Binah article about a teen with an ipod

The world at large watches TV, uses the internet, and does whatever else they want to do, and don't call it an addiction, they call it normal behavior. Frum people should not be doing any of that, so if they do, its called an addiction. Difference between taiva and addiction? Hmmmm. Difference between the yetzer hara and the yetzer tov? Eating treif or being mechalel Shabbos? All the same thing, the yetzer hara!

Gold Member Joined: Mar 31 2010 Posts: 2093

Gold Member Joined: Mar 31 2010 Posts: 2093

Gold Member Joined: Sep 12 2011 Posts: 1953

Hi, my name is 5*Mom. I used to be an addict--to Mishpacha and Binah. I've been sober for almost a year and I'm taking it one week at a time.

Honestly, I've never felt so clear-headed!

someone who otherwise keeps shabbos but uses an ipod or computer is probably suffering from some sort of addiction.

There are plenty of frum people who use these things without feeling compelled to use them on shabbos. Me, for example.

Platinum Member Joined: Aug 01 2005 Posts: 16933

I have a ffeeling that this girl wasn't going to be almost baptized, but there really was a boy at the other end and Binah obviously wasn't going to write that...
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Here's a true story about a teenage girl who spent enormous amounts of time on the internet. She was 'addicted' to several Harry Potter websites. She would write HP fanfiction during boring classes in school, participate in HP forums rather than study for tests on subjects that bored her, even chatted with fellow HP fans all over the world. Most of them were girls. A couple of them were boys.

She spent a good few years of her life on those sites, and she doesn't regret a single moment. Chatting with people her own age gave her something she didn't have in real life - friends who were as nuts about Harry Potter as she was.

She learned to make graphics and practiced her writing and research skills, through contests on those sites. She enjoyed chatting with the boy from Portugal, who admitted that he was gay but having trouble coming out to his parents. He used to argue that Americans were spoiled and fat. She argued that he sounded jealous. He admitted she was right and he wanted to move to America. She wished him good luck.

She knew another guy whom she didn't chat with that often, but one memorable night she stayed up all night chatting with him. He had been abused as a child, had temper issues. He had broken up with his girlfriend, whom he had gotten pregnant. He told the girl about all the abuse he had gone through, and how he felt like killing himself. She chatted with him for 10 hours, mostly just listening, and telling him there were people in the world who would miss him if he was gone. She didn't really mean she would miss him. She barely knew him, and felt little respect for a guy who would leave his pregnant girlfriend, no matter what he'd gone through as a child. But she felt responsible to listen, if that was what he needed.

She had friends who were girls, too. From England, the US, Poland. She was closer to them than to the boys, sharing photos and telling them about momentous events in her life. One in particular, the Polish girl, found the girl's accounts of Jewish life fascinating. Another girl was actually Jewish, Conservative. She too enjoyed hearing about Orthodox Jewish life.

So. What happened to all this? The last Harry Potter book came out. It was no longer so much fun to speculate. The girl got older, and busier. A couple of years after the last HP book came out, the girl lost all interest in the sites. She still communicated with the Polish girl, but spent more time texting and talking to her chosson.

Then she got married, got even busier, found other sites (like imamother) that she was more interested in.

She never used the internet on Shabbos. She would like to, in the same way she would like to do many things that are assur. But she won't. Because she believes in G-d and doesn't want to break His commandments.

So. She is still Jewish. Happily married with no boyfriend on the side, despite having *gasp* CHATTED with boys online.

Through it all, she has always loved to read.

She is probably addicted to books.

**

What do I think of all this? I agree that 'addiction' is very, very overused. I think that most people are just doing something they enjoy very much (like porn) but can stop with the right motivation or if they become more busy, more tired or just feel like being in control of it. Do I have personal experience with this? YES. I do. And I won't elaborate any more, even anonymously.

I sometimes get the urge to eat a cookie. I can't control it. I have a cookie, and I rarely stop at just one. I need another, and another, and soon I've eaten half the package. I find it easier to abstain entirely and not have them in the house at all. Sounds like addictive behavior, doesn't it? Maybe I need an intervention. Twisted Evil

I'm so tired of all the MELODRAMA surrounding the topic of 'internet addiction.' How do people have the energy for it? Rolling Eyes

Gold Member Joined: Jul 30 2009 Posts: 1698

Platinum Member Joined: Nov 01 2009 Posts: 8228

Hp amother, I recently reread the hp series and was thinking about some things. I went to one of the hp forums and it wasn't the same.
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I believe that most of you don't have a valid argument to stand upon cuz you have your own internet addictions. You are addicted to imamother! The amount of posts some people have are seriously indicative of addiction.

Platinum Member Joined: Dec 27 2007 Posts: 7253

AS someone with 6,128,951 posts, amother, I don't think you're one to lecture us on addiction Very Happy

Gold Member Joined: Mar 31 2010 Posts: 2093

Ditto Barbara, it's so easy to make everything an illness.
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Diamond Member Joined: Jan 24 2010 Posts: 3400