> Many people metabolize the alcohol more slowly, and get less of a "hit" from drinking, which makes them less susceptible to addiction.

This is the opposite of how it works, ethanol is the active ingredient for all of the fun parts of drinking, the metabolite, acetaldehyde, is the cause of all of the unfun parts (nausea, headache, flushing).

A significant percentage of East Asians have one or both of a superactive alcohol dehydrogenase (which converts ethanol to acetaldehyde) and a defective aldehyde dehydrogenase (which converts acetaldehyde to acetic acid), and they have significantly lower rates of alcoholism.