According to the Doctor in the book Alcoholics Anonymous, alcoholism is an affliction.  The definition is something that causes pain or suffering.  The question of if as alcoholics, people are choosing to drink, and not take care of their lives, might be answered in this labeling of the illness and affliction.  

The body being abnormal, according the doctor, in where there is an abnormal craving that occurs after the person afflicted with alcoholism ingests a drink, makes sense to most who really do have alcoholism.  

The next part of the illness, and it is two-fold illness according to those who know, is the mental obsession.  The Doctor, in the Doctor's Opinion, saw that alcoholics needed "moral psychology" or the ability to be honest with themselves mentally, and he also says, once the alcoholic can achieve this, usually through humility in my opinion, his or her belief in themselves going forward, without the option of alcohol being part of the plan, greatly increases.  It increases so much, they often feel that helping the community and others, and no longer living a life that includes selfish motives, is the only way they want to proceed.  

The Doctor says the alcoholic needs to be freed from the physical craving, which usually requires a few days of abstinence, possibly under medical attention and care, and then after the alcohol has left the person's system, psychological measures aiming to allow the individual to gain clarity driven thinking through being honest with themselves, will become beneficial. 

I cannot state enough how underestimated this beginning of understanding the physical portion of the illness, can be for those who struggle with alcoholism.  The often complex problem has a very simple solution, the beginning of the illness starts with understanding the strange and not always fair, reality that when alcoholics, or people who non-alcoholics are shocked drink "that much" and often at the "wrong times", drink alcohol, they lose actual control of what the physical properties of alcohol allow their body and mind to then do, which is compute to them they need more, or something terrible will happen.  

Alcohol is not bad, and that was very important for me to understand as an alcoholic.  For years I thought alcohol did to me what it did to everyone, and it was very nice to learn that I had a different body and mind when it came to drinking than others.  Everything just fell into place after I honestly admitted that and felt how hurtful my human brain interpreted it.  

I really appreciate the Doctor's honesty in the Doctor's Opinion, on how he states openly that humans, including Doctor's can't always help others, even though both the patient and the doctor are giving their best efforts.  

The Doctor in the Doctor's Opinion says, he does not agree that the solution to alcoholism for an alcoholic is mental control or the ability to control the decision making process regarding having drinks.  He states cases where men with alcoholism took abstinance and their drinking problems seriously, and then they thinking they didn't have a craving problem beyone their decision making powers, just wanted to have one drink, and the craving end up making them drink more, leading to complete unmanagability immediately in life.  

The Doctor notes that drinking for the normal person to "escape" might just be a function prefered when stress is in one's life, but for the alcoholic, drinking is not to escape, it is to respond to the subtle and subconscious (in my opinion) influence the craving has on our bodies, attached to our minds.  

If you're an alcoholic, when you drink one, you 100 percent will want more than one.  Every single time.  In fact, saying you will want one is an understatement, you, if you're like me, will need one.  I remember that terrible feeling of "I need the drink" and I don't care what else needs to come before it.  

This theme of "moral psychology" that the Doctor touches on is very important going forward, and it is important to understand that it is not a good or bad definition of moral necessary, but more so a definition of powerful and honest truth with oneself.