I have to agree with your assessment of the Gin and Tonic. That's my summer go-to and, yes, I'm smart. Until the fourth Gin and Tonic. Then I'm an idiot.

I can not, however agree with your assessment of Tequila, nor Scotch:

Tequila is toxic masculinity in a bottle: The dark and darker of frat parties, bro challenges and uber-masculine rites of passage. There is even a Tequila made from Mezcal and dead rattlesnake. True story (thankfully, not mine): https://humanparts.medium.com/chasing-the-snake-a-memoir-22df39007c45

Scotch, or any whisky, is warm chivalry in a bottle. It is made to be sipped in small doses, its purity powerful in the same way the sun gives all life, but you can't ever look directly at it for more than a nanosecond. The name whisky (or for Americans, whiskey) comes from the Irish, Usquebae, meaning 'water of life.' It is said that God invented whisky to keep the Irish from taking over the world... As an Irishmen, I'd say the trade was well worth it.