In The Fix, Damian Thompson takes a controversial position on addiction, positioning it not as disease but as choice. A recovering alcoholic and journalist, Thompson lays out a brilliant cultural analysis of contemporary addictions and explains how capitalism and modern society drive them.Calling himself a “12-step heretic,” Thompson says that the hell of addiction is taking over our modern lives. Indeed, aside from illegal drugs, painkillers, and alcohol, addictions to web-connected devices, video games, technology, television, sex, and food are have become ubiquitous.Thompson argues that attachments to family and work have been replaced by addictive behavior. Simultaneously intellectually serious and charming through the bleak prognosis, The Fix offers a glimmer of hope for the dark future it predicts.
