Habits are the characters already formed which can hardly be discarded because they have taken deep root and control of the person involved. One may wish or desire to stop certain habits at some points but because the strength inherent in habits can be all encompassing and like growing fat in the liver, it can overshadow one’s ability to disengage from it, it is difficult to really stop it.
I have seen people who have included as part of their new year resolutions the dropping of certain habits but alas, the moment such decisions to stop are taken, the power of practicing the habit comes heavily on them that they cannot but fall back to their past. Well, when character formation is based on good virtues, it becomes advantageous but it is bad when the characters formed are irresponsible and uncalled for. The victim of habit may wake up to say. “I don’t want” but may not really have the power to stop thereby leaving such a person in slavery and bondage to negative attitudes.
Habits can be disgusting when it is a negative one. The one we dwelt on last time was that of drunkenness. Drunkenness is excessive in-take of alcohol into our system. Even though some researches have it that a little of it in the system can help the body function. How many people who drink alcoholic beverages do take a little at a time? Experts in human health have advised that a bottle for a day is okay but most people when they get into pubs, several green bottles are declared as a show of affluence.
Those who go to drinking places with their friends will always want to impress others by declaring bottles as a mark of arrival. They can sit in to gulp several bottles. Sometimes when I watch them, my interest is usually in counting the number of bottles consumed; sometimes I do record as much as several cartons consumed by a group between four and six persons. At such times, I usually have wondered where all those liquids go to in the body. Why don’t the heavy drinkers fall sick because too much of everything is bad. When you drink water up to 1 litre at a time, you hardly can breath but one person can gulp more than two litres of alcohol at a stretch and simply walks away. They may survive but the organs in the system especially the liver are usually terribly affected.
Behaviour could be dangerous. For instance, if you happen to meet a drunkard behind the wheels, wherever and whenever there are traces of confusion along the path. He drives so reckless and you don’t ever make the mistake of calling him to order because it is tantamount to calling a lunatic to order. Of course what you will receive back is abuse and fight. The show of shame can be overwhelming to a sane man that the best thing to do when you encounter a drunkard on the way is to give him his space because at that point in time he is not in control of these actions. The spirit in him can even lead him to lie down on heaps of refuse or at the centre of the road without really knowing what has happened. Little wonder why the scripture admits that “wine is a mocker” and that “if you want a fool to die quick, give him wine”.
The philosophies of women liberation have left some women with the belief that whatever a man can do a woman can do even better. That is why when you enter some beer parlors you see women who come on their own to booze. When the men are declaring several green bottles, they place their own demands all in the bid to tell the men “oh! If you think that you have the money and brain to take in several bottles, we can do it much better”. And true to their word they settle down to drink shamelessly in public.
Such women in their ignorance forget that when it comes to alcohol men and women do not have equal capacities to absorb the liquid contents of green bottles. Women should understand that for the reason of their safety and health, there can be no competition of any sort with men when it comes to consuming alcohol. Researchers have shown that women are affected by alcohol more because they tend to have greater proportion of body fat than men. Fat cannot absorb alcohol easily. So greater portion of alcohol is deposited in the blood stream. Women have less of stomach enzymes that break down alcohol before it gets down to the blood stream. Women absorb up to 40% more alcohol into their blood stream than men. Based on research, women are usually shorter and lighter than men, as a result of these; they tend to concentrate more alcohol in their blood. Consequently, -when a woman with the same average size with a man consumes one bottle, its effect on her is the same as two bottles in the man.
In view of all these side effects of alcohol on women, a woman who thinks she can compete with a man in drinking is simply exposing her self to greater health risks. Another risk which women suffer is rape. This is because a woman has lighter weight and lighter brain. When she takes as much quantity of alcohol with men she is easily thrown off balance. Some have lost
