Exactly. If you don't want to drink, don't drink. There is a world of difference between being excluded, and feeling excluded. Ryan feels excluded, but I genui

Exactly. If you don't want to drink, don't drink. There is a world of difference between being excluded, and feeling excluded. Ryan feels excluded, but I genuinely doubt that people are shunning him because he doesn't have a beer in his hand. He isn't being forced out of interesting conversations because of his sobriety. I've never once seen binge drinking at a conference. Drinking, sure, but binge drinking implies that people are doing kegstands or something similar. Now, I don't know Ryan personally, and maybe I'm missing the bigger point, but this blog post reminds me of an Elizabeth Taylor quote: "The problem with people who have no vices is that generally you can be pretty sure they're going to have some pretty annoying virtues."