21
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 29 Sep 2024
21 points (78.4% liked)
Asklemmy
44157 readers
2157 users here now
A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions
Search asklemmy ๐
If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!
- Open-ended question
- Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
- Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
- Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
- An actual topic of discussion
Looking for support?
Looking for a community?
- Lemmyverse: community search
- sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
- !lemmy411@lemmy.ca: a community for finding communities
~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
No. I think this is a symptom. People escaping the shitty world we live in. Fix real life and less people with want to run away from it.
Addiction is separate from circumstances.
Look at Heath Ledger, Amy Winehouse, Michael Jackson, etc etc etc.
Heath was young, successful, dating a billionaire, and had everything in the world at his fingertips. He decided to have a one man party with drugs and alcohol.
I agree with you, but I'd call "circumstances" socio-economic status instead. A few remarks for everything else:
He didn't "decide" to use drugs. By definition, addiction is the compulsive use of substance a despite knowing they are harming you. As in: You want to stop, but you can't. You can't "choose", your way out addiction.
Being young and having money make it easier to be happy, but are not requirements beyond your basic needs. I agree with you 100% there. But to me this shows the issues in society go beyond money and basic needs.
These dudes don't kill themselves because their circumstances make them miserable, they kill themselves because DESPITE having "everything" they are still miserable.
Precisely because everyone is sold in the idea that the reason you're miserable is not the oppressive, violent system you live in and the lack of opportunities for free development and growth, but instead it's just that you haven't purchased enough stuff and don't go to the gym often enough.
When that doesn't work, boom: Addiction or death.
While this is true to a degree, there also seems to be indications that some people are more susceptible to addictive behavior than others, so some will only be inclined towards addiction if their circumstances are bad enough to make it more attractive.
I suspect this is similar to smoking causing cancer. Sure, it will likely shorten your life and cause cancer, or you can be like George Burns and smoke regularly for over 70 years.
Ultimately, it's hard to know how susceptible you are to addiction (or smoking-related cancer) until you've taken the chance.