ford_truckin wrote: ↑Thu Nov 29, 2018 10:26 pm
Johnny Dangerous wrote: ↑Wed Nov 28, 2018 9:42 pm
The precept says nothing about "alcohol is a poison", or "alcohol is inherently bad so don't have anything to do with it". There are other teachings that certainly might say things like this, and we should adhere to the teachings which are definitive for us. If one is simply following the fifth precept though, then one just avoids intoxication which causes heedlessness, not much more to it than that from my point of view.
As far as Right Livelihood, IMO there is a
certainly a substantial difference between someone who sells alcohol exclusively for a living, and someone who serves it as an incidental part of their job (waiter at a restaurant serving beer and wine, as one example). Also as I mentioned, if one does something like work at a bar, one will likely be put into situations which certainly would test one's Right livelihood - deciding to serve alcoholic regular customers for example.
Just working at a restaurant though? Objecting to that is just overzealous moralizing, from my point of view, not application of Buddhist ethics.
If the person is earning tips from bringing alcohol drinks to their customers then it is wrong livelihood. Doesn't matter if they are working at a restaurant or bar. I don't believe in a watered down version of Buddhist ethics.
And alcohol literally is poison. This is scientific fact.
https://lifehacker.com/5684996/what-alc ... n-and-body
You prefer a Buddhist ethics you just make up based on in your own whims then? We are talking about the Fifth precept, not your opinions on what alcohol is.
I do addiction counseling for a living, I know a little about alcohol. There are many substances which are both poisons and medicines...in fact almost any psychoactive substance occupies both categories historically. The effects of alcohol that are most damaging actually arise from what the brain and physiology does in response under the wrong conditions, in addition how society views and uses them, not from some inherent property of the substance. in fact, *all* drugs mimic things that already exist in our neurochemistry/physiology, they don't create new states.
As far as your body seeing it as "poison"...sure, your body sees chiles that way too, ever tried eating a durian fruit? All kinds of things are like this.
I'm not saying alcohol doesn't damage people who abuse it, as I said, I do this stuff for a living and I know what it can do. But it's not the alcohol, it's the human preponderance to run away from pain, run after pleasure, and to try doing so with a 'quick fix' which is socially condoned combined with physiological factors that make alcohol dangerous.
I'm mystified as to what you think that goofy life hacker article proves, because it isn't anything your're claiming.