Slashdot Mirror
Beer Added To The Food Pyramid
Alehound writes " Beer Is Food: The US Government labeled beer(alcohol) as a drug, BeerAdvocate.com begs to differ as they inform their reader that beer can be a part of your diet in a healthy way. Beer does a body good? So the "Beer Gut" is a myth? So why the hell do I have a gut? And yes these guys do drink beer for breakfast." It's only 10 in the morning, I'm dumping out the half pot of coffee left, and cracking open a Boddingtons! Do it!
Is this the same Bods that I get on tap in England? If it is I've got to say that Boddingtons is THE most flavorless beer I've ever had in my life. Period. That stuff SUCKS! I'll drink lager before I'll drink a freakin' Bods. No hop bitterness, no maltiness. Nothing. As soon as I see Boddingtons I know I'll be having a Stella or 1664 or something. Unless there's a nice guest ale...
Boddingtons. Oh My God.
So why the hell do I have a gut?
Maybe because when you drink beer it's 6-10 at a time and you sit at a desk all day. In large amounts these calories add up.
I doubt that a semi-active person that has a couple beers here and there would get a gut from drinking this tasty beverage. In moderation, beer, just like soda, will not make you fat.
Why the heck don't beer, wine, and liquor have to have the nutriton information label on them like all food does in the U.S.?
-- dR.fuZZo
There's nothing wrong with drinking in moderation. It's more the amount of activity you put into it. You don't do much more than sit around when you binge drink. Do marathon runners get tossed a bottle of Aquafina or a can of Blue Ribbon?
Libertarians somehow believe that private businesses should be stronger than governments but weaker than individuals.
What, do you mean like Labatt Blue or Molson? That shit is at least as bad as Bud!
Oh, you were going to name some microbrew? Well there's tons that are good in the US too.
Editors aren't on the ball today, or don't know their slashdot history...informative + flamebait = troll.
Chris
It's interesting to watch how the government cracks down on various drugs. The US Government has deemed smoking as pretty bad, yet smoking does not cause drunk driving, nor does it cause men to go home and beat their wives. An addiction to tobacco does not ruin someone's life the way an addiction to alcohol can. I hear lots of complaining about the costs smokers create in terms of health care, but I never hear about the costs associated with heavy drinkers, not to mention rehab programs.
What's really interesting is how they make marijuana illegal, when in many ways it is not as bad as smoking or drinking. In terms of health, people say marijuana does less damage than all that tar and chemicals they put in cigarettes. Some people say it's even less addictive than tobacco, though I would not know. Marijuana also does not make you overconfident the way alcohol will - making you think you are the best driver in the world when in reality you should not be anywhere near the controls of a vehicle. The government likes to say that marijuana use just leads to usage of dangerous drugs like cocaine, but that is not true - just like alcoholics generally don't move onto cocaine either.
I'll probably get modded down for this, but I feel the world would be a better place without alcohol. But that simply will not happen. People will not give it up, just look at when they tried prohibition in the US.
It's interesting you chose that particular slander for your post, since it was the early 20th-century equivalent of "reefer madness". One of the driving rhetorical points of Prohibitionism, and the reason that it was embraced by some elements of what became the women's movement, was just that: "Alcohol causes our responsible men to become irresponsible and beat their wives. If we get rid of booze, there will be no wife-beating!"
Naturally, it didn't work that way. Sober men are just as capable of rage as drunk ones, and neither beer nor gin can make a violent man from a peaceable one. Moreover, blaming a man's misdeeds on the drugs he consumes, rather than on his own character, does nothing to cause him to correct himself. A violent person who can excuse his behavior the next morning by saying, "It was the bottle talking," sees no reason to become less violent.
The remedy for domestic violence is not to dissuade men from drinking, but to convince them (as has thankfully been done in society at large, thanks chiefly to feminism and the law) that domestic violence is wrong, shameful, and criminal. Only by ascribing responsibility solely to the individual -- not to his drug, and not to "society" -- can the problem be corrected. Why? Simple: The booze doesn't make decisions; individuals do.
Leave beer alone, for -- as with marijuana -- the vast majority of users enjoy it responsibly. Lay the blame for wrongdoing on the wrongdoers -- and shame on you, if you let them blame it on the bottle.
I think the beer people drank for food wasn't quite as strong as what we brew today-for entertainment. Today's brewery's work for a higher alcohol content, breakfast beer was probably more like a fermented barley soup and brewed for a lower alcohol content.
I personally think it would be great if we recognized alcoholic drinks as a food source, since it would encourage people to think more about the nutritional content of what they drink. Hmmm, we might someday have Total Beer commercials..."You would have to drink 4 pints of Blatz to get the same vitamins as one pint of Old Totalovski's..."