Tiger Woods is in trouble; everyone knows that. He has apologized for his behavior and his sexual addiction. But if addictions are diseases, as is heard so often in modern society, then for what is he apologizing?
One does not apologize for having a cold. One does not apologize because of something that has happened to him which he cannot control.
Yet as so many addictions are mere habit, then why ought we to consider them diseases? This point brings the issue to a head: we need to make up our minds about what is really just something that happened to someone and what things someone does which are wholly their responsibility. We need to see diseases as diseases and bad behavior as bad behavior.
What Tiger did was wrong, of course, but we risk giving him an out by treating it as though it were an addiction beyond his control. So long as we confuse the two points, we will see an increasing number of folks behaving badly then trying to pass it off as a problem beyond their ability to control. We shall only weaken society further if we grant individuals a pass on their behavior supposedly as a result of false conditions.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
1 comment:
Addiction may be disease, but addiction generally requires willing exposure to something bad.
Being addicted may make one a victim, but becoming addicted in the first place is the person's fault and they are certainly to blame for their initial behavior.
Post a Comment