It's more complicated than hereitary or not, clean and simple, I think. No one wakes up one day an alcoholic, they have to get themselves there with their choices as well as having a hereditary disposition and some people without a hereditary disposition end up alcoholics so. . . It's like "heart disease" or any of those other illnesses; if someone in your family has it you're at greater "risk." It's in the genes but you're not predetermined to get it, can't "blame" heredity for it (or you can but that doesn't get you to any better a place than blaming your parents for a rotten childhood).