I'm 41 years old and I still have friends that pressure me to drink. I simply tell them to pound sand and then I wake up early the next morning to make breakfast for my wife and kids.

If they're not your friends after you say NO then they wernt your friends to begin with.

Are you an alcoholic?

That seems pretty much irrelevant to his post. What he says is pretty much accurate in of itself. It is worth taking on its own.

Ha, no, but I have my share of experience on the subject. Not to mention I had to watch more than one cousin and a great many friends slide down that way. As for me... well, my avatar is Warren Zevon for a reason. I never quite fell over that cliff, but I come close a couple times. I know how it works, but thanks to God and modern psychology that I never got too close a look, know what I mean. Anyway, that's as personal as I want to get tonight, so if you'll excuse me...

It has been known already that alcohol is an addiction. Once one is in this state, it is extremely hard to stop because the chemical imbalances in your brain changes. But I doubt no one is born an alcoholic. We have the choice to be either responsible or irresponsible. I don't feel pity for alcoholics. I feel pity for their families that they were put in the back burner because one individual chose to follow his own desires then their love ones.

Incredibly simplistic. People pressure you to do things with them for a number of reasons, but the primary one is because they want to do stuff with you.

So what is the logic behind your statement earlier?

Thought experiment. Ever had a friend try to pressure you to play a game you didn't want to play? Same principle.

Don't start drinking, it's a waste of time. The upside is not worth the downside.

Just be confident and refuse. It's kind of sad to do something you don't want to because you're trying to impress someone.

Is it one or the other? I feel pity for the family and friends of alkies, hell, I am family and friend of multiple alcoholics. I can also empathize with legit alcoholics. There's a lot of pain that goes with alcohol or substance abuse of any sort, pain for everyone involved. That said, it's not "one person makes a choice." That person suffers more than anyone involved, and the more he or she suffers, the more he or she tries to find succor the only way they know how. It's a terrible situation for everyone involved, none more so than the person at the center of it all. I watched my cousin's 20 year suicide tear my family apart. I know, however, just what he went through during that process and throughout his whole life. To take one side and discount the suffering caused to the other diminishes the whole situation. And choice has very little to do with it. Just like suicide, it becomes an question of simply trying to ease your own incredible suffering, and people nearby get hurt.

No one starts their life as an alcoholic. They sure as hell end it as one, but we are created by our environment and our responses to external stimuli. People aren't born alcoholics, but they are created thus by their family, by their peers, and by their circumstance.

I fail to see why sympathy has to go to one side or the other is all.

Coffee said a lot of it already, but...

When you add up things like: alcohol addiction, DUI, date [censored], stupid/harmful things done when drunk, stupid/harmful attitudes towards alchohol by many of the users of it ("take 21 shots on your 21st!"; binge drinking; glorification of being drunk in the first place; etc); the after-effects of being drunk; liver damage..... there's certainly a lot of negative aspects to drinking. Enough that a good % of people would certainly consider it a negative thing in general. Even without religious puritanism.

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I'll add a "yeah, that!" to the people saying - if they're trying to pressure you into things you don't want to do, that's heading out of "friend" category. Especially if they keep doing it after you say no the first couple times. Might want to think about getting new ones, depending on how ****** they are about it. (Or, here's a thought - volunteer to be the designated driver/etc. Assuming you like hanging out with these people still.)

The only real idiot drinker/s I can recall interacting with are a couple of dudes I was in a project group with in college - I remember stuff like the one guy moaning about being "shorted" on the Jack in his Jack & Coke (during lunch, on a weekday, while we were meeting in the school union snack bar to talk about our project); and the same guy talking about an upcoming "beer tasting" festival, one of those things where a lot of breweries have a table in a ballroom/gym/whatever and you get to go around trying beers... and he was talking about how they had to "pre-load" on vodka so that they'd get good & drunk on the beer samples.

Yeah. Brain-dead morons like that are why alcohol has a negative rep.

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Personally, I don't drink. I don't like the taste, and the idea of losing self-control is a bad thing. No, I've never hung out at a bar or a dance club, that's not my thing. Luckily, my friends have similar interests - tabletop gaming, video games, sci-fi, etc. Yeah, I've been a nerd/hanging out with nerds since high school in the 80's. Deal with it. The current guys I get together with on Saturday nights do drink, but not to excess (they're all in their 30s-40s & several are married with kids) and mostly just expensive beer. They sometimes make the polite offer "want to try some?" when they've got something wacky & new, but they're not pressure-y about it at all. No biggie.

I know what are you trying to say. And yes, we are a product of many different factors that can change our personality and behavior. It's a jungle out there. I'm pretty sure you're also aware that there are many people out there who have a lot of issues including psychological issues, yet, they don't follow the alcoholic route. My friend is a great example - which isn't an unusual example. His parents were both alcoholics and his older brother was beginning to take on the bottle. My friend saw how their lives were destroyed slowly and even though he wanted to drink as well to forget the problems and abuse, he decided not to. He didn't want to end like them. He did what was right. Now that he is older, he drinks normally; knows when to to quit. His parents are still in that hell of addiction.

A couple of other people have already said it, but I'm just going to repeat it because it's good advice.

Your friends and coworkers probably just want to hang out with you in the weekends because they think you're a cool guy. Just go with them and order soda when they order beer. They'll probably make a few remarks about that, you'll tell them you don't like alcohol, and then you'll all continue to socialize and have fun together.

Well, psychological determinism isn't a thing. It doesn't come down to if X and Y are present, then Z response occurs. Your friend was smart and made good, but a lot of people don't. We're all wading through the muck, trying to get out without getting our clothes dirty. Some people will, and some people are gonna fall down. I don't think that makes them bad people, is the thing. They [censored] up is all. I have a buddy that I referenced in an earlier post who saw the effect alcohol had on several family members and chose not to drink. He's 28 and has never so much as had a drop. You ever watch the West Wing? The Vice President attends meetings even though he had only been drunk once or twice in college, because his family had a strong history of Alcoholism. I've known a few people like that myself. There are always the heroes, who do right from the get go and make good. But there's way more who don't, and those people benefit far more from support and empathy than they do from condemnation. Condemnation simply acts as confirmation of what many of them hold true: That they are corrupt, they are sinful, they are weak, they are evil. Because a lot of people succeed where they fail doesn't make them bad or failures. It just means they stumbled, and it causes less pain to everyone around them in the long run to help them back up again, rather than compare them to those who did right and demonize them.

Right. I never did considered alcoholics as bad or evil people. I don't feel pity for them, yes, but I don't think that that particular decision makes them the devil incarnate. Look at Hitler, he eliminated all alcoholics and we all know who was the real evil one.

I suppose it's difficult for me to understand not feeling pity for someone who one doesn't perceive as downright evil. When you said that alcoholics don't deserve pity, I read that as them not being deserving of respect, empathy, or aid. Usually when I've heard someone say that, it's akin to saying "Screw 'em." If that's not the case, I'm sorry I misconstrued. Sounds like I may have. If I was right, then I suppose we're gonna have to agree to disagree here.

I don't drink. I don't think people who drink are bad either, however when they let it control them, it's a problem.

Well, they had the choice. They knew the consequences. Should I feel pity for them if they decide to go the destructive route?

They did have a choice, but as I said, that choice was informed by a number of influences. We all have moments of weakness, where our world is spinning out of control and we would do anything to sort it out again. For some of us, the only way we can see of regaining control of ourselves comes in a bottle. People start drinking for any number of reasons, but when they take it to an extreme, there's usually some demon there that they're trying to drown. To me, that is worthy of pity. Lost souls everywhere and in any situation are worthy of pity. To you, they may not be. I don't know your moral system. Me, I was raised to see all people as possessing dignity, being worthy of pity, and being redeemable. The only people who I see are not worthy of pity is those who can't find it in themselves to pity anyone, sociopaths.

You know, I have said what I needed to say on this matter. A very sad matter, really. I hope the OP chooses the right thing and won't throw his life away because of the pressures of some rogues. Our lives are made of decisions, just one can change your whole life.

I agree.

Those who say that nobodies born an alcoholic should remember that some people having a genetic disposition towards alcoholism is proven. Not all of them will become alcoholics but they are more at risk.

Spoiler

Anyway, I am a teetotaler as well. I don't get much in the way of social pressure to drink though, seeing as I'm a bit anti-social.

Yes, I was aware of that. In fact, in my example of my friend, it is probable that he inherited this "alcoholic" gene. Both of his parents were alcoholics, his older brother eventually became one, and he admits that he loves to drink too but he has managed to conquered his innate impulses.

They where never my friends to begin with . There's nothing wrong with social drinking, it's just when it gets abused or causes trouble that it becomes a bad thing. Also if your "friends" are trying to force you to do something that you don't want to----tell them to piss off and find new friends.

Beer every once in a while is actually http://www.essortment.com/health-benefits-beer-48427.html for you. Just don't binge drink or get acute poisoning.