{"id":6556,"date":"2016-09-29T19:45:57","date_gmt":"2016-09-29T19:45:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/?p=6556"},"modified":"2016-09-29T20:31:41","modified_gmt":"2016-09-29T20:31:41","slug":"coffee-drinking-scandalous","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/blog\/2016\/09\/coffee-drinking-scandalous\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Was Coffee Drinking Once Scandalous? – Article by Jeffrey A. Tucker"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n
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\"The<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Jeffrey Tucker<\/span>
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In 18th-century Europe, many products and services reached a newly emergent middle class for the first time in human history. The capitalist age was maturing, and that meant that average people had money for the first time and lots of choices on how to spend it. One of the new products they could buy was coffee. With that came a great deal of social suspicion and even dread.<\/p>\n

None other than Johann Sebastian Bach satirized the puritanical fear of coffee in his delightful and witty \u201cCoffee Cantata.\u201d It was one of the few times he ever tried his hand at pure pop entertainment. Of course he succeeded brilliantly; he was Bach after all!<\/span><\/p>\n

The \u201cCoffee Cantata\u201d tells the story of a daughter who scandalized her father due to her devotion to coffee. She couldn\u2019t stop singing about how wonderful it is, while her father corrected her constantly. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou naughty child, you wild girl, ah!\u201d the father yells at his daughter. \u201cWhen will I achieve my goal: get rid of the coffee for my sake!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cFather sir, but do not be so harsh!\u201d she responds. \u201cIf I couldn’t, three times a day, be allowed to drink my little cup of coffee, in my anguish I will turn into a shriveled-up roast goat.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She happily agrees to do everything he says in every area of life except one: she will not give up coffee.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then follows a beautiful tribute to coffee: \u201cHow sweet coffee tastes, more delicious than a thousand kisses, milder than muscatel wine. Coffee, I have to have coffee, and, if someone wants to pamper me, ah, then bring me coffee as a gift!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The father threatens her: “If you don’t give up coffee for me,\u00a0you won’t go to any wedding parties,\u00a0or even go out for walks.”<\/span><\/p>\n

She still refuses.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then the daughter plays a little game. She has a husband in mind and extracts from him a promise that if she marries him, he must allow her to drink coffee. He agrees. Then she goes to her father, who opposes the marriage, and makes a deal: if she is permitted to marry him, she will give up coffee. The father is delighted, and agrees.<\/span><\/p>\n

Thus does the daughter gain a new husband, and, much more importantly, a permanent right to drink coffee whenever she wants! <\/span><\/p>\n