A U.S. appeals court on Friday declared unconstitutional a nearly 158-year-old federal ban on home distilling, calling it an unnecessary and improper means for ​Congress to exercise its power to tax.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of ‌Appeals in New Orleans ruled in favor of the nonprofit Hobby Distillers Association and four of its 1,300 members.

They argued that people should be free to distill spirits at home, whether as ​a hobby or for personal consumption including, in one instance, to create ​an apple-pie-vodka recipe.

The ban was part of a law passed during ⁠Reconstruction in July 1868, in part to thwart liquor tax evasion, and subjected violators ​to up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

  • JoeBigelow@lemmy.ca
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    6 hours ago

    Can’t read the Epstein Files if you’re blind from methanol poisoning, remember to collect your tips and tails folks!

  • Seth Taylor@lemmy.world
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    6 hours ago

    My dad makes what I would describe as moonshine or vodka or something like that every year at home. We’re in the EU though. I always found it odd it’s illegal in the US

    • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      If you do it wrong, or drink the wrong part of the finished product, you can go blind. So I get why regulation may be needed.

      • RaccoonBall@lemmy.ca
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        If we’re banning it for safety reasons, we need to ban a lot more activities. have you seen what happens if people use a table saw or pool improperly? Even stairs are probably more dangerous than home distilling

    • Paranoid Factoid@lemmy.world
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      Appalachian Roulette: You have to drink a shot of potentially poisoned moonshine every time a mountain daughter is impregnated by her father.

  • eyes@lemmy.world
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    Man, a lot of people here just repeating the same old myths and police lines about moonshine making you blind and stills exploding. Not to be that guy but do some research.

    Methanol poisoning is hugely overstated, sugar and grain mash don’t produce enough for it to be dangerous. Fruit mash can, but it’s easy to mitigate. Most cases of methanol poisoning are either the person purposefully drinking methanol or from alcohol that’s been adulterated with it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_methanol_poisoning_incidents

    Stills can start fires, if improperly operated, but so can gas hobs and we’re not calling for a license to operate those. You really need to be making industrial quantities at pressure for it to explode. Looking at it as a cause of fires in countries where it’s legal indicate that it’s a non-issue. If you’re worried about forest fires, don’t make it so people need to hide in the woods and they’ll do it at home.

    • _stranger_@lemmy.world
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      The danger comes from the distilling, which concentrates the miniscule methanol to dangerous levels. When I learned distilling, I was taught to throw away the first half cup or so to reduce methanol. In reality, methanol has a lower boiling point than ethanol, so you get mostly methanol in that first few shots due to the still warming up, but overall it’s negligible. In a well controlled environment, it’s technically possible to separate the two via this fractional distillation, but it’s not something those early moonshiners really knew about.

      In summary, I see home distillation in the same light as picking wild mushrooms: you really have to know what you’re doing. As always, regulation and education is the answer here.

    • CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works
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      23 hours ago

      It should be noted that it was the US government who intentionally poisoned the alcohol supply during prohibition. The people that attempted to drink this poisoned alcohol were the ones suffering of blindness and other complications.

    • liimnok@lemmy.ml
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      22 hours ago

      Also methanol tastes nasty. You don’t want it in your shine. Nobody is going drink enough of it to cause harm.

      • DillDough@lemmy.zip
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        Except that literally happened when the US government poisoned the supplies. Just like we did with paraquat to weed, and a million other examples.

  • jivandabeast@lemmy.browntown.dev
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    This is the biggest win for homebrewers since Jimmy Carter.

    Everyone in this thread talking about how people are gonna blow themselves up, but … okay? It’s up to the individual to make sure that they’re being safe and following adequate procedures. It’s not like working on cars, RC/drones (lithium batteries), flying planes, and guns are all perfectly safe hobbies, and those are all very normalized.

    In terms of safety surrounding unwanted product, like methanol, it’s again the person’s responsibility. Much like how it’s up to the canner to make sure they’re not giving people botulism or a kombucha to have only the wanted bacteria.

    • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
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      The problem wasn’t the individual blowing themselves up, it’s the individual starting a massive fire that spreads to surrounding structures. That’s less of a problem with modern fire suppression and building materials, though, so what made sense 158 years ago probably isn’t as big of a concern.

      • Bluewing@lemmy.world
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        I doubt even the risk of fire will a problem since modern home distillers will use small electric stills. And the alcohol boils of at about 170F, (about 76C for our challenged brethren in Texas). So the explosion risk is also very minimal.

        The challenge is to maintain a steady temperature while distilling your booze. Just enough heat to drive off the alcohol while leaving the majority of water behind.

        • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          since modern home distillers will use small electric stills.

          Acting like most of the people doing this aren’t the biggest rednecks on the planet… Meth labs don’t need to be dangerous either, and yet… (not comparing alcohol to meth before the angry replies come).

      • CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works
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        23 hours ago

        What about BBQs? You’ve got people, often drinking, handling things like propane canisters and burning charcoal while cooking objects that emit flammable oils in dry grass or right next to their home. It’s a recipe for disaster.

        • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
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          As I mentioned elsewhere, the problem is that there’d be a civil war if you tried to stop people from burning shit. There’s a compromise being made between public safety and the public’s appetite for regulatory restrictions.

          But also, like I said, fire is less of a problem with modern fire suppression and building materials. I wonder if those propane grills would actually be legal if our cities were still built like they were 158 years ago. I also wonder if they’ll remain legal forever, or if increasing droughts and infrastructure decay will force bans in some cities.

      • jivandabeast@lemmy.browntown.dev
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        I’m talking about people in this thread commenting like this reversal is going to cause massive fires tomorrow.

        But to your point, the ban was never about safety, it was about tax collection.

        • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
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          It could definitely cause a massive fire someday. Some home brewer blows up in California during a drought and suddenly you’ve got another wildfire in an urban area.

          … but it probably was about taxes. The US doesn’t give a shit about public safety.

          • [object Object]@lemmy.world
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            I don’t see people complaining about houses in the US using flammable and dangerous natural gas for tons of things, including drying clothes for chrissake. You know, a process that occurs by itself if you just leave the clothes in the air for a bit.

            • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
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              Didn’t I already say it? The US doesn’t give a shit about public safety.

              I’d be in favor of banning gas stoves and clothes dryers, but that would probably cause a civil war.

      • Raiderkev@lemmy.world
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        That and home made hooch can sometimes make people go blind if they do it wrong and there’s too much (I wanna say?) methanol in the batch.

          • Raiderkev@lemmy.world
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            The very first incident I clicked on makes it look like it’s definitely an issue. Under Mexico on the site you linked-

            Government restrictions on liquor and beer sales during the COVID-19 pandemic may have exacerbated the problem of illegal production and sale of alcoholic beverages in Mexico. Reportedly, 35 people died in 2020 in just one mass poisoning incident due to methanol tainted drinks

    • eyes@lemmy.world
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      As I understand it the risk of methanol poisoning from home distillation is hugely overstated in grain and sugar based mash and can be effectively mitigated in fruit based mash with fairly simply.

    • No_Eponym@lemmy.ca
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      Yeah, gotta take courses for some of those right? Get a licence? Some have safety standards so you know what you get and come with instructions on how to operate them?

      There are rules and regulations on almost everything you listed. Because health and safety regulations are written in blood.

      Or, you know, be indifferent to human suffering and societal cost and basic common sense. Very American vibe these days.

      • Rusticus@lemmy.world
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        7 hours ago

        Please take your soap box over to the gun control communities, where real lives can be saved. Your concern about home brewing is misallocated, hyperbolic and patently false.

      • XeroxCool@lemmy.world
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        You do not need anything to work on cars or fly rc aircraft (within limits) and can freely play with various lithium batteries in many different manners.

        You are talking about it being common sense to protect people from themselves, yet you could just as easily say it should be common sense to beleive everyone will take precautions before playing with gasoline. That’s the funny thing. There’s no such thing as common sense. “Common sense” is a bullshit concept for people to act like everyone knows something just because it’s part of the complainer’s life experience already. You know gasoline is dangerous but can be controlled. I know people generally know enough about gasoline by time they can interact with it to be safe. But if someone never interacted with it before, they’d have no idea how it behaves or what dangers are associated with it. Like, would you know how to store fertilizer in a way that it won’t combust? To farmers, it’s common sense. That doesn’t make it universally common knowledge. Or should it be obvious that snow is very slippery and might require you to drive at 1/4 speed? If you live in a place that gets snow, it’s common sense. Yet, every year, some place just south of the usual snow line gets snow for the first time in a decade and the streets become undrivable with cars piled up from residential-speed crashes. It’s not common sense if the cars have always, undoubtedly, stopped in a predictable manner, even in rain.

        Regulations notoriously lack hobbyists’ level of common sense anyway. There’s often a gap between what’s legal and whether inexperienced people would even think to check if some activity is legal. The only tip off is if certain supplies are regulated.

      • tux@lemmy.world
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        Actually no. There’s no restriction on you doing any of that on your own or at home. Just like anyone can cook whatever they want in their house even if they don’t know how to properly handle food, there’s nothing stopping anyone from hopping on Amazon and grabbing an RC kit or buying a pressure cooker, etc. Common sense and personal responsibility are kind of a big part of individuality and independence. For hobbyists generally they’re not endangering the public, just themselves. Which is your god given right lol.

        Funnily there are laws around some obviously dangerous things (like making bombs) but not others (like owning a muzzle loading cannon or flame thrower) generally don’t (IANAL, check your local laws).

        • No_Eponym@lemmy.ca
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          Ahh, you can just go buy a gun and use it in your own home with no license or background check eh? Rah rah America I guess.

          As for the rest, there are layers upon layers of consumer protection regulations that go into limiting what parts you can buy, what can be imported, what quality it is, how it should work. I guess if you’re gonna be real intense you can go buy some lithium cells, motors, 3d print parts etc, but outside of that there is a vast framework of overlapping regulations trying to keep stupid people from hurting themselves or others. Your ignorance of the systems protecting you doesn’t mean they aren’t there or that they aren’t important, and they probably contribute to the illusion of competence and divine support so many have. It’s not Good keeping you safe, it’s actually the government.

          • doodoo_wizard@lemmy.ml
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            Hello Canadian!

            Yes, assuming you are buying a non nfa gun you’re allowed to have from a person instead of a ffl holder you can completely legally buy a gun with no license or background check.

            There are many additional jurisdictions that place restrictions on that practice though.

            You’re wildly overestimating the volume and enforcement of what can be called consumer protection regulations.

            Take canning, for example: there’s no law against advertising some device that can’t reach 15lbs of pressure, the requirement set forth by the fda to prevent botulism, as appropriate for canning even for low acid foods like green beans that are the exact target for botulism.

            There’s no law against selling a lithium battery powered device that relies on the controller built into its specific power brick and it’s specifically wired usbc terminated cable for overcharge or overheat safety and reliably catches fire when it’s plugged up to any other power brick/usbc cable combination.

            Idk about Canadian canning laws, but I know for a fact that there are no protections about the other example in the great white north because the same design has been all over insurance claims for house fires there too.

          • CultLeader4Hire@lemmy.world
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            To answer your gun “question” the answer is generally no, it’s DEFINITELY no where I live but gun laws vary. I own guns, they required licensing and background checks and waiting periods. My drone had to be registered with the FAA to fly legally and even then many places are completely off limits to me.

            Americans tend to be obsessed with convenience and will sacrifice almost anything or anyone to increase their convenience in even the smallest way, including rejecting the concepts of public and personal health and safety.

      • jivandabeast@lemmy.browntown.dev
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        Actually no: there are no courses, licensing, rules, or regulations for a hobbyist (which is who this ruling affects) on the majority of the things that I listed (cars, RC/drones, canning, making kombucha, and even to a certain extent guns. We trust adults to be adults and learn the skills required to do these things because the risk is almost entirely to them.

        If we had to ban everything that had a chance of causing harm to people, shouldn’t we ban gas stoves? Those could cause an explosion if someone was careless and left the gas running.

        A dude distilling 5 gallons of wash in his backyard for his own personal consumption is not the same as a distillery processing 1000 gallons of wash.

        • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          Actually no: there are no courses, licensing, rules, or regulations for a hobbyist […] If we had to ban everything that had a chance of causing harm to people, shouldn’t we ban gas stoves?

          Why did you jump from “courses, licensing, rules or regulations” to “ban everything”? Those are two completely different arguments.

          The companies who build gas stoves for public use should 100% be regulated.

        • Rusticus@lemmy.world
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          7 hours ago

          Ironically gas stoves produce as much of the carcinogen benzene as having a smoker in your kitchen. This likely has contributed to the rise in non smoker lung cancer, which is more prevalent in women (who are more likely to be using said stove).

          We need to ban gas stoves, but not for the reasons you state.

        • No_Eponym@lemmy.ca
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          Actually yes: Consumer protection regulations exist for cars, RC/drones and parts, canning supplies, and certainly guns. All those components are set up so that they function a certain way, more dangerous versions are restricted, and governments try at the very least to educate people about the dangers of just DIY stuff (e.g. safe home canning). Your illusion of competent adults is created, in part, by a framework of regulatory guardrails.

          Where did I say ban everything that’s dangerous? Do you want to have no restrictions on anything? Lots of things that are dangerous are banned or restricted, and you’re probably alive and healthy today in part for that.

          Dude distilling 5 gallons of wash with no understanding of how it works, the danger to him or his neighbours, no regulation of the parts or ingredients that go into his setup is a menace and an accident waiting to happen.

          • jivandabeast@lemmy.browntown.dev
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            All those components are set up so that they function a certain way, more dangerous versions are restricted

            TY for making my point for me, it was really nice of you. Legalization is what allows those manufactured safeguards to exist. Without legalization, there is no way a company is going to sell a still that meets a UL safety metric. Which in turn causes anyone who wants to do this to use a cobbled together rig that’s probably leaking fuel or gases.

            Lots of things that are dangerous are banned or restricted

            And lots of things that are dangerous are not banned or restricted, and are in fact extremely normalized. I could go buy fireworks in a tent on the side of the road, without needing to provide my age or any sort of training – and fireworks are VASTLY more dangerous than distilling.

            Dude distilling 5 gallons of wash with no understanding of how it works, the danger to him or his neighbours, no regulation of the parts or ingredients that go into his setup is a menace and an accident waiting to happen.

            Again, this is a product of prohibition and not having access to safe equipment or information. The cost/barriers to entry for home distilling are also very high. There is a minimum amount of research that you would need to do in order to understand what the procedure is and what equipment you would even need.

            Finally, I will once again state that the dangers of home distilling are extremely overblown. When New Zealand legalized home distilling there were zero reports of methanol poisoning from home-distillation, caused 0.14% of residential fires, and 0 deaths. 1 2 3.

            Someone is literally more likely to have a fire and/or die from an unattended candle.

            • BlackLaZoR@lemmy.world
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              The cost/barriers to entry for home distilling are also very high.

              What? No. Equipment is so trivial it can be home made and still work.

        • No_Eponym@lemmy.ca
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          Can anyone make a gas stove or propane grill? Can you rig up your own home-made propane tank? Can you get your propane from a rando who mixed it at home? Are there rules and restrictions on ventilation and how houses are built or where you can use your grill? Be reasonable.

          • frongt@lemmy.zip
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            Yes, yes, no but you can probably get bootleg propane (it’s happening in India right now), depends on jurisdiction.

  • DickFiasco@sh.itjust.works
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    I’m seeing a lot of misinformation in this thread. Stills don’t “blow up”. That was a myth perpetuated by law enforcement in the same spirit that smoking pot will make you go crazy. Making soup in a pressure cooker is far more dangerous than using a still. Distilling liquor is done at atmospheric pressure, no part of the equipment is ever under pressure.

    • wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz
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      Distilling in an enclosed space over open flames can result in flare-ups. This can obviously be prevented with adequate ventilation and/or using an electric heating element, but that doesn’t guarantee everyone who tries it will have the requisite knowledge to do so safely.

      Doesn’t mean it should be illegal, but like, if you’re gonna try a potentially dangerous hobby, you know, like, read about it first? Distilling in ignorance can result in higher concentrations of fusel oils, methyls, and isopropyls, which can be toxic or even deadly. Hence the old “bathtub hooch makes you go blind” trope. Learn how to separate the heads and tails properly, or don’t do it at all.

      So it’s not like the only danger is fires and explosions. It should definitely require a license to do commercially, but hobbyists should still do their due diligence to ensure safety.

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      You don’t need initial pressure to have an explosion. Flammable vapors in a confined space, even at low pressure, can explode if ignited.

      • BarrelAgedBoredom@lemmy.zip
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        If it exceeds a particular vapor pressure, the ethanol fumes become too rich to explode, just like any other explosive vapor. The high vapor pressures of a still wouldn’t lend themselves well to exploding. Fires, sure. But unless you’re distilling over an open flame and something horribly wrong happens with your still, it’s not very likely to burst into flames. Most small scale hobbyist stills are electric nowadays

      • DickFiasco@sh.itjust.works
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        The setup in the video is not a still. It’s a device designed specifically to create an explosion. You could replace the ethanol with hairspray, WD-40, butane from a lighter, gasoline, nail polish remover, or any number of household items to achieve the same effect.

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        Didn’t you hear? Dick says that’s all a myth, a ruse by the government to get more taxes… to do evil things like build roads schools and hospitals! This video is propaganda!

    • No_Eponym@lemmy.ca
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      False. My great grandpa was a bootlegger. There are and we’re explosions and fires making hooch.

      • mikezane@lemmy.world
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        Home distilling is significantly different than bootlegging. The biggest batch that I start with is 5 gallons. Bootleggers were working with commercial quantities.

    • [object Object]@lemmy.world
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      Yeah, making moonshine was a rural pastime in my country for ages, even when it was illegal, and the most danger from it that I’ve heard of is that the result smells and tastes pretty damn nasty.

      Wikipedia says:

      Alcohol concentrations at higher strengths (the GHS identifies concentrations above 24% ABV as dangerous) are flammable and therefore dangerous to handle. This is especially true during the distilling process, when vaporized alcohol may accumulate in the air to dangerous concentrations if adequate ventilation is not provided.

      This sounds like it requires the air to taste like fortified wine.

        • frongt@lemmy.zip
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          Yes, you can vape alcohol. No, you really shouldn’t, because if you get too drunk off it you can’t throw up or have your stomach pumped.

  • halferect@lemmy.world
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    The comments in this thread make it sound like it’s super dangerous, its not and you have to fuck up so much to blind yourself or blow up.

    • BlackLaZoR@lemmy.world
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      Yeah. The main reasons why it doesn’t blow up, is that it stinks so hard you can’t possibly ignore it and you have to ensure good ventilation.

      The main reason why you won’t go blind is because the antidote for methanol is ethanol.

      When you hear about methanol poisoning causing blindness it’s usually some morons drinking purified methanol.

    • Bunitonito@lemmy.world
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      iirc methanol and acetone both have a boiling point much lower than ethanol, so I think one would learn really quickly to discard the first little bit of distilled product, because it’d be nasty as hell. I never tried distilling but the issue seems like it’d fix itself, right?

  • grue@lemmy.world
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    Y’all know the risk of home distillers blinding themselves via methanol poisoning is way higher than the risk of them blowing themselves up, right?

    • socsa@piefed.social
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      Not really, it’s the exact opposite. There isn’t any more methanol in small scale shine than there is in homebrew beer. The risk is if you make a large enough batch that you can get a full bottle of just heads, and then decide to drink that for whatever reason. But even at moderate scales, that’s not going to happen.

      • grue@lemmy.world
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        Yeah, but an explosion would be incredibly rare, too. So rare that I think even the “get a full bottle of just heads and then decide to drink that for whatever reason” would still manage to be more likely.

    • Frozengyro@lemmy.world
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      You know the treatment for methanol poisoning is ethanol? As long as you’re tossing the fore shots and not putting them into a sour mash you’re fine.

  • BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today
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    Nothing is going to change, there won’t be any more stills blowing up in the future than there have in the past.

    People who wanted to do this were already doing it. This just makes it legal. I doubt there were too many out there that wanted to, but we’re holding off because of the law, and now they can indulge.

    • liimnok@lemmy.ml
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      Exactly. People are already out there distilling. This will help open up discussion and education about home distilling making it even safer. Is good.

    • halferect@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      Not really, we have “laws” and as long as you weren’t making money no one cared , we have TV shows of people in a competition with home distilleries, this is basically just fixing a outdated bullshit law from 158 years ago

  • Stern@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    So long as they’re doing it for personal use and being safe enough to not blow up the neighborhood, I don’t care. If they wanna sell for others to consume then obviously that’s a whole other thing.

    • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
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      1 day ago

      It’s the “being safe enough” part that’s the problem. How do you regulate that? Do you really believe that the average American is capable of operating something as dangerous as a still in a completely safe manner?

      If we were talking about homebrewing, yeah, absolutely, that shit is awesome and there is no good argument against. Home distilling is basically building a bomb and hoping that it doesn’t go off before you get wrecked enough on moonshine to notice it happening.

      • Blade9732@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        I have a neighbor who parks his stupid Cybertruck in his garage every day. Google “Tesla explosion”. Another neighbor has a Toyota overland build truck, he has an exposed 5 gallon propane tank on the back and 20 gallons of fuel tanks on the sides, it just sits there waiting to detonate. Google “Home gas explosion”. Another neighbor puts his Giant Turkey fryer on his balcony and frys a huge turkey every thanksgiving. Google “Turkey fryer explosion”. The old guy across from me home builds black powder rifles as a hobby. He has at least a 50 pounds of black powder stored in his workshop. Google “Black powder explosion”. The kids get picked up in a school bus with 100 gallons of CNG on it. Google "CNG explosion ". The 7-11 at the end of the block has an open cage filled with propane tanks, many returns that may not have the current safety valves on them. Minimum wage employees are in charge of this and the local crackheads stand right by it, smoking cigarettes. Google “propane tank explosion”. Most of the houses in my neighborhood were built 40-50 years ago, they all have water heaters. Many have no Tpr valve, improper venting, ect. Google “water heater explosion”. I guess you might be right, we need way more laws and regulations to protect us from from the bombs all around us.

      • Zak@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        How do you regulate that?

        Create safety standards for small commercially manufactured stills. Most people are lazy, so those will significantly outnumber more sketchy DIY stuff. We have safety standards for other dangerous items like propane tanks, and they reduce the risk to a level most people find acceptable.

        in a completely safe manner

        There is no such thing. There’s a level of risk society finds acceptable. If a still can be as safe as a propane grill, I’m happy.

        • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
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          1 day ago

          And if it could be as safe as a propane grill I would have no objections. But those things are orders of magnitude apart in terms of relative safety levels.

          • Zak@lemmy.world
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            1 day ago

            Do you have a source for that claim? I found this source suggesting otherwise; in New Zealand, where home distilling is legal and there wouldn’t be a reason to hide it, less than 0.14% of residential fires were caused by home distilling.

            • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
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              22 hours ago

              That’s honestly worse than I thought.

              If you’re confused then this is a great object lesson in how to read statistics. Consider how many people actually own a home still in New Zealand. It’s not going to be a lot. Realistically, I think 1 in 10,000 would be a high estimate. That is to say, about 0.01% of the population. I’ve not had any luck finding actual numbers on that despite my best efforts, but I think it’s a fair assumption given the amount of specialised equipment involved in home distilling (much more so than home brewing), as well as the space needed to set it up and the time required for the for process. It’s not exactly set it and and forget it. In comparison, the percentage of people who live in a home who have a stove is going to be fairly close to 100%.

              Already you can see the issue right? If 0.01% of a population are causing 0.14% of all home fires… That’s insanely bad.

              But it gets worse. That study covers a 20 year period, but home distilling was only legal for the last 10 years of that period. Which means a couple of things. Firstly the number of home distillers would likely have been even lower for most of the period covered by the study. Home distilling would only really have taken off as a hobby over those last ten years, and for much of that time equipment would likely have been hard to come by; that’s not the sort of thing where import / manufacturing and distribution are going to be easy to just set up overnight. Secondly, home distilling as a cause of fire was likely under-reported for those first ten years as people would have a strong incentive to hide the cause of the incident. By far the single biggest category of equipment listed in the study is “Not recorded” accounting for more than all the other categories combined. Obviously, there’s going to be a distribution of all the other equipment types throughout that “Not recorded” block, but it’s not all unlikely that the “Not recorded” stats for illegal home stills would be at least slightly higher than for most other equipment.

              Then there’s a second factor to consider; frequency of use. People often cook on a stove at least once a day. In comparison I very much doubt the average home distiller is running their still every single day. It’s a time consuming process that requires a fair amount of attention. Generally you’re going to make a batch and then consume that batch until you eventually need to make another. If we were to normalize not only for frequency of ownership but also frequency of use, it’s not hard to arrive at a fair estimate that home stills are causing fires at a rate of several hundred times that of, say, the average gas stove, based on the numbers in that study. Obviously I’m being pretty loose here, but I’m just trying to illustrate the general point. I’m not claiming to be presenting hard data here, I’d have to really sit down with the raw numbers and run a proper normalization, as well as get some stats not accounted for in that study, but yeah, overall, I’m feeling very good about my “orders of magnitude” estimate if the numbers you’re presenting are accurate.

              (Also, it probably goes without saying that getting your statistics on how dangerous making moonshine is from a webpage entitled “Making Moonshine is Safer Than You Think” maybe isn’t the best idea. I’m fairly sure pedophiles also have strong opinions about the relative safety of taking candy from people in unmarked vans.)

      • iopq@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        My grandma did it for decades and didn’t blow anyone up. Nobody went blind either. You make it sound like it’s making a McNuke in your kitchen

        • liimnok@lemmy.ml
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          Yeah man, its not that hard to do. I remain unexploded having cobbled together my “still”.

        • Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works
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          My great uncle Joe survived the entirety of WW2 despite being thrown into some of the worst fighting imaginable. This proves that war is completely safe for everyone involved.

          • iopq@lemmy.world
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            10 hours ago

            I get the n=1 argument, but there are many people who have successfully done it safely. The government’s job is just to make sure the equipment you buy is safe enough, not to protect you from every dangerous choice in life