Last year at the GQ Awards, singer Lily Allen had an on-stage, on-camera row with Sir Elton John brought on by her quite literally shameless public drunkenness. Allen even went so far as to bring an entire bottle of champagne to the podium with her, refilling her glass at least once before the award went out. Does anyone remember what the award was or who won it? Hell no. Everyone just remembers that Lily Allen wore her intoxication on her shiny, sleeveless dress and had a few choice words for a knight in Her Majesty's fabulously musical service. There was something beautiful about that moment. It was two sides of the lush coin showing at once, even colliding. Who you see as the hero in that instant is as good a personality test as the long form Myers-Briggs.
The uninformed would mistake Sir Elton as the stand-in for all sober, respectable people. This is incorrect on two fronts. First, there's no such thing as a sober, respectable celebrity. Even without chemicals, being famous is an altered state of consciousness. More importantly, Elton John is not your straight-edge friend who puts up with your drunken stupidity. No, the good knight is actually the friend who partied way harder than everyone else way back when and now he's doing his best to stay clean. I don't know enough about the guy to tell whether or not he's the superior bullshitting type of recovering addict who thinks he's got the key to healthy living just because he kicked a habit that got out of control, but I do know that his indignation at the GQ Awards was more complex than just being paired with a sloshed 20-something at a serious moment.
Being sober is problematic. Former addicts know this better than anyone. Being clean means having no excuse for impolite behavior, among other kinds of social faux pas. Nobody wants to be in Elton's position, but more folks than will readily admit it love those rare opportunities to play Lily's part. The first thing alcohol does to the human brain is dull those areas of highest function, what Sigmund Freud called the Superego, those learned emotions associated with how we think others perceive us. The Romans knew this, which is where we get the phrase In Vino Veritas: In Wine There Is Truth.
As with everything made easier by intoxication, honesty certainly doesn't require chemical courage. Of course, showers aren't required if one wants to get clean, strictly speaking. Having a quick, easy way to accomplish a state of being has always been our species' preference. We drink so we can both feel uninhibited enough to say what we really want to say and so we have plausible deniability later when we're sober. People use drunkenness as a Get Out of Honesty Free card. "Never mind what I said last night. I was completely wasted."
I don't buy that and neither should anyone with a lick of sense. Drunk people are terrible liars too numb to feel the cuts of their own stupidity. It's sober folks you've got to watch out for. What's less trustworthy than a person who knows exactly what they're saying? The lush lifestyle is one at least partially motivated by an abhorrence of the disingenuous.