Have You Ever Been Drunk on the Job?

I suppose it depends on the policy of the company. At my old job it was alright to have one drink on your lunch hour. Now you couldn't sit at your desk and chug a beer or sip wine while you work. I personally have not ever drank on the job but I have come in still drunk from the night before and it was the worst 8 hours of my life. So I don't think I will be doing it again.

My drunk friend tested that, and now lives with her mama, no job, got a DUI and lost custody of her kids. If your drunk at work, you need help. Unless your porn star, then anything goes.

Most of the world must be laughing at this article, as are members of our parents' and grandparents' generations. Drinking at lunch doesn't make someone an alcoholic, and it doesn't mean that they then spend the afternoon drunkenly hooking up with coworkers in the supply closet or dancing on the table, lampshade on head, during important presentations. The world doesn't end, work gets done, and people are actually *happier* doing their jobs (contrary to the American opinion, happy workers and a productive workplace are not mutually exclusive).

I worked for a while at a bar in the downtown business center of Perth, Australia, where the whole whitecollar world turns out to have a couple pints during lunch. Daytime drinking is commonplace in Latin America, and ubiquitous in parts of Europe. Studies have shown that drinking only affects inhibitions to the extent that people expect it to do so (so, if a beer at lunch makes you get all wild and crazy, it's only because you're expecting/looking for an excuse to GO wild and crazy).

America's neo-Puritan stance on alcohol is physically and psychologically detrimental to the wellbeing of its population. Judgement, shaming, guilt, and pointless criminalization feed into a culture of fear and mutual animosity, even while research continues to demonstrate that well-adjusted moderate drinkers have better health and greater longevity than do non-drinkers (or heavy drinkers).

Alcohol is not a problem in and of itself; it merely has the potential to cause problems, as do many other things. If someone drinks at work and their preformance and productivity are suffering, of course they should be fired. If someone's daily drinking is interfering with their ability to maintain relationships or fulfill their obligations, and that person does not adjust their habits in consequence, then that person is an alcoholic. Otherwise, a person's drinking should be of no interest to anyone else.

I know quite a few people who are under the influence, be it drinking or smoking pot. I don't necessarily condone it, but if you can function at your job, and the safety of others is not dependent on you, do what you want. If you get caught, it's your #$%$

Not while on the clock, however in my NAVY days while stationed in LaMaddelena Sardegnia, I was most of the off time. Once that duty station was over (2 years for overseas rotation) I haven't been.

I drank when I waitressed, enough to be very drunk but I always made more money on those days. Guess I was more relaxed and friendly. I wouldn't do it at the boring job I have now. I'd be sleeping at my desk!

I couldn't and wouldn't do it

Yep, I used to drink all day because my job was so boring one summer. I'd never got to intoxicated, just a drink every break I got. Finnaly I realized I needed a new job. Flying olains was just not for me.

Before you answer the question, know this: when you go out drinking at night, come home drunk at 1am, sleep till 7 am and go to work, and then you work all morning until lunch time. As you drive out to get some lunch, you are still legally drunk. If you have an accident and your blood alcohol is tested, you will be arrested for drunk driving. If someone dies in that accident, you just committed murder. That is how low the threshold is for a legal finding of DUI.

Functional alchoholics. That's what I call them. I know a lot of people who just can't stand other people unless they are half drunk. When they are sober, they are critical of everything and ornery and mean. I actually prefer them half drunk. Don't get me wrong, cause they hold full time respectable jobs 40 hours per week.

Hmm I went to work tipsy but no one noticed, not doing it again specially because the computer is annoying to my eyes plus i wouldnt want to get caught. However me and a co worker keep a flask around and once in a blue moon we take a shot. lol

I have never and will never drink on the job. It's just not my style. I've suspected others of doing it, but they've never said straight out that they did, nor did I ever ask. It's not my place to worry about it. They are grown ups and can make their own decisions, plus they have bosses who should monitor for that type of behaivor. So if someone is drinking on the job or coming to work drunk, who cares. Unless it is directly interferring with my life or my work, I don't care what other people do with their time. I don't feel I should have to babysit other adults behaivors, I feel I only need to control mine.

One of the saddest things I've ever had to do was when I had to turn away a guy who I'd known since I was 9 (he was a friend of my brothers and of mine) at my front door and refusing to allow him to come in because he was drunk and had, for quite some time, had a pattern of inappropriate and/or aggressive behavior when drunk. He was still drinking the next morning at 8am following my brother's wedding reception, he drank before work and was fired from several restaurants where he worked as a server because he drank on the job too, has had his license suspended for DUIs twice (that I know of), and is banned from nearly every restaurant with a bar in a 3 mile radius from where he live(s/d?) because of his "unruly" behavior towards both employees and other customers when he came in and started drinking. Things hit the point where I had to tell him that I couldn't be around him if he had been drinking or was going to drink - I couldn't deal with any more drunken "stark naked and it's ok because we're like family" arguments that had me insisting (from a safe distance) that he get dressed, random knocking on my front door at weird times because he decided he wanted to stop by and visit with me, begging him to get help to stop drinking because the men in his family have a history of alcohol-related health conditions causing them to die in their late 40's only to be told that he "had it under control" and I should stop worrying, and so many more issues that were caused by his drinking. I'm not saying that everyone who has a drink at some point in their day is an alcoholic or even that those who get completely drunk when they go out are alcoholics and need rehab - but I doubt that my friend started out drinking the way he eventually got into doing, which is daily and involves large quantities (think over a 12 pack of beer all by himself plus hard liquor added in as well pretty regularly) nor do I think he thought he'd ever get to this point with his alcohol consumption either.

It's important to be responsible when and/or if we, as individuals, are going to have a couple of drinks - but there are always going to be some people in the world who cannot see that they are heading down or are already on a bad road. They are NOT making good decisions, and with alcohol, their decision-making skills get WORSE. For those people, all we can do is hope that they will eventually listen to our urging them to get help and take actions to at the very least, protect the safety of ourselves and others. Not everyone is able to stick around until their friend/family member does one of two things; dries themselves out for good, drinks themselves to death (possibly taking other innocent lives with theirs in the process) and whether or not to walk away is difficult decision to make. Concern for how much another adult has been drinking is about SAFETY, NOT babysitting or wanting to control how much fun or ability to exercise their free will that a person who is of legal age can have. If they're getting drunk on the job, do you think it'd be a good idea to take a gamble on whether they're not also going to be drunk on their "off" time and driving around on the streets around where you live? Would you get in a car with them behind the wheel?