I have been around addicts my whole life (drugs and alcohol), I've known many people who died from their addiction, and I've struggled with addiction myself at

I have been around addicts my whole life (drugs and alcohol), I've known many people who died from their addiction, and I've struggled with addiction myself at times (drugs and alcohol). I have a few issues with this article. 1. Behavioral addictions are not comparable to a serious chemical addiction. The person who can't stop watching Netflix or can't get off Facebook is not the same as someone who can't stop sticking needles in their arm (heroin) and is flirting with death everyday. I've had behavioral addictions and chemical addictions, and I can tell you first hand that a chemical addiction is a different monster. You start to feel physically and mentally ill when you can't get your fix for a chemical addiction. Flu like symptoms, you can even die from withdrawal from some things. Comparing that to something like video game addiction is a huge stretch and somewhat offensive. 2. Saying that an addictive personality is really just deep seated emotional issues is not really changing much. Deep seated emotional issues are very hard to change. We try and some do, but a lot of us only make minor progress or don't change at all. Especially the people whose emotional issues have led them to a serious drug or alcohol addiction. Sometimes the best they can do is just abstain and use something healthier to cope. The whole article feels like the author is engaging with the issue on an intellectual level. Sure, there are addicts who can recover and then even use their substance without relapsing. But there are many addicts who relapse and die, or ruin their lives. It makes sense then to err on the side of caution. For most addicts, there's more to lose than to gain, and it's hard enough fighting addiction that I don't think we should encourage addicts to push their boundaries. I've just known many people first hand that truly embody the phrase "Once an addict, always an addict." Sure, maybe it's not true for some people, but it's true for a lot of people, especially the addicts that have it really bad.