Why do people develop addictions? Is it to make their lives more pleasant, or merely less unpleasant, or does that depend upon where you are in the happiness scale? Why would a rich kid develop a coke habit? Why would anyone start sniffing lighter fluid or glue? What\u2019s the point in tripping out on LSD?<\/p>\n
Rhetorical questions, every one of them. The causes are too complex and numerous for an ignoramus like me to attempt to analyse, but the questions did at least get me a hook for this article.<\/p>\n
People get addicted to the darndest things. I\u2019ve already mentioned glue and cocaine. Alcohol and cigarettes are the most frequently demonized substances, likely because they\u2019re legal. Sugar, caffeine, carrots (yep!), chocolate\u2014the list (probably) goes on. And the level of addiction varies hugely\u2014a heroin habit is a little tougher to kick than that daily double-double at Timmy\u2019s. (For those of you unfamiliar with Canadian culture, that\u2019s a coffee with two creams and two sugars, purchased from Tim Hortons.) And those of us who\u2019ve tried to kick the coffee habit can only imagine how difficult trying to kick a horse habit might be! (Assuming we know that \u201chorse\u201d is\u2014or was\u2014slang for heroin.)<\/p>\n
That\u2019s another rhetorical question being used as an introduction to speculation about what the next fashionable addiction is likely to be. Will it be a food, or a drink, or a pharmaceutical, or a piece of technology, or\u2026?<\/p>\n
People seem addicted to their smartphones; conversely, the frequency and severity of addiction to snow blowers doesn\u2019t seem to be nearly as severe. They\u2019re both triumphs of technology in their own ways, but one is construed as cool and the other is just a tool to be used in making our lives easier.<\/p>\n
So what determines the addictiveness of a given substance or toy? (Yep \u2013 another rhetorical question). One of the pieces in a collection I\u2019m planning to publish is about carrot addiction. But what else could people become dependent on?<\/p>\n
Just imagine a world in which genetically modified Brussels sprouts were addictive. Overnight, legions of children (and adults?) would switch from being repulsed by them to craving them. Instead of bribing your kids to eat them (something I really did try), your kids will be stealing money from your purse to pay the sprout pusher at school.<\/p>\n
Eating leftover Christmas or Thanksgiving food without Brussels sprouts would be cold turkey in more than one sense.<\/p>\n
What about toothpaste? It\u2019s impressive the lengths that the manufacturers have already gone to to make teeth brushing more popular with kids. Sparkles, kid-oriented flavours (don\u2019t get me started!), and armies of cartoon franchise characters have all been tried: needless to say, I\u2019m not privy to how successful each tactic has been.<\/p>\n
But what if Colgate or Crest or whoever decided to add crystal meth to their toothpastes? \u201cCrystal\u201d equates with sparkles quite nicely, and the names \u201cmeth\u201d and \u201cmenthol\u201d seem to be made for each other, so the marketing angle almost solves itself. The only obstacle would be those pesky lawyers. But toothpaste already contains at least one substance (fluoride) that many parents object to; what\u2019s the harm in one more? (Tongue firmly in cheek here\u2014good friends lost a daughter a few years ago; her demise was indirectly linked to crystal meth.)<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s now speculate on the consequences of mass addiction to garlic. (Some inhabitants of one island country in Europe might accuse their mainland neighbours of already indulging in that particular peccadillo.) What might those consequences be?<\/p>\n
First of all, garlic festivals (such as that held each year in Perth, Ontario<\/a>) would become infinitely more popular.<\/p>\n Second, security at such festivals would have to be beefed up, since the street value of garlic would increase dramatically until someone decided to flood the market with cheap garlic.<\/p>\n Third, vampires would fall on lean times. Garlic blood is not their idea of a happy meal.<\/p>\n Fourth, it\u2019s possible that pregnancy and birth rates might decline due to garlic intolerance incompatibilities between partners. (Then again, it might result in vampire-proof babies being born.)<\/p>\n Fifth, it\u2019s possible that garlic festivals and music festivals might combine, since both would attract addicts. The Glastonbury Garlic and Grunge Festival has a certain ring about it, don\u2019t you think? And if they\u2019d been serving garlic instead of other substances at Woodstock, just imagine how many more people would remember what went on there?<\/p>\n Sixth, and finally, the government would tax the heck out of garlic\u2014after all, that seems to be the way that other addictions are regulated. The tax could be called GST\u2014Garlic Smell Tax, although it might get confused with another tax (in Canada, at least).<\/p>\n Smartphones do seem to be the most addictive toys these days, especially when they\u2019re laced with another addictive substance\u2014social media. But what could supplant them? What\u2019s in the technological toy pipeline? Hoverboards? Virtual Reality that\u2019s indistinguishable from real reality? Jet packs? Flying cars? Where\u2019s the addiction potential in these?<\/p>\n The only one with any promise there is VR.<\/p>\n Need an LSD trip? Dial it in! (And hope the programmers have really vivid imaginations!)<\/p>\n Need a few hours away from the pressures of family life, unpaid bills or even homelessness? Select from the menu and play away; you can live la vida loca<\/em> for a while.<\/p>\n Tired of how easy the rich life is; Suffering from affluenza? Parents handing everything to you on a plate and making criminal charges go away for you? Download a game from the cloud and experience life on the pioneering prairies or the Bangladeshi sweatshops for a few hours.<\/p>\n VR is getting better and better. Picture rendering is more realistic. Sound is more authentic. The range of scenarios and pseudo-random interactions is growing ever larger. Its addiction potential is huge.<\/p>\n And I\u2019m in danger of getting serious here.<\/p>\n The only thing we should really allow ourselves to be addicted to is life. Yes\u2014it will ultimately kill us; none of us survives life. But we should always seek to get a high from life\u2014a high that\u2019s achieved by living life and not by using drugs and toys to hide from life. That, coming from a pessimist whose nicknames include Marvin the paranoid android.<\/p>\n I have very little experience of unhealthy addiction. The nearest I\u2019ve come to an unhealthy addiction was a several-months-long obsession with Pacman when it first came out in the early 1980s. Oh \u2013 and I spent seven shillings (35 pence; about 70 Canadian cents) one week on the penny slot machines when I was about twelve years old. I honestly believe that I have an addictive personality\u2014that\u2019s to say that I could see myself easily becoming addicted to any number of things\u2014so I deny myself anything that might become an addiction. Don\u2019t picture me as some kind of Puritan (or if you do, please spell it with a small \u201cp\u201d!) Instead, call me a scaredy-cat.<\/p>\n In spite of my pessimism, I plan to stay addicted to life. I hope life remains addicted to me, although I know that at some point in the next 50 years or so it will kick its \u201cme\u201d habit.<\/p>\n I just hope I never live to see a world addicted to Brussels sprouts\u2014the huge increase in greenhouse gas emissions might just hit the tipping point for our planet\u2019s ecosystems!<\/p>\n What’s your prediction for the next major addiction? Think along the lines of “relatively unharmful” in keeping with the (mostly) light, entertaining tone of this piece! Let the world know by leaving a comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Why do people develop addictions? Is it to make their lives more pleasant, or merely less unpleasant, or does that depend upon where you are in the happiness scale? Why would a rich kid develop a coke habit? Why would anyone start sniffing lighter fluid or glue? What\u2019s the point in tripping out on LSD? Rhetorical questions, every one of… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[181],"tags":[36,37,38,40,39],"class_list":["post-243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fake","tag-addictions","tag-brussels-sprouts","tag-garlic","tag-life","tag-vr"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1617,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243\/revisions\/1617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Toys<\/h2>\n
Life\u2014the Ultimate Addiction<\/h1>\n
Your Turn<\/h1>\n