The American Spectator : Draining the Romance Out of Drugs

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Draining the Romance Out of Drugs

By Christopher Orlet on 10.1.07 @ 12:06AM

Drug addiction is a willful self-indulgence and not a disease, Theodore Dalrymple writes.

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Dalrymple's favorite quotation comes from Edmund Burke:

Men are qualified for civil liberties in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their appetites: in proportion as their love of justice is above their rapacity...Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.

Today, rather than encouraging temperance, we embrace the notion of addict as victim. Ultimately the question becomes what society should do with the addict? Dalrymple concludes that he should receive rehabilitation -- not treatment. He should be told that his free ride is over, and that it is his duty to put moral chains on his appetites. Hard work putting chains on one's appetites, but it is also hard work getting up at 5 a.m. every weekday and going to work in an office building in order to support your family. And there is not a thing romantic about it.

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About the Author

Christopher Orlet writes every Thursday from St. Louis.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (1) | Leave a comment

Diane| 11.8.10 @ 5:08PM

I couldn't agree with you more. As the mother of a 46 year old crack addict, it disgusts me the way society deems this addiction a disease. It's a choice. Unfortunately, the family unit is destroyed by one persons unwillingness to do the right thing.