Alcoholism & Drug Addiction are Diseases

[Anonymous]

This part of AA is good (although I'm not arguing for AA as a whole here). If these problems are caused by a disease then what right does society have to imprison these people, put them in the gulag treatment centers, ruin their lives with criminal records, etc.? Do we imprison those who have diabetes?

http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/news ... olism-gene

[Anne Bonney]

First, alcoholism/addiction are NOT diseases, IMO.  Second, I would assert that calling it such actually empowers the "do-gooders" to lock us up for our own safety.  Because we're so "sick" that we can't be trusted to know what's best for us.  We know why the neo-con/fundies like programs.....get tuff on kids/crime.  But the libs/hippies/new-agers like the 'alternative' approach.  They look at it as "rehabilitation/therapy" and helping them avoid prison.  Those are the people that actually BELIEVE the crap they're spouting, which IMO makes them even more dangerous than the neo-con/fundies.  At least you know[/b] they're twisted fucks.  A lot of these "alternatives" supporters reach people (and their kids sometimes) because they're sincere in wanting to help and believe what they're doing is good and right and true.

[Anonymous]

First, alcoholism/addiction are NOT diseases, IMO.  Second, I would assert that calling it such actually empowers the "do-gooders" to lock us up for our own safety.  Because we're so "sick" that we can't be trusted to know what's best for us.  We know why the neo-con/fundies like programs.....get tuff on kids/crime.  But the libs/hippies/new-agers like the 'alternative' approach.  They look at it as "rehabilitation/therapy" and helping them avoid prison.  Those are the people that actually BELIEVE the crap they're spouting, which IMO makes them even more dangerous than the neo-con/fundies.  At least you know[/b] they're twisted fucks.  A lot of these "alternatives" supporters reach people (and their kids sometimes) because they're sincere in wanting to help and believe what they're doing is good and right and true.

IMO, people calling AA NA a cult actually empowers the do-gooders to lock us up as it makes "us" look crazy with no clue what a cult entails or brainwashing involves or our ideas of "abuse" non conforming to legal definitions of abuse. IMO I think going with the science on the issue is the best idea. Saying there's no such thing as addiction...just really is not accurate.  You cant be locked up lunless youre an immediate danger to yourself or others, disease or not. Depressed people arent locked up, nor should be drug addicts if legal precedent is followed and respected. The whole idea of locking people up for enjoying drugs...ugh...dont get me started

[Anne Bonney]

First, alcoholism/addiction are NOT diseases, IMO.  Second, I would assert that calling it such actually empowers the "do-gooders" to lock us up for our own safety.  Because we're so "sick" that we can't be trusted to know what's best for us.  We know why the neo-con/fundies like programs.....get tuff on kids/crime.  But the libs/hippies/new-agers like the 'alternative' approach.  They look at it as "rehabilitation/therapy" and helping them avoid prison.  Those are the people that actually BELIEVE the crap they're spouting, which IMO makes them even more dangerous than the neo-con/fundies.  At least you know[/b] they're twisted fucks.  A lot of these "alternatives" supporters reach people (and their kids sometimes) because they're sincere in wanting to help and believe what they're doing is good and right and true.

IMO, people calling AA NA a cult actually empowers the do-gooders to lock us up as it makes "us" look crazy with no clue what a cult entails or brainwashing involves or our ideas of "abuse" non conforming to legal definitions of abuse.

I'm not sure I can decipher that.  What are you saying?


]quote] IMO I think going with the science on the issue is the best idea. Saying there's no such thing as addiction...just really is not accurate.

Well, yes it is.

 You cant be locked up lunless youre an immediate danger to yourself or others, disease or not. Depressed people arent locked up, nor should be drug addicts if legal precedent is followed and respected.

 :eek:   What color is the sky in your world?  People are locked up every day regardless of diagnosis.


 

The whole idea of locking people up for enjoying drugs...ugh...dont get me started

Yep.  Pretty fucking stoopid.

[psy]

First, alcoholism/addiction are NOT diseases, IMO.  Second, I would assert that calling it such actually empowers the "do-gooders" to lock us up for our own safety.

Precisely.  The idea becomes that since a person is not in control of their own facilities they do not really have free will to be taken away.  This means that imprisoning them and re-educating them is really helping them get their freedom back.  Now let's argue for a moment that it was true and that there were some people that truly could not control themselves...  I don't agree with that, but even if it were true, who gets to make that distinction?  Who gets to decide who is an "addict" and who is not?  Who gets to decide who needs forced "treatment" (incarceration + re-education)?

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under live robber barons than under omnipotent moral busibodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good, will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." ~ C.S. Lewis

Interesting Essay by C.S. Lewis if you read the whole thing.  He describes this exact system, where people are locked up and forced to reform their beliefs for their "own good".  He was applying it to religious beliefs but any personal choice that does not affect another person directly falls under the same paradigm.  It is better and safer for everybody if nobody has the power to lock people up and change the way they think without their knowledge and consent.  Freedom of thought is sacred and forced "rehabilitation" is nothing more than a euphemism for re-education.

This isn't even mentioning the scientific evidence pointing to the fact that addiction is *not* a disease.  If you think alcoholism/addiction is a disease, you might consider viewing the evidence for the "other" side of the argument:

http://www.peele.net/lib/diseasing3.html

The Supreme Court agrees:

In 1988, the US Supreme Court upheld a regulation whereby the Veterans' Administration was able to avoid paying benefits by presuming that primary alcoholism is always the result of the veteran's "own willful misconduct." The majority opinion written by Justice Byron R. White echoed the District of Columbia Circuit's finding that there exists "a substantial body of medical literature that even contests the proposition that alcoholism is a disease, much less that it is a disease for which the victim bears no responsibility"

http://supreme.justia.com/us/485/535/case.html

NOT A DISEASE.  It's a CHOICE.  People should not be condemned for what they put in their bodies.  At the same time, people should not be excused by what they have in their bodies (it's not my fault, it was my disease).

pardon my programmese, but that's a fuckin cop out

I can understand how a drunk/addict can find the idea palatable so he/she can blame everything he/she has done wrong on "the disease", but it doesn't make it true.  Furthermore, it just gives pre-emptive absolution for any further actions... encouraging irresponsible behaviors that harm others under the guise of "the disease".

[Anonymous]

WRONG - the Supreme Court agreed in 1988 before the 2004 gene isolation evidence was found. If it's a disease treat it like one, don't put people in prison over it. There is no justifiable reason to do some. I'm not suggesting to send them to the gulags either. Also if there is a reasonable treatment for a disease, people are still responsible - if someone has cancer and they just sit around and do nothing about it, then they face the consequences on their own.

[psy]

WRONG - the Supreme Court agreed in 1988 before the 2004 gene isolation evidence was found. If it's a disease treat it like one, don't put people in prison over it. There is no justifiable reason to do some. I'm not suggesting to send them to the gulags either. Also if there is a reasonable treatment for a disease, people are still responsible - if someone has cancer and they just sit around and do nothing about it, then they face the consequences on their own.

Genetic predisposition to a chemical does NOT mean disease.  It does *not* mean people are out of control.  It does *not* mean some gene causes people to pick up a drink ( a behavior ) and another and another.

hereditary baldness is a disease.  there is nothing a person can do to avoid it.  drinking, on the other hand, is a CHOICE.  C H O I C E.  If somebody who knows he has a hard time controlling his alcohol decides to drink anyway he/she is fucking stupid.  Fucking stupid is a subset of C H O I C E.  *NOT* disease.  A *disease* is out of a person's control and cannot be controlled with willpower.  People DO quit drinking by willpower alone.  There are so many differences between what constitutes a "disease" and what AA labels a "disease".

Let me ask you a flat simple question here:  Do you favor treating people against their will if they "cannot" control themselves?

[Anonymous]

Genetic predisposition to a chemical does NOT mean disease.  It does *not* mean people are out of control.  It does *not* mean some gene causes people to pick up a drink ( a behavior ) and another and another.

Why is it that some people can go to dinner, have a glass of wine and that's it? Others need to continue drinking until they've thrown themselves into the gutter and are rummaging through dumpsters near bars looking for spiders (empty bottles with small amounts of alcohol left in them). I'm not talking about anyone who uses alcohol or drugs here, I'm talking about people who have gone too far even by the standards of other drug users. Most people attending those AA meetings probably don't really belong there by the standards of that program itself.

Let me ask you a flat simple question here:  Do you favor treating people against their will if they "cannot" control themselves?

This would depend on several factors. What is the treatment? Is it some half-baked theory of some charlatans like the guys who founded AA or the gulags? If a guy is lying in the street bleeding to death and I am a doctor, I bandage him even though he is telling me not to touch him, is that an evil thing? Secondly, what are the consequences of this "cannot control themselves" state. Are they freaked out perverts trying to rape their neighbor's wife because they're so spun out on meth? Who are their actions effecting?  Does putting them in prison make any sense? IMHO, no, it's contradictory to the underlying meaning of a legal system.

I don't think I've seen or heard of a "program" that I would confide in today. Maybe someone will come up with a drug that allows these people to control their drinking/usage and we won't need to even talk about the programs anyway. That would seem to be a nice ending to a sad story.

[psy]

Are they freaked out perverts trying to rape their neighbor's wife because they're so spun out on meth?

OK.  Here' you're venturing into future-crime.  Either a person raped the neighbor's wife or he didn't.  In one case, lock him up *for rape*, in the other case... well it's his business if he messes up his body.

Who are their actions effecting?

then judge them by those actions, not by what's in their own body or how fucked up they are.  They can swing their arms all they want but that right ends precisely with another person's face.  If and until that happens, there is no point condemning them or forceably treating them for what they have not done.

Does putting them in prison make any sense?

not unless they have violated the rights of anothe person or harmed somebody else *directly*.  (neigher self harm, nor offense (such as the grief of a family member at the situation) is enough to warrant it).

I don't think I've seen or heard of a "program" that I would confide in today. Maybe someone will come up with a drug that allows these people to control their drinking/usage and we won't need to even talk about the programs anyway. That would seem to be a nice ending to a sad story.

That's already been done.

I could list off a page of legal and illegal pharmaceuticals for dealing with various addictions.  Problem is that the 12 steppers lobby against such things as they believe alcoholism is a "spiritual disease" requiring their special brand of "recovery" which doesn't really mean recovery.  They think that a pill to cure alcoholism is missing curing the "spiritual" part.

It's batshit fucking crazy 12 step religious zeal gone awry is what it is.  Moral busybodies... like CS Lewis said...  that and greedy members of the recovery industry who don't want to lose customers.

[psy]

Why is it that some people can go to dinner, have a glass of wine and that's it? Others need to continue drinking until they've thrown themselves into the gutter and are rummaging through dumpsters near bars looking for spiders (empty bottles with small amounts of alcohol left in them).

Choice.

You're presuming the alcohol itself is what caused the people to want to engage in such self-destructive behavior.  That's simply not always true.  Some people drink to run away and because it works to dull the pain.  The pain is the problem, their past is the problem.  It's not the alcohol itself.

Either way.  Whatever the motivation for a choice (not forced), whether genetic propensity (not guarantee) or depression or what have you... it's still a choice and nobody, especially not the state, has any right to interfere with it.  It's a personal choice and does not affect anybody else directly.

[Anonymous]

I could list off a page of legal and illegal pharmaceuticals for dealing with various addictions. s.

I've been down that road and didn't find anything that really worked.

It sounds like you are in favor of some complete legalization. This could make sense but remember what Zappa said about the U.S. being some corporate dictatorship. The slave system would not tolerate anything like this because it would bear a risk on production. Same reason the U.S. fought so hard against communism.

[psy]

It sounds like you are in favor of some complete legalization.

I am, personally, but I don't speak for anybody else here on the matter.

[Anonymous]

You're sounding gulag here. The pain and the past, to me that's all pure b.s. - gulag rhetoric. I liked to use because I loved the effect, frequently I would use to celebrate some good event like a raise and not using to deal with some negative situation. Some drugs will cause many people to act in a certain fashion that doesn't work very well with society. The "future-crime" thing has validity when you can show that you are preventing a significant number of rapes. If you can't demonstrate that prevention then there is no validity.

My point in leveraging the disease concept would be to take a step in the right direction, not necessarily as a final answer. You talk to people about legalizing heroin and you'll be laughed out of most towns in America. But at least if you can keep people out of prison and avoid screwing up their future employment via their criminal records, it has to be better than what it is today. Some people are suffering gravely for some drug mistake - a bunch of hard time and now can't get a decent job due to the record. Many others just didn't get caught.

Choice.

You're presuming the alcohol itself is what caused the people to want to engage in such self-destructive behavior.  That's simply not always true.  Some people drink to run away and because it works to dull the pain.  The pain is the problem, their past is the problem.  It's not the alcohol itself.

Either way.  Whatever the motivation for a choice (not forced), whether genetic propensity (not guarantee) or depression or what have you... it's still a choice and nobody, especially not the state, has any right to interfere with it.  It's a personal choice and does not affect anybody else directly.

[Anonymous]

People are entitled to their personal beliefs about what addiction . But there is more evidence and data for and about it  an illness than for just about any mental illness which is why majority scientific opinion, the AMA, etc, recognize it as such . Internet battles wont really change that. Google link v google links battles get somwhat ridiculous. Imo a group of people who claim they have been "brainwashed" really have no buissiness telling people that their brain function and their actions are determined only through "willpower" as they should be able to understand others' struggles through their own expereince, but waddy gonna do

[psy]

The "future-crime" thing has validity when you can show that you are preventing a significant number of rapes. If you can't demonstrate that prevention then there is no validity.

No. You're missing the point entirely.  Say I were to pull up statistics showing that African Americans comitted more crimes.  Even if that were true, it would not justify locking up all African Americans even if it would reduce crime.  Similarly, simply because more drug users commit crimes does not mean that it is justifiable to lock up or forceably treat ALL drug users.  Some can and do use responsibly (even hard drug users) and judging them as a whole instead of individually by their actions is prejudice.

Furthermore, you could say "well drug users are prone to rape" all you want but it might be just as accurate to say "rapists are prone to drug use".  Coincidence does not mean causality.  Rapists might choose certain drugs to enhance sexual performance or any number of reasons.  Criminals might also be more prone to drug use since they are already breaking the law.  Etc etc...  Saying "drugs cause crime" is oversimplifying greatly.  Even if it were true, statistically... as i've said, judging the group based on the actions of a few individuals is prejudice.