Addiction: The persistent compulsive use of a substance known by the user to be harmful. That’s how Webster defines addiction. It also pretty well describes our relationship to oil. Coal too, for that matter. I’m sure the folks at Massey sent a gift basket to the guys at BP for knocking them off the front page.
But in the end, it’s us. We’re the addicts. We want to believe whoever will tell us that our addictive use of fossil fuel and the off-shore drilling, strip-mining and endless Middle East wars are okay so long as we can get our next fix. Obviously we still need to get around and I’m typing this on a computer that’s plugged into the wall and just before turning on the AC, so what to do?
I think if we spent as much on education as we do on defense in this country, we might know the answer to that question.
Eric Shaw Quinn 
Do you think we are all addicts because we buy into every single message that the media and marketers plop in front of us, or are we at a baser level just all that greedy and self serving that we want what we want when we want it and that’s just the way it is? There are people out there who try to make a difference, with the environment, with helping those who need help, with living life happily without the crazy rush to the finish line that everyone else seems to be signed up for, so who is following their instincts as a human being, who is living with a more open mind, and who is just caught in the middle?
I find the addiction something we were born into.
I don’t think of myself as a good pioneer of sorts. I don’t sew, I don’t can food although with every good intent I try to grow veggies in the summer time, I bath more than most, so an outhouse would be the end all for me, and shooting a gun on the prairie for survival would not suit my personality. I suppose I could can my foods or freeze my own veggies if growing was the only option, but no way I could live without running water. Candles are something I like, but the intense heat eliminates my ability to live without electricity and I do not like to air dry my hair. Call me vain but it frizzes. I have very few vices and defrizzing my hair is on the top of that list! I do not have a pioneer personality but I do have a pioneer spirit (you figure that one out). So, for my “addiction” to be “handled”, I might find this difficult. I do try to conserve in all areas and eliminate as much of my carbon footprint as possible, but like I said, I was born into this addiction. With the Industrial Age came a price. I do believe in changing our ways.