Want creation fuels American addictiveness

¶ … Creation Fuels Americans' Addictiveness that the dependency many Americans have on drugs is the result of the premium that American society puts on success. This success comes with costs attached, but those costs are brushed aside, often with the help of medicating drugs. The addictive personality of Americans extends beyond drugs, too, to addictions of all types. Slater argues that because we "are told every day that we're ignorant, misguided, inadequate, incompetent and undesirable" we can only escape this condition if he indulge, an act that will make us feel better. Slater's point is not that we are inadequate or any of those other negative attributes, but that we are meant to feel that way if we do not achieve to a certain level. Yet, the level to which Americans achieve is actually very high.

The quick fix mentality is ascribed by Slater to be one of the most important causes of drug abuse. Our society is harsh, he describes, but we prefer quicker action rather than solutions that evolve over the long-term. As a result, drugs become an attractive means of medicating ourselves in response to the harshness of our society. Slater makes a good point about those at the low end of the socioeconomic scale that seems to tie his argument together. At the higher socioeconomic levels, the quick fix mentality is tied to our determination to achieve -- problems must be addressed quickly so that we can move forward. At the lower end of the socioeconomic scale, however, Slater notes that drug use is often "a peaceful escape from a hopeless and depressing existence." This is not an American phenomenon specifically. It can be witnessed in a Southeast Asian opium den, among laborers in Afghanistan, and in bars all through the developed world where men drink themselves into oblivion as their only means of escaping their harsh travails. The inverse of this is also true -- the Japanese may not hoover drugs the way we do, but they have their own addictive vices from pachinko parlors to deviant pornography to suicide. Their society is at least as harsh as ours and does translate to addiction though not necessarily to drugs.

That responses to harsh stimulus of achievement-oriented societies is addictive but perhaps not drug-oriented, and response to lack of achievement orientation is also connected to addictive behaviors indicates that perhaps addiction runs deeper to the human condition. If we consider Marx' analogy of religion as the opiate of the masses clearly addiction -- when religion is included -- is a facet of the human condition. There is nothing unique to American society that drives addictiveness; it is merely our humanity that drives it. We invented all of our addictions to help us take shortcuts towards coping. If caffeine sparks our mornings and alcohol dulls our nights, then religion allows us to accept death and love allows us to medicate the inherent loneliness of our individual existence.