do I drink? used to.

how much? too much. hence my answer to question one.

it seems like more people are becoming aware of the idea that alcohol can be really harmful even when there's not a physical addiction. It seems like increasing use of terms like alcohol abuser, alcohol use disorder, etc. helps change the idea that there's this one type of alcoholic, they wake up and start drinking to function and they get the shakes if they don't. regular binge drinking doesn't look like that at all, but it's still really physically and mentally harmful. I feel like we have really normalized unhealthy alcohol use in a way that is dangerous to society.

there are of course people who use alcohol responsibly and like it for loosening up a little, the taste, the process, whatever. I don't think everyone should be sober or anything. but man for a lot of people it can be real bad and it's easy to be in denial by telling yourself it's like like you're addicted, you could stop if you really wanted to, you hold down a good job, you never drink before 5, etc.