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I recently left the mental health care field after three and a half years. In that time I saw a lot of people addicted to drugs, to alcohol, to sex, to a lot of things. I think there is truth in what Perry and Hitchens both are saying. It is difficult for a person to break away from addictions. It also does require making a conscious and driven choice to abandon those addictions. The thing that I learned more than anything else is that if a person wants to be healed, he or she must WANT that healing. We can talk to them and encourage them until we're blue in the face but ultimately this is a choice that THEY must make. I worked with some people who were addicted to alcohol and smoking. By the time I left, some of these people had been able to break free of those controlling behaviors. They each saw the kind of person it was making them and they decided they didn't want to be that person anymore. But that requires enormous self discipline. The slightest return back to abusing a substance and it undoes all of that hard work. You don't get cured of alcoholism or drug addiction. Once you're there, you're there for life. You are "recovering" and that demands effort on your part to remain that way. People are hoping that this kind of thing is easy. But it's not and I doubt it ever will be. So, I can see where both of these men are right.

Yep, an addict must WANT to be free of the addiction and make a conscious and deliberate decision to stop the behavior that causes the addiction. Going to rehab and hoping your cravings will just go away doesn’t do any good.

When my ex-husband and I were still married, I went to some AA meetings with him and attended Al-Anon meetings for many years. FWIW my ex has been sober over 32 years and while divorced, we remain good friends.

I remember being at an AA convention where the speaker talked about the difference between saying “I’m a Recovered alcoholic” versus saying “I’m a Recovering alcoholic”.

He said:

“If I get shot in the leg, I can recover from that gunshot wound and say I’m a recovered gunshot victim. But that is not to say I’ve become bullet proof.”

“With alcoholism, it is a daily, one day at a time and for some, a one minute at a time commitment to staying sober, but once getting sober, the next drunk is only one drink away. Being sober today is no guarantee and does not make me bullet proof from that next drink.”

I can see where both of these men are right.

It's just that addicts are a waste of space and time, and they harm many other sober people's lives, like their spouses, parents or children. Pox on their lazy, excuse-making asses.

You see Matthew Perry smiling condescendingly and snarking to a genuinely literate man throughout that exchange. I'm not buying Perry's explanation, either.

Sorry if it's too soon for some of his fans. I'm really sorry for his friends and loved ones. They put up with a lot over the years—trying to help him as he was committing slow suicide, wrecking his health. Probably had a heart attack in the hot tub.