French Finally Get Word For 'Binge Drinking'

It seems like for the longest time, binge drinking wasn't really a French problem; or rather, drinking tons of alcohol for the specific purpose of getting blacked-out drunk wasn't even a concept in the French language. Instead of coming up with a French word, they just added a "le" to the English term "binge drinking" (i.e. "le binge drinking") and called it a day.

Not anymore; Guardian reports that Le Monde, the French language police of sorts, has finally approved a French word for binge drinking: beuverie express, literally "fast drinking." Le Monde defines this term as "the massive absorption of alcohol, generally in a group, aimed at provoking drunkenness in the minimum amount of time".

It's not exactly binge drinking, but it gets the concept across; Le Monde qualified "massive absorption" of alcohol as "more than 4 to 5 glasses in less than two hours," although we don't know how large each glass is or what they are filled with. Because in this office, five glasses of wine is nothing.