Women and Drinking

A new British police initiative is underway to prevent rapes during the heavy holiday drinking season. The campaign sprung from research charting an increase in sex attacks and rape during December and January in recent years as well as reports that alcohol plays a part in two thirds of all rape cases.

There was a time when drinking alcohol was a punishable offense for women, but the flappers of the 1920's helped put a stop to that. The unladylike behavior of barroom drinking has come a long way since Hank Williams sang about the wiles of honky tonk women. Reruns of Sex and the City reinforce the idea that dishing about your lovelife while downing a cosmopolitan in a swanky bar is a rite of bonding for high-flying ladies.

This brought to mind our interview with Alex Morris. Alex wrote about a rise in female drinking for New York magazine. Her article reflected studies showing that more women are drinking - and drinking more. While men were cutting back, women’s dependency on alcohol was going up. Some women believe that drinking like the boys in the office is the path to promotions; others say that feminism means one can choose to be out of control. We're also joined by Dr. Richard Grucza, an epidemiologist at Washington University School of Medicine.

(Photo by Logan Antill via Flickr/Creative Commons)