Recreational Drug Use, Peer Pressure, and What It Really Means to Be All Grown Up

Here's the thing; I really like chocolate. I also like to drink a nice cup of tea almost every day. Yet even (and especially) people of the Mormon Faith aren't supposed to consume certain types of one of my all time favorite beverages. 'Cause, believe it or not, caffeine really is a mild stimulant. It's a drug. Likewise, at some point, somewhere down the line, such as in ancient Middle Eastern societies (primarily Jewish and Muslim), someone or other suddenly decided that they'd better not eat animals with ("parted") cloven hooves. Okay, okay, so God told someone or other among them not to partake. And that's perfectly okay, right? I mean, as they say, "To each his own." You know, "free will," "religious freedom," and all that.

But you know what? In addition to chocolate and many different types of teas (some that contain caffeine and many that do not), I also really love bacon. And when I say, "I love bacon," I mean I really, really love bacon. In fact, to me, there's just about nothing better for breakfast (or lunch, dinner, or even just a snack) than a whole plateful of nice, crispy, salty-sweet strips of well cooked porcine flesh.

What's more, I just happen to currently live in East Asia, where pork is a practically indispensable food stuff. You really wanna get even with authoritarian, organ harvesting, human rights abusing Communist China for starting yet another global pandemic? Just take all their pork away! Sounds silly, I know, but literally billions of people the whole world over would probably starve in pretty short order if all the pigs in the whole entire world were to suddenly die off en masse.

But me, I prefer chocolate. Though bacon is a close second. Or is it the other way around? Hmm. Well anyway, I eat something with chocolate on or in it at least once every single day for months at a time sometimes. No foolin! I mean, let's not forget that even Mormons eat chocolate. Or so I'm told. I'm not Mormon myself, so I think I'll just have to take the Internet's word for it.

Yet despite my sincere and abiding love for this often sugar-saturated tasty treat, I sometimes I go for literally weeks at a time when I don't eat any chocolate at all. And yet, curiously enough, I end up experiencing absolutely no withdrawal symptoms. No lying in the gutter because I'm unable to even think of anything except that next piece of chocolate, yet another Snicker's Bar, or even a scrumptious double decker, choco crunch ice cream cone. Sometimes, I actually even prefer vanilla. Blasphemous, I know, but... what's a guy to do, eh?

Yet still, believe it or not, I can also go for long periods of time when I don't eat chocolate at all. And that right there is the point, you see. In other words, my strong preference for chocolate may indeed be habitual in nature, but it's most certainly not indicative of any sort of addiction.

So that's why I actually do eat chocolate. Because choosing to periodically indulge in the joys of that particular sugar-sweeteed, cocoa-infused concoction simply does not affect most people in any appreciably negative fashion. Sure, it's often packed full of sugar and does contain mood emhancing chemical compounds, but eating chocolate doesn't cause significantly delayed response times and the markedly slowed reflexes that are commonly associated with the consumption of alcoholic beverages. Nor is it particularly prone to give most folks "the munchies." Or cause them to gradually withdraw from society, due to, perhaps, conspicuous over-consumption. Though I'm not entirely sure that all recreational drugs need be used more than once before they end up practically enslaving the user.

Worst of all though, I've even noticed that if I have a big package of Hershey bars, and I'm at a party, or some other typically shallow, show-offy public gathering, and I ask everyone, "Hey, do you all want one of my Hershey bars?" some will say yes, and take one. And some won't. Some will say, "No thanks, I'm on a diet." Still others may say, "Oh man, I wish I could, but I'm diabetic." And that's that. Dude or dudette said no. And the last time I checked, no most certainly meant just exactly that; NO.

Right?

But, let's just say, hypothetically, that you're at a party, or some other so-called "social" gathering, and somebody is drinking alcohol, certain individuals just tend to simply not be able to "drink alone." And by that, I mean if even just one person is doing his or her very best to get inebriated, so they can... I don't know... lose all their inhibitions, and gradually stop being able to even speak clearly, to the point where they often end up spitting in other people's faces, or manhandling them, while their words all start to slur together, they simply must get everyone else to join them in "the fun." I mean, that's the way it usually works, isn't it? No chemicals, no "social lubrication." Or... something like that.

Or maybe, curiously reckless individuals like this are simply motivated to slurp down copious amounts of whatever noxious libation they can get a hold of just so they can hopefully trick other members of the group into engaging in some sort of impromptu sexual activity. Something that not everyone involved may be able to fully recall later on. But I guess whatever it takes to get what you want from others, right? Although... I really don't think I'd want anything like that from anybody if I had to resort to getting it in that particular way.

I mean, yuck. And here I thought that consent was actually supposed to count for something when it comes to being a "consenting adult." But maybe that's just me.

Whatever the case may in fact be, I've just noticed over the years, that if I eat too many chocolate bars and then get behind the wheel of a motor vehicle, there is almost no chance whatsoever that all that sugar and caffeine will actually do anything more than simply sharpen my senses. See, that's why, in most cases, caffeine is fully legal and mostly unregulated almost everywhere in the world. Because, in most cases, it's just plain harmless. Okay, okay! In fact, chocolate also contains phenethylamine, a chemical that actually makes people feel more romantic. That's why it's such a staple of Valentine's Day festivities, and why, in the good old days anyway, when a guy wanted to impress a girl, he might give her a nice box of chocolates. And maybe some flowers too, of course.

But here's the thing; if I'm at some stupid party or "social" gathering, and I say, "No thanks" when someone wants me to "have a beer," or even do something else that's even stronger, everyone seems to suddenly turn into a horde of pubescent, peer-pressured high schoolers, and they look at you like you're some kind of creature from another planet or something! So that's why I never go to parties anymore. Or even class reunions. Ever. As in, never ever never.

Oh, I've tried over the years, to visit a "pub" or two, especially while I was teaching English in Taiwan, just to get out and meet people, but there always seemed to be some jerky little person in those kind of places - sometimes even the "friend" I came with - who would simply not listen when I said NO. And then they even ended up buying both of us glasses of this or that alcoholic beverage, and then they'd just sit there, just waiting for me to take a swig

But I never did. Ever. Which, yes, just in case you were wondering, I do know, really is rather odd when it comes to most members of this here fancy human race.

Once, in Taipei, Taiwan, I had this one girlfriend for a while. Nice girl. A very talented artist, she was. So anyway, one year, for Chinese New Year, or whatever it was, she invited me to her family's house for dinner. Her parents weren't even there, but one of her overly cocky A**hole Chinese American cousins from California just happened to be visiting family in Taipei. You know, the kind of guy who probably grew up feeling rather insecure because most of the "cool" guys around him were either black or Caucasian surfer dudes. Or... whatever this guy's personal problem may have in fact been.

And despite the fact that this hipster dude was told in advance that I never drink alcohol, he just kept giving me that "Are you serious?" look. And he kept repeating, "Like... you mean... never?" in that deep, overly "masculine" sort of voice that I've noticed that many clearly overcompensating individuals tend to affect sometimes. But hey! Maybe it really was his real voice. Who knows. I just know that in more than five years living and working in all sorts of places all over Taiwan, I never met any other Chinese/Taiwanese person who talked or presented himself quite the way this horrifically macho California Taiwanese dude did. "ABC" (American Born Chinese), they call them in Taiwan. But they're not all the same, of course. In fact, I've met some really nice ABCs. But that guy.... Uh-uh. Nope.

Whatever the problem may have in fact been, like other people I've unfortunately encountered throughout the course of my life, this cousin of my former girlfriend decided, like some kind of demented, socially challenged high school bully, that he was just going to have to make me drink. So he had a glass of whatever it was passed down from his end of the long dinner table to me. But being a dedicated teetotaler, I of course refused. And that did not make him at all happy. Not at all. No, not one little bit.

I mean, don't you just hate it when people don't get what they want by coercion, peer pressure, or even brute force?

So you see, that's what's actually really funny about socially acceptable drugs, you know. A person says no, but certain individuals just keep right on pushing. So, for some odd reason, when it comes to addictive, mind altering substances, many, many people just simply will not take NO for an answer! Go figure.

And then I look around, and I see all the lonely people standing or sitting around in some dingy, smoke-filled, often dark and extremely noisy drinking establishment, and almost none of them look all that happy to me. Even and especially when they start to get drunk and act really, really stupid. And irresponsible. Or even, sometimes, so aggressively, and even violently, that the bar, pub, or restaurant owner actually has to have some typically over-sized dude or other on staff on a regular basis, just to throw all the pathetic people who just don't seem to be able to resist overdoing it out ye olde door. I mean... they actually to pay people to do that.

And that right there, kids, is exactly why you can take your booze, and all your other "socially acceptable" drugs, and stick 'em right where the sun don't shine.  But... that's only if you won't take no for an answer, of course. Otherwise, "To each his own." Right?