Pleasure soaked in guilt - or not

Guilty pleasures? Easy. I'm a Roman Catholic whose father was Jewish. Goodness, I could teach a university-level course in guilt and still have enough material left for private tuition. Yet, there is nothing wrong and everything right in relishing what is pleasing as long as that pleasure is natural and moral. It doesn’t even have to be particularly constructive or endearing, merely harmless. Even if it harms the person it pleases it is not necessarily wrong.

The way, for example, we have persecuted smokers is outrageous and hypocritical. As tobacco is marginalized, legions of anti-depressants and painkillers — many of which may have as yet unknown long-term consequences — are welcomed into the mainstream. For me, though, it’s whiskey. More specifically, single-malt Scotch. I’d never touched the stuff until I went to university, where it was thought fashionable to have a bottle of Glenfiddich on the desk. Truth be told, most of the 18-year-olds I knew couldn’t stand the stuff, but were obsessed with the persona it presented.

Blended whiskey had always been the norm — cheaper, more common, and for most people, it had the taste that whiskey was supposed to have. My first glass of Laphroaig was at Merton College, Oxford. I was helped in the experience by the fact that I was sitting in a medieval room that was once the court of the wife of Charles I. That king was beheaded in 1649, but my taste buds were liberated rather than executed. This particular single malt is harsh and tough and not for everybody, but for me it was the sky, the sea, the everything. Thus began the journey through Highland Park, Glenmorangie, Balvenie, Macallan, and so many more.

Thing is, while a bottle of the holy nectar is not cheap, if drunk by someone on the right side of addiction, it will last. Unlike an expensive bottle of wine, it does not have to be consumed in one or two sittings. Some single-malts are ridiculously pricey, but $50 will usually buy something that tastes like an angel has just danced on your tongue. Pretentious? It depends. All connoisseurs, or people disguised as connoisseurs, use their own lexicon and try to make others feel excluded if they don’t quite understand the jargon. Ignore it. There are entire vocabularies used by drinkers to describe what they are tasting, but this is supposed to help classify particular single malts and make the whole process more accessible rather than limit the joy of whiskey drinking to a chosen few.

There is nothing that should provoke guilt in any of this, but the new war on fun in North America tends to regard all pleasures with a doubtful stare. To hell with them — let them drink themselves to oblivion on bad, weak, thin blended rubbish. Good Scotch induces a feeling of calm, happiness, and acceptance. It encourages a kind word and helps us to imagine that perhaps all is well with the world. Most of all, it tastes good and it’s an absolute pleasure. Golden rather than guilty.

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