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Addiction is a chronic condition characterised by compulsive engagement with a substance or behaviour despite significant harmful consequences. It is not a failure of character. It is not something that willpower alone can resolve. And it is not a choice in the way that ordinary choices are choices.
People with addiction are often the first to invoke freedom. It is my right. I am only hurting myself. What I do in my own home is my business.
Philippe Jacquet does not argue with the principle. He asks a question instead.
In the clinical context used by Philippe Jacquet, the demon refers to the experience of internal division — the state in which a person does what they do not want to do, and cannot do what they want. The etymology confirms this: the Greek daimon derives from the root meaning “to divide.”