The Negative and Positive Effects of Alcohol - Coursework Example

Negative and Positive Effects of Alcohol Drinking alcohol is nearly as old as mankind itself. First used as a food source, it has long been an integral part of practically all cultures throughout the history of the world. People use it to relax and it is seldom absent from any celebratory event no matter how large or small. Alcohol also causes psychological, emotional and physical problems affecting employment and relationships. It is also a leading cause of death including both for the chronic drinker and the innocent victims of alcohol-related accidents. Alcohol can be good or evil depending on the level of personal responsibility exercised by the individual drinker. This discussion debates the positives and negatives relating to the consumption of alcohol. As mankind began emerging from their cave homes more than 10,000 years ago, they began farming grains which led, by necessity, to formal civilizations. The discovery of beer soon followed the discovery of grain as a renewable food source thus it is accurate to state that beer dates back to the earliest known evidence of human civilization. It has always been and all evidence points to the idea that it will always be a major part of the culture among much of the world’s population. Throughout the annals of western society, beer has enjoyed a colorful history and society has certainly enjoyed beer. Its use accelerated the use of written communication, was consumed as part of religious ceremonies by medieval monks and ancient Egyptians and drank by necessity in Medieval Europe (Standage, 2005). The first settlers to America brought beer with them. Beer was food to the colonists who imported barley from England to brew it themselves. Local corn was inexpensive and more readily available therefore soon malted corn became a substitute for malted barley (Rudin, 2002). The gruel made of grains first discovered by accident became an essential economic and social phenomenon that has impacted all of human history and likely will continue to do so well into the future. Beer and other spirits has been an important aspect of life for people of all levels of society who use it to celebrate and simply to relax. The bar, tavern or pub is a gathering point for socialization and refuge for many. Regardless of how innocuous, historically important and beneficial the consumption of alcohol may be presented, the detriments outweigh any benefits whether real or perceived. According to the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence (Alcoholism, 2000), alcohol is among the three largest causes of preventable mortality in the United States. Contributing to approximately 100,000 deaths annually, only tobacco and diet/activity patterns contribute to greater death tolls. The Council also estimates that, despite laws against underage drinking, approximately 13.8 million Americans over the age of 18, representing about seven percent of the population, have experienced difficulty controlling their alcohol consumption, including 8.1 million people who are alcoholic. It is particularly disturbing to note that the prevalence for drinking problems is among those individuals within the 18 to 29 age group with a greater number of men experiencing problems than women by a factor of almost three to one. Despite laws against underage drinking, more than half of all high school seniors in this country have reported being drunk at least once and a third of them have reported having three or more drinks in a row in the weeks prior to the survey while another 76 million people, almost half of all Americans, have reported being exposed to alcoholism within the home (Alcoholism, 2000). These numbers are particularly alarming as studies continue to show that individuals who have started drinking before age 15 are up to four times more likely to develop alcoholism than those who started at age 21 and there is a greater tendency for alcoholism to run within family lines. The evils of alcohol are well documented as are methods to reduce the harms initiated by alcohol use such as moderation or through one of several 12 step-type programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous or any of the many other programs that have developed for various other disordered behavior/addictions. Participants in these programs are able to find a path to a better quality of life and a more complete way of interacting with other people. Prohibition, of course, is not the answer to solving alcohol-related problems. It has been tried and failed miserably. It is well-known that alcohol prohibition encouraged the proliferation of criminal gangs and the associated violent activities. It also made criminals out of policemen who took bribes to ‘look the other way’ while illegal booze was delivered to and consumed at ‘speak easies.’ Legislators are reluctant to prohibit the responsible adult consumption of alcohol motivated by questions of personal autonomy and choice. Most Americans, especially those who are knowledgeable of the Constitution, believe constraining what adults do in private including what they can put into their bodies is clearly unconstitutional and an infringement on personal liberties unless this action infringes upon the rights of others.  Everyone can differentiate between the wide-ranging social consequences that exist between a person who consumes an occasional alcoholic beverage and one who commits crimes while drunk.  The following example of an infringement of personal liberty involving alcohol is considered reprehensible by all freedom loving people. During a casual conversation with his boss, an employee at the Best Lock Corporation in Indiana admitted that he had a couple of drinks in a bar several years earlier. He was fired immediately because company policy dictated that employees were prohibited from drinking alcohol at any time. The methods that employers use to implement policies that increasingly encroach on privacy rights provoke important civil liberties questions. (Schloerb, 1991, p. 13.). The right to drink, responsibly, is the constitutionally guaranteed right of every adult American. If this freedom is taken away, other liberties will follow until we have the type of country the Founding Fathers were trying to break away from. The rhetoric of those who condone alcohol use is compelling but would they also allow any type of drug to be legalized as well while citing the same civil liberty concerns? It is not an issue of freedom, it’s a safety issue. We are not ‘free’ to drive 125 miles-per-hour through a school zone because of the safety issue. Alcohol can affect not only the physical health of the individual, but can have long term repercussions on their psychology and social life as well, strongly affecting the way they relate to the world and those around them and only controllable through life-long voluntary measures such as Alcoholics Anonymous. Physically, alcohol can have a dramatic impact upon an individual’s body particularly as it affects the liver. According to Dennis Koop (2007), alcohol damages the body in numerous ways due to the way in which it processes the substance when it is introduced. As alcohol enters the liver, it is metabolized by an enzyme called CYP2E1. In this process, toxicity levels are increased in the production of compounds Koop calls reactive oxygen species (ROS) which are formed when oxygen gains an electron, thus reducing the levels of oxygen in the body and functioning to damage other cellular molecules. Animals that have been treated with this compound have proven that the presence of CYP2E1 does indeed increase the level of chemical damage in the body by free radicals, particularly as they affect the lipid components of cell membranes in the liver cells (Dey & Cederbaum, 2006). This is because when the levels of CYP2E1 are high, there is a greater level of lipid peroxidation within the liver, thus a lower ability of the liver to fight against the toxins that have been introduced (Koop, 2007). Thus, the liver damage widely suspected to be directly caused by alcohol consumption is proven and unavoidable. With this knowledge in hand, it becomes a concern regarding why individuals might continue to choose to drink to the point of it becoming an uncontrollable habit. For many alcoholics, the deeds they have done in neglecting their families and supporting their habits may have proven too much to bear, driving them to further drink as a means of forgetting about them. Alcohol is the drug most often associated with intoxicant induced violent crimes. Hoffman (2003) describes the mental progression, or moral career, of entry and participation in these programs as a series of states that were first outlined in a study on psychiatric patients. “Light’s (1980) study of the moral career of psychiatric residents proposes a singular model of residents socialization, consisting of five stages: feeling discredited, moral confusion, numbness and exhaustion, moral transition, and self-affirmation.” The first stage is that point at which Hoffman suggests the alcoholic is brought into treatment, whether by self-volition or court or other mandate. They are discredited by the community at large, by themselves and then by the members of the meetings as they learn their thinking has been completely false all along. This leads to a state of moral confusion, in which the participant is struggling to identify which beliefs are incorrect and which are acceptable, moral behavior. Additionally, an individual may have been born with a neurological disorder resulting from alcohol abuse by their mother while pregnant. Of all drugs, alcohol is most widely used by both adults and youths. Young persons are most at-risk to begin a habit that may ultimately ruin their lives. The need to belong to a group is strong during this time and, combined with the fact that they do not yet possess the decision-making wisdom of adults, often leads to poor choices including opting to use alcohol. They also tend to become bored easily and experience frequent emotional highs and lows, all potential factors in teenage alcohol use. Experimenting with alcohol causes many adverse effects especially in the case of developing youths. The frequency of alcohol use amongst young persons for social, recreational and experimental reasons is extensive and continues to escalate. Heightened propensities toward violent behaviors have also been linked to alcohol. Alcohol use increases the chance that students will become pregnant, contract a communicable disease, perform poorly in school and attempt suicide (Chaiken & Chaiken, 1989) Alcohol, without it, civilization may not have progressed as it did but many believe it to be the scourge of modern society. It is the essence of life and cause of many thousands of deaths, a multi-million dollar business which costs Americans millions in health-related expenses. Without it, celebrations are less vivacious but those who celebrate too much then drive and often kill the innocent. It has been and always will be manufactured, sold and consumed. Even after prohibition in the early part of the last century, it was manufactured, sold and consumed. Alcohol was there at the beginnings of humanity and will be there at the end. The question is how to alleviate the detrimental affects. Moderation and education is the only answer. References Alcoholism.com. (2000). “Alcohol-related Statistics.” WebMagic. Available October 31, 2007 Chaiken, J. & Chaiken, M. (1989). “Drug Use and Predatory Crime.” Drugs and Crime – Crime and Justice: An Annual Review of Research. J.Q. Wilson & M. Tonry (Eds.). Vol. 13. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Dey, A., and Cederbaum, A.I. (2006). “Alcohol and oxidative liver injury.” Hepatology. Vol. 43, (Suppl. 1):S63–S74, 2006. PMID: 16447273. Hoffman, Heath C. (Fall 2003). “Recovery Careers of People in Alcoholics Anonymous: Moral Careers Revisited.” Contemporary Drug Problems. Vol. 30, I. 3, p. 647. Koop, Dennis. (2007). “Alcohol Metabolism’s Damaging Effect on the Cells.” National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Available October 31, 2007 from Rudin, Max. (June/July 2002). “Beer and America.” American Heritage Magazine. Vol. 53, I. 3. Schloerb, John. (1991). “Employment Discrimination Based on Employee Lifestyles.” NWI Document Bank #P13. Standage, Tom. (2005). A History of the World in Six Glasses. New York: Walker & Company. Read More