A "disease" that you deliberately buy at the store and pour down your throat. Very interesting.
Eh, I don't want to get into a huge debate about this, but I will say that my father, and subsequently my step-father were both alcoholics. It's not always entirely a choice, per se. While I have little tolerance for drunks, and I myself have chosen not to drink to excess, though one or two on the rare occassion doesn't bother me, I can understand how it happens, and I can have some sympathy for that. I have great respect for people able to clean themselves up, get on the wagon, and manage to stay there, even if it involves the occassional relapse or slip. It happens. That struggle is never an easy one, and it's one that's with you all of your life, much like my kidney transplant will always be with me for the remainder of mine.
I will simply offer to you that in my father's case, he believed he slipped over the line into acolholism during his tours in Viet Nam. He was career Air Force, serverd for 30 years and retired as a full bird colonel. While he was in Nam, he served two tours with MAC/V-SOG, which if you're not familiar with the unit, was a multi-branch military special forces unit (Military Advisory Command/Viet Nam - Studies and Observations Group) that went places we have never admitted to being, doing things we never officially did. His DD214 record is nearly entirely redacted, with pages of solid black marker. That made it fun to prove he was even there after his service-related passing in 1992, to acquire his death benefit from the VA. Anyway, what you need to understand about the military back in the 50s through the 70s, was that alcohol was cheap, and plentiful, and very nearlly pushed on soldiers serving. The "Class 6" stores had booze for next to nothing, parties were thrown pretty much every week, and when your boss invited you, or suggested you throw a party, it happened. It was part of the career path, and expected of you. Needless to say, there was a LOT of drinking back then, and as a result, a lot of alcoholics were created, in part by what they experienced, in part by their own doing of course, and in part by pressure from the peers and superiors. A lot has changed now in the military, and it was, I should note, the military that got him cleaned up and sober, and for that I can never thank them enough. My father had tremendous will power that is rare to see in a person. When he put his mind to something he did it. Eagle scout, career AF, father, husband, scout master, and more. He got dried out, and stayed sober for the last 8 or 10 years of his life until he died of lung cancer from prior agent orange exposure.
While I despise drunks, because of what I've experienced in my youth, I recognize that it's a result of what I've been through, and I don't hold that against others as a stereotype or pre-conceived impression. Everybody has their problems and shortcomings, and what defines us is how we confront and address them, and overcome them. Nobody is perfect.
Is it a disease? I couldn't tell you for sure. Is it a hurdle some have to cross, and a hurdle that some fail to surmount in their lives? Yes. So are many other things. Smokers, drug addicts, people who are overweight, people who are bigots and racists, plenty of problems to go around, so just be careful when looking down your nose at someone for what they are dealing with, and just be glad you don't have to live in their shoes.
