[Nyororin]

I think that somewhere along the way what I was saying has been misinterpreted and dragged in another direction.

I said I have personally experienced much more pressure to drink (and excessively at that) in the US than I have in Japan.

There is no stigma attached to drinking in Japan, so it is not a big deal, nor is it looked on as something "special" - people drink, get drunk, and that`s that. I honestly do not see people making a huge fuss out of it.
Because there is less stigma, there is no need to keep it out of public view - so you see more people who have been drinking and who are in various stages of intoxication.
In the US though, there IS a stigma attached to it, so there IS something "special" to it (at least through the high school, college, and early "adult" years). There is a stigma attached to being seen while intoxicated, so the people who you do spot who are drunk are people who have reached the point where they could care less.

To someone coming from a culture where there is a heavy stigma attached to being out in public when intoxicated, or at least not doing your best to hide it - Japan tends to look much worse than it is in reality. THIS is what I am trying to say. Japan gets a bad rap for being a country full of drunks, when the whole deal is looked at much differently so it seems to be more a case of cultural acceptance and a lack of stigma resulting in far more visibility.

Per capita alcohol consumption in Japan is quite a bit lower than that in the US, UK, and AUS. However, there are different social and cultural norms in those places, so you may not see it in public.