Hacker News Reader

Comment by ineedasername | Hacker News Reader

To be fair, if it wasn't denatured then it wouldn't just be someone, somewhere. It would be hoards of underage kids. Heck if I use the self-checkout lane at the supermarket to buy cough medicine the attendant has to come over and approve the purchase because that's abused by underage kids as well.

That said, I won't claim to know precisely where the line should be drawn, but would say that in a sanitizing product shortage during a pandemic the line should be somewhere in the area of "hey how about we make it easier to make more sanitizing products right now"

View on HN

Would it? Would it be hoards of teenage kids? Perhaps we should try to figure out why hoards of teenage kids would drink cough syrup or hand sanitizer. Perhaps the problem is that we pay to much attention to underage kids. Maybe if there wasn't an age limit, underage drinking wouldn't be so taboo. And underage drinking would not be a problem and binge drinking might go down.

I agree with everything you said, but in our society as it is right now, I still believe it would be hoards of teenage kids. Maybe it's a local problem, but there are stores near me that put cough medicine behind the counter for this reason. So you're right, there are underlying dynamics that contribute to this behavior, but the behavior does exist.

That's likely less to do with alcohol and more to do with the fact that it's pretty easy to "make" other psychoactive substances using it.

In particular, you can spin robitussin rapidly to separate the dextromethorphan.

https://erowid.org/chemicals/dxm/

Unrealistic, teenagers can still get trashed on vanilla extract from the grocery store but very few do

Maybe this reflects a lot more on the environment & social circle I grew up in? In that context though:

I think if the alcoholic nature of extracts were more widely known to teenagers, more would take advantage. But it also doesn't come in a convenient "party" format. If you could walk into Walmart, buy a half-gallon of sanitizer for $10 (well, pre-covid you could get those sizes for cheap, now not so much) and mix it with a gallon of fruit punch, then you've basically got the ingredients for a typical small 4-8 person Everclear & Fruitpunch highschool basement party without the hassle of tracking down that >= 21 friend.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com