Addiction involving drugs or chemicals coming from outside the body is understood. What about addiction to the chemicals and neurotransmitters that spike up our synapses like endporphins or adrenalin? Why make a distinction?

Aren't people addicted to adrenalin rushes in things like roller coasters or climbing mountains or jumping from planes?

Sex is a chemical reaction. Why can't that be addictive?

If we want the term 'addiction' to be precise, in case we need to have a discussion concerning something very specific, then we need to keep it in its medical definition, otherwise it becomes difficult to let others know exactly what we are referring to. For example, if we say "Jane's addiction has led her to such and such" we can know immediately that she uses some type of mind-altering substance to the degree that the body would go through serious withdrawal symptoms, requiring medical intervention, if she were to suddenly stop putting the substance into her body; this is also called "chemical dependency", a term that medically, is equivalent to "addiction" but was introduced later due to the fact that pop-culture has changed the meaning of the term "addiction" to mean basically any type of affinity a person has, to an object, a substance, to a feeling, whatever, no matter if the source is located externally or internally.

Imagine doctors trying to have a discussion about an addiction if they were using the pop-culture definition. They would have to then add lots of new words to clarify exactly what they were referring to. For example, how would they distinguish between drugs, natural substances that the body makes, objects, etc. It would be a bloody mess, and most discussions would be too vague to ever lead to theoretical development. Why would they discuss all types of addictions under one umbrella term when it is understood that each type of 'addiction' (using the pop-culture definition') arises from entirely different causes?

When terminology is precise, in medicine the etiology is considered, and in philosophical and scientific language, the origin of the observable phenomenon is considered when defining a term, so that it references something specific, but then again, the general public cannot think in abstract terms, they only look at the behavior itself, not its origins, so naturally they don't grasp the concept of precision in language for the purpose of reaching depth in discussion.

So, in my opinion, it is a mistake to use the term 'addiction' for anything and everything that a person feels like they can't live without. Even if we try to say that addictions are things people cannot live without, but that are unnecessary for basic survival. Even then, we don't know what a person needs physically; a person may be doing something that they absolutely need neurologically because it has a healing effect on the body; the body may need some certain type of ritualistic behavior in order to alleviate neurological damage due to chronic stress, and in this case, it would appear to be 'unnecessary' from the outside, when actually it is very necessary physically. I would not call a strange, repetitive, uncontrollable behavior an 'addiction', even if it is sexual, because our bodies make chemicals in everything we do, not just in sex, we can 'get high' doing various things, so if we begin to call everything we do that causes an elevation in mood an 'addiction' then suddenly we are not having any discussion at all because the word means nothing anymore.

There are other terms such as 'fixation', 'fetish', 'obsession', 'compulsion', 'affinity', etc. that should be used to distinguish different types of repetitive, uncontrollable behaviors. In one of my articles I've outlined some of the differences in these terms, and the behaviors they are best used to designate. It's a start, but is not all-inclusive of every term that should be used to distinguish every type of behavior: http://vekquin.com/articles/fetish-addi ... ssion.html

--Vekquin

Of course to have a discussion one has to use a common language with a shared understanding of the words used. Words of course don't have fixed meanings, often have multiple meanings and take on different meanings in context.

After doing a quick read of your definitions I have no trouble is trying to stick with them to discuss the issues at hand.

There is a underlying frame, perhaps the psychologist's frame that seeks to explain behavior as the outward response(s) to an inner mental landscape. For example I had such and such a childhood and as an adult it is expressed in sadism or submissive behavior or narcissism. This seems to imply that we have little choice in this, perhaps the same way we don't choose our basic sexual orientation.

I would posit that we make choices about our behaviors in the realm of fetish or BDSM because we have attached meaning to those behaviors and actions or simply we have linked them to the human sexual response which is generally a "feel good" experience. We all seem to select feel good as opposed to feel bad experiences.

What seems to be at play in BDSM is that we can habituate our responses by conditioning and positive or negative reinforcement. Call it addiction, obsession, chemically induced from the outside or from within, but the same stimulus response reaction is enabled and becomes a pattern.

Sadism is an interesting psychology to observe. It is a pleasurable reaction to the pain and suffering of another person. That is the sadist requires another living being to experience and altered state (pain and suffering) for the sadist to feel sadistic pleasure. While one might argue that the masochist likewise requires someone to inflict the pain, it is the pain inside their own bodies which is the experience they are after.

It seems reasonable to suggest that some kinky behaviors may not necessarily be cathartic or dealing with a deep underlying psychological need in all cases, but are more aligned with substance addiction - the so called endorphin rush or high. This leads to the question as to why people seek being high. Doesn't it?

Oh! I was not implying that I think you should change your definition of 'addiction' to mine; however, I probably would not be inclined to use the popular definition of the term, because I prefer to use terms such as 'obsession' or 'compulsion' or 'fixation' for non-substance-oriented repetitive, uncontrollable behaviours, so if you say to me 'addiction' I'm always going to respond as if you are referring to a chemical dependency, otherwise I really don't know what you are referring to because there are soooo many different kinds of repetitive, uncontrollable behaviours.



Yes, that is basically what American Psychology claims, but it is not thought of as 'outward response to an inner landscape', that would be classic psychoanalytic thought. Popular psychology (i.e. Behaviorism) claims that there is no 'inner mental landscape'; there are only conditioned automatic responses to external stimuli and nothing further than that; basically that all animals and humans are nothing more than programmed automata. Most Western countries other than the US have various, equally popular competing theories that do not think of humans as just reactionary blobs with no control, just simply programmed to respond to certain situations in a certain way and nothing more than that; no free will, no personal choice, etc. The US is totally dominated by the school of thought called Behaviorism, (Skinner, Watson, et. al.) which arose in the first half of the 20th century and is still the most preferred model. It's also the most over-simplified model of human nature that has ever been created in all of the history of humankind. The absurdity and stupidity of the Behaviorist model has been revealed a zillion times by very sophisticated researchers and scientists, for example the Gestalt Theorists in the 1930's and 40's, (who also undeniably proved that animals reason) but they are largely ignored by the Established Order (i.e. pop-psychology and pop-culture which is heavily influenced by pop-psychology).



I think that you are mixing up two models and coming up with a muddled, logically inconsistent mix. Are you saying that we choose our responses through the meanings we willfully, perhaps even carefully, attach to various objects, situations, and scenes? ...or are you saying that we develop automatic, unconscious responses based entirely on environmental 'reinforcers' and/or chemical reactions that control behaviour?



This is 'reasonable' only if you accept the Behaviorist model, and believe in 'addiction' to the body's own chemicals; that is, you believe that chemicals in your body cause and control your behaviours. That is a popular theory, but like all theories that rely on brain chemicals to make claims, it is highly suspect and can never be proven. The chemicals the body creates during certain acts may only be a side-effect rather than a cause! There are multiple ways to explain why humans appear to have the need to alter their consciousness once in a while under specific, controlled conditions, within a sexual context or otherwise. Animals do it also, not just humans. Mountain goats eat coca leaves for one example.

Being a world class lover is like being an a dancer who is born with moves. But we can learn to "perform" to spec. It is each person's obligation to please their partner. It's a selfish thing because they are trying to please you. So you have to teach your lover to play you and you have learn from them. Sex pleasure is mostly about the feelings inside your own body... but that usually arises from interacting with the lover's body.

Men may be lazy and more selfish as lovers. It seems to take little to get them off/satisfied and they lose interest in their partner's pleasure.

BDSM make it more obvious. It's nogotiated. Each has a role to play which APPEARS to be what the OTHER partner wants. The sub acts submissive to please their dom/master. The master/dom acts cruel or humiliates the slave because that's what slave needs. These scenes can be planned in infinite detail... and there are the costumes and props of course.

break... more to follow