Ann Dowsett Johnston shares her story, and mind-blowing evidence about how alcohol harm is spreading among women, globally.
Alcohol abuse is rising in much of the developed world — and in many countries, female drinkers are driving that growth.
This is global: the richer the country, the fewer abstainers and the smaller the gap between male and female consumption.
The alcohol industry, well aware of this reality, is now battling for our downtime — and our brand loyalty. Wines with names like Girls’ Night Out, MommyJuice, Mommy’s Time Out, Cupcake and, yes, Happy Bitch, plus berry-flavored vodkas, Skinnygirl Vodka, mango coolers, Mike’s Hard Lemonade, all are aimed at us.
I came of age in the ’70s, a heady time for women in North America. Smack-dab in the middle of second-wave feminism, my baby-boom peers and I headed off to university in our miniskirts and tie-dyed T-shirts, assured by Gloria Steinem and a host of others that the world was ours for the taking. We could, in Steinem’s words, “grow up to be the men we wanted to marry.”
I became an award-winning magazine writer, got married and had a son. I created my own opportunities…
