakness. Companies were able to come to this conclusion because an alcohol industry-funded study in the mid-20th century looked into the disease <\/em>of alcoholism, rather than the toxicity <\/em>of alcohol. Thus, ever since, we\u2019ve concluded that alcoholism is a disease that affects certain people\u2014not that alcohol itself is harmful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Myth<\/strong> #3: Alcoholism Is a Shameful Disease You Either Have or You Don\u2019t<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Beyond the inescapable marketing efforts of alcohol companies, Whitaker also believes that we\u2019re societally conditioned to view alcoholism as a terrible problem to avoid at all cost<\/strong>. As examples of this perspective, most people believe alcoholics shouldn\u2019t be employed, and many consider the word synonymous with more pejorative terms, like \u201cdrunk,\u201d \u201clush,\u201d or \u201caddict.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whitaker claims that we also view alcoholism as a binary state: You\u2019re either a full-blown alcoholic, or you don\u2019t have a problem at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Viewing Alcoholism as Shameful Makes People Desperate to Avoid That Label<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Our collective view of alcoholism leads to bad consequences: Whitaker believes that because the label \u201calcoholic\u201d carries so many negative connotations, people go to great lengths to persuade themselves they don\u2019t have a drinking problem when in reality, they do<\/strong>. For instance, someone might convince themselves that because they only drink on weekends, they can\u2019t be alcoholics, even though their weekend drinking always involves binging. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s more, people feel that as long as they don\u2019t have symptoms of \u201ctrue\u201d alcohol addiction they can proceed to drink as they have been\u2014even though their drinking may well be seriously harming them. And they can only determine what \u201ctrue\u201d alcohol addiction is by measuring themselves against other drinkers because there\u2019s no standard diagnosis of alcoholism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Myth<\/strong> #4: Alcoholics Anonymous Is the Only Way to Recover<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Because Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is the most popular, known, and respected recovery program in the world, most people believe it\u2019s the only <\/em>way to recover, writes Whitaker. Specifically, most believe that unless you\u2019ve gone through AA and followed all its steps\u2014including labeling<\/a> yourself as an alcoholic\u2014you can\u2019t possibly be in recovery. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In reality, AA was created by two upper-middle-class white men who built the program to suit people exclusively from their own demographic, writes Whitaker. This means AA is designed for people who already <\/em>wield tremendous power<\/strong>, not for groups who\u2019ve never had power (like women and ethnic minorities). The program thus likely won\u2019t suit or be helpful for these groups. In fact, many of AA\u2019s core tenets\u2014developing humility, submitting to a higher power, and so on\u2014only harm <\/em>such groups further. This is because they\u2019ve historically been conditioned to be humble, untroublesome, and small. Trying to become even more <\/em>so can be crippling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Truth: Alcohol Is Always <\/em>Bad for Us <\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Contrary to some<\/em> alcoholism myths, Whitaker argues that alcohol is nothing short of a poison that destroys the body<\/strong>. Even a small amount of alcohol is bad for us because whatever effect the drink has\u2014making us relaxed and happy\u2014the body will seek to undo <\/em>it to reinstate homeostasis, a proper bodily balance. It does this by making us tense <\/em>and anxious <\/em>after drinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whitaker adds that any amount of alcohol also has many other negative effects, such as disrupting sleep, increasing anxiety and depression<\/a>, hindering the liver\u2019s detoxification process, affecting our ability to lose weight, damaging our brain, preventing a variety of hormones from fulfilling their functions, causing cancer, aging us prematurely, and harming our gut.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Shortform note: Not everyone agrees with Whitaker that alcohol is always <\/em>a poison. Some contend that drinking in moderation is good for cardiovascular health and the circulatory system<\/a>. However, alongside such claims always comes the caveat that drinking excessively <\/em>is indeed bad for you in the ways Whitaker lists. Further, many studies disagree on what constitutes \u201ca drink\u201d and \u201cmoderate drinking,\u201d complicating the choice to drink even more.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whitaker points out the incongruence between our modern-day health obsession and our continued alcohol consumption. Why do we take such good care of our bodies but still consume a substance that slowly kills us? She contends this is because of four alcoholism myths we believe about drinking and alcohol.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What are the most common myths about alcoholism? What is the real truth about alcohol? In Quit Like a Woman, Holly Whitaker claims that she and many people took so long to recognize their alcoholism because we’re conditioned to believe drinking is normal. In her book, she debunks the most dangerous myths about alcoholism. Let’s explore these alcoholism myths and learn why they’re so harmful.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":6972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,9,24],"tags":[830],"class_list":["post-86483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-psychology","category-society","tag-quit-like-a-woman","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Top 4 Alcoholism Myths\u2014Debunked - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Many alcoholism myths hide what addiction really looks like. 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