I think writing this advice off as unhelpful is actually more harmful than offering it in the first place. I think this is very real and very helpful advice. Is it hard to follow? Speaking from experience: absolutely.
Self-control is like a muscle: exercise it frequently, and it gets stronger. It also gets tired and needs rest, and it atrophies with disuse.
And like exercise, it's almost always beneficial. Even folks with physical disabilities see very real benefits from exercise, even when it's hard and painful! I used to live next door to a man who walked with a cane and very obviously struggled to go up and down stairs... And yet any time I would offer him help, he would refuse, because he knew the effort would keep him as mobile and active as he could be, given his circumstances--and do accept that help would actually harm him in the long run by accelerating the decline in his abilities. I doubt I would have his level of discipline were I in his situation, and to this day I envy that of him.
I think going so far as to say "telling someone to exercise self-control is unhelpful/unsympathetic" is exactly analogous to telling someone exercise is harmful. Not "too much exercise is harmful", but "any exercise is harmful", which is obviously untrue.
I'll be the first to acknowledge that humans are innately lazy, and that exercise is hard/boring/inconvenient/whatever. However, we do no one justice by giving them reasons to excuse that laziness. Justifying a lack of internal effort/ability should be and explanation of last resort, not the baseline.
Put differently: very few people are physically incapable of doing a pushup (or whatever other basic exercise you want to reference) due to actual physical limitations. Most who cannot simply haven't put in the work to reach the point where they can.
[E] This turned out longer than I anticipated. It turns out I feel strongly about this, and feel like this is one of the most toxic aspects of the society I feel like I inhabit. People should be encouraged to push their abilities, not given excuses not to. It's all too easy to accept those excuses as truth, and this prevents us all from reaching our highest potential. This feels like a net harm to society and a driver of very real inequality
It absolutely is. Most people become addicted to something because they lacked the self-control to say "no" the first time... And the second time... And so on until it became an addiction.
Also, by saying this you're insulting every person who has broken an addiction by way of exercising their self-control until it's strong enough to overcome the addiction. Some of us don't appreciate that.
Addiction is a psychological disorder - it is not at all a matter of self-control.
Just as being sad is not the same thing as being clinically depressed, and worrying about a review is not the same thing as having an anxiety disorder, people need to stop equating really liking something and being addicted to said thing.
> Addiction is a psychological disorder - it is not at all a matter of self-control.
And self-control is not psychological?
> people need to stop equating really liking something and being addicted to said thing.
Self control is precisely the difference between really linking something and consuming a reasonable/healthy amount of it vs being addicted to it and overconsuming.
The disorder that you dropped from "psychological" is actually semantically important, you know.
> Self control is precisely the difference between really linking something and consuming a reasonable/healthy amount of it vs being addicted to it and overconsuming.
If you were unable to get the hint from the other examples I gave, I'll be plain: you are terribly mistaken, addiction is a disorder of the brain.
What moral failing do you assume people with mood or anxiety disorders have?
> The disorder that you dropped from "psychological" is actually semantically important, you know.
Lack of self control can be described as a 'psychological disorder'. Also you completely avoided the actual question :) - maybe try answering it instead of playing semantics?
> I'll be plain: you are terribly mistaken, addiction is a disorder of the brain.
So you replaced 'phsycological disorder' with 'disorder of the brain'? That's supposed to make your point less pointless?
> What moral failing do you assume people with mood or anxiety disorders have?
Again, nowhere did I mention the word 'moral'. Try to address what I actually said instead of imagining strawmen in every comment.
> If you were unable to get the hint from the other examples I gave
No, I didn't get any 'hint' from your pointless examples. You see, I try to read what you said directly and respond directly, without any imagined 'hints', strawmen, or meaningless semantic games around vague and ambiguous terms.
This is such a false dichotomy. Even if you assume addiction can be a disease, self-control is still absolutely an element in overcoming it.
It's also not necessarily an either/or thing, and the existence of people who have broken addictions through exercise of their own self-control completely dismantles your black-and-white argument.
No it's not. That's a lazy way of thinking. Addiction isn't that simple, and deluding yourself into thinking it's that simple does yourself a disservice. It's not a moral failing, it's a disease.
And it's not lazy or delusional to claim addiction is as simple as being a disease?
If anything, that's a more lazy approach than saying it's a failing of self-control, which is itself a complicated and complex issue (hence my paragraphs and qualifications and whatnot above).
Writing it off as "a disease" removes all agency from the individual involved, whose lack of self-control is probably why they're addicted in the first place. That's true regardless of whether or not the addiction itself is a disease or a lack of self-control.
Saying "it's a disease" is also hugely insulting to the many people who have broken addictions by improving their self control. Even if you consider it a "disease", every person who has accomplished this has proven that the cure sometimes really is "improve your self-control".
And if that works in some cases, how can you prove whether or not it will work in another case without trying it first?
Self control is not 'simple', nor did I say anything about a 'moral failing'. 'Deluding yourself' by arguing against a position you imagined does yourself a disservice and just seems like a simple straw-man.
Whatever addiction, you’ll only get past it by assuming and believing it is under your control, paradoxically. Playing victim is, as very often in life, the opposite of empowering.
Wanting people to understand that they can improve their own self-control is trying to help them. With more self-control comes more agency and more control over one's own outcomes.
How is that being spun as a bad thing? I don't understand how we've reached a point that it's considered more "helpful" to teach people they have no control over their actions, rather than helping them gain more control over those actions?
I think writing this advice off as unhelpful is actually more harmful than offering it in the first place. I think this is very real and very helpful advice. Is it hard to follow? Speaking from experience: absolutely.
Self-control is like a muscle: exercise it frequently, and it gets stronger. It also gets tired and needs rest, and it atrophies with disuse.
And like exercise, it's almost always beneficial. Even folks with physical disabilities see very real benefits from exercise, even when it's hard and painful! I used to live next door to a man who walked with a cane and very obviously struggled to go up and down stairs... And yet any time I would offer him help, he would refuse, because he knew the effort would keep him as mobile and active as he could be, given his circumstances--and do accept that help would actually harm him in the long run by accelerating the decline in his abilities. I doubt I would have his level of discipline were I in his situation, and to this day I envy that of him.
I think going so far as to say "telling someone to exercise self-control is unhelpful/unsympathetic" is exactly analogous to telling someone exercise is harmful. Not "too much exercise is harmful", but "any exercise is harmful", which is obviously untrue.
I'll be the first to acknowledge that humans are innately lazy, and that exercise is hard/boring/inconvenient/whatever. However, we do no one justice by giving them reasons to excuse that laziness. Justifying a lack of internal effort/ability should be and explanation of last resort, not the baseline.
Put differently: very few people are physically incapable of doing a pushup (or whatever other basic exercise you want to reference) due to actual physical limitations. Most who cannot simply haven't put in the work to reach the point where they can.
[E] This turned out longer than I anticipated. It turns out I feel strongly about this, and feel like this is one of the most toxic aspects of the society I feel like I inhabit. People should be encouraged to push their abilities, not given excuses not to. It's all too easy to accept those excuses as truth, and this prevents us all from reaching our highest potential. This feels like a net harm to society and a driver of very real inequality