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Comment by fxtentacle | Hacker News Reader

s/weak-willed/addicted/

There. Fixed it for you :) Yes, to me it seems like capitalism creates a society where most people get addicted just trying to cope with everyday life. For some it's alcohol, for some it's OxyContin, for some it's food, for some it's all-nighters in World of Warcraft.

"59.3 million (21.4%) people over age 12 used illicit drugs in the past year."

"Underage [..] 29% reported drinking alcohol"

https://www.verywellmind.com/rates-of-illicit-drug-abuse-in-...

Looks like weed and alcohol already are 50% of all citizens... I don't find it difficult to imagine that the other half ab-uses food.

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So before mass capitalism people didn't drink?

Can I ask that you read a large number of history books across any number of cultures on addictive behaviors throughout history, because you'll find that anytime a society had an excess of time and labor/production that people find addictive behaviors to enjoy. This is not recent. This is not capitalism. This is humanity.

What capitalism has done is given everybody enough free time from starvation to actually follow addictive pursuits.

Aren't there claims commonly made (I haven't reviewed the literature to know if it's compelling or not) that the medieval serf worked less than the modern worker?

I've read a number of studies like this and at the end of the day everyone ends up at apples != oranges.

If you wanted to live with the same amount of 'lifestyle' as a serf did then you'd likely only have to work a few hours a week. The issue is I don't think most people want to live that lifestyle. We like clean water to drink. We like sheltered houses with electricity. We love having a house that is too large and filling it up with an inordinate amount of crap. We love living in expensive places with a lot to do. Turns out wanting all that requires a lot of stuff.

At one point in my life I was more interesting in not working and messing around and doing other things. I worked around 40 hours a month for a few years and made enough of a living to pay my bills (hey, computer work pays good). So it's not impossible for at least some people to live like that , though with rent increases not sure if it's possible these days. But with all that said, I like having all the stuff that working a full time job gives to me, so there is that.

So you're saying it's a matter of lifestyle and not free time? Because here you're acknowledging they had free time, which goes against your argument "capitalism has ... given everybody enough free time from starvation to actually follow addictive pursuits", but drawing a distinction between things we have?

It almost seems like capitalism has brought us not free time, but an unquenchable desire for "having a house that is too large and filling it up with an inordinate amount of crap".

You know, if you go back and talk to any serf back in the day and I'm pretty sure that a very large percentage of them would want to be or lord or king themselves.

But would they want the latest and greatest hoe and have FOMO over someone else's vacation in the next village? It's not possible to be a lord and the serf would have known it, but we long for things that are attainable at a cost.

That actually sounds like an interesting read. Do you have any recommendations for books about the history of addiction?

The fact you're trying to tie obesity to alcohol (Existed for thousands of years) and weed is bizarre, considering the far more natural and obvious link is copious amounts of sugar and hfcs (In drinks, spreads, processed food, etc). A 5 years old kid is not obese because of drugs. He's obese because his parents feed him absolute garbage due to preference, price, eduction, etc. Most modern/western people are hopelessly addicted to sweet

You can’t add two unrelated stats together and say it’s 50% - there’s highly likely some crossover there…

And of course, the modern solution is to get them addicted to a new drug!

The top comment even recommends that everyone should be taking it. Yikes.

You're conflating use, unhealthy use, and addiction.

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