Originally published at: Alcoholism charity executive busted for drunk driving for the third time - Boing Boing
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Addiction is a horrible disease that currently has no cure. All of the currently available treatments are imperfect, and relapse is extremely common. Yes, it’s bad that this woman relapsed and then drove drunk. I’m glad no one was injured. Publicly shaming her is unlikely to help her or anyone else suffering from this disease. One of the biggest impediments to people with this disease getting help is the shame associated with admitting you have it, and the shame associated with relapse. BB should be better than this.
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Agreed - also, characterizing this person as an entitled charity exec is a bit rich. They’re 26 and driving a Ford Ka. Maybe they have done fantastic work in their position - particularly having personal experience with the people they’re trying to help.
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Hm. This from the US State Dept: Adjudicative Guidelines for Determining Eligibility for Access to Classified Information (something that IMHO could be applied to positions of significant responsibility).
21. The Concern. Excessive alcohol consumption often leads to the exercise of questionable judgment or the failure to control impulses, and can raise questions about an individual’s reliability and trustworthiness.
(Time to audit the charity’s books and see where the money is going.)
It’s because addiction is seen as a moral failure, rather than what it actually is: a genetic neurological disease with behavioral symptoms. The treatments, most of which are shamed-based religious therapies from 100 years ago are the primary go-to even by the medical establishment. Would we ask someone suffering from psychosis or bi-polar to just sit in meetings and “get over it”? The “anonymous” treatments for these sorts of diseases haven’t been helpful, because they shuffle real scientific study away promising treatments. What other medical treatment has had a <25% success rate for over 100 years?
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The anonymous feature of support group based treatments was absolutely critical at the time those groups started precisely because of the view that the addictions were a sign of moral failure. The first organization, in fact, to view alcoholism as a disease rather than as a moral failure was Alcoholics Anonymous. AA is absolutely not a religious based program which uses shame as a motivator. That’s just not how it works. AA isn’t perfect. Far from it. But your characterization of it isn’t accurate.
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It’s frustrating to read the comments, frankly. The disease model still predominates, even though it has never worked or provided much in the way of treatment options (other than the religious cult AA).
There are medical interventions, including Naltrexone, which has been very successful in weaning people off of the compulsive behavior of excessive drinking by short-circuiting the dopamine reward system. The Sinclaire method has some impressive research behind it, not that anyone cares, because the hopelessness model of addiction has a lot of cultural appeal.
There are also behavioral interventions, which have a higher success rate then AA. Very few of them regard it as a disease, rather than a disordered behavior.
In this case, I’m sorry for the person who made such poor decisions under the influence of alcohol. I’m also sorry for anyone who finds glee in this sort of thing.
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Lurker for over 10 years. Signed up today.
Alcoholism is terrible and hard to manage. Drinking is not a moral flaw.
But you don’t drive drunk. I don’t get the apologists. It is simple. You don’t drive drunk.
I am always surprised when boingboing chooses to highlight something like this as trying to make someone feel bad isn’t what I expect to see here - it certainly isn’t “wonderful”.
But driving drunk is not OK.
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I had seen that there were some pretty interesting side effects with Ozempic also, though I don’t know if they would/could be considered as a long-term solution…
Not one single person in this thread has said it is.
I will be perfectly clear about why I said what I said. There is only one reason why the author of this post deemed this story worthy of being posted: the irony of the executive of a charity for helping alcoholics being arrested for DUI. That’s it. “HAHA! Look at this idiot! She’s supposed to be helping alcoholics but she can’t control her own behavior! Isn’t that Hilarious?” It’s not a funny story. It’s not an ironic story. It’s a tragic story, that thankfully isn’t more tragic, which it easily could be. There is nothing wonderful about this story, and there is nothing positive gained by posting it here on BB. It doesn’t belong here.
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Yes, they may be very beloved in their job. I have a friend who used to do weight loss interventions, and she was overweight. All the thin folks that tried to coach the clients in weight loss had a brittle relationship with the clientele. My friend was greatly loved and the clients really listened to her. Because she knew what it was like, clearly! Sometimes people need that connection to be able to feel heard and understood. Maybe that’s what’s going on here. Maybe she’s really good at her job and just had a tragic lapse.
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This!
The irony of her job and her drinking may be one thing (as others have noted) and not a subject for mockery. But even when drunk, people can decide not to drive. It is so ingrained in our culture now, that there is no excuse.
And welcome!
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Which isn’t meant to excuse her behavior or that she doesn’t deserve consequences- just to say that maybe it shouldn’t be advertised to the whole world that she f***ed up? Thousands of people are charged with DUI every day. We don’t shame them all. The only unique circumstance here is that she works for an alcoholism charity. I don’t think that warrants singling her out.
In Japan, there is a service available called 運転代行 (Proxy Driving) that we can use when we’ve had anything to drink (there is no permissible amount to drink and drive).
They send a car with two people, one of whom drives your car while the other follows. They take you and your car home and then leave in the other car after getting you home safe. It’s usually cheaper than a taxi and it gets your car parked in your driveway so you don’t have to go fetch it.
I don’t know if this exists in other countries, but it really should.
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It certainly should.
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Reminds me of this.
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