The White Lotus took this part of escapism way too far

Smartphones may be banned at the health spa, but the booze isn't?

Glass in the pool bugs me, but not as much as Laurie’s consequence-free binge drinking. Photo credit: Warner Bros.

If you’re a fan of The White Lotus like me, you no doubt remember the episode “Full Moon Party.” In it, the extremely thin gal pal trio of Jaclyn, Laurie and Kate convince their hot Russian hotel butler to take them out of their sleepy five-star Thai resort for a night of slumming it at a street fair and drug-fueled rave.

They drink that night. A lot. This might have been an interesting plot twist, considering they’re staying in a strict “wellness” resort where even smartphones are banned. Maybe they simply wanted a dopamine dose of judgement-free gin and tonics, without the scrutiny of the health spa staff standing over them?

No, they certainly don’t care about their health: They’ve been drinking heavily since episode one, sharing countless bottles of pricey wine as they gossip behind each other’s backs. At The White Lotus, the booze flows as freely as the vinyasas. It’s magical, too, with nary a consequence, even when mixed with benzodiazepines, a deadly combo IRL.

As the trio starts to take shots (!)¹, I kept holding out hope: Maybe these ladies who are in their mid-forties and barely eat would finally face at least a little bit of harm? But again, nope: After their raucous night, they simply …fell asleep? No one had the spins, no one threw up on themselves, no one woke up at 3 a.m. with panic-inducing insomnia, no one drunk-dialed an ex or bought something stupid on Amazon, no one blacked out, no one got assaulted, no one drove drunk, no one smashed their head in the shallow end of the pool. The worst thing that happened was when Laurie took off her top in the pool (and no one cared), and Jacklyn, who is married, slept with the Russian butler (and no one cared, except Laurie got a little jealous, which provided the show with unresolved catty drama for the next episode).

While I haven’t yet watched the finale, it seems like the only time we actually see a character second-guess their substance abuse is when Saxon, an obnoxious dude-bro, mixes alcohol with ecstasy. He’s reluctant about it. “I don’t do drugs,” he says, swallowing a pill while drinking. His steaming pile of regret the next morning leaves us with the implication that his typical policy of only getting drunk is somehow safer, which flies in the face of, I don’t know, every statistic ever?

A falsely neutral portrayal with true harm

Yes, I know this show is meant to be edge-of-your-seat escapism, with lots of murder, mayhem, and sex fueled by drugs, alcohol, and bad choices. And I LOVE watching it. But I also know there is the potential for real harm when one of the most popular TV shows in media history perpetuates, normalizes, and glamorizes alcohol, just like most other TV shows and movies currently do. (See also: Somebody, Somewhere on Max and Nobody Wants This on Netflix, both well-done, otherwise entertaining shows that sadly involve constant harm-free drinking. For a more authentic take, watch The Outrun, on Netflix.)

This is bad, y’all: In essence, alcohol has infiltrated nearly everything we watch, but no one on TV ever seems to get hurt by it

I’m not the first to notice this conundrum. “A 2019 analysis found alcohol remains the most frequently portrayed substance in films, and substance use (including alcohol) on screen was more often portrayed as having either neutral or rewarding consequences (such as increased popularity), in comparison to unrewarding consequences (such as vomiting or headaches),” notes a well-researched article about the problem of alcohol in the mass media, published in The Conversation. “One prime example is Ratatouille (2007). This Disney-Pixar film is so beloved by Gen Z it got turned into a TikTok musical. The film shows alcohol a whopping 60 times, even though it’s rated PG and aimed at children.”

Way back in 1985, addiction (and DWI!) researchers were also concerned, as highlighted in chapter 7 of the book Alcohol in America: Taking Action to Prevent Abuse. “The rate of drinking on television is greater than that in real life and the rate of problems associated with drinking on TV tends to be much lower. . . . If indeed alcohol is a major public health problem and, as the [National Research Council] panel estimates, is responsible for 50,000–75,000 deaths annually—you could not find this out from watching television."

While of course it’s hard to prove that being constantly bombarded with commercials and clips of people drinking leads to rising alcoholism rates, there’s no denying this: America’s drinking problem keeps getting worse, not better. More people than ever are getting sick and dying.

This was once the same problem with cigarettes, but it’s now far more regulated in the media than booze. This saved lives. Regulation works, but our lawmakers are too weak to do anything about it (and they’re too busy fucking up our entire country and climate as well).

So, while there’s not much you or I can do to fight back against Big Alcohol, we can at least teach ourselves and our kids: What you see on TV is almost always fantasy, including the harm-free drinking.

More by me on alcohol use disorder and systemic barriers to getting better:

• What if alcohol warning labels told the truth?

• The unspoken reason it's so hard to stay sober

1. I’m sorry, but if you think it’s fun to drink shots of cheap booze in your forties, you have a drinking problem, even if you’re on vacation.