You may have heard by now about a study recently conducted in a journalism class in which the findings showed a large chunk of students exhibited signs of being “addicted” to the Internet. Look, I have loneliness issues, too. But we’ve got to draw the line somewhere.

Sex addiction. Internet addiction. I saw an episode of True Life where some girl claimed her boyfriend was addicted to texting. Can we all just chillax on this for a second? Addiction is an actual issue. It’s not something you get to hide behind if you’re lazy. “Oh, I can’t go to class today, I’m addicted to skipping.”

Students in the study were asked to spend 24 hours disconnected from all media. In the students’ reports of their experiences, they apparently used the same terminology as drug users in withdrawal, saying they were “depressed” and “miserable.” Which is fine. I can’t go more than six minutes without human contact, but that’s because I’m a big baby. It’s not because I’m fighting some kind of addiction. Have you ever seen Intervention? Those people have addictions. I’m not punching out windows to run away from my family and freebase Facebook. Not an addiction.

Let’s talk about sex addiction, too. Because, Jesus, are we still going to perpetuate the myth that Tiger Woods cheated on his wife because he’s addicted to sex and not because he’s, you know, an asshole? This is stupid. If you believe in sex addiction, then you’re addicted to being ignorant.

I get that students would feel withdrawal when forced to spend a day disconnected from all media. But that’s not because we have some carnal need, it’s just because media are what we’re comfortable using. If the power on the campus went out, I wouldn’t get the shakes. I’d just go play catch with my friends or something.

And besides, “addiction” is a really strong word to be throwing around when the study involved students basically cutting themselves off from communication with most of the outside world. Isn’t the need for company, like, part of the human condition? I suppose I’m addicted to breathing, too, because you should see how nuts I get when I’m in breath withdrawal.

It’s symptomatic. We’re so quick now to label everything as an addiction or a disease that it’s almost as if we’re washing our hands of anything that would make us weird or deviate from the norm in any way. You see it in the form of everything being diagnosed as a psychological disorder. I like chips. I’m a chipophile. I hate darkness. I must have Seasonal Affective Disorder. That one was real.

It’s just something to hide behind. Labeling something makes it OK. Take alcoholism, for example. There’s a South Park episode in which Stan’s dad confines himself to a wheelchair and shaves his head because “alcoholism is a disease.” It’s not like cancer. In many cases, if you’re an alcoholic, you probably don’t require medicine to overcome your need to drink. It means you need to work — hard — to force yourself not to drink.

But that’s the sad reality when everything is an addiction. I’m not perfect either; I’ve actually got a confession. You see, I thought I was immune to this stuff, but it would be closer to the truth to say I can’t get enough. I’m gonna have to face it.

I’m addicted to love.

Rob Gindes is a senior journalism major. He can be reached at gindes at umdbk dot com.