Alcohol abstainers do not need sobriety sophisms

I don’t drink. And that is not just the official story because I am underage.

It is a little strange, especially in my Irish family. But it is quite true. I am not morally opposed to the idea of drinking, but something always seems to block me. In high school it was means. My first semester at Rice it was time. For the past year it was a promise — which just expired. And recently it was shock from a friend getting into alcohol-induced trouble.

Drinking is perfectly compatible with my faith. I know that it does not have to be harmful and certainly not a death trap. And it is probably not a bad way to spend a cast party. But still, I abstain.

This places me in a curious position that has revealed a peculiarity of society. We assume there must be a reason why someone would not want to be drunk. At any given moment, should a person have to provide an acceptable reason for remaining sober?

This odd societal practice struck me last year when I was offered a drink at a party and declined. I was forced to explain myself to the disapproving glances and resulting questions about my beliefs on alcohol or underage drinking. They were not trying to exact peer pressure but were merely worried that I was offended, or worse, judging them. In the end, they simply assumed that there must be some vast explanation for why I did not want a drink. That is not the case.

A judge I worked for this summer told me a story about trying to convince his son to drink during their vacation to a foreign country where the drinking age was 18. He could not believe that his son, another Irishman, was refusing a drink when his father was practically begging him. Apparently, it is not just college students or young people who demand a philosophy for declining alcohol. All generations scratch their heads at an abstainer.

Given this massive peer pressure, one has to wonder how many of the various beliefs concerning alcohol are less because of religious, practical or moral convictions, and more because of simple dislike of alcohol. Perhaps the situation is so dire that people need to rely on elaborate philosophies to explain their abstention rather than simply relying on an aversion to an unpleasant-tasting liquid that has the potential to make fools of us and empty our stomachs onto the pavement.

Should we assume — if we remove any convictions, philosophies or excuses — everyone would all rather be drunk than sober? This maybe true for some people, but I doubt it is for everyone. If people choose not to drink, are they anomalies or just more honest than those who would rather be sober but explain their radical, incomprehensible decision via religious beliefs, M.A.D.D. horror stories or early morning appointments the next day? There is nothing wrong with drinking. And we should not assume that there is anything wrong or abnormal about sobriety either. In the end, people should not need vast moral or philosophical reasons to want a soda instead of a beer on Pub Night.

So let’s stop trying to explain it away. I have no mighty beliefs to fall back on — I was raised in a wet household. But I would think that I am entitled to dislike one of the most universal conventions of our society, not to mention Rice, without a handy excuse.

Katy Mulvaney is a Baker College sophomore.

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