By: MinaRose2023 & TopTierTitan
Hello everyone this is MinaRose2023 writing about a heavy topic Alcoholism. My family suffered from the effects of Alcohol. My grandfather was an alcoholic who ended up hurting me as a child. He’s dead now but even so it affected me and my mother. So in this article, I will be writing about three Alcoholic Characters I know well and why having them in Anime is important.
Canna from Fairy Tail is an alcoholic who I believe became an alcoholic both because of not being able to ever tell her father Gildarts who she was. She also felt like she could never be an S Class Wizard to tell him. Over time this and the environment of the party made her turn to alcohol. She never hurts anyone and generally, everyone knows she just drinks alcohol a lot. But I think this is closely related to how she feels inadequate to tell her father how she began to turn to alcohol.
Willow Schnee from RWBY is another alcoholic woman who had begun drinking due to the abuse and the reason why Jacques Schnee married her. Her alcoholism however negatively affected Weiss, Winter, and even Whitley by her being addicted to alcohol they stopped having a mother taking care of them.
So in this way, we see how debilitating alcoholism is to the Schnee family.
Qrow Branwen from RWBY is another example of an alcoholic in anime. He is loved by his nieces and truly cares for them. Likewise when they see him abusing alcohol even further after the truth comes out about Salem and Ozpin in volume 6 Ruby addresses it and both Yang and Ruby need to help him up the stairs of Jaune’s sisters house. He later realises how alcohol is affecting him and we see how he slowly starts to begin to stop his dependency on alcohol.
In these ways we see how alcohol affects others and most importantly how it affects those who struggle with alcoholism. I think it is important to see this in media because so many are affected by this addiction.
If you or a loved one struggle with alcohol addiction in this article we added resource sources for help. You’re not alone and you or your loved one can heal.
I hope this article helps someone thanks to my co-writer TopTierTitan for adding from his experiences as well.
TopTierTitan coming to you today with the profoundly serious and sometimes understated topic of alcoholism. Giving you examples from my own life as well as several anime characters and how it affects us and the people around us in many ways, mostly negative.
Beginning with experiences from when I was only a few months old and another when I was about a year old. I can remember my father getting me purposefully inebriated to quell my cries when he felt I was getting too much to handle for him. Both instances getting me stumbling and falling over and hitting my head on the coffee table to where I was bleeding. My earliest memories of him coming into my room and being upset at my brother and I for existing. It would change him and he would become a different person, he would get annoyed more easily and anger quicker, there would be times where he would drink in such excess, he would leave himself in a pool of urine. Eventually being able to consume an entire case of 48 beers by himself he would care less about things that he used to care about. He would drive to work drunk not thinking of the consequences or how it may affect us or others. Many times, he would change into a type of monster that I would be scared for my life.
My father’s father also had a drinking problem causing many issues, bringing me to a golf course and hitting me in front of others because I did not swing the club correctly. My brother getting drunk enough on Saint Patrick’s Day he went to the hospital for alcohol poisoning. Another incident where my brother crashed through an airplane runway fence and caused several thousand dollars’ worth of damage, getting him a DUI and enough fines that lasted several years to pay off. Even myself getting drunk enough one time where I did not have the strength to lift myself, I could only crawl to the bathroom and just wait to be sober again.
One of the first anime characters that comes to mind when you talk about drunks is Atsuko from Yu Yu Hakusho, Yusuke’s mother is often depicted being a lush or out drinking, unconcerned for him or his safety. Atsuko is often shown as flirtatious or just absent in many aspects of his life, only showing concern when it comes to being able to provide or contribute monetarily to their living situation. This further bolsters his flippant attitude towards most things that he is involved with, why care when most people only show their love for money or power.
Next, we have Vash the Stampede who drinks because of the mental scars from trying to save everyone. He knows from experience that he cannot save everyone but still he goes out of his way to try, even putting his own body at risk. The physical pain only outweighed by the mental pain of the memories from those he could not save. Living a life on the run under the idea that he caused damages that are not his own fault, yet he cannot bring himself to explain this to those that matter.
From these few examples we can clearly see that not only does it affect yourself and how you act towards others it affects those around you. Although fooling you into thinking you were acting courageously it can easily warp the mind into doing something brash or without regard for bystanders. A warm feeling in your belly is small consolation for when it is abused and used as a crutch, the consequences can be far reaching with deep scars that may take years to heal or go away.
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1-844-289-0879 USA Alcohol Addiction Helpline
1-888-744-0069 USA Alcohol Abuse Hotline
1800888236 Australia Direct Line for Alcohol Addiction
1300222222 Alcoholics Anonymous in Australia
Hogar Crea in different municipalities in Puerto Rico Línea CREA: 787-761-0715 Oficina Central / Bayamón 939-273-8838, 939-450-7860 / Cayey-Ponce 787-738-7268/ Juncos 787-734-1767/ San Juan-Trujillo Alto 787-400-9914/ Mayagüez-Aguadilla 787-805-1522
Uk Addiction Helpline 0808 163 9632
Uk drinkline national alcohol helpline 0300 123 1110
Germany’s support for alcohol, medication, and drug problems, available online and also by telephone on 0180 365 2407
Japan’s contact through DARA in Thailand +66 8 7140 7788
Confidential alcohol hotline in France 0811 91 30 30
French AA 08 20 32 68 83
KETHEA
Therapy Center for Dependent Individuals
Sorvolou 24
11636 Athens
T: 210 9241993 – 6
