‘Alcohol is part and parcel of work culture’
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr7rjmzlznvo
by Original_Success3895
‘Alcohol is part and parcel of work culture’
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr7rjmzlznvo
by Original_Success3895
28 comments
> Previous research found that one in five higher earners drinks alcohol at least five days a week.
> According to the latest NHS data, external, 32% of men and 15% of women in England drank more than 14 units in the past week, putting them at “increasing or higher risk of alcohol-related harm”.
> But research shows that 34% of employees actively avoid work socials due to alcohol, suggesting that something needs to change.
1 in 3 workers are avoiding work socials to get away from the leery work alcoholics.
1 in 5 higher earners drink alcohol 5 times a week.
Labour should ban the subsidised bar in Parliament and begin fixing our dodgy work culture there.
If we’re going to Nanny state people’s vices for health reasons let’s do it properly, not just target the ones MPs don’t indulge in themselves.
Over my working life, it’s reduced. I saw alcohol being consumed in the office less up to 2000 and since then I think a company had a champagne toast once.
Drinking after work is optional.
I think work events involving alcohol can be a problem, yes.
Alcohol is pathetic. Drinking culture is pathetic. I hate it all
I’ve been at the same company for 12 years, and the difference in the drinking culture even in that window is stark. Whether it’s a generational thing, a “cost of living” thing, or a societal change in how we view drinking remains unclear. The trend is definitely clear though; it’s dying out as an activity.
I’m an aussie expat living in hong kong and the brit’s are legends. The first time uk colleagues took me out they absolutely drank me under the table.
I work for a University were like a quarter of the staff are Muslim so you cant really do drinks socials which suits me in some ways.
I have a friend who is an accountant and the work culture between his work and mine is like night and day.
If I’m going to get smashed, I’d rather do it with my personal friends rather than work friends. Socialising with work friends isn’t truly switching off from work and there’s always the political and power dynamic elements. With work friends I’m always showing my “work face” and not my more personal one.
Hate alcohol and alcohol culture.
Went on stag do, 3 days of binge drinking, went to wedding – drinks from 11am to 1am, went on holiday people getting pissed 5am in airport and on plane.
Like WTF are we doing? How is this even allowed?
I vape weed on the wedding evening and get questioned about it. Culture, society, humans, lol.
One of the interesting things about the UK is that about 50% of the population has always barely drunk, having a drink less than once a week (so in reality probably a lot of people do just have a sherry at Christmas), and a significant minority (20% of the population currently) have been teetotal since the temperance movement came along in the 18C.
The pub and afterwork drinks is a bit like the Church of England – its cultural prominence far outweighs the actual engagement with it by the man of woman in the street!
And long may it remain. Alcohol (in moderation) makes everything better.
Go to a pub in the City of London on a Friday at 4/5pm and you’ll see the crazy amounts of people in suits drinking.
Personally I’ve always avoided socialising with work, partly because I’m introverted but also because I had heard about all the things that go wrong at boozy office parties that can even impact your job.
Last year I thought I’d give it a go for once, bumped into an English lad who snuck in a bottle of whiskey so we were mixing that into our free soft drinks all night (for clarity, most people were also drinking). He had a bit of a grudge against one of our superiors (I’ll call her X) who I actually didn’t have a problem with but as this lady stepped up to get an award for her work, the English lad next to me said “Fuck X”. I think he meant to say it more under his breath but it came out at a time just as the applause stopped so it was relatively audible. She kind of slowed down a bit as he said it but didn’t look in our direction and just carried on.
A month later I get let go because they’re “looking for a different personality”. No idea what happened to the English lad. Needless to say, never ever again, I will just get pissed up at home or with my small circle of trusted actual friends.
Some of the worst things I’ve seen have been at work events involving alcohol
Not even close to what it was in the 80s and 90s. Lunchtime drinking was acceptable in those days, never mind after work drinking.
I wish it still was. I had a blast in the 90s/00s with work mates of all ages after work and on nights out. Now it’s pretty sterile and sort of frowned upon for folk to let their hair down.
Who wants to drink with their work colleagues? Can’t wait to get away from them.
Back in the 80s my workplace had it’s own bar, packed every lunchtime.
Pre or post Covid. I have never enjoyed office nights out and rarely attend.
Why? Because I’ve already spent 8 hours of the day with these people. I want to get home and see my family!
Even if I did fancy a drink or night out I’d much rather do it with my real, outside of work friends or my wife.
I get on with people at work but I like the work/homelife separation. There’s people I choose to spend time with, and people I get paid to spend time with. Once I’m not getting paid to spend time with them I’m done.
I think the only reason office drinking culture survives at all is because there are many people unhappy with their home or social life and use work colleagues to fill that gap.
‘Luv me free elf care
Luv me drinkin, it’s me cultya
Luv me smokin
Ate exercise, jus dun lyke it
Ate taxes to fund me elf cafe
Why is the elf service at capacity and so shit now, it’s brown peoples fault’
This is news to me, don’t think I’ve encountered anyone drinking while at work.
‘High functioning people’? Used to call them alcoholics in my day.
There should be no bosses rule to it. Big issue is some people have long commutes, kids to take care of, don’t feel safe in some bars, recovering alcoholics etc and if you miss the work drinks you are the one missing out on projects on promotion because so many bad bosses make favourites like this
Our work do a last working day of the month drinks which I’ve never turned up to. People just seem to make fools of themselves and don’t use the time for what it is, networking. Telling my boss how I really feel after a few pints will probably set me back a year or two.
Alcohol is such a shit drug, no idea how it ever was popular
Reading this hungover in the office after a HR-paid social event with an unlimited bar tab
Career hospo here. The amount of drinks I prepare are either leaning more towards alcohol free or fancy bottle softs, afterwork drinks can lead to people being nice and pissed up, but itll only be one or two people out of a group as others slowed their consumption. It doesn’t feel like it’s due to the cost of living around here as they order plenty of food, many seem to have come to the conclusion that teleporting your evenings away by getting pissed as fast as possible and feeling terrible everyday just isn’t worth it.
I’d rather be buried alive than slop down pig shit with the sacks of meat at my work, just load me into the mud, no coffin please, just wet, wet mud.
Is it me or are there a lot of people in awful office environments? Like the way some people talk about their work colleagues is completely different from what I’ve experienced. I get along well with my team at work and we like our Christmas do’s and other work get togethers. Granted its impossible to from the office to the pub so we’d never go to the pub after work together.
I consider myself lucky that most places I’ve worked haven’t been centred around alcohol. One place absolutely was and it was difficult to fit in, make friends, join in conversations.