What I think about addiction and addicts is completely personal.

I will start by talking about my own vision of the “thing” and this before and after I had a clue what this was.

As I said earlier, the before will be very short. I did not have a clue about what addiction was. I knew of course that one could be “accro”, addicted to chocolate, cigarettes, cocaine etc… but not to the point where the thing liked could take over one’s life.
Then came the other perspective of the “thing”. I started seeing addicts as people with no sense of power whatsoever. For me anyone who can’t just stop anything with a simple NO is powerless and I used to despise people like this. I am not ashamed to say so as my mind was already set. However this way of seeing things was what was incrusted in my mind until I discovered what suffering from addiction was.

Today I would say, the addict is the most selfish, self-centered and careless person on earth… but NOT because the addict has just decided to be so but only and I repeat my word ONLY because he/she is simply powerless with the illness.
Yes, addiction is indeed an illness, but one that is so dreadful and shameful that in certain places in the world it is still a massive taboo.
I have noticed that the word and its knowledge are well spread in West Europe, central Europe, the UK and North America. The other places such as Africa, South America, Asia and Middle East have for some the knowledge but refuse to talk about it and the others just like me years ago do not have a clue.