Episode 04: Alcohol and Agency - The Question of Informed Choice

psychophobia* podcast · May 12, 2026 · 1h 36m · transcript

psychophobia* podcast

“The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”— Samuel Johnson

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Alcohol is one of the most culturally protected forms of psychological escape - normalized, celebrated, and rarely examined with the seriousness it demands. Beneath its social acceptability lies something more unsettling: a substance that numbs not only pain, but possibility. Michael sits down with Gary Allen, nearly eight years alcohol-free, to explore what happens when someone steps outside drinking culture entirely. Together they examine the mythology surrounding…