Born This Way

[FireDragon76]

People who are from families with alcoholism in their histories are going to be a lot more prone to succumbing to the condition; holding them to the same normal moral standard with regard to drink for “normal people” is wildly optimistic.

Alcoholism isn't purely genetic.

People who are prone to alcoholism can still exercise responsibility over the choices surrounding their propensity. If they kill somebody in a car accident due to alcohol, the legal system doesn't exonerate them. If they blow out their liver, it's going to be alot harder getting an organ transplant.

 

[Pommer]

Alcoholism isn't purely genetic.

People who are prone to alcoholism can still exercise responsibility over the choices surrounding their propensity. If they kill somebody in a car accident due to alcohol, the legal system doesn't exonerate them. If they blow out their liver, it's going to be alot harder getting an organ transplant.

Yes, you are correct, but with the near ubiquitousness of alcohol in our society means that those prone to abusing it are more likely to do so. Also denial, (“I might drink a lot but not like Dad used to!”) can get in the way of people seeing their poor choices for what they are.

Ascribing a moral judgment to behavior that one is nearly driven to do seems like a waste of time, since only an alcoholic can stop their drinking after acknowledging that they (themselves) are alcoholic.

Most people would like to think kindly of themselves and will forgive themselves of a whole bunch of stuff while avoiding the judgement levied at them from outside.

Using the “disease-model” for alcoholism removes this “shame” and can allow someone to actually see the damage that they’re doing to themselves and the people around them.

 

[benadamm]

But the only reason that I can sit here now and contemplate this question, is because of Adam. Without the knowledge of good and evil how would I be any different than all of God's other creatures? Blissfully incapable of sin, not because I selflessly choose the nobler path, but simply because I'm too ignorant to know the difference.

That's what Adam's choice gave me, a gift, and a curse. The gift of a deeper understanding of the world around me, and the curse that with that understanding comes the recognition of the cruelty that I inevitably inflict upon it. Innocence was lost and and for all of our lamentations we cannot get it back. We know the evil that we do, in spite of the fervency with which we yearn not to do it.

Adam's choice didn't make him a sinner, so much as it made him a man who knew that he was a sinner. That's his burden... not that he sins... but that he knows that he sins.

Perhaps like all of God's other creatures it would be better if I lived and died in ignorance, and perhaps if I had been in Adam's shoes that's how it would be today. But that's a choice that I was never given. My choice is different. My choice is to do the nobler thing when I can, and to ask forgiveness when I can't. Even if there's no one there to grant it.

Do I fault Adam for the choice he made? No. Was it worth the cost? Knowing that it's the only reason that I can sit here now and contemplate this question I must reluctantly say yes... reluctantly, because what I have gained has cost so many so much that it seems unfair of me to say that it was worth the cost, because the cost wasn't just mine.

Well, this response certainly took on a life of its own...sorry.

The kind of knowing the forbidden fruit gave Adam was ontological not intellectual.
In order to know frogness fully one must be a frog.

Adam and Eve knew being good. They ate the forbidden fruit and knew evil, being themselves evil.

 

[FireDragon76]

Yes, you are correct, but with the near ubiquitousness of alcohol in our society means that those prone to abusing it are more likely to do so. Also denial, (“I might drink a lot but not like Dad used to!”) can get in the way of people seeing their poor choices for what they are.

Ascribing a moral judgment to behavior that one is nearly driven to do seems like a waste of time, since only an alcoholic can stop their drinking after acknowledging that they (themselves) are alcoholic.

Most people would like to think kindly of themselves and will forgive themselves of a whole bunch of stuff while avoiding the judgement levied at them from outside.

Using the “disease-model” for alcoholism removes this “shame” and can allow someone to actually see the damage that they’re doing to themselves and the people around them.

I'm skeptical. Some people only quit because they are faced with legal or societal consequences of their behavior, not because they have some kind of deep insight into self-harm.

 

[Pommer]

I'm skeptical. Some people only quit because they are faced with legal or societal consequences of their behavior, not because they have some kind of deep insight into self-harm.

The insight comes later after enforced sobriety, (whistle-locks on cars, etc.), if at all.