"But when alcohol comes in, start running. Because there's a demon there, and it goes back to her childhood"
About this Quote
Then he drops the word “demon,” and the quote snaps into a familiar celebrity script: addiction and volatility framed as possession. That metaphor does two things at once. It dramatizes the threat (good for a soundbite) while also shifting agency away from the person drinking. The “demon” becomes the villain, allowing Gest to sound compassionate even as he warns people to flee. Empathy and self-protection share the same sentence, uneasily.
“...and it goes back to her childhood” is the key tell. It’s not just scandal; it’s origin story. Gest gestures at trauma as explanation, offering a causal narrative that modern audiences recognize instantly - hurt becomes headline becomes behavior. The subtext is messy: he’s implying he knows intimate history, asserting proximity and authority, but he’s also packaging that history into a neat justification for why the room should clear when the bottle opens.
Intent-wise, it’s a boundary disguised as concern, and a bit of mythmaking disguised as diagnosis - the celebrity ecosystem’s favorite language for real pain.
Quote Details
| Topic | Mental Health |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Gest, David. (2026, January 17). But when alcohol comes in, start running. Because there's a demon there, and it goes back to her childhood. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-when-alcohol-comes-in-start-running-because-74057/
Chicago Style
Gest, David. "But when alcohol comes in, start running. Because there's a demon there, and it goes back to her childhood." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-when-alcohol-comes-in-start-running-because-74057/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"But when alcohol comes in, start running. Because there's a demon there, and it goes back to her childhood." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/but-when-alcohol-comes-in-start-running-because-74057/. Accessed 18 Feb. 2026.




