All I can say after trying to get through this interview is, for anyone seeking genuine insight into alcoholism or any other addiction, to look at the work of Gabor Mate. He is a medical doctor, a psychiatrist, and someone who spent a decades long career working with alcoholics and addicts of all kinds in Vancouver, BC. He's conducted valuable research, written books and produced many videos on the topic of addiction and the many misunderstandings people have around alcoholism in particular. While Mr. Thorburn has clearly been hurt by behaviors he associates with addiction, he seems to have allowed his own painful experience to construct a model of alcoholism that is shallow, littered with cliches and generalizations, and lacking insight as to the fundamental causes of addiction. Many 'experts' (people who work with addicts and alcoholics) have now come to view addictions (including alcoholism) as maladaptive coping strategies in response to trauma. It's complicated, and each individual will find a different road to recovery.
Just as so many medical doctors were wrong about the Fauci-Wuhan Virus, masks and vaccines, they are often (usually) wrong about alcoholism. Your comment suggests anyone can become an alcoholic--after all, anyone can adopt a "maladaptive coping strategy" in their maladaptive response to trauma by drinking addictively. Sorry, but no. If you do not have the disease of alcoholism, try drinking addictively. You will not be able to.
All I can say after trying to get through this interview is, for anyone seeking genuine insight into alcoholism or any other addiction, to look at the work of Gabor Mate. He is a medical doctor, a psychiatrist, and someone who spent a decades long career working with alcoholics and addicts of all kinds in Vancouver, BC. He's conducted valuable research, written books and produced many videos on the topic of addiction and the many misunderstandings people have around alcoholism in particular. While Mr. Thorburn has clearly been hurt by behaviors he associates with addiction, he seems to have allowed his own painful experience to construct a model of alcoholism that is shallow, littered with cliches and generalizations, and lacking insight as to the fundamental causes of addiction. Many 'experts' (people who work with addicts and alcoholics) have now come to view addictions (including alcoholism) as maladaptive coping strategies in response to trauma. It's complicated, and each individual will find a different road to recovery.
BTW, if addiction was a response to emotional pain, as Mate seems to think, we'd all be alcoholics.
Just as so many medical doctors were wrong about the Fauci-Wuhan Virus, masks and vaccines, they are often (usually) wrong about alcoholism. Your comment suggests anyone can become an alcoholic--after all, anyone can adopt a "maladaptive coping strategy" in their maladaptive response to trauma by drinking addictively. Sorry, but no. If you do not have the disease of alcoholism, try drinking addictively. You will not be able to.
I haven't read this yet, but look at what I just stumbled onto: https://josepheverettwil.substack.com/p/gabor-mate-is-wrong-about-adhd-addiction