A disease you catch or it's genetic. If I commit suicide is that a new disease? You did use two important key words tho, choice & poor..
Committing suicide is at the very least caused by a disease since it's against the very nature of our being to terminate our own existence. The argument could also be made that suicide in itself is a disease or comorbid condition as the literal definition of disease is "any harmful deviation from the normal structural or functional state of an organism".
Likewise most if not all forms of drug abuse has a disease as its root cause. Feeling abandoned/socially disconnected/devastated for an extended period of time(Moderate to severe depression), PTSD, Schizo/Borderline/Bipolar/Dependent PD's to name a few, seem to be the most common causes for serious abuse.
Also very strong evidence that conscious & unconscious self-medication of eg. MAO-Serotonin-Dopamine imbalances like ADHD, Borderline and Bipolar is frequent, especially for 'milder' cases of abuse.
So it's a choice... and bad choice, but a choice none the less. You know there was a point where you knew that if you kept on taking it you were going to be addicted.
It is a disease, that is often caused by a choice.
I'm open for debate on whether an action driven by an unconscious mechanism failing to perform its normal functions in the person's brain and from that leading to an intangible, ever-present and perceptible void in the conscious mind which can't be filled by that person's reachable day-to-day stimuli, constitutes a conscious and active choice or not.
Personally I view at least the serious cases of drug abuse as the physical equivalent of being set ablaze with no one around to help, deciding to throw yourself in the nearest reachable liquid only to realize that liquid was searing hot cooking oil which is now slowly eating away your outer shell and stripping you of your identity.
Even if you manage to crawl your way out of it you're still only a fragment of your former self. Rebuilding what was lost requires immense effort on top of having to deal with what is most likely a serious physical and life-long mental addiction, and chances are you still haven't gotten help for the underlying reasons that lead to the drug abuse it in the first place.
You call it choice, I call it failure as a society.
The notion that we can predict what is normal behavior and brain synapses is in no way a good indicator we can blame or fix someone.
But it isn't about what is normal and fixing what is abnormal/deviating. Rather about what is harmful and detrimental to that person's well-being, and helping them find constructive ways of coping with it.
PS: My apologies
Zoey Raven for detracting from the well-made game you've pieced together. Promise to not derail the thread any further.
