*Will contain spoilers for seasons 1-5 of Big Bang Theory*
Penny, of Big Bang Theory, has a drinking problem.
Apparently no one is talking about it, and it doesn’t seem a likely topic to come up in a serial sitcom with a laugh track. It would be, by far, the most serious issue they’d touch on, so I’m not holding my breath.
But she does.
She drinks when she’s stressed (when she was drinking with Leonard’s mother), drinks more than she intends to (numerous times she mentions this), does things she regrets while drinking (sleeping with Raj, sleeping with Leonard post breakup), and drinks to the point of passing out (several times she mentions she doesn’t remember what happened the night before, and she didn’t remember (sleeping with Raj or what happened between them).
She also drinks in private (several times Leonard walks in on her drinking since Season 1) and tries to hide the amount of liquor she drinks when drinking socially (season 5 she’s drinking with Amy and Bernadette and remarks that they finished the bottle, but she finished the vast majority of it. She then tells them not to talk about it when they point this out).
So why isn’t this being talked about?
Well, the biggest issue I see is the simple normalization of alcoholism. Most of the standard behaviours of alcoholics are featured in a lot of shows and movies that feature 18-35 year old characters. Binge drinking, drinking until you vomit, drinking to the point that you pass out are so normalized that people don’t realize that these are alcoholic behaviours.
I don’t feel there’s anything wrong with drinking, but I do feel there is something very wrong with media normalizing alcoholic behaviours. Young people who are drinking don’t realize that it’s not normal to always puke after drinking. Young people don’t realize that it’s not normal to drink until you pass out. Young people don’t realize that binge drinking is considered, in the United States, as having more than 4 (female) or 5 drinks (male) in one sitting.
Binge drinking increases the amount of risky behaviour that people engage in, including driving while intoxicated, having unprotected sex, violence, etc.
I’ve met several people in real life that tell me, braggingly, that they don’t remember the night before because they drank too much. They laugh it off as though it were something that everyone does – because they believe it. This idea surrounds us through our media, and it’s costing us.
In fact, alcohol has the highest cost, both personally and societally, ranking above heroin, marijuana, crack-cocaine, meth and mushrooms (study performed in Britain). And by far, the burden is put on others.
If you or someone you know is exhibiting these symptoms, you may have a drinking problem. Please try to get help – there’s plenty of free advice out there, and several programs available. Keep in mind that Alcoholics Anonymous does have listed that one of the 12 steps is to hand yourself over to God or a Higher Power and thus might not be for everyone.
Alcohol treatment might also be covered under your employer’s Employee Assistant Program (EAP).
It was exactly this tendency that made me hate Two and a Half Men so much: people saw Charlie Sheen’s character though not as an hero at least as something normalized and that’s a trend on television on the last two decades: we have normalized dysfunctional behavior. Think on Oliver Stone’s take on the dysfunctional family sitcom on Natural-Born Killers or Christopher Titus’ comedy that show us how derranged and damaging can this destructive behavior truly be in real life.
Of course I don’t try to appeal to shoe saccharine television of the same mold of Growing Pains and Father Knows Best but both fall in the same mistake: They don’t write real people since they don’t consider real people funny, they write broad brushes of an idea of a real person.
I like critical and hard hitting media about important topics, but to just laugh this stuff off is socially irresponsible. It’s like the ‘rape jokes‘ popularity. Say what you will, but I think joking about rape on TV is far more contributing to a rape culture than smutty books ever could.
It’s not like I want these people to stop talking about rape or alcoholism or bad behaviour in media – but I would really appreciate if we could talk about it. And hear the characters talk about it. Hell, even a tacky disclaimer at the end that warns that this behaviour is not responsible would be better than acting like everyone drinks until they have sex with someone they dislike, black out and forget the entire night.
I’ve been saying for a while now that it seems a real trend in media to be idolizing negative behaviour.
I first pegged my own concern upon this worship of the jackass. How the person who is rude or quick to violence in the face of the most minor of insults is seen as a real hero.
We seem to have developed a culture of idolized rudeness, hostility and all around self-destructiveness.
Remember Will & Grace, where the Karen character was an alcoholic? This was supposedly HILARIOUS. Whereas when someone is a crackhead it’s tragic. The cynic in me is muttering away about alcohol companies and product placement right now…
I can only imagine how well a show like Mad Men normalized people’s ideas of drinking. Alcohol companies must have had a wet dream over that.
Yeah, I know a lot of young people at my work who binge drink during the week ends. Ten plus drinks. They tell me bout how much they puked, how rotten they feel in the morning, and all the crazy stupid stuff they did that night. It starts to affect there job too as they stat calling in sick or not bothering to show up. What is the world comin to?
There’s always been people who have been irresponsible with drinking and/or drugs, but the normalization of the behaviour really can’t be helping people to be responsible about it.
I totally agree with this. Most people start consuming alcohol under the influence of their friend’s circle and, especially, movies. A lot of drug related scenes in number of flicks leave an impact on people. People copy their favorite stars and it’s their responsibility to understand the fact and warn their fans to avoid it whenever possible.