This morning, while drinking my morning coffee, I read this headline: “5 Gadgets That Will Help You Drink Wine In The Shower.” Subhead “Don’t be afraid to enjoy a beverage while you bathe.”
My blood began to boil.
I’m getting tired of writing responses to these stories. But they keep being published. So the message bears repeating.
This story, published by Food & Wine, uses the typical trope: clickbait headline + wacky tone (sometimes you just *need* to have a drink in the story) + product roundup. It’s similar to a story Cosmopolitan published in May titled “I Hid Three Bottles of Wine in My Clothing And Nobody Noticed.”
I said it about the Cosmo story and I’ll say it about this piece: these are slippery at best and dangerous at worse narratives.
I know, I know, it’s just a joke. I’m the sober killyjoy. It’s meant to be funny. Lighten up.
Except that I can’t. As a member of the media, I used to toss stories like this out without thinking. Nudge nudge, wink wink — who doesn’t drink in the shower? The only thing is I believed my own hype. I believed our own hype. I believed that I could create stories and posts filled with cocktail carts images and “you deserve it” references, without consequence. I believed it so hard that I let myself off for drinking that glass of wine or later, ten, a night.
I believed it that I drank so hard I passed out in those very halls where Food and Wine is now created. Three years ago this month, actually. Passed out, bruised, broken. Filled with guilt and shame. Thinking about drinking in the shower.
But that’s my problem, right?
Wrong.
We are a nation besieged by substance abuse and addiction. Most of the headlines are, and for good reason, about our opioid crisis. But alcohol still kills more people. One in every 12 adults suffer from alcohol abuse or dependence along with several million more who engage in risky, binge drinking patterns that could lead to alcohol problems.
You know what a risky, binge drinking pattern looks like?
It looks like drinking in the shower.
Yes, I know Food and Wine has “Wine” in the title. I understand the advertising implications, especially now. But that doesn’t mean publishing a story like this is OK. It doesn’t mean it’s smart.
It is tone-deaf. It’s careless. And I know my media colleagues can do better. That’s the dialogue we need to have.
Because somewhere a young woman is questioning how much she drank the night before. She’s questioning the cultural norms that tell her, despite all the evidence, that she deserves to drink. She’s questioning why drinking makes her feel like shit but she keeps doing it. She’s getting further and further away from her truth, but, hey, everyone drinks, right?
Somewhere this young woman is scrolling through her feed. Wine in the shower? However subtly, she’s reminded that there is an easy out she can access anywhere! And that wine should be at the ready everywhere. Funny funny, ha ha.
Maybe this young woman will examine her relationship to alcohol. (Encouragingly, there’s also been a wave of stories about people opting out of drinking.) Or maybe not. The tipping point is different for every one of us. But that wine in the shower bit? For many, it’s too close to home.
My plea is for my media colleagues to really be thoughtful about how they tell stories related to alcohol. To have a critical eye when writing, editing, producing, and approving content. To have discussions with writers and staffs so they can approach creating this content with a level of intelligence and empathy. That includes everything from captions to headlines, from product placement to the number of times booze reference appears in your ‘Grams. I encourage them to talk with people in recovery, those who have “opted out,” those who have gone to the depths, and those who have touched the edge. (Really, it doesn’t take that much to find us. We are all over media. We’re all over this world, and only getting more visible.)
We know you are just trying to make a living. We know you are just trying to do your job. Please just listen. Please be thoughtful. Please come to the table and have us at yours. Let’s tell a better story.
Erin Shaw Street is a writer and editor based in Birmingham, Alabama. She writes about travel, culture, food, health/wellness, and sobriety. She has not drank in the shower, or anywhere else, since March 13, 2016.