Addiction and Political Liberation: Moving from "Stigma" to "Oppression"
Friday, October 13, 2023
8:00 AM – 9:15 AM ET
Location: Laurel CD (Fourth Floor)
It is often claimed that addiction travels with “stigma.” While that is true, I argue that stigma, even structural stigma, is not strong enough to describe our ameliorative obligations to people with substance use disorders (SUDs). Instead, we should discuss the oppression associated with addiction. What kinds of political subjugation and material harm are routinely experienced by people with SUDs? I describe several paradigm oppressions and their political functions: incarceration, institutionalization, involuntary sterilization, and family separation. While these examples capture the subordinating treatment to which people with SUDs are often subjected, they fail to explain why such people are politically marginalized. To answer that question, I introduce the concept of the double bind of addiction: circumstances in which every option available to an individual with an SUD either incurs harm or else reinforces negative stereotypes about addiction. Finding oneself in these double binds, I claim, is a central element of the lived experience of SUDs. I argue that the existence of double binds is inseparable from the behaviorally totalizing implications of most theories of addiction. The mainstream models on offer—the self-medication hypothesis, the brain-dysregulation view, and the “akrasia” theory—all license an observer to interpret any behavior expressed by someone with an SUD as explained by their addiction. I provide some examples of double binds, and close by connecting the double bind directly to oppression.