Teetotaler, not teatotaler

Reader question:

Teatotaler or teetotaler?

My comments:

A teetotaler is someone who drinks tea, coffee and other liquids but not alcohol.

Teatotaler, on the other hand, is a misspelling. What it supposedly stands for is “tea totaler”, presumably someone who drinks nothing but tea.

I’ve see both “tea totaler” and “teatotaler” in print, the former being a new coinage for people who drink tea only, the latter, as I said, a misspelling.

I’ve also seen in print “coffee totaler”, which is someone who drinks coffee only.

This is the new generation thing, making up words just to suit themselves. To me, an old timer, neither “tea totaler” nor “coffee totaler” makes complete sense because, let’s face it, aside from tea or coffee, they must also drink water, right?

I mean, they must not be opposed to plain water, hot or cold

That’s why tea or coffee totalers are not to be confused with teetotalers, who are actually opposed to something.

To wit, alcohol.

And the “tee” stands for not tea but T, the letter T, as in T-shirt.

Teetotaler literally means totally, with a capitalized T.

And that means teetotalers are against alcohol completely and in totality. Teetotalers don’t drink anything containing alcohol, weak or strong. They don’t drink beer or wine. Nor do they drink brandy, whisky, let alone vodka, tequila or baijiu, the Chinese hard liquor.

How does the word teetotaler come to be, then?

Well, here’s an explanation by the Smithsonian Magazine, October issue, 2019 (Where Does the Word ‘Teetotaler’ Come From? And More Questions From Our Readers):

Q: Where does the word “teetotaler” come from?

It dates back to the 1820s and 1830s when alcohol consumption in the United States dramatically increased. Back then, drinking was an all-or-nothing habit, explains Jon Grinspan, curator of political history at the National Museum of American History. The “tee” in “teetotaler” likely refers to temperance activists who were totally opposed to alcohol with “a capital T” (or “tee”). Similar to the way people used the label of capital-R Republicans or W-Whigs, being a T-Totaler was a distinct identity. It was only after Prohibition ended that drinking in moderation became more popular and the label fell out of fashion.

Knowing its history, you won’t ever confuse teetotaler with teatotaler again.

Teatotaler, by the way, might be used as a deliberate wordplay on teetotaler to mean “tea totaler”, which, I’m sorry to point out, is not accepted as good English.

At least not yet.

All right, here are media examples of teetotaler of the proper type, who drinks everything except anything alcoholic:

1. “I have 2020 dialed in,” says Jim Carrey over green tea in Los Angeles. He’s got his goals all set for a busy year: This month he stars in Sonic the Hedgehog (in theaters Feb. 14), the big-screen movie based on the popular Sega video game. He plays the evil mastermind Dr. Ivo Robotnik, who seeks to harness the whip-fast energy of Sonic, the small blue hedgehog, and take over the world. Carrey also stars in season two of his acclaimed Showtime series Kidding (which launches Feb. 9), in which he plays Mr. Pickles, a Mister Rogers–like host of a children’s TV show struggling to find meaning after a devastating personal tragedy. And this spring, he’ll go on tour to promote his semi-autobiographical novel, Memoirs and Misinformation (out May 5), which he’s been crafting for eight years.

This furious productivity is par for the course for a prolific actor who seemed destined for stardom since he was a boy. The youngest of four raised in and around Toronto, Carrey spent years building a stand-up comedy act full of wild impressions, which eventually earned him his big break on the comedy sketch show In Living Color and rocketed him toward two decades of movie hits, including Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Dumb and Dumber, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and The Truman Show and Man on the Moon, both of which earned him Golden Globe awards for acting.

Carrey, 58, has been married twice (he has a daughter, Jane, with first wife, actress Melissa Womer) but has been single and dating for more than two decades. He has a residence in Los Angeles – where he spends time with Jane, 32, and his grandson, Jackson, 9 – and a getaway in Hawaii, where he enjoys his privacy away from Hollywood, often painting and sculpting. His artwork has been showcased in exhibitions in Montreal, Los Angeles and Las Vegas, among other places.

What was your childhood like?

I moved around a lot. My dad [Percy] was looking for jobs and stuff. He was an accountant, but he really was a comedian, and a saxophone and clarinet player, par excellence. The funniest man I’ve ever met. Truly off-the-hook, insanely funny. If you look at the little thumbnail on my Twitter, there’s a man with his hands up, with his knee up in the air, and he’s doing some kind of crazy, goofy dance. That’s my father at his wedding. That’s it, in a nutshell. My dad had a desire to turn the world on—to walk into a room and make everybody feel like everything is just great. People just left our home all the time literally with pee spots, just going, “Oh my God, Percy, you missed your calling.” And I became his calling, you know? We were like a tag team of comedy. We were amazing.

Is there anything in your personality that came from your mother, Kathleen?

The art. My mom painted and did pastel pictures. She would get up in the middle of the night when the brats weren’t awake, and would do these wonderful paintings for our room. And she had a tremendous talent for it. When I finally started really becoming a painter and a sculptor, I suddenly realized one day, “Oh my gosh—for 40 years I’ve been a custodian of the talent my father gave me, and now I’m getting time with my mother.” And she suffered a lot too, so there was a lot of me helping her in her pain. It motivated me to be funny, to make her laugh, to feel better. I always say, “I challenge any comedian to say they didn’t have a mother who was in pain.”

When did you and your family first realize you were funny?

They always thought I was funny from the get-go. They didn’t tell me I was stupid, they told me I was funny, and that was the difference. It was encouragement. From the time I was in a high chair, it was my way of getting out of eating the foods I didn’t wanna eat: I would start shaking, like I was having a seizure, with these crossed eyes and stuff. As an infant! Somehow, I knew innately if I could make them laugh, the food would get cold and they’d finally be OK to let me not eat. Born with it, literally born with it.

...

What do you do to stay healthy, both physically and emotionally?

I don’t stay healthy. I go off completely sometimes and indulge in things that I know aren't good for me: Sometimes it’s food, and sometimes it’s people, and sometimes it’s dating, and sometimes it’s – you know, a lot of different things can serve to help you escape from the world. So I always come back to the same place, where I go, “OK, it’s time for the purification; it’s time to get all of the noise out.” Now I’m a teetotaler.

- Jim Carrey Opens up About Life as a Comedian, the Joys of Grandparenting and Streaking in Hawaii, by Amy Spencer, Parade.com, January 31, 2020.

2. Eric Trump has had discussions about launching a new line of Trump-branded vodka in the United States, according to people familiar with the matter, but it was unclear whether the deal would be finalized by Jan. 20, when his father, President-elect Donald Trump, will be inaugurated.

One proposal was for a deal between Eric Trump Wineries and a limited liability company that would use the Trump name under a license agreement, two of the people said.

“Given the success of Trump Winery and Trump Cidery in Charlottesville, Virginia several groups have approached our team about expanding our offerings to include spirits,” Eric Trump said in a statement. “These conversations, while exciting, have been preliminary and nothing has been finalized.”

A licensing deal for Trump Vodka launched nearly two decades ago, in 2005. “I fully expect the most called-for cocktail in America to be the ‘T&T’ or the ‘Trump and tonic,’” Trump said in a news release at the time. But U.S. sales ended a handful of years later.

The president-elect is a teetotaler, and has advised his children throughout their lives to avoid alcohol. His brother Fred was a “drinker,” Trump wrote in his book Art of the Deal. “That led to a downward spiral. At the age of forty-three, he died.”

Eric Trump has said he doesn’t consume much alcohol. “I’m not really a drinker,” he told the New York Post in August at an event promoting the new Trump Cidery in Charlottesville, Virginia. “I really just work.”

- Trump’s son Eric mulling new Trump vodka line, CBSNews.com, January 10, 2025.

3. During the holiday season, some people are teetotalers, while others imbibe with beer, a glass of wine, or a shot of pure, distilled spirits. While body size, sex, gender, and the number of drinks consumed influence how drunk someone gets, individual reactions to alcohol can also vary due to differences in genetics and tolerance.

Alcohol is broken down in the human body by two main enzymes, alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) and aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH). Mutations in these enzymes alter alcohol metabolism; for instance, low ALDH activity can lead to metabolite buildup, causing face flushing and nausea. Beyond metabolism, other factors can also impact how alcohol affects coordination and drinking behavior.

For instance, researchers found that family history of alcoholism can influence static ataxia or body sway symptoms after alcohol consumption: Those with a family history swayed less than those without. This behavioral complexity led David Rossi, a molecular neuroscientist at Washington State University, to explore the brain as static ataxia involves the cerebellum, the brain region involved in motor function and balance.

Alcohol suppresses excitatory signals while enhancing gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), the main inhibitory neurotransmitter in the brain. When GABA receptors are stimulated, they reduce neuron firing, leading to sluggish movement. This wobbly effect isn’t limited to humans; Rossi found that rodents exhibit similar behavior.

He tested rodents’ motor skills on a spinning rod, comparing those with higher ADH and ALDH activity and a greater thirst for alcohol to less tolerant rodents. He found that their cerebellar GABA receptors varied in sensitivity. He noted, “The [rodents] that really like to drink are very insensitive to the motor impairing effects of alcohol.” These mice could keep drinking and maintain balance. Meanwhile, the lightweight mice felt the drunk-like effects of alcohol more easily and tumbled off.

Tolerance also plays a key role. After a mouse’s equivalent of a weekend bender, as they withdraw, the cerebellum adjusts to alcohol’s inhibitory effects. Rossi remarked that repeated consumption leads to the brain downregulating inhibition, enabling rodents to stay functional even past their limit.

So, whether you’re a lightweight or a seasoned drinker, everyone’s response to alcohol is a varying mixture of environmental and genetic influences. Just remember, moderation is key!

- Why Do Some People Get Drunk Faster Than Others? The-Scientist.com, January 13, 2025.

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About the author:

Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.

（作者：张欣）