EDIT: Let’s cool it with the downvotes, dudes. We’re not out to cut funding to your black hole detection chamber or revoke the degrees of chiropractors just because a couple of us don’t believe in it, okay? Chill out, participate with the prompt and continue with having a nice day. I’m sure almost everybody has something to add.
Addiction is NOT a disease. Sorry, but your choice do heroin does not get to go into the same category as a child with cancer.
You asked for your problem, they didn’t.
EDIT: This NOT up for debate. I answered OP in good faith. I’m not here to discuss/debate my stance.
Wait, what’s your definition of a disease?
Anything that isn’t self-imposed.
2 people take the same dose of heroin, they repeat the experience 5 times each on the same time line. Lets say they both has the same surgery. One person stops easily, experiencing mild withdrawal that feels like a flu and goes on with their life without ever thinking about it again. The other feels a powerful compulsion to take more, they maintain their usage say initially through extending a medical script and later the black market.
What was different between the two? Maybe you think person 2 had terrible moral character but if they had never been given heroin this would never have manifested. We call that pathological difference a disease and try and treat it. What would you call it?
I call it junkies.
So you say the difference is some moral deficiency? ok well why don’t we try and treat that. After all we need pain killers in medicine and we want to make them as safe as possible.
Let’s call junkeyism a disease and see how we can stop it happening. Maybe by understanding if some people respond better or worse to different kinds of drugs, maybe we could identify a test we could do to work out what would be safe for someone?
Like what do you think it means when a doctor calls something a disease? People can make bad decisions and still get diseases. If inject yourself with the blood of everyone you meet you’ll eventually get a few, they don’t stop being a disease just because you gave it to yourself (and also we might ask why someone felt compelled to do something so foolish and could we have helped them).
Junkeyism ALSO isn’t a disease. It’s a bad decision. Tens of thousands of children die of cancer every year. Cancer- a REAL disease. A disease they never asked for.
Their cause of death shouldn’t be categorized alongside dipshits that chose to shoot drugs into their veins.
I’m not arguing this with you. So fuck off.
It’s very rude to just swear at someone who hasn’t done anything to you. You don’t seem very nice.
I’m still confused though, if someone ate some mercury because they bit down on a thermometer or something should their mercury poisoning not be diagnosed as mercury poisoning? should it not be treated the same way?
Well, for starters, thank you for answering the prompt.
But, I mean, the barebones definition of Disease is when the organism’s functions behave outside of their evolutionary purpose. I don’t think people evolved their brain’s Sigma Receptors and Dopaminergic Systems just to be triggered by Meth, much less to form a habit based on the results of that interaction, so by definition I think that fits the terminology.
And I disagree with that. Which is what you asked about.
So you don’t care that the majority of people who abuse drugs are doing it to self-medicate something, be that pain, depression from the state of their life, or an undiagnosed neurological condition?
(Adderall is just a dilute relative of meth, and so has similar effects on ADHD brains, i.e. makes us more functional. Also, there is research showing that cannabis has a positive effect on autistic brains, which would explain why so many autistic people I know love their greenery. Plus, anecdotes from fellow ADHDers of “I microdose weed because it helps me focus better, and it’s easier to get than legal adderall”)
No. I don’t care. A junkie is a junkie. Having a neurological condition doesn’t give you an excuse to get whacked out on meth 7 days a week. CANCER is a disease. Addiction is NOT.
I say this as someone with ADHD and ASD, and as a person who lost a friend to addiction this year.
JUNKIES don’t have diseases. PERIOD.
So, unpacking your worldview here, how do you feel about cancer brought about by smoking, or by prolonged exposure to materials that you know are radioactive and/or carcinogenic? Does that change with the knowledge that processed meat and plastics, things that are impossible to avoid unless you structure your life around limiting exposure to them, are most likely mild carcinogens?
Also, please tell me, regardless of how you classify addiction, that you at least understand that the only evidence-based approach to drugs is decriminalisation. Almost all of the societal ills associated with them are entirely the fault of their possession and sale being crimes. You can’t find safe environments to use them in if they’re illegal, nor can you feel safe seeking medical aid if you’ve taken too high a dose without realising it. If you’re a dealer, you have no regulatory bodies to answer to, and pay no taxes on the money you make. If you’re running organised crime, you’re already sitting on enough of a supply to land you in jail for the rest of your life, and that makes murdering competitors seem like a much more palatable option. And then there’s the developing world. Most of the money this makes ends up back in the hands of rebels, warlords and cartels in the developing world, where they cause untold misery and suffering.
But if you legalise them, that nips most of those problems in the bud. You can publicly admit to using them, feel safe seeking medical aid when you mistakenly take too much, get help from programs designed to end your dependence. The dealers go out of business, replaced by actual stores that pay taxes and follow regulations, like not being able to sell to minors or water down your product to sell more of it. Organised crime loses one of its biggest sources of money overnight, given that their expensive material of unknown origin and purity is suddenly replaced by cheaper material of known origin and purity. The cross-border smuggling also ceases, because what else are you going to find that is illegal, compact, and high in value? Oh, and the developing world can actually benefit from drug production, since the criminal groups will be greatly weakened from the loss of profits, and developed world importers would rather deal with legitimate businesses than violent criminals and rebels.
We learnt this shit a century ago with alcohol, one of the most destructive drugs (even meth would not be as destructive if legalised), why are we still doing it?
I said I’m not debating this. And I’m not.
Both the NIH and DSM-5 would disagree.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK565474/table/nycgsubuse.tab9/
https://nida.nih.gov/publications/drugfacts/understanding-drug-use-addiction
I can find 10 people to say that ADHD isn’t real for every 1 person who says substance use disorder isn’t a disease.
Does that mean ADHD isn’t a real condition?
Am I disagree with them, which is what OP asked. Are you arguing with everyone here that disagrees with science, or just me?
Believing that the moon landing was a hoax, or that dark matter doesn’t exist, is ultimately harmless. The same cannot be said of disagreeing with proven, helpful medical knowledge, in favour of a gut-feeling based alternative that only makes things worse. It is a moral imperative to make you realise you are wrong, or failing that, thoroughly demonstrate it to everyone watching, so your harmful ideas do not spread.
My ideas are no more harmful than any other opinion here. I didn’t say it I don’t accept it as science, I simply said I disagree with it. As OP asked.
I answered in good faith that this is how I feel. I won’t apologize that it upset you. That’s your problem.