im setting up an argumentative essay on why alcoholism should be consider an disease i don’ t know how 2 start
Posted by: Alan in alcoholism treatment, tags: Alcoholism, argumentative, consider, disease, don', Essay, Know, setting, Should, Start
Question by Shyanne: im setting up an argumentative essay on why alcoholism should be consider an disease i don’ t know how 2 start
I trying to find out what should be my 3 major points. Im not traditional college student im 44 years old and this is becoming very frustrating
Best answer:
Answer by Short3Gears
Good luck… you’d be better off arguing that it is NOT a disease. It is (IMHO) an addiction like drugs and cigarrettes and food…
It runs in the family – that is one excuse for calling it a disease… but it is more monkey see monkey do and lack of will power…
30 year alcoholic 1 years dry and happy about it… no meds, no AA, just motivation… Motivation does not cure disease… People that quit drinking… just that… they quit… you can’t quit a disease. AA is a good thing for many – it helps them quit with support and helps with motivation – it does not CURE anything physical and a disease is physical – even a mental disease has physical causes… alcoholism does not – unless you find proof and prove me wrong… there is no proof that I am aware of and I have studied it while trying to quit myself…
As for the other posters’ responses so far, you can NOT call the resulting sickness and DT’s part of the “disease” of alcoholism… they are the after effect – not the original problem of drinking tooo much.
Point #1: it is an addiction. Like cigaretts and drugs and food. So far I have never heard anyone say smoking tobacco is a disease.
Point #2: It runs in the family. Daddy drinks, son drinks. Or it ’skips’ a generation – Granpa died an alcoholic, daddy over compensated and did not drink, and the next generation went overboard not learning how to drink proper from daddy (ok, I admit that is a long shot explanation 
Point #3: People QUIT drinking. Diseases can not be ‘quit’.
Point #4: Detox, meds to combat drinking, therapy, AA, liver failure, brain damage ARE ALL causes of over drinking. They ARE NOT the cause of drinking (alcoholism). – smoking causes lung cancer and heart disease – is smoking a disease…. ?? and people also quit smoking… etc etc etc…
ps. I sound angry about this so called alcoholic ‘Disease’ because I am angry. I made it through computer systems engineering while being an alcoholic. I paid for my own schooling. I tried AA. There were other alcoholics in AA ONLY because they had to register going – Why??? Because they filed with Massachusetts as ALCOHOLICS and GOT FEE TUITION, FEES, and ROOM and BOARD under the guise of having a DISABILITY – DISEASE – ALCOHOLISM… I call that pure BS… I made it on my own, they could have too… and I didn’t quit drinking till 10 years later… (not sure when/if they did… but they said they were in AA and NOT drinking… but STILL had the “disability”!!!!
What do you think? Answer below!
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August 19th, 2010 at 6:42 am
Here’s 3 points to consider:
Alcoholism runs in families like many diseases.
Alcoholism causes numerous harmful medical sequelae such as liver failure.
Alcoholism often requires medication to treat (such as lithium during a detox to prevent DTs and antidepressants after detox), also hospital stays are common.
Try going to AA’s website and see if they can help, too. Good luck!
August 19th, 2010 at 6:52 am
When i have to write these papers, i “attack” the definitions of the key words in my thesis statement. I would define “disease” and find how the criteria for something to be a disease is found present in alcoholism. i’m just picking a few things off the top of my head here: 1. does it affect functioning? yes 2. is it long term and consistantly present? yes 3. does it have harmful physiological effects? yes … etc etc. HTH!
August 19th, 2010 at 7:27 am
You could try looking up Alcoholics Anonymous (http://www.alcoholics-anonymous.org/) and browse through their site. You will find many interesting and enlightening points on why alcoholism is a disease.
You could also look at sites dealing with Addiction Psychiatry (American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry’s website is http://www.aaap.org/). Most Psychiatrists are of the view that alcoholism and other addictions are due to an imbalance of neurotransmitters (brain chemicals) with the addict/patient unconsciously trying to correct the imbalance on his/her own.
You could look up Alcohol Withdrawal also and find that it is a life-threatening condition where a patient could actually die from seizures, dehydration or end up with brain damage. http://alcoholism.about.com/cs/withdrawal/a/aa000125a.htm