Comment by hypfer

They're being used as a crutch to fast-track achieve the illusion of a goal.

That is textbook abuse, because you're deluding yourself into believing that you're achieving something, when in reality, the only thing you do achieve is addiction. Or so the worst-case outcome anyway.

Abuse of course sounds like you're hurting someone else, but in this case, you're just hurting yourself. But you do that quite hard.

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Ego death is hard, but achievable without cheating like that. And - not to be snarky - when laid off, you have a lot of time for the introspection to pull that off without such crutches.

The author decided otherwise - and it's their right to do that - but it's still textbook substance abuse, which is objectively bad.

Hence my comment to correct that.

It shall be read as directed as the reader getting wrong ideas. Not at the guy clearly struggling and just finding something that works for them.

If you take a look at the rest of the comment section, you will see why this is ethically necessary.

FWIW, it's not the author's fault that this ended up in this place, but it still ended up in this place, and with that, it is harmful, because HN does not comprehend the idea of context.