Do you like Amy Winehouse? I think she has a wonderful voice. Here are the words of "Rehab", probably her best known song:
Rehab
Amy Winehouse
They tried to make me go to rehabBut I said 'no, no, no'
Yes, I've been black, but when I come back
You'll know-know-know
I ain't got the time
And if my daddy thinks I'm fine
He's tried to make me go to rehab
But I won't go-go-go
I'd rather be at home with Ray
I ain't got seventy days
'Cause there's nothing
There's nothing you can teach me
That I can't learn from Mr. Hathaway
I didn't get a lot in class
But I know it don't come in a shot glass
They tried to make me go to rehab
But I said 'no, no, no'
Yes, I've been black, but when I come back
You'll know-know-know
I ain't got the time
And if my daddy thinks I'm fine
He's tried to make me go to rehab
But I won't go-go-go
The man said "why do you think you're here?"
I said "I got no idea.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna lose my baby,
So I always keep a bottle near."
He said "I just think you're depressed,
Kiss me here, baby, and go rest."
They tried to make me go to rehab
But I said 'no, no, no'
Yes, I've been black, but when I come back
You'll know-know-know
I don't ever want to drink again
I just, ooh, I just need a friend
I'm not going to spend ten weeks
And have everyone think I'm on the mend
It's not just my pride
It's just 'til these tears have dried
They tried to make me go to rehab
But I said 'no, no, no'
Yes, I've been black, but when I come back
You'll know-know-know
I ain't got the time
And if my daddy thinks I'm fine
He's tried to make me go to rehab
But I won't go-go-go
Knowing that this is true (she actually is an addict), what do you think of someone who thinks like this? Does it make any difference to know that she´s talented and young? If you were close to her, would you respect her decision, insist, force her to take care of herself, or do something else? Why would you act in that way? In other words, should addicts be helped or left alone?
Posts
13 comments:
Addict people are unable to decide what to do with their problem. They must be convinced that they are ill and thus they need a proper treatment. Sometimes they don´t understand it and they are reluctant to look for the cure, so the difficult decision has to be taken by their parents or relatives. Sometimes the ill person has to be sent to a rehab center against her/his will. That causes a lot of trouble and pain to the family but it is the only thing that can be done if they want their loved person cure.
Pat
I agree with Pat when she says that an addict person has to accept he/she is ill and needs help. However, I don't think they should be helped only by their family.
Sometimes addicts' parents do not realise what is happening and believe everything is ok.
If one has a friend who is a drug/alcohol addict, one should try to help him/her making them understand that is not good for their life and do not leave them alone, letting them ruin their life.
I agree that an addict should receive help from his/her loved ones, either friends or family, but I don't think rehab centres are the solution for all addicts. I don't think everyone is unable to help themselves, I've known cases that only needed therapy or even just support from the right people to get them back on track again. Besides, if someone goes against their will to rehab, it won't probably be as useful as someone who is actually willing to do so. And how about those who are sent to rehab just because nobody wants to go through the trouble of taking care of them themselves?Every person is different, and so shoulb be the treatment they receive.
In my opinion there are two kinds of adicts: the ones who need help and the ones who doesn't.
The adedicts who need help are those that got into the addiction because of a lack (of love, of support, of money, etc) and find the solution to the problem evading reality. If any of my friends got to that point I would insist on taking him or her to rehabilitation. There (and with help from the family and friends) the addict will find a way out of the whirlpool that is the addiction. On the other hand, those addicts who find the evasion of reality amusing are not to be insisted. They, like the singer, know what they want, and therefore are conscious of what they are doing. They have a purpose. Some artist, when they reach the peak of their career, need drugs/alcohol to find a place where they can amuse themselves. People who have everything lose the posibility of being happy and therefore look for a way to avoid this real world.
This are the reasons I find reagarding addicts. Those who need solutions to real problems and look for them in the wrong place need help, the ones who look for the addiction just for the sake of evading a boring reality should be allowed to decide for themselves.
Ghillermiho. let me disagree with you on that there are two types of addicts. I personally think that addicts are addicts, no matter the reason why they choose or are led to ruin their lives. a "bored-of-life" artist who takes drugs is also an ill person who needs treatment. If we consider more praiseworthing helping someone who was led to drugs because of seriuos personal problems, that´s another question. another point is that in most cases famous people don´t have a friend or a relative who intends to do something about the problem. Sometimes people who is around drug consumer celebrities have a strong interest in keeping these famous people in that condition, because they can take advante of this situation, I mean, they can make good profit from it. Can´t they?
I agree with you Pat, but at the same time, I think that addicts do not choose or are led to ruin their lives.
They just make a mistake, again and again, and eventually they think that the addiction is the solution to all their problems.
Sometimes they notice that they are doing things in the wrong way, but they just can't stop doing them. The illness is stronger than them.
They will ruin their lives after that, but as Rocio said, the right people near them, can help them get rid of the problem.
I understand your point pat, the problem is that you are talking about addicts in general. If addicts have to be looked upon, it means that their individual situation must be considered too. What I tried to do is clasify (in a broad sense) between those I think can be helped and will welcome the help, and those that will refuse the help we can provide. My intention was just to make a rought classification.
I would like just to point out that I also disagree (it seems on purpose but it isn't) with daniela. I think that addicts don't know that they are following the wrong road because most of the times (againg a generalization), that path is the only one they have. When an addict steals from his family to buy drugs, for example, they do it because they can't see any other way of getting money, it is not that they know that it is wrong, they are beyond good and evil. When only one road is available there is not a correct choise, there is not a choise., and that is what they are left with, or rather without, choises
I agree with you guillermyho when you say that "addicts don't know that they are following the wrong road because most of the times..., that path is the only one they have". They believe it is, because once thay've become addicts, the way out of it seems almost impossible for them (and many times for the people around them too).
However, unlike what you seem to be trying to say, I believe that absolutely averybody who gets into drugs NEEDS help, regardless of whether they want it or not, and I say this from experience. It is heartbreaking to see someone you love getting lost in that world. Of course they'll refuse any kind of help, they are sure they know what they're doing because they feel "good" after snorting or injecting some cocaine, or smoking marijuana. It is that short term solution that turns them into addicts.
Some people start taking drugs in order to overcome certain problems (whatever thay may be), others take it up just for "fun", because friends do it, or beause it's fashionable (yes, it sounds awful). But whatever the reason, I think that the addict is somebody who has found the wrong answer in the wrong place and is unable to see the real consequence of his/her actions. Some of them may try to decieve us by aknowledging the damage drugs do them, as Amy Winehouse does in her song, and saying that they know what they're doing. I even heard some addicts say that they didn't care if they died because of it. But I assure you, should they be given a second chance, they would be most grateful. Having people worrying about them, showing that they (really) care, showing that they understand and support them makes them feel they're not alone (and you do feel very lonely when its only you and the drugs), and many times makes them want to recover from that in order to live their lives and make the most of them. Many times, you see, they're just trying to fill some emptiness inside them, and if they find that they can do it by themselves and with people who love them, they'll know they don't need drugs anymore.
I agree with Rosebud in the sense that family and friends are the only possible means which can lead an addict to overcome this illness (sort of)
As many of you have already stated, addicts do not have any other chance in life than continue their consuption, because of their economical situation, family, job, or even teenager who are brought up through the wrong path in life. Of course, there are mamy more examples........
But, what we have to have clearly in mind is once you enter to the world of drugs, it would be extremely difficul to get out of it.
Last night, I was listening some people talking on the radio about these boys who are on the surroundings of the University and Plaza San Martin.... The journalists said, with pride on their voices, that they were not worth-living because of the amount of drugs they take. Personally, comments like those do not help to this issue, but to the irrational way of thinking of some people.
All in all, I do agree with most of the comments, and I re-state my belief by saying that family's support is the source of improvement.
Just a quick comment about addicts and the way in which every of us should treat them. We all know that Drug addiction is a serious illness that affect the brain and the body. Once one has become addicted, dropping drugs off goes beyond his or her will. The persons cannot see the real damage they are causing to themselves, they do not realise that they are dying little by little...they just do it as a necessary "HABIT"..and will do whatever, no matter what, to get the "Rubbish"..Their only salvation, talking quite dramatically but with the truth, are their beloved!They need to know that life is worth living it and that there are people in whose life they are very important..
I think that letting them know that simple fact, is the key to get them back!!!
I was thinking, as Alvaro mentioned, about the boys -mainly children- who lived in the surroundings of our university, and also in all those who are in the streets. They have neither a family nor a home. I've heard on the news they consume drugs to forget their reality or simply because they have nothing to eat. I think it is more difficult to tackle this problem in this case, though not impossible.
Not long ago, some of the boys who were in Plaza San Martin were taken away by the police. Is that the solution? I don't think so.
Well, Pianoingles has a point here. How can society melp in this cases? Many think - as Alvaro pointed out - that they do not deserve to live. First, before tackling the addicts' problems we should solve the problem arising in society that makes drugs a solution, a escape from a scary reality.
Drugs have been consumed by men and women since tribal times. Greek, egiptian, aztec or chinese, just to mention some of the oldest civilizations on earth have consumed drugs..... conciously. Many great writers and musicians did take drugs, but the objective was different, the objective was going beyond reality to "see" further than common men. Since the last decade, drugs are consumed - as pianoingles said - to evade a reality in which one has to choose between eating almost nothing or taking drugs just not to feel hungry.
Those people need more than just family to support them. They make the concious choise I mentiones before. We need to choose be between helping them out of their miserable conditions or, as many people choose to do, ignore them. I choose helping.
(sorry, the last sentence sounded more like a political campaing than an opinion.)
I have read all the reflections in this topic you have posted and I have to say that I agree with some comments and disagree with another ones
What nobody has mentioned and I think it is quite important to be discriminated is that not all the drugs are the same kind of drug (sorry for the tautology!). On the one hand, there are ILLICIT narcotics which can be sub-divided into two -quite different- groups: hard drugs (cocaine, heroin, pills) and light drugs (cannabis, mushrooms, cacti or psychoactive flowers). On the other hand, there are also LICIT drugs which in same cases can be more destructive than the illegal ones. They are tobacco, alcohol, amphetamines, etc. The legal market is huge, very profitable and hegemonic-driven so nobody would say anything against it.
Particularly, I have never heard about someone dying due to cannabis overdose (if exists) but instead, it is vox populi that plenty of people die because of lung cancer or cirrhosis.
Another interesting item related to the topic is that –as Guillermyho has said- not all the addicts have the same necessity or urge. People consume stimulants with different purposes in mind. Some of them may not be fulfilled only with terrestrial issues. They yearn for expansion of their minds and souls. They cannot be encapsulated just in their human bodies. They look for breathing spaces or for oneiric images.
There is a quite interesting book by Aldous Huxley in which he mentions the different ways of doing these things described above. Some people make martial arts, other ones meditate, others do mental control and there are those who simply use psychoactives in order to open what Huxley calls “the perception doors”. Whenever these perception doors are opened we are able to see different realities, dimensions.
We are able to connect something -which is not physical but metaphysical- we’ve all got inside us (mind/heart/soul/energy) to another level of consciousness, to the OM, to the global energy that surrounds us.
Some citizens in our society may want to get rid of the youth who smoke joints in the San Martin Square or can criticize their life styles while they point at them with their inquisitor fingers but no one in his sane sense would ever say a word against those addicts who have their perception doors wide-opened and have brilliant minds such as Noam Chomsky, Salvador Dali, Henry Miller, Julio Cortázar, Milan Kundera, Amadeo Mozart, Charles Bukowski, Gabriel G. Márquez, Alejandra Pizarnik, Roberto Bolaño, Sylvia Plath, Gustave Courbet, Pablo Picasso, Egon Schieli, Edvard Munch, Ludwig Beethoven, Hermman Hesse, Manuel Puig, Mary Shelley, Amadeo Modiglian, John Lennon, William Shakespeare, Bob Marley, Antonin Gaudi, Vincent Van Gogh, Charly Parker, Janis Joplin, Carlos Castaneda, Pat Metheny, Federico Fellini, Robert D. Junior, Yoko Ono, David Bowie, Robert Fripp, Sigmund Freud, Eric Clapton, George V, William Burroughs, Thomas de Quincey, Bela Lugosi, Carlos Santana , Billie Holliday, Edgar A. Poe, Keith Richards, Elvis Presley, Richard Nixon, Dick Van Dyke, Robert F. Kennedy, Andy Warhol, Maria Callas, Frida Kalo, Charles Baudelaire, Fedor Dostoyevsky, Ernest Hemingway, Carlos Gardel, Roberto Goyeneche, Jimmie Hendrix, Raymond Chandler, Jack Kerouak, Jack London, William Faulkner, Scott Fitzgerald, Eugene O’Neill, Dylan Thomas, Robbie Krieger, Luis Buñuel, Allen Ginsberg, Fernando Pessoa, Paul Mc Cartney, Truman Capote, Augusto Rodin…and the list goes on and on and on….
Post a Comment