I'm of the opinion that the advertising or whether or not it's a girl's drink are equally unimportant. If you like it, drink it and if you don't, then don't.

Actually, I hear Bailey's and coffee is a popular morning drink amongst scientists at McMurdo Base in Antarctica, amongst both men and women alike. But those people are in the coldest place on Earth and a bunch of drunkards to boot, so I won't call them girls.
Modern Drunkard Magazine did an article on being soussed at the South Pole a few years ago.

Bailey's is creamy. I don't know about you, but if I'm boozing it up, I don't want cream. You're just asking for technicolor vomit.

Now Drambuie, that a drin...hell, I can't even say it as a joke. That stuff is nasty. Reminds me of Liquore Strega.

You might find this related Kids in the Hall skit amusing: Girl Drink Drunk

I rather like Baileys. I'd rather a glass of that than a pint of wifebeater any day.

No ice, mind. That's just wrong.

I'll drink almost anything except Baileys
and Advocaat.

A beer for the gentleman
and wine or a fruit based drink for the lady

Al Murrey Pub Landlord

Of course it is a girl's drink. And yes, definitely no ice.

So James, just how bad is your hangover, then?

heh

mmmm baileys (girl's drink) mmmmmmm
No ice, definitely, but I have to confess to liking it.

I suppose it's a bit like the ludicrous advertising attempt to pretend that Babycham is anything other than a girl's drink. The only time I've had that was when I was 8 years old (my parents taking the "baby" bit of it a bit too literally).

It's good poured over ice cream, and I really like it in coffee. It's bloody expensive, though.

Men have the following options for inebriation:

Beer
Whiskey
Vodka
Gin
Tequila

Anything else is forbidden.

Only latent gays think there are girl's drinks and men's drinks.

Only latent gays think there are girl's drinks and men's drinks.

Absolutely. Whereas proper, out-in-the-open gays know that there are butch drinks and nelly drinks... and some annoying ones that won't say either way, at which point it's all down to how you hold the glass.

Any drink with cream in it is obviously intended for invalids or the cat, certainly not for men - the dribbles tend to solidify in your beard.

Charlie, I think wine is acceptable as long as it is drunk out of a cask. As in, straight from the tap.

Around here Bailey's is mainly known as the top layer of a "Slippery Nipple". That's Bailey's floating on Sambuca. Great shooter in the winter.

Only latent gays

Also Australians. I will leave the logical deductions for the rest of you

Bailey's is tolerable when mixed with Jameson and dropped into Guinness.

"Only latent gays

Also Australians"

And the difference is... ?

If I'm drinking a Bailey's and it is actually a girl's drink, then it is that girl's responsibility to demand it back from me. Surely you libertarians don't expect the state to intervene in such a private matter.

Bugger off, you wannbe-asian poof. Baileys is a great drink.

I find it easier to say to my girlfriend that "yes, you're absolutely right Baileys IS a girl-only drink, now the deal is that you stay well away from my port and the bottle of Tokay that Adriana gave me for my birthday and I won't touch your Baileys"

Life, like South Korea, is so much easier when you have a clear DMZ.

Adriana gave you a bottle of Tokay for your birthday? She didn't give me a bottle of Tokay for my birthday.

I have a chum who is normally a Stella and vodka man, and he'll have the occasional Bailey's. Mind you, it is his wife's bottle.

Drambuie now, that is an acquired taste. Someone bought me a bottle once, and by the time I got to the end I was beginning to find it just about tolerable, but it's sure not Jack Daniel's.

Don't spose you pooves could 'andle
a pot or two of scrumpy then?
There is a pub here in Bristol
called the Cotham Porter Stores
which is a scrumpy cider house with a fiercly loyal
clientelle.
I drop in occasionally to check up on who is left alive.
On the wall is a poster for Taunton Cider
bearing the visage of someone who looks like Worzel Gummage, and has been attacked by lit cigarette butts and cheesegraters, with legend
Good Health!
The promotions people at Taunton Cider obviously favour their own product, cos their advertising skills have surely gone to hell!

Do the people here have a problem with girls' drinks? Gimme a couple more Baileys, and then we can take this matter outside ...

Woops! Wrong again!!
I just googled the place up out of interest.
It was the actual pub sign I was referring to apparently. (How many had I had that last time I was in there!)
The site sez the sign may have been painted by one J Lennon esq.
Though "rocking horse people eating marshmallow pies"
describe the regulars perfectly.
I think it's a bit porky scratchings dont you?
Go have a look!

I'm all for Bundy Rum, myself. I've got a bottle sitting right here waiting for Australia to beat England in the cricket tomorrow.

personally i find a glass of the stuff settles my stomach nicely after i've been drinking all night - sort of like milk, but with the added advantage of at least a minimal alcohol content.

I'm all for Bundy Rum, myself. I've got a bottle sitting right here waiting for Australia to beat England in the cricket tomorrow.

I just happen to have a bottle of Hendricks gin (takes a Scot to make the best gin in the world) and an ample store of tonic water for exactly the same purpose - the idea being that after the fall of the 5th England wicket for some ridiculously low score I will neither notice it nor care any more.

What about last year's hit Magners in a glass full of ice then?
Amusingly ironic (if rather expensive) blokey drink, or definite sign that one "likes shopping"?

Whisky for my men, and beer for my horses.

The only possible purpose that I can see for Baileys is to try and get the cat drunk. And if the cat is drunk, he can't beat up the Dobermanns.

The advertising mentioned sounds like the commercials in the US for Saronno (almond-flavoured liqueur), which is shown being drunk by hairy-chested he-men. Which is nonsense - if men wanted that flavour, they'd just drink Vicks cough syrup and be done with it.

llater,

llamas

Why have you forbidden Rum, Charlie?

I once drunk half a bottle of Swiss Chocolate Liquor.

If you have ever consumed a pint of building adhesive, you will know how my mouth felt the next morning.

That is the reason Baileys and its ilk are girls drinks, its just not possible to drink them in any quantity.

Yes Charlie. Why not rum? How can any highly flammable beverage be a Girl's Drink™?

Perhaps I should elaborate on the highly flammable. Maybe James won't mind the diversion.

When I was a sailing instructor, we would once or twice a year have parties than ran three or four days. The beverage of choice was always some form of rum. Bringing something unusual was encouraged. Overproof rums (~150-160 proof) were unusual (and sure to impress). And at least once Everclear (190 proof) was passed around. It is actually 95% pure ethanol and is distilled from grain, not cane. But at that strength, finer distinctions are sometimes lost on the consumer. From Wikipedia: "Everclear is also gaining popularity as fuel for the alcohol stoves."

I'm not sure if this particular adventure was conducted with overproof or Everclear or both, alternately. My own recollection is a little hazy (due to the time which has passed, of course), but as on most nights many bottles were passed around the bonfire. One night was to be the sort of adventure that comes from watching too many James Bond flicks and begins with "That was nothing. Watch this!" and degenerates into a pissing contest.

Most of you have probably seen carnies blasting great jets of flame out of their mouths. Mind you, it's not as easy as it looks.

Again, the details are lost in the fog (of time, that is), but a few points stand out that should be understood by anyone attempting the feat. The basic method we used was take as big a breath as you could, take as big a mouthful from the bottle as you could, grab a burning ember from the fire, hold it near your chin, tilt your head back and blow hard.

Here are some suggestions. Most, but not necessarily all, were learned by observation rather than personal experience.

1. With lungs full to bursting and a mouth full of ethanol, strongly resist any swallow reflex. If you are unable to resist, at least be sure you are away from any sources of ignition.

2. Take a tiny swallow before starting so that you have some idea of what is in store if you forget suggestion 1.

3. Don't inhale. Trust me on this. Failing to follow the first and second suggestions triggers coughing which inspires inspiration and when done with your mouth full has some unpleasant consequences.

4. The ember you select should show a consistent flame, but should probably not be popping, crackling and throwing sparks.

5. Make sure the ember has an end that is not burning and grab it by that end.

6. If some generous person hands you their ember, mind suggestion 5, above. Glowing bits may not be obvious.

7. Approach the burning ember to your face slowly. It makes judging the distance a little easier.

8. When your mouth and lungs are full, do not attempt to answer any questions.

9. Do not dribble. If you do, extinguish it quickly and anticipate shaving the remainder of your beard the next day. Which may involve some temporary additional discomfort.

10. After blowing all of the air out of your lungs with great effort (which hopefully resembles full afterburner on a fighter jet but may in fact bear closer resemblance to projectile vomiting), you will have the urge to gasp. There may be some quantity of ethanol remaining in your mouth, see suggestion 3.

11. Have a spotter standing by with a wet towel, sweatshirt, swimsuit, or something suitable for extinguishing unplanned personal combustion.

12. If proximal unplanned combustion is occuring during ten, the consequences could be ugly. Fortunately that is speculation, not empirical knowledge.

13. When passing the bottle and ember to the next idiot challanger, exercise caution if you are attempting to hand him the cold end of the stick.

Wise words there. Wise words indeed.
It's amazing what you learn on this thread.

So, given that, is rum a girl's drink, or isn't it? We need to know. Personally I think it would be a little harsh to accuse anyone of being "good with colours" after all that.

It's a great cure for tickly cough. After having consumed a litre of the stuff over 8 days, my cough completely disappeared...

Sweet Saving Christ am I thirsty now.

- Josh

I would disagree that rum is a girl's drink, as it was the drink of choice for both pirates and the British Navy back in the days of wooden ships and iron men. Churchill's quote about rum, sodomy and the lash wasn't a comment about the party he attended with the girls last Thursday.

YMMV.

But that was rum in the sense that Midwesterner's Everclear rocket fuel can loosely be called 'alcohol'. Royal Navy rum had to be heavily diluted for general use and the 'grog' of rum before combat was clearly designed to render most men incapable of the sort of process that might involve "sod this for a lark" thoughts.

Bloody hell Mid! the things we get up to when young eh?
To paraphrase W C Fields

On the whole I'd rather drink the Baileys

Julian, British Navy Rum, in it's raw state was "Exactly" like the stuff Mid describes but was, as you say, watered down. But in situ. The casks that were loaded aboard ship were easily as strong as 180 proof.
When I worked in the Crown Court and the Navy stopped the Rum ration, our chief Usher, who had been in submarines aquired a couple of barrels of the stuff from mates still in the Navy, and brought a bottle in for us all to taste.
Court ajourned that afternoon I can tell you !!!

PS Old W C Fields would probably have handled your 13 point plan with alacrity.
Starting his career as an excentric juggler and fire-eater as he did.
But I gather he came to think it too precious to set fire to and drank it instead!

Being a Mormon in the American midwest, I a) have no experience in actually drinking and b) have many friends who like me to come along when they drink, as it means they have a happily designated driver. I therefore have done a great deal of observation. And more than my fair share of pulling over so someone could protect the upholstery at the expense of local shrubbery.

The only people I see drinking Bailey's do so when it's added to something else -- usually coffee or hot cocoa, but sometimes other drinks.

I always thought the definition of a "girl's" drink was something along the lines of "colorful, fruity, and/or overpriced," whereas the definition of a "guy's" drink was "undrinkable swill designed to get you drunk at a very low price-per-swallow rate." I had one friend (female) who would try anything blue. And several female roommates who drank only fruit-flavored vodka products (if they couldn't get a fruity "vodka" they'd buy really expensive stuff and then add shots of cherry flavoring.) There was a girl who drank only Jim Beam, but she got the "girly" nod because she only drank it out of the tiniest bottles imaginable (mind, she'd drink at least half a dozen in a night. The small bottles were a matter of style.) The girl who would drink out of the kegs at parties till everyone else passed out, then walked home and puked all over our floor? Not that girly. But the frat guys really respected her.

However, I am also in my 20s, so perhaps my friends have not yet evolved their drinking habits fully.

Baileys is cack.

Then again, they have pretty ladies in their ads to flog it to other ladies. So there is some compensation to be had there.

All this talk about rum reminds me of a trip 3 years ago to Barbados, home of Mount Gay rum (no sniggering please), which has a dark flavour, and high in strength. It is nice with various mixers but bloody strong on its own. The Royal Navy used to drink it. As Julian Taylor said, grog - named after an officer - was the drink for the ordinary sailors, containing lime juice (hence the nickname Limey), sugar and some water. The strength of a tot of grog was equivalent to several pints of beer, and even young teenage sailors drank it.

Suffice to say that when Nelson's fleets went into battle, their crews had had a double ration of grog, and were hence utterly fearless. The French and Spanish never stood a chance.

Midwesterner's drinking advice is truly awesome.

Thank you, Johnathan. The things one can learn from other sailors ... Even our weekly parties often ended with a sunrise sail.

Sarah. You sound fun, funny and perceptive. I nominate you for Samizdata's designated driver.

grog - named after an officer

Actually Jonathan, I think grog is named after a certain Admiral's coat...

I've never much liked Bailey's. It only takes two or three pints of it and I'm out of my skull.