LogFAQs > #905342824

BloodyNate posted...

what do you mean by "stay the course?" do you mean they keep falling into their addictions? most people don't realize they're addicted until it's too late. hell, how many times have you thought "i'll make sure to get off CE by 10pm" only to find it's 2:57am and you're debating the finer points of addiction? we all let ourselves fall in to something thinking we won't, it's just that the most vulnerable fall into the worst things.

in addition, it's a very privileged thing to say that "the information is there." most people who become addicted are either never exposed to that information, or have that information countered with false information at the wrong time. how many times has someone told you not to mix liquors because it'll fuck you up? it's bullshit, but that time you were at your first party and fucking Fratboy Garrett said that, you made sure to stick to just tequila for the night, and you still got fucked up anyway.

OR how many times have you tried something where someone said "you'll get hurt" and you thought "nah, not me." that's literally a neurological fact about being young -- you think you're always going to be the exemption, even when all of the evidence says otherwise. we are physically unable to properly register consequence until our brains are fully formed, and addiction nearly always takes place prior to that.

it's all so much more nuanced than "they made a bad choice," and to say otherwise is reductive and damaging and literally killing people.

I mean, I've already stated the kind of person that I am. The answer to those things is never for me, by and large. I'm not an impulsive person and, even in my reckless teenage years, preferred weighing things in my head. I generally knew what I was capable of doing and not.

In the area I was in growing up I was offered drugs or drink on a nigh daily basis, and still managed to never do them with minimal outside help as I wasn't religious, and my parents just gave me the typical drugs are bad speech. But I've also been told I'm a little bit of a control freak, as I hate having my perception altered.

As for why I'm doing this, my day is already well under way. Already slept and woke up and done most of my daily activities, so this is wind down time for me and a topic I'm familiar with.

In the age of the internet all of this information is readily available to most anyone, save those that don't want to look. Most of those that wouldn't also tend to prefer going in to things uneducated, so it still boils down to choice in my books.