27 Common Misconceptions You Have About Drinking

Ahhh, the demon drink. Since long before Biblical times, people have been commiserating with one another over the effects of booze on the body, the family and society in general. The ancient Egyptians wrote about it, Shakespeare had a few words to say on the subject, and Protestant temperance and prohibitionist activists have been campaigning to have alcoholic beverages legally restricted or banned outright for over two hundred years - notably succeeding, at least temporarily, in the early 20th century in the USA, Norway, Finland and Iceland. In fact, although Iceland repealed the prohibition of spirits in 1923 after only eight years, beer remained illegal there until 1989. Regardless, the consumption of alcoholic beverages has become such a worldwide phenomenon over thousands of years that it appears that humanity has evolved the mutant ability to make booze out of anything: fruit, vegetables, herbs, flowers, you name it. If an enterprising Welsh rugby player were trapped on an island with nothing but puffins for company for little more than a week, he'd come back with a dozen cases of Puffin Ale. Pub culture in the United Kingdom is such that even those of us that don't drink know enough about it to do reasonably well in a booze-themed round in a pub quiz. Booze has permeated our society - and of course, if enough people go on about a subject then, like cultural weeds, up springs the dreaded urban myth. When people get the wrong idea, engage in Chinese whispers, or simply make stuff up wholesale about drinking, it's time to set a few things straight: these are the most common misconceptions about drinking.

27. Too Much Beer Can Give You A Pot Belly

Not what most people mean when they say they have rock hard abs, the pot belly has had a prolonged association with an overabundance of pints for decades now, and mostly for no good reason. Alcohol itself doesn't make you gain weight: it's the calories in it... trouble is, people who drink like thirsty fish on leave from the Marines tend not to watch what they eat or when they eat it, and usually have a laissez-faire attitude towards exercise. Added to that, regular heavy drinking can potentially screw around a little with your hormones, changing the way fat is deposited on your body. But sorry - there are too many other factors at play to blame your 'beer belly' on beer alone.

26. Once You've Broken The Seal You Can't Stop Peeing

We've all heard it - that the first long, triumphant urination after the beginning of a drinking session signals the arrival of wave upon wave of toilet breaks throughout the remainder of the evening. But no, 'breaking the seal' is not a real thing. Alcohol is a diuretic - that means more booze will inevitably mean more pee. Holding off from that first giant hosing of the toilet wall (you piglets) will not keep the wee wee fairy away, it'll just make you wet yourself at the bar like a big numpty.