Slate has an article criticizing recent congressional attempts to change the language regarding addiction in order to destigmatize it with the hopes that it will encourage more users to seek the help they need. The author's rebuke this attempt on a few basic grounds http://www.slate.com/id/2171131/pagenum/2/.

~That considering drug addiction along the same lines as a chronic brain disease diminishes the sense of autonomy in the user that is necessary for him/her to take the steps needed to quit their use because it implies that it is out of their control.

~ That if addiction were equivalent to other brain diseases like schizophrenia, the addict would not be able to make other choices in between their times of use.

<blockquote>  Yet addicts rarely spend all of their time in the throes of an intense neurochemical siege. In the days between binges, cocaine addicts make many decisions that have nothing to do with drug-seeking. Should they try to find a different job? Kick that freeloading cousin off their couch for good? Register for food stamps? Most of the patients one of us treats hold jobs while pursuing their heroin habits.<blockquote>. 

~The authors argue that it diminishes the role a person's choices play in their affliction. <blockquote>it threatens to obscure the vast role personal agency plays in perpetuating the cycle of use and relapse to drugs and alcohol. <blockquote>

~And finally, it questions whether stigmas are necessarily bad because the social stigma can help motivate people to stop their destructive behavior. 

I have a few problems with this.