Society and Addiction

hitest

hitest

Several days ago I received a global e-mail from a highly regarded software engineer who was in distress. I'm an addict in recovery, I stopped using May 23, 2015. My life today is a blessing compared to my active addiction days. I truly hope that the engineer gets the support he needs to return to wellness. The AMA classifies addiction as an illness. Addiction is a treatable disease. Unfortunately society condemns people who suffer with addiction. This stigma ironically is not applied to other diseases like high blood pressure and diabetes. If you or someone you love is suffering with addiction help is available. Have a great day! :)
 
Yes, this is an interesting matter. I kept constantly thinking that I for my part living a shitty life is purely my own fault and due to my own deficiencies; while most of the other people, and especially those with public visibility, like eg. showbiz-people or distinguished engineers, certainly have the kind of social relations etc. to support and sustain them and allow them to do what they do.

But then, occasionally things happen to fall apart. and that raises the question if this is actually the case.
But, if it is not, then why do we alltogether continue to live such a life, and only blame those who can't bear it any longer?
 
hitest said:
Unfortunately society condemns people who suffer with addiction.
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That's only partially true. Actually society does perfectly tolerate addiction, as long as the concerned people continue to somehow function properly, and -most important- profits can be made from the addictive behaviour.

The reason why addiction is considered an illness is simple: it makes it possible to lock people up without them having done anything bad. Me, for instance, I am labelled an addict, as a punishment for not behaving properly in line with the government.

So this is a two- or threefold issue. On one hand addiction is the modern version of witch-hunting - and it is obviousely important that society condemns witches (because otherwise witch-hunting would not work).
On the other hand society actually promotes addiction (or at least certain kinds of addiction), because addicted people are the perfect citizens, they're docile: as long as they get their stuff, they don't speak up, the don't critizise, they don't want to overthrow the government.

On the personal level, addiction only happens when something important is missing in life, and then gets substituted by whatever creates addiction. But that's what is expected from us: we're expected to function as sterile NPCs, to behave properly and to fulfill our duties; we're not respected as humans; we're just needed as consumers. We are supposed to live a shitty life, do a shitty job, buy shitty food and watch a shitty tv program, and -over all- to accept what is called "limited expectations".
This is not what humans were designed for. Psalms 82:6 I have said, Ye are gods
 
In a lab experiment, rats were offered two kinds of water. Pure water or water laced with Colombian marching powder. If you keep a rat in an empty cage with only food and these two kinds of water, they prefer the laced version. If you keep them with company, toys, boxes,... they prefer the pure drink. Find what is missing in your life and you have fewer problems ditching an addiction.
 
Addiction means one has - at least partially - lost control over him or herself.
This happens when sneaky routines are developed unnoticed.

So to beware or get rid off bad routines (habits),
one need to check, revise, change, or break certain routines regulary.
What is done intentionally, what unconsciously?
What's doing me good? (Not short termed!)
What's bad for me?
What feels good, what bad, distinguish it from the "Yeah, but..."
Everyone has to do things feeling not good.
The point is to distinguish feelings conciously, doing things intentionally.

To do so one needs to be capable of hearing oneself.
Regulary switch off all stuff that overwhelms your inner voices.
Switch off the infotainment bombardement for a while:
smartphones, tablets, computers, TV, radio, music, etc.,
avoid noisy and overstimulating places like shopping malls, concerts, cinemas, fairs, carnivals etc.
It all distracts you from listening to yourself
(Their overall purpose is exactly to do that: Listen to them, and block your judgement.)
Every "Boing! New message for you!" yanks you out of your meditative process of feeling into yourself.
Search the calm sea of total silence.
Check if you are capable of becoming and enjoying to be completely quiet for a couple of hours.
Get beyond boredom.
"Missing something urgent/important" is one of the main motors sneaking people into routines (addiction) they did not consciously chose.
Looking at the stark reality app. 99.99% of all of that is pure bullshit,
or at least must not be answered to immediatly, could wait for a couple hours, or days.

Do some walk in nature.
Doing it regulary is the very most best thing you can do to you anyway.
Meet and talk to real people.
Eat healthy. You are what you eat. If you don't feed yourself right, you mistreat your body, which is you.
There is a good chance you mistreat youself in other ways, too.
Drinking absolutely no alcohol (including other drugs) for at least three months can be a telling insight on many levels.
Take a look at your appartment and yourself: Outer neglect is a sure sign for inner neglect.
Read books
Look for sufficient compensation to get back in balance (sports, music, painting, cooking, foreign languages...)
Try relaxation or meditation techniques.

If this ain't no help, seek professional help.

Every engineer knows:
Unsolved problems grow automatically, and produce additional problems.
So work on your debugging routines continously,
be on guard for bugs permanently,
fix them immediatly.
 
Crivens said:
In a lab experiment, rats were offered two kinds of water. Pure water or water laced with Colombian marching powder. If you keep a rat in an empty cage with only food and these two kinds of water, they prefer the laced version. If you keep them with company, toys, boxes,... they prefer the pure drink. Find what is missing in your life and you have fewer problems ditching an addiction.
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Bingo. Not sure if this is an urban legend, but it perfectly nails it.
And hat brings us to the matter of the highly advertized so-called social media, which is nothing less than social: you can now have thousand followers, but nobody will even notice when you die.
I have currently no idea what to do about it, and maybe we just have to continue watching how our friends try to kill themselves, because it is Kali Yuga and therefore perfectly normal that people start to kill themselves. But, I don't like it that way.
 
PMc said:
… but nobody will even notice when you die. …
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I like to think of that as the (very rare) exception, not the norm, and not only because of recent events and social media. Before social media as we now know it: there was the landline, and mail.

When a relative of mine developed dementia, the family tried to contact some of her oldest friends, consulting a small traditional contact book that she had kept. IIRC one person that might have mattered most could not be contacted; people had simply lost touch.
 
grahamperrin said:
there was the landline
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There was boundaries.
Except there was a real emergency nobody called you late at night, or on weekends.
If you were not at home you simply were not reachable.
You also could ignore the phone without justifying yourself, cause anybody assumes you simply were not home.
And that was Okay, because it was normal.

Today everybody is reachable everywhere at anytime for everything.
Even on holidays you cannot actually recreate because being on permanent response keeps always one part of you on the job.
Can you simply switch off your phone, e.g. when you off duty on not paid time without feeling to justify yourself to your colleagues or superiors?
That's not healthy. That's 24/7 tension.
Finess that with destraction (TV, games, multimedia,...) or oppression (drugs [alcohol]) will produce those sneaky routines which lead to addiction.
 
grahamperrin said:
I like to think of that as the (very rare) exception, not the norm, and not only because of recent events and social media. Before social media as we now know it: there was the landline, and mail.
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It's certainly an exaggeration. But nevertheless, look at the youngsters. Traditionally they happened to flock together and do all kinds of nonsense. Nowadays they maybe flock together but certainly treat their smartphone. From what I hear, they no longer do crap on Beltaine (May Eve).
And currently, with the discussions to train children to use "modern" media already in kindergarten, we will get masses of social analphabetes in the years to come.

Yes, on the technical side there was landline and mail. But that's not what I'm looking at. When I grew up, I got into what was still remaining of the hippie communities, and that was actually my family. It was a sub-culture, self-sustaining, and you could find support wherever you went. It was also a political vector, maintaining freedom, free thinking and independence from conventions (like those of our boring parents). Communication worked - somehow, I don't really know, by getting together, meeting each other.
That's why I kept my attention on the sub-cultures and the deviants. Because I think this is what actually ventures into new lands and in the long run brings society onwards.

So what happened with the arrival of the internet: many of the sub-cultures ventured there, and finally, almost all did with the appearing of Facebook. And so they lost their ability to organize themselves, lost their own relations and their identity.
 
Profighost said:
There was boundaries.
Except there was a real emergency nobody called you late at night, or on weekends.
If you were not at home you simply were not reachable.
And that was Okay, because it was normal.
Today everybody is reachable everywhere at anytime for everything.
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And everything in the end boils down to - nothing.

I have written a paper somewhere - about the importance of taboos. The importance is not in prohibiting something, it is that breaking the taboo shapes an identity. If everything is a mesh of all the same (non)importance, there is no identity, no meaning in anything.
 
Profighost said:
Can you simply switch off your phone, e.g. when you off duty on not paid time without feeling to justify yourself to your colleagues or superiors?
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In recent years: yes. Absolutely.

Other times in the past: if I felt it wrong to switch off, it was my conscience (never pressure from my employer).

Even on holidays you cannot actually recreate because being on permanent response keeps always one part of you on the job.
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When I last enjoyed a proper holiday, 2018 it might have been, properly switching off was a joy.
 
A month or so ago, I was flying back home from Europe over the Atlantic ocean. Looking down I saw all these waves going this way and that crashing down and I thought to myself, "And no one noticed."

I thought of all the sea life that are doing their thing down there without regard to me or any person in any country anywhere else. They existed and persevered despite what I say or do (ignoring pollution). It reminded me of astronauts in space who notice the same about our beautiful world and how it must be preserved.
 
PMc said:
That's only partially true. Actually society does perfectly tolerate addiction, as long as the concerned people continue to somehow function properly, and -most important- profits can be made from the addictive behaviour.
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There was tobacco smoking. A good example - it was tolerated, but it was highly addictive and a killer, yet tolerated and big companies profited. Then under a "public health" banner, it gets taxed heavily, to supposedly stop people smoking - so the treasury benefits. Taxing doesn't help the addicts to stop (that was never the intent, which was in fact to monetise the addiction), but over the years it simply becomes less and less accepted, the detrimental effects on health more widely known and it declines a lot.

Then we have vaping. Originally a "stop smoking" thing, now a huge global business, with young people who have never smoked in their lives now spending insane amounts of money on vaping - i.e. inhaling a vapour containing this same highly addictive (and taxable) substance found in tobacco. I predict the tax can only go up and up...

So, you have this highly addictive repugnant thing, which is now widely known to be a bad thing that will kill you, but it's a source of tax revenue. So you replace it with a far less repugnant, taxable thing safe in the knowledge that it will probably take a few more decades before the health risks are all fully exposed - then onto the next thing...

"Business, is business"
 
blackhole said:
So, you have this highly addictive repugnant thing, which is now widely known to be a bad thing that will kill you, but it's a source of tax revenue.
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I have no problem with taxing such a thing. If they made such things illegal, like alcohol of decades ago, there would still be an underground and time wasted arresting people.
But you have to keep the tax to some reasonable limit. Otherwise that same underground movement will come about.
If people want to kill themselves in that way, so be it. It's their decision. Just don't bother me with your smoke or rowdy behavior.
 
I used to go out, socialise and (thoroughly) enjoy drinking, luckily never addicted.

It's now so obscenely expensive in the UK, people who want an alternative will naturally go for things that can't be served over the counter.

I assume that tax is largely responsible for the obscene increase (and its consequences).
 
blackhole said:
There was tobacco smoking. A good example - it was tolerated, but it was highly addictive and a killer, yet tolerated and big companies profited. Then under a "public health" banner, it gets taxed heavily, to supposedly stop people smoking - so the treasury benefits. Taxing doesn't help the addicts to stop (that was never the intent, which was in fact to monetise the addiction), but over the years it simply becomes less and less accepted, the detrimental effects on health more widely known and it declines a lot.
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And you can see people do exactly what they are told to: feel offended by the smokers. They don't feel offended by the greedy, twisted government.

In former times smoking was a decadent habit entertained by the wealthier ones; and no respectable club without it's smoker's lounge. Now we are told smoking isn't healthy (and mark well: we get that told by those who care the least about our health!), and the smokers are isolated and put up against the wall: let them bleed.

That's the common scheme: isolate some subgroup and put the blame on them, and the people will chime in and hate as required. Divide and conquer.
When we're done with the smokers, the next will come. Beer and wine are probably still too strong a lobby behind, but then there are those despisable sugar addicts, and the meat addicts. Labelling is already in place, and just imagine how much of the dreaded carbondioxide they produce with their eating!
 
I know we've all heard these stories before but I'll tell mine.

Back when smoking was considered normal around the workplace, all but three of us smoked at a small radio station I worked at. One day ol' Skeets (real nickname) let it be known the doctor found a spot on his lung. "It ain't nothin'," he said. But he switched to those plastic filters that reduced the amount of tar he sucked into his lungs. It scared everyone else enough that they, too, started using those filters.

Three years later, Skeets was dead. Another DJ, Don, got throat cancer after that. I fond out later half the staff had died from some sort of smoking related disease.

My wife and I were having a discussion about this about 10 years ago. I realized then that more than half the people I've known, that one would consider moderate to heavy smokers, died young from smoking related diseases---or so they claim.
 
Getting sober isn’t just about quitting the substance—it’s about figuring out what’s really going on underneath. Like, what’s missing or what’s been hurting so much that it led to using in the first place? Whether it’s feeling alone, stuck, or just dealing with stuff you don’t know how to handle, you’ve got to dig into that to make real progress.
 
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