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>I think alcohol is next, I doubt it. There's a reason why it was considered an 'essential item' in a lot of places during the pandemic, why the soviets gave o

>I think alcohol is next, I doubt it. There's a reason why it was considered an 'essential item' in a lot of places during the pandemic, why the soviets gave out vodka rations etc. Alcohol's a useful tool for keeping a population compliant and sedated, people love it, it's super easy to make, hence why in many places the production and distribution of it tends to be highly regulated, otherwise just about anyone could do it, it's big business and in a lot of places, it brings massive tax revenues through sales so...I doubt it's going anywhere any time soon. I mean what are they gonna do, ban yeast and sugar? Ban leaving fruit sitting too long? You can't really ever stop the production of alcohol. It just kind of happens naturally. It's not really possible to just ban the process of fermentation...

quickthrower2 6y ago
I think if people had to drink prison hooch or wait weeks to brew their own substandard beer, as opposed to drinking bottled craft beer or tasty wines there would be less alcohol consumption.
- pixelbash 6y ago
  I suspect while that might be true initially people would soon get really quite good at it.
- nicoburns 6y ago
  The history of the US prohibition says otherwise. Or rather, while overall consumption of alcohol probably did drop, the effect on society of pushing it underground was not positive.
  - efreak 6y ago
    From memory, alcohol consumption actually _increased_ during prohibition.
knolax 6y ago
> Alcohol's a useful tool for keeping a population compliant and sedated The same could be said for most forms of recreation.
ycombinete 6y ago
The Soviets gave out vodka rations because it was in their interest to keep their population addicted to alcohol. Like the nobles did before them, and like they did under Stalin. There’s actually a fascinating history about vodka and it’s use by the ruling parties in Russia over the last few centuries.

quickthrower2 6y ago

I think if people had to drink prison hooch or wait weeks to brew their own substandard beer, as opposed to drinking bottled craft beer or tasty wines there would be less alcohol consumption.

pixelbash 6y ago
I suspect while that might be true initially people would soon get really quite good at it.
nicoburns 6y ago
The history of the US prohibition says otherwise. Or rather, while overall consumption of alcohol probably did drop, the effect on society of pushing it underground was not positive.
- efreak 6y ago
  From memory, alcohol consumption actually _increased_ during prohibition.

knolax 6y ago

> Alcohol's a useful tool for keeping a population compliant and sedated The same could be said for most forms of recreation.

ycombinete 6y ago

The Soviets gave out vodka rations because it was in their interest to keep their population addicted to alcohol. Like the nobles did before them, and like they did under Stalin. There’s actually a fascinating history about vodka and it’s use by the ruling parties in Russia over the last few centuries.