A Mark on a Glass is a Sign of the Times

My last day in Europe my eye caught something on the glass of wine in the airport hotel. Here's the takeaway: When culture changes businesses conform with or without legal mandates. Or go out of business.

(Aside, offsite airport hotels are pretty universal. In the right mood they are the caravansarai of people off on fantastic adventures. They can also be human warehouses for the disgruntled victims of flight delays. My hotel out under the flight path of the Frankfort airport, with its cold bleak view of tarmac, warehouses, and service roads felt a little more like the latter.)

Anyway, on the wine class were small marks indicating .25 liters and .125 liters. In German a viertel and and achtel. respectively. These are ubiquitous in bars and restaurants. Mandated by EU law they insure that you know what you are getting, whether its soft drinks, juice, wine, beer, or hard liquor (smaller measurements on smaller glasses.)

Very different from the ambiguous "large" and "small" found in the US, or the even vaguer "generous pour" of the typical American bar. We know that the folks selling drinks are measuring how much they sell. That is just inventory control. But why not specify the amount?

Its really another manifestation of cultural difference with regard to how much Americans want to experience (either as consumers or sellers) regulation. AND I note, there are variations in what we want to know. Increasingly we want to know calories even if it doesn't actually keep us from ordering the slice of cheesecake.

Its worth nothing that in this respect American culture is moving closer to Europe, albeit faster in some places than others. We think of these as shifts in law. But they are driven by changes in culture. And when those changes take hold even without mandates restaurants begin to conform to culture. If your American restaurant isn't indicating calories and content it will be soon. 

And yes, Europe is getting closer to the US. A few months ago Austria banned all smoking indoors in restaurants and bars. Going where Starbucks led 22 years ago with their first restaurant in Vienna. Back then everyone said Viennese would never give up their coffee/beer, newspaper, and cigarettes. But they have.

In my neighborhood one bar owner preferred to go out of business and left a sign on the door making clear his protest. But I doubt the economy will miss him (he was 76) or his last 4 octogenarian customers coughing their lungs out at the bar.  Like a mark on a glass, his too was a sign of the times. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Real United Methodist Church

There is a substantial difference between the  real  United Methodist Church and the  image  of the UMC asserted by traditionalists anxious to justify their decision to leave it. The real UMC is tens of thousands of congregations and pastors faithfully witnessing to Jesus Christ in the difficult context of contemporary society. In reply to my recent blog post ( https://xroadschristianityandculture.blogspot.com/2022/12/why-remain-in-umc.html ) Kevin B responded on Facebook, " The article is good in mentioning the positive contributions the Methodist connection has made even before the UMC was formed,  but it fails to address the significant and ongoing rejection of Methodist doctrine and practice that has caused this split. " The charge that the UMC has "significant and ongoing rejection of Methodist doctrine and practice" is now a commonplace among the group identifying as "traditionalist" and their associated organizations like the Good News Movement, the
Read more

UM Regionalization - Is it Fair?

In a recent editorial Rob Renfroe stated, “ Our friends in Africa with whom we work closely have told us they cannot remain in a church that allows for a contradictory, “contextualized” sexual ethic.” (for the whole piece see  https://www.umnews.org/en/news/traditionalist-caucus-president-speaks-to-criticism_ ) This provides his rational for remaining politically active in the UM General Conference. He's working to guarantee the rights of these "friends" to disaffiliate. Renfroe doesn't tell us exactly who these friends are, the basic idea here is  that by allowing regional decisions on same sex marriage and ordination of LGBTQ persons the UMC is saying that sexual ethics are a matter of cultural context rather than universal divine mandate . And this gets to the core of the Good News and WCA critique of the UMC. They maintain that there is a universal, biblical mandate for human sexual relations that is not subject to historical change and cultural evaluation. Renfro
Read more

The Long View

Some of you may know that for the last three years I’ve had only one functioning eye. Let me corner you at a party and I’ll tell you all about it.  The takeaway is simple. One can adapt. To look to my right I have to turn my head a lot further. Stretching exercises are a necessity, not an option. Especially when driving, one can’t be too careful about what’s coming up on the blind side.    Fortunately, right before losing the sight in one eye I had cataract surgery, and thus artificially overcame the myopia which had long necessitated that I wear glasses. And yet, like almost all of my fellow humans, I still have a particular form of myopia. It comes from the shape of our mind rather than that of our lenses, and makes it hard for us to take seriously even a future we can clearly see.  Many in my generation despised the efforts of Hal Lindsey and his ilk to scare us into faith through apocalyptic visions of the future. We thought Bob Dylan’s idea that a  Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall , or Jack
Read more