|
I have to agree with everyone here. Addiction is addiction "period". Problem is, sometimes its not "seen" as an addiction. I am sure that a scientist that gives up nearly everything to achieve some goal, and struggles to do so for years, is as "addicted" to it as someone coding software can be. The only difference is, we see MMOs as useless, while we see a new kind of light bulb "useful", so we call the later eccentric, while the former is "addicted". In truth, they may both be addicted. Mind you, I do think that a distinction should be made and any treatment needs to be to limit the damage in those cases, not prevent people from doing brilliant things.
I do however have a serious problem with them insisting on labeling them each with some special name. The nature of how and why addiction works is the same *regardless* of the addiction. Its mechanisms are not completely known, but well enough known to tell when its a real one, or just some moron making up a term, so they can then turn around and say, "Well, its not really that some people get addicted easier, its because of the **existence** of the thing they became addicted too. That is the problem, even if it is genetic." Umm. No... Because, as Brody says, addictive people get addicted *regardless* of eliminating the things you think they shouldn't be addicted to.
Was going to say something about the kinds of people that are most vocal about anything some crank psychologist or media news outlet invents, and how they are *usually* made up of people that have replaced addiction to X with the addiction to belonging to a group that attacks X, but decided that it would be hard not to get too specific and offend someone that belongs to one of those groups.
|