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Which is worse: Food or Drug Addiction?

Which is worse?


  • Total voters
    98

West Texas CEO

GAF's Nicest Lunch Thief and Nosiest Dildo Archeologist
Drugs meaning basically any kind of drug whether prescribed or illegal.

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Drug addiction costs a lot of money, can kill you, can lead you to make bad decisions that harm others, cost the country money in rehabs and counseling, free needles, methadone clinics and so on. The drug trade can bring crime into an area or a family. Addicts can end up toothless, covered in acne and scabs and wrinkles, unable to take care of themselves or their families, unable to work and so on.



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Food addiction can cost a lot of money, in extreme cases can kill you, costs the country money in hospital bills not picked up by your insurance. Addicts can end up obese and/or unable to work or take care of themselves or their families (though many obese people are fully capable of those things and it would mainly be the upper end of the spectrum who are house or bed-bound.) Food addicts don't usually bring crime into neighborhoods and buying food is not illegal.

So which would you rather have in your neighborhood? Drug addicts or food addicts? Which one do you think is more of a problem?









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jshackles

Gentlemen, we can rebuild it. We have the capability to make the world's first enhanced store. Steam will be that store. Better than it was before.
I would say food addiction is worse on a personal level, but drug addiction is worse on a societal level. Micro vs macro.

People underestimate food addiction and how difficult it can be to get out from under. If you're an alcoholic, there are programs that help you just stop consuming alcohol and keep you accountable. With food addiction, you can't just stop eating food. You have to eat, but the things you eat have to be "healthier", and you have to eat less quantity. Imagine telling an alcoholic that they have to stop drinking, but three times a day they have to drink only a single can of beer, or they'd die.

Drug addiction is more of a societal problem. As someone who lives in an area where ALL drugs are legal, I can tell you first hand that it's an absolute nightmare that these substances have become normalized. I went to Walmart yesterday, and there was a lady simply passed out in the entryway where you pick up the shopping carts - and this is such a common sight here that nobody even bothers going over to even make sure she's still alive. Homeless everywhere, crime out of control. It all started when drugs became legal.
 

BadBurger

Many “Whelps”! Handle It!
Eating too much obviously messes up ones health in the long term, but a hot shot or just mixing the wrong drugs can kill a perfectly healthy human being in minutes. As well as making them unable to function at a high level from day to day.

So I voted drugs.
 

NecrosaroIII

Ultimate DQ Fan
Drug addiction exists on a spectrum. Being addicted to heroin isnt the same as having a weed tolerance.

Food addiction is pretty rough too. And unlike drug addiction, the victim will always have to deal with food. They need it to survive.
 

Mistake

Member
I'd say they're on pretty even terms, especially to friends or family seeing it unfold. In both cases you watch self destructive behavior that ultimately costs a life, thereby inflicting grief on anyone who cared about them
 
Drugs. Don't know many homeless people who are on the streets because they are too fat. I guess it does depend on the drugs because some are lethal. I might be possible to overdose on Big Macs but it would be a high amount.
 

Toots

Gold Member
As the old adage goes, the only thing worse than being addicted to drugs is being addicted to attention
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Drugs are bad. Food is good. Just not too much.
Everything in high dosage is bad. Drugs are fun. Just not too much.
 

Peggies

Gold Member
It's always bad if you have to do something in order to feel "good" (or actually not bad). Addiction is some evil piece of shit that fucks you up in every possible way.

I always found the Addiction Demon in American Horror Story - Hotel painted a quite accurate picture of that fact.

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Drug addiction is obviously worse I guess. I'd just say it's easy enough to avoid, just never do the drug in the first place and you won't get addicted to it. Can't really do that with food.
 
Objectively, drug addiction. Heroin and crack are a lot more addictive than sugar or salt.

Sugar is a delicious blight upon society. With over half of America obese and self imposed diabetes skyrocketing, the cost of food addiction will outstrip drug addiction by simple numbers. There are way more fat people than there are heroin addicts, and since America has zero healthcare systems in place it is a huge problem, and it is only going to get bigger (no pun intended).
Addiction, no matter what form it takes, is a terrible disease. My dream is that science can nail down the genetic markers and eliminate it with some CRISPR wizardry.
Humanity suffers from the disease of more. Gotta have more. Gotta have more money, more drugs, more booze, more junk food, more power, more more gimme more.
 

Audiophile

Member
It's a matter of the weight of the addiction vs the availability. I can go to my corner shop in two minutes and for 5-10 quid end up chowing down on tonnes of sugar, oxidised PUFA oils and low grade chemical poison. Plus there's the factor that few will will shame you for it. In fact, some will even shame you for trying to eat healthy. Then there's things people are told are healthy which are not.

Meanwhile, you have to seek out heavy drugs and make a very conscious decision to get it (though if you've experienced some degree of physical dependence on something, that "conscious decision" becomes a little bit cloudy). It's also costly; and of course, frowned upon by most. In the case of the latter, the degree to which you can hide it and still function comes into it too.

I spent ~3yrs in which I was regularly taking 90mg codeine twice a day when I was young and stopped without issue (had leukaemia and the steroids caused costochondritis). I had it on and off again about 10yrs later as I have hypermobile joints and literally nothing else helped the pain, I never veered into addiction but certainly had some physical dependence, but within a few weeks off am fine.

But, with sugar or carbs I slip up a little and that's it, I can completely fall off the wagon. I have to avoid all of that stuff like the plague and if I do have treats I set aside a specific period with a hard cut off no room to wriggle out.

Of course codeine isn't "heavy", but you'd still think it'd be more of a problem than food. For me, in purely practical terms at least, food can be a way bigger problem.
 
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Mr Reasonable

Completely Unreasonable
But, with sugar or carbs I slip up a little and that's it, I can completely fall off the wagon.
Can you expand a little on this?

I've recently been changing how I eat and I think I've got a bit of insight into what people are talking about when they say they're sugar addicted. I never thought I was, but now I realise how sweet so many things are, and the regularity that I would eat them, and the quantity to boot.
 
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Deleted member 1159

Unconfirmed Member
It's always bad if you have to do something in order to feel "good" (or actually not bad). Addiction is some evil piece of shit that fucks you up in every possible way.

I always found the Addiction Demon in American Horror Story - Hotel painted a quite accurate picture of that fact.

05hLXMY.jpeg
I think you meant to post a link not something off your C drive
 

chakadave

Member
Addiction is insidious no matter what it is.

Porn and sex addition is something no one talks about but it is destroying relationships all the time

Food is hard because it’s food and you have to eat.

Drugs and alcohol are bad because of the damage they cause to us physically. But they are also more clear in how to stay away from them.

There are recovery groups that deal with all different kinds of addictions and usually all of them say in one form or another the drug or substance is usually just the symptom to a deeper problem.

That is just the thing the individual goes to to feel better.
 

Laptop1991

Member
Drug addiction easily, i've never known the windows being put out at the local Co Op for a packet of crisps or some Jammie Dodgers.
 

thefool

Member
Drugs are awful, even without addiction.
Dont do drugs kids. Don't fall over the culture about it and the enablers who promote it.
 

Paltheos

Member
There is no “worse” addiction, all addiction sucks period.

wtf? No.

Drugs can fuck with your head. Not that food, especially crap food, can't, but the scale is totally different.

No one's afraid of fat people mugging them for food money (and that's not just because they'd be slow). A lot of drug addicts can't control themselves.
 

Mistake

Member
I think there are some drugs bad in low dosage. Although I guess if we use to put Cocaine in Coke it was ok.
There are functional drug addicts. I have no idea what percentage, but it's a thing. I know it would destroy me though, so I stayed far away, not even nicotine
 
wtf? No.

Drugs can fuck with your head. Not that food, especially crap food, can't, but the scale is totally different.

No one's afraid of fat people mugging them for food money (and that's not just because they'd be slow). A lot of drug addicts can't control themselves.

Addicts can’t control themselves period, the addiction itself doesn’t matter. A 350+ pound person can’t control the amount of food they consume anymore than a heroin addict can control their heroin consumption.
If you want to argue that drug addiction can be inherently more dangerous to you personally because of the risk theft or violence, than that is fine, but I think it misses the bigger picture.

I partied like a rock star, I loved drugs, cocaine in particular. I tried a lot of them, I enjoyed most of them, and I walked away from them all without a problem. But when it came to booze it was different, good old garden variety alcohol.
I knew it was killing me, as sure as an obese person knows what their food consumption is doing to them, but I couldn’t stop. It was as simple as not picking up the bottle and pouring it down my throat, but you might as well have been asking me to climb Everest or make a functional warp drive. The lack of self control over the source of the addiction is found in ALL addicts, regardless of the substance.
Again, addiction is hell, the source of it does not matter. The disease slowly destroys a person, mind body and soul, and anybody that even remotely cares about you is going to suffer as well. The ripple effects of it stretch out through time and society itself.
 

NeoIkaruGAF

Gold Member
Both Is Good The Road To El Dorado GIF


You don’t want an addiction, plain and simple.
Some drugs may damage, and ultimately kill you, faster - both in when and how it happens - and may have you deal with seriously dangerous people, but it’s not a question of which is “worse”, as that would imply that either is “better”. It isn’t.

A food addiction will ultimately lead you to a horrible, untimely death as well, and it’s guaranteed to give you a miserable life.
Diabetes, sleep apnea, bad joints, trouble breathing, heart failure, limited movement. And in some countries, it will lead you to bankruptcy for healthcare expenses as well.
 

Toots

Gold Member
I think there are some drugs bad in low dosage. Although I guess if we use to put Cocaine in Coke it was ok.
Low isn't an absolute metric.
Anything can be taken safely in a low enough dosage.
Something my man Mithridates understood well (that and total paranoia).

Also you're right for cocaine and more than that it is apparently still used in medicine for it's anaesthesic qualities... I just skimed this article of little value. It does not goes in depth, but it seems peer reviewed and really pro cocaine use in a medical setting because of "important therapeutic applications" so they are certainly right.
 
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