• Jack Riddle@sh.itjust.works
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    11 months ago

    “People are addicted” and “actively choose it” are contradictory statements. Addiction is a disease, not a personal failing.

    • GBU_28@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      I’d only refute the "active"part.

      You physically choose to locomote towards the counter to make the purchase, you physically choose to lift the cup to your mouth.

      The problem is your own mind is working against you to make that physical choice seem absolutely mandatory, via the importance of chemical signaling

    • moriquende@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Agree it’s a disease, but it’s also a choice. You choose to buy a big gulp when you crave it.

        • moriquende@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          How is choosing to buy a sugared drink instead of water the same as playing a game of chess against a grandmaster? What exactly about it makes your analogy fit?

          • zero_spelled_with_an_ecks@programming.dev
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            11 months ago

            Here’s a few ways:

            Information: does an individual know chess rules? Openings? En passant? Do they want to spend the time and effort to learn? Are they getting their info from reliable sources or are they learning bongcloud and knooks?

            Difference in skill level: the food and diet industries have thousands of specialists on their side with experience in psychology, advertisement, economics, lobbying, etc. Grandmasters can set up traps that new like a good idea to their opponent while thinking 10 steps ahead.

            Complexity: chess and diet are not a single choice, but a series of choices, some of which make later moves more difficult.

            Effort: it takes a long time to learn enough to even put up a decent resistance to a grandmaster, let alone win. It’s more than I’d care to put in. I don’t want to think about chess all the time. That’s called a chessing disorder.

            • moriquende@lemmy.world
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              11 months ago

              So your point is that it’s difficult to resist the urge to buy sugared drinks due to distinct factors such as lack of information about it being unhealthy (which I seriously doubt nowadays) and people being psychologically manipulated through advertisements and making their product economically competitive. I agree some of these factors make it easier to be unhealthy, but I disagree that it’s enough to say people don’t have and make a choice. The choice to be healthy is just a harder one to make than it should.

              • zero_spelled_with_an_ecks@programming.dev
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                11 months ago

                You’re straw manning me. I’m not saying people don’t have a choice. But they’re still going to lose. It doesn’t matter that I have a choice of which piece to move when the point is not to move pieces, but to checkmate. Saying there are choices misses the point.

                • moriquende@lemmy.world
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                  11 months ago

                  No it doesn’t because you’re arguing as if choices were dependant on one another. Choosing to avoid a coke one time doesn’t mean you’re now in a bad position to avoid another coke later on. It’s not about winning or losing it’s about building habits and keeping them, which I have agreed is made hard in some people’s environment.

    • gears@sh.itjust.works
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      11 months ago

      They still are choosing sugar?

      I’m addicted to nicotine and I actively choose to hit my vape, for example.