How many people get sick or die from self-inflicted trauma? I’d have more sympathy if there was more responsibility taken in this country and less enabling.
Do you feel the same about a child dying from cancer and someone dying from a heroin overdose for example?
My mother died of complications from diabetes and congestive heart failure. She was an alcoholic, ate a poor diet, didn’t exercise much and smoked half her life. I loved my mother, but her personal choices cut 10 to 15 years off her life.
People scream “affordable healthcare” or “free healthcare”. But nobody takes personal responsibility. Nobody will judge behavior. People voluntarily take dangerous and addicting substances. Alcohol,nicotine, opiates...you name it. Then when it becomes a problem, it’s a “disease” and not their fault and the public must pay the price.
So yup, most of my sympathy goes to the kid with cancer, not the adult with free will.
“So yup, most of my sympathy goes to the kid with cancer, not the adult with free will.”
Yes, I agree there and if you reread I never once mentioned a child or someone who did not make poor life choices. My only point, in a round about way, was all people make bad choices whether it be health related, job related, family/interpersonal, financial...bad choices happen because we are imperfect humans.
That said, those with substance abuse problems are broken people vast majority of the time. It IS sad and I do feel for them, but there’s little we can do for an adult making poor choices. Our world, not just America, is IMO irretrievably broken. Just a matter of time until it’s pretty much end game now.