How on earth can you claim to feel like you havent missed out on much when youve never tried it. What you're describing is more akin to growing up in your parents religion than making a personal choice.
Heck, if you really want to try it once for the experience, go ahead under supervision. And don't fall for the 'it didn't ruin my life the first time'. That is just the bait. Its never as good as the first time, you chase the dragon, and you feel like crap later.
If you're feeling like crap all the time and waking up with your money gone, perhaps the problem lay within the drinker, not the drink.
FWIW, I've had my deepest conversations in late evenings after a gig with a glass of white wine in my hand from which I sipped for like an hour. (I'm a musician.) My life would be fundamentally different without a single sip or even entering a bar, and I would really miss something.
But I think you’re mistaken to claim that everyone who enjoys great wine, or whiskey, or beer, is getting nothing from it.
It isn't all religion. Alcohol is a poison, by the definition of poison. There are a hundred studies on its negative effects.
No one's saying alcohol is healthy, but you're certainly cutting out a certain potential for social experiences by avoiding bars and alcohol. For some people the effect help them loosen up enough to have positive, meaningful interactions they wouldn't have otherwise.
Many studies do show that alcohol leads to additional stress, which then drives the need for additional drinking.
EDIT
Don't take me wrong. You seemed to really focus on the Religious side. I'm just saying that there are a lot of valid Health Reasons (Non-Moral, Non-religious) reasons not to drink.
And, I'm not saying I don't like drinking. Just because I'm an addict doesn't mean I don't like drinking.
There might be tangential things you don’t experience too, places you’ll never go, and people you’ll never meet.
-Someone who has experienced “hard” drugs
I've also never drank besides the occasional cocktail, and I can count on my hands the number of times I've bent to a bar. I had other kind of experiences instead and I wouldn't change it, but of course I've missed out on certain things.
But also that was just to point out that IMO the analogy with hard drugs doesn't work, I don't want to debate about a hypothetical world where most people do hard drugs.
Nobody says he just missed out on crashing into a tree on a windy road.
I unfortunately come from a culture where alcohol consumption is accepted, so it's been harder than I would like to break with tradition in the face of science, but doing so it a good thing, and if your cultural background helps you a hand because it does not accept alcohol as readily as mine, more power to you.
Drugs FOMO is some of the stupidest FOMO around. I've nothing against using soft drugs, but making any drug part of your life style is almost certainly a bad idea, and if never even trying suits your personality type (some are just more easily addicted than others), then you are wise for steering clear, not an ignorant traditionalist (or at least, not necessarily so).
That does not mean gathering in third places is problematic, I do wish we could come up with ways of doing it without the expectation of the consumption of alcohol.
You might be stopped in your car in the parking space but someone else might just crash into your car.
So just being in the car on a public road or parking will be safer than driving but not safe as in zero chances of being involved in an accident.
The same goes with alcohol even if you dont consume you are not completely safe from its effects: someone might drink and drive or drink and operate a machinery or drink and build your house …
Probably the same can be said about tiredness or something else. We should pick our battles. I am not sure which ones are better. Just found it funny that even sitting in the car is not safe enough as long as we have vehicles
That's the beauty of life. You write your own adventure. Whether people know it or not... eh.
On the other hand, many people drink alcohol and live perfectly normal lives. So I don't think that's an informative comparison.
That's true of most minority positions, just like atheists generally know more about Christians than vice versa ... since you brought up religion, I'd say it is going with the drinking culture flow that is the equivalent of blindly staying with your parent's religion.
And just like with atheism vs. religion, we don't just always make the choice that's easy and comfortable. Like the guy above here who finds that he's more included socially when he drinks - yeah, no shit he is, and he'd be more included in a Pentecostal meeting too if he spoke in tongues. Should we all just go along with things that seem dishonest or insane to us, for the sake of fitting in?
I dare say the opposite, as many drinkers routinely experience not drinking, while the opposite is by definition not true.
I'm a drinker but I have sometimes spent several months without drinking, for various reasons. Including spending months at countries where I didn't drink at all and people I met wouldn't even know whether I usually drink or not.
Honestly I have never saw those wonders of the "never-drinking life" that I'm supposed to be missing. It's the same (drinkers can meet friends during the day and outside of bars, too!) minus the activities that involve drinking.
-- disclaimer I refer to "normal" people who drink but are not addicted. Non drinking people are normal as well.
Aside, this sort of "hilarious reply!" post isn't exactly nice when I'm right here is it.
I didn't say doing that would be wonderful, that was your own words. It's not fun to be the only atheist at a Pentecostal meeting either, but as I said: sometimes you choose what to do for other reasons than fitting in and having fun.
I used not to be a drinker (not total teetotaler, but would never drink when out) well into my 30s. Now I do drink.
I much prefer drinking.
I do think that "alcohol culture" means different things to different people in different places and at different ages. To generalize massively, I don't think much of the stereotypical way way 19yos from the UK drink when in Ibiza.
But I do enjoy 4 or 5 cocktails or whiskys in a good bar (which for me isn't one with loud music incidentally) with good company.
The life of a teetotaler is not just your life minus the time you are drinking. Indeed, you explicitly make GP’s point when you say, “I never saw those wonders of the “never-drinking life” that I am supposed to be missing.”
Now, I would not argue that being a teetotaler is wonderful. I don’t drink because my father was an alcoholic. I feel like I have missed out of vast swaths of life. To me, the experience varies from fine to quite isolating and painful (especially when I was younger and conformity mattered more).
When I was younger, going to a bar and not drinking was like being a virgin late in life while everyone is talking about sex. Once you’ve had sex, you realize no one judges virgins. But as the virgin, you feel painfully alone. You know your friends’ awareness of your difference is harshing their mellow a bit.
But in the end, it is absurd to argue with people on the internet over who knows more about life. That’s a conversation better over a beer. I guess.