Someone doing this stuff isn't thinking of the endgame any more than an alcoholic is thinking about cirrhosis. They just want to get high. They're not at the opiod buffet picking their fave. They're doing the best stuff their dealer has that they can afford.
It’s not to say being an alcoholic is easier per se, but whatever specific substance a person is abusing is going to be what their body demands to feel relief. If you’re addicted to pain meds, alcohol intoxication isn’t going to be the sensation your body will fiendishly crave.
Highs aren't fungible in the way you're describing. Don't mistake "I begrudgingly took a worse opiod because I couldn't get the one I want" for "I'm fine with anything"
It doesn’t matter because you can’t just push-button swap chemical dependencies.
Try, and you’re likely to end up dead or addicted to both the one you tried to switch from and the one you tried to switch to.
Stick to crypto Monero, I think your talents will be better suited there.
And by the way, the equivalent death of an alcoholic (happens to millions of people every day) would be an agonizing death with gastrointestinal bleeding, maybe cirrhosis, maybe a long period of disability before (which effectivel can mean death if you're homeless)...
As others have already said, you pretend to understand problems which you obviously have not experienced or witnessed at close yourself.
Your "I'd rather be" sounds like "They should rather eat pie" to any person with any kind of empathy or emotional connection to addicted humans.
That being said, yeah, I'll too rather not be addicted, as addiction to hard drugs (including alcohol) means pure agony. Why does anyone "choose" agony then?
Overcoming any serious addiction is a personal, social and medical problem requiring lots resources, luck and extreme willpower.
I'd say, a form of willpower that people comparing addiction to sheer indulgence cannot even grasp.
Beating addiction is not simply a decision, although an individual decision is of course required. Seeing that as the root of the problem is a flawed view from outside that contradicts everything we know about how human brains (and lifes) work.
Or not even that, just to avoid withdrawal symptoms.
The most common cause of overdose deaths is quitting cold turkey as people end up taking more of the drug to compensate the withdrawal.
I think the danger is from relapses long after withdrawal when both tolerance and knowledge of the supply has been lost. In some ways, withdrawal is the easy the bit - brutal but something to fight that gets easier as time passes. The nagging empty hole in your soul with sobriety is harder to fill and drags you back.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reward_system#Wanting_and_li...
Reminds me of Krokodil [1].
That said, I just finished listening to an episode of Radiolab [2] describing how unsubstantiated claims about fentanyl causing overdoses through contact may have triggered episodes of mass psychogenic illness [3]. So I'm inclined to take these gory images with a grain of salt, e.g. these may be a wounds that were neglected due to drug use versus unavoidably caused by it.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desomorphine#Toxicity_of_kroko...
[2] https://radiolab.org/podcast/good-samaritan
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desomorphine#Toxicity_of_kroko...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tryptophan
The mechanism in play for Xlyazine is that it's a relatively powerful vasoconstrictor. So the repeated use leads to decreased perfusion/flow/oxygen in the injection site. Which means wounds in the area don't heal.
So, yes, there's neglect involved, but the cycle is mentioned in the article. They get one abscess, have heard of this side effect, and become scared to inject anywhere other than the wound site for fear of a second abscess. Then that area gets infected, tissue necrosis, etc, and they finally start ruining another area.
Thanks, Zoe.
Important to remember that the alternative to shooting up is, often, to be cold, and miserable, alone, on the street, with no sleep.
One possibility potentiates the other.
Horrifically, you could even think of drug use as an attempt to adapt to loss of housing.
The backdrop for urban drug use, here in Vancouver, is a profound housing crisis and shortage, and a complete, thoroughgoing failure on the part of multiple levels of government to do anything about it.
To underscore this, the reason we have a heroin epidemic is because our solution to the preceding prescription opioid epidemic was to take away the pills.
Yes [1].
Law-abiding Americans became addicted to prescription opioids (wave 1). We clamped down on their distribution, particularly prescription, and left those addicted with no legal choices. They turned to heroin (wave 2). So we clamped down on its distribution, particularly import, and so got concentrated (easier to ship) and synthetic (no unique precursors) fentanyl (wave 3).
Criminalization of drugs, but not of all substances is a must. Alcohol and marajuana are certainly okay. But again criminalization is the only way to ensure people get the attention they need. We just need to change the way we jail people.
In Thailand you get two options go to jail or go to a temple and get clean.
I think you have not even the most basic understanding of addiction, or (perhaps most relevant to this case) specifically withdrawal. If you are addicted, you can’t simply choose a substitute, and particularly you can’t avoid withdrawal from one drug just by choosing another, except for some very special cases.
And I doubt it would be easier to get either since they're unlikely to hand out an unlimited quantity to anyone who pays for it even if it were legal.
Tranq is cheaper because it is available for animals, and not 'seizing and destroying something while putting the people who possess it in prison' is a great market force for lowering prices.
Ergo, don't criminalize heroin and tranq stops appearing in it.
2. I think some drugs would become cheaper, and other drugs would become more expensive. Drugs with limited supply would become cheaper as more production/supply chains open up. Think cocaine, heroin, and some pharmaceuticals without large overseas labs. There are inefficiencies in the illegal drug trade that legal trade could smooth over as well: better payment methods, more open price negotiations, legal settlement for disputes, reduced employee churn from violence/arrest, reduced bribes/corruption related charges.
3. Regardless of the price of drugs, the overall price would be smaller, as illegal drug use has huge externalized costs. Everything from corrupt governments to increased health care utilization to wasted law enforcement resources to destroyed human capital.
4. The existence of an available quality tested market would force the black market to compete more on quality.
We already see this with alcohol. Most liquor is tarted-up industrial ethanol, delivered by train tankers to the bottling plants, with some marketing and branding wrapped around it. Industrial ethanol is very inexpensive to produce, around $1/liter; the price of consumption alcohol is downstream of excise taxes and branding.
Cost is not a relevant factor. We can produce all of these chemicals for so little that it is a rounding error. This is a matter of policy.
There is a direct social cost in terms of health care, law enforcement, crimes committed to obtain drugs, fallout from broken families resulting in further dysfunction and more.
Then there is also the unseen cost of lost productivity. If users, deceased users, imprisoned users, distributors, deceased distributors, imprisoned distributors, and law enforcement personnel were not engaged in these activities, their efforts could be focused on more productive areas of the economy. We all pay for this policy socially and economically.
Alcohol is everywhere. Alcohol consumption correlates heavily, like crazy heavily, with assaults, rape, murder, domestic violence, accidents, and serious or fatal car crashes.
Weed is now legal or legal-ish in many places, essentially all of the big population centers in N. America. Edibles and vapes mean you don't even have to smell it.
And let's not forget all of those articles about SV wunderkunds "micro-dosing".
The addicts that the OP was discussing have serious withdrawal issues and are, compared to things like booze or marijuana, trivial in terms of overall population.
There is absolutely no valid reason we can't treat people with suboxone, which will allow them to maintain their addiction without getting high. However it needs a prescription and doctors usually won't just prescribe it to addicts, especially for extended time periods.
This could all be 'fixed' if people didn't have a subconscious need to make people 'pay' for doing things they feel are wrong.
A good example of this is when I got a complete workup done by a liver specialist, having been a very hard drinker earlier in life. Upon telling a close family member that everything came up fine and there were no lasting effects they commented 'that shouldn't be right' as if I had cheated society somehow by not having health consequences for being an alcoholic.
That’s Christianity for you: screw love and acceptance, it’s punishment all around.
Perhaps you'd like to attack Judaism instead, but that isn't as fashionable, is it? The point here is that the need for atonement is a feature of base human nature, and the problem is a lack of Christianity.
But... we have places like the Salvation Army that would rather have folks die instead of giving a trans person shelter and help.
There are abusive homeless shelters peppered across the US, some of which have forced church, forced drug classes, and forced work. Some of these will take away your possessions or turn away a man with children because the shelter that allows children has a strict "no man" policy.
Right this very moment, people are passing laws to ban trans folks and take rights away from queer people in general.
It doesn't really matter what you think the point is, it obviously either isn't shared or doesn't show in people's actions. There are plenty of examples of christians actively doing harm in real time.
Well, I have worked with organisations here that originated from the communist party (in a Western country without a "complicated" history with communism) and they just don't discriminate at all. Not even against people who might be "not poor enough" to actually need them. It seems to me quite better indeed than Christians denying help to trans or gay persons.
I'm not going to distinguish between the folks that "follow christ" and who does not - many are going to claim it and I'm not really willing to engage some of these folks to see if they are "true" or not. Living in the US, there wasn't a big outcry against folks discriminating. You were told to just be normal. Don't be gay. (I'm bisexual). In the 90s and before, a lot of folks used it to justify outright racism. And there isn't enough outcry now or then.
Granted, this isn't just Christianity. But I'm not going to give Christianity a break because they aren't special when folks are glossing over the harms.
I appreciate that I'm in danger of doing a "No True Scotsman" fallacy here, but my original point stands. This is evidence of a lack of the core precept of Christianity.
As I said, "At least it isn't true across the board".
It is very obvious that folks aren't unconditionally offering help to those in need, using the banner of Christianity to justify it. And to justify homophobia, racism, misogyny, and a slew of other things.
And what I've seen very little of is other folks speaking out. I see folks protesting comprehensive sex ed and birth control, while these shelters (and others) get no pushback.
Do better if you want views like this to change. Be loud and help folks.
Bit presumptuous.
The original point was about a desire for drug users to "atone" for their behaviour in order to get help. It's utterly unchristian, literally flies in the face of the core Christian value.
There are a bunch of noisy people in the southern states of the US who don't understand why the Old Testament is included in the Bible. It's a huge problem, and it's showing up in this conversation.
Often that tenet is being absolutely debased by making it “love your neighbor, except if he is gay, trans, woke, liberal, communist, black, fill in the blank”
Jesus himself proclaimed “love god and love your neighbor” to be the core and heart of his teaching, yet instead you have people fighting over the stupidest things in the bible just to be “right”, creating tons of denominations that make no sense at all.
If Jesus values are just, they should be universal values. And his core teaching does echo tenets of reciprocation.
Isn't that what we want? People laying our their reasoning and their ideology on paper, and leaving a parent group whose actions they can't condone? This is the calling them out. Compare and contrast to ideologies and areas where people who published these opinions would be killed for their heresy.
No doubt many/most of the sects are stupider than what they broke away from, but sometimes, critically, they are vastly superior. I'm not religious but for example I can recognize the value of Martin Luther's reformation.
So arguing from the second perspective the problem with the breakaway reformations we have seen is that they often tend to deal with the “true scotsman” fallacy, where they double down on rules and regulations in the bible just to be worthy and a “true” Christian, sometimes coupled with a “holier than thou” attitude. (Obviously generalizing centuries of history here)
Instead of the movement to a more universal “love thy neighbor” seems a more fitting approach, if it’s truly universal as Christianity claims.
It feels that's exactly what you did though. Pick a favored feature and declare that people not doing it predominantly that way are wrong.
> if it’s truly universal as Christianity claims.
Even if they believe that you should love the sinner I don't see where their traditions say they should lay down and let themselves be victimized because they can't regulate people they "love".
> “true” Christian, sometimes coupled with a “holier than thou” attitude. (Obviously generalizing centuries of history here)
Those centuries of history led to here, where in a country founded largely by Christians on Christian principles, you're allowed to say you don't think any of them are doing right. And you and I - total heathens, receive no threats, no hate.
“Love thy neighbor” is not just a favored feature, it’s the pivotal commandment that Jesus himself stressed after being asked “ One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
As how we should execute that command is a different discussion I feel, and what kind of societal impact it would have. So my core argument is that this commandment hasn’t always received the proper adherence (imo)
But all of them fall pretty damn hard when meeting reality of (heavily) flawed humans, who ride most of their lives much more on emotions rather than being rational. So we have folks like Mother Theresa refusing help to people with leprosis because suffering is good and brings you closer to christian God (kind of pointless for hindus), or due to refusing to convert to christianity. How can such a person be celebrated is beyond my understanding, even ignoring those millions of dollars that disappeared under her management, that is kind of tradition in nonprofits.
I've seen personally horrible treatment by self-entitled people very deep in christianity, considering all others unworthy beings and treating them as such. Those tend to behave in very subpar manners while shroudinging themselves in righteousness that goes against the core principles of any religion, and rather stand as an insult to it.
Or to put it in a different way, if existence would end according to christianity heaven would be pretty empty place, most people are failing 10 commandements pretty hard (since sins are sins and they stand through the times, no priest has any actual right or ability to manage those, so plenty of rituals are utterly pointless if you think about them a bit).
Religions are weird, simple great core ideas consistently twisted into obscure made up rules and absolutely pointless power structures. Always go against personal responsibility, critical thinking, and are hopelessly beyond modern morals. Maybe enough for simpler minds but mental gymnastics that smart people have to constantly do to stay true believers while accepting modern science understanding is quite a burden, and most fail there
Honest translation: they told a man that there was plenty of space for men in the men's shelter, but that they could not enter the women's shelter.
And why would that be?
https://reduxx.info/trans-serial-killer-who-targeted-women-w...
https://www.womenarehuman.com/male-transgender-boasts-of-har...
https://www.womenarehuman.com/male-trans-pedophilia-rape-his...
> passing laws to ban trans folks
Name one. One single such law. The proposed laws are to return to enforcing sex-based policies. Males weren't welcome in female washrooms, sports, shelters, or prisons before but were forced in by the intentional conflation of identity with physicality.
If you mean bills enforcing no drugging or surgery of minors, well we're being assured that doesn't happen so the laws obviously don't matter.
> and take rights away from queer people in general
Again, name one. What right?
There's a lot of conflation going on, claiming parents want to ban drag shows when they want to ban all sexual shows - burlesque as well - in public places where children might go. Nobody is coming for the drag queens, etc.
But, thank you for being clear that you're talking about TQ+ laws and rights, instead of tying them to LGB sex-based rights as if the rainbow is monolithic in politics. Lesbians face street violence for saying that lesbianism is female and demanding the right to male-free spaces.
Wasn't much of a "sacrifice" though was it?
Like, he arose a few days later,so effectively his "sacrifice" was a weekend or so.
/s
I can't imagine crucifixion feels good, but this "sacrifice" pales in comparison to what the parents of CMH recipients endure; let alone what the recipients themselves did to save their friends.
They knew they risked death and torture with no foreknowledge they would be worshipped by billions for all eternity.
While I'm sure you could point out this is true for other beliefs, they aren't being followed by virtually everyone in government where this is happening.
Judaism (as a religion) is largely unconcerned with the behaviour of non-Jewish people. The "gentiles" are not expected in any way to follow the laws of the old testament, and also don't benefit from doing so in any way
There’s people creating drugs that turn people into zombies. And there’s people taking drugs where they don’t even know what’s in the drugs. And in your upside down moral worldview, the problem is caused by some third person who has a problem with this state of affairs.
Because there is no safe, above-ground supply chain for those drugs with actual quality control and penalties for contaminated supply.
> there’s people taking drugs where they don’t even know what’s in the drugs
It's not like those addicts have a choice of walking into a pharmacy and being able to buy a safe drug manufactured by a reputable pharma company with a datasheet of exactly what's in it.
Both of these problems are caused by the stupid "war on drugs".
Singapore doesn’t seem to have a huge drug problem, and they went all in on what you call “the war on drugs”. So maybe there is a winning strategy there, at least for Singapore?
1) there will always be demand for drugs, thus fulfiling that demand legally will reduce the harm caused by low-quality/tainted drugs, the side-effects of the underground drug trade (violence, weapons smuggling and gangs branching out into other crime) and can be offset by taxation (as long as the total price including tax is still lower than what the black market offers).
2) existing users who are addicted can't just quit cold-turkey, they will need a certain dose of the original drug or an adequate medical substitute for a period of time - that dose can be lowered over time as part of a recovery/rehab program but cutting those users off forcibly will hurt them physically and force them to seek out black-market sources.
Even without that, the process for getting clean is not easy. You can't walk into a hospital with withdrawals and expect to be admitted -- unless it is alcohol or benzos they won't do anything at all for you.
We should as a society stop saying 'they chose their fate' and instead give them options for a softer landing when they decide that they had enough.
That's not my interpretation of it, which is that "that shouldn't be right" refers to an unexpected outcome given the assumptions, rather than some sort of sense of justice being violated.
You're absolutely 100% right about this. This should be the first part of any treatment, to make it easier to separate the druggie from the drug camp and then come off, if possible, at a reasonable time as decided on by them and their team. This is one of the cores of the Portuguese system, to use some drugs to wean people off the dangerous ones.
> This could all be 'fixed' if people didn't have a subconscious need to make people 'pay' for doing things they feel are wrong.
I know some people like this, but I see more people saying this in that we shouldn't forgive the violent and non-drug related crimes people committed while resisting being removed from the streets. They don't want them not treated, but they want them jailed instead of released once they're clean. It's hard to argue - I've personally helped two old female shopkeepers chase thieves out of their store. Threatening and obviously disrespectful and non-needs related thieves too, not someone simply trying to take a bottle of water and food.
The social net / missing social network is.
Our society struggles to take care of its own people because we live in a mentally restraint.
Even in Germany were you have a right for a basic living like a flat and heat and foot and electricity we have homeless.
And no we don't spend the money a flat and everything would cost us into alternative 'equivilent' like enough street worker / social help for them.
People with good choices and support primarily choose non self harming activities.
Everyone else should get proper professional care.
The knife/gun/club-wielding crook is not the problem?
> The social net / missing social network is
The lack of critical care after being stabbed/shot/clubbed is?
Of course drugs like these are a problem when their use turns people into oozing zombies. While they would still have other problems if they'd been using less damaging drugs at least they'd be able to keep their body parts and have a chance of recovery if they'd ever get over their addictions.
> Everyone else should get proper professional care.
Define "professional" in this context. Some people just don't want to be helped, they just want to zonk out on some substance and be done with. In that case "professional" would mean "providing substances which do not turn users into oozing zombies" since these people are not helped with Methadone or similar opioid-agonists.
In Germany you need to look away your gun and need to have it in a locked case for traveling (even in a car as a hunter).
And for the school shootings: less bullying more social support.
It's not magic, it's not the guns and other weapons.
The solution to all is education and social support.
Let people take part in our society.
That’s not true. People in the west have so many more choices than people in my dad’s village in Bangladesh. But it’s people in the west who are destroying themselves with drug and other vices.
Additionally, just from a cursory google, it looks like addiction is also on an alarming rise in Bangladesh, especially in the youth. I don’t see evidence addiction is isolated to “the West”.
Addiction is rising in Bangladesh—but as it’s getting richer and more westernized. But even then, to put it into context, the drug overdose rate in the US is 20 times higher adjusted for population.
The drug is the problem, and so are the suppliers -- they are killing people. Addicts and people who need psychiatric care are harming themselves. If the criminal suppliers were supplying contraband woolen socks instead, there might only be a trade dispute and a loss of retail tax income.
That said, users of harmful drugs fall into two sacrifice zones: SZ1) the purveyors of the harmful drugs don't care much if you die, and SZ2) the rest of society doesn't care if you die, but doesn't want you dying in a business district.
Government is willing to be in some "dealing" businesses, such as tobacco and alcohol, because by far most users of these substances can keep working and paying taxes. The economic advantage of government involvement is clear.
There is only so much that the levels of government will invest to reduce (palliate) the suffering of users of harmful drugs. Local government is directly motivated to not have its community (revenue base) supplanted by drug zones. Citizens don't want that either. So the minimal mitigation is what you would expect.
When we say something is a social problem, we often mean that we wish humans were kinder to humans.
>The economic advantage of government involvement is clear.
Does this also include the prison-industrial complex?
Drugs? They’re widely despised of and I don’t think I have ever _seen_ a person who did drugs in my entire life. I’m middle class btw. Note that less religious cities have higher numbers of alcohol and drug consumption, like Izmir or Mersin.
It’s honestly sad to see entire societies of 330M people devastated by such simple substances and unable to defeat them. Alhamdulillah for Islam.
> “Islam and Islamic culture have successfully maintained virtually alcohol-free societies for centuries and this was done without a kind of stiff-armed, crackdown prohibition as was attempted in US history, which itself arguably caused more harm than good.”
It’s more of a head space where you don’t care whether or not you are alive tomorrow, and I definitely shouldn’t be doing this, but that’s a problem for tomorrow.
If there’s even a brief moment of contemplation it is no match for the physical withdrawal that takes over from your rational mind, like a totally different person carjacking your your body at gunpoint with a sensible plan to save the day. The negotiation lasts less than one second.
Frustration, bewilderment, terror, despair, oblivion, repeat.
Recovery is not easy. It’s obviously a lot more complicated than “don’t do that, dummy!”, considering that message combined with gangrene loses the argument with the carjacker nine times out of ten.
Edit: sober for 9 years (one day at a time).
They're not suicidal. Addiction is a pathological state. I've been an addict, with some long periods of sobriety and/or healthy moderation, since my late teens and I'm in my 40s now. Opioids is what got me started but it doesn't matter the substance. They change. At the moment I'm trying really hard to get clean from a serious cocaine and ketamine addiction.
I'm also a successful business owner and CEO, I'm Very High Net Worth, I have a loving partner and a loving family. I had no significant traumas growing up. I have access to the highest level of care possible. Between my psychiatrist and my addiction specialist and all the various coaches and providers I spend hours a week working on this problem.
And yet I cannot stop taking drugs. I cannot stop by will alone. Having been through the ups and downs so many times I know I have to attack this problem from like 20 different angles 20 different times before I'll stop. I've been through this so many times now.
I went to rehab a year ago and then I maintained sobriety for a few weeks until the unexpected death of someone very close to me triggered me to relapse. Life stressors tend to be triggers. That's why I say I've been an addict for 20 something years. Even though I was clean many of those years, it's just an illness in remission. The struggle never ends it just waxes and wanes.
Now I'm trying to make arrangements in my affairs so I can go away to rehab again.
My point was, I'm not suicidal. I'm terrified of death. I'm not even depressed. I love the life that I've built. Yet I continue to use, compulsively, drugs that are causing me physical health problems and that have a high risk of ultimately killing me.
Addiction is a pathological state. Full genetic sequencing recently told me I have a D2 receptor subtype that is associated with a higher risk for addiction. Confirmed what I already knew.
It's a compulsion. It feels like a tic. There's a button in my brain that needs to be pressed, an itch that needs to be scratched, and only taking certain substances will do it.
I'm all for the decriminalization of drugs. No one should be incarcerated for this. It's reprehensible that our society does that. But full legalization of all substances? That's a position born of ignorance. These substances are not evil but they are biologically dangerous. Any chemicals that directly activate the reward pathways in the brain are inherently dangerous. Addicts are created they are not born. You shouldn't be able to buy heroin from the heroin store anymore than you should be able to buy sarin gas from the sarin gas store.
I've read all the articles about tranq. My heart aches for these addicts. My heart aches for all the friends I've lost to addiction. Welcome to Coming of Age in the Opioid Epidemic.
https://www.aad.org/dw/dw-insights-and-inquiries/archive/202...
> “The tranq dope literally eats your flesh,” she said. “It’s self-destruction at its finest.”
> She unrolled a bandage from elbow to palm. Beneath patches of blackened tissue, exposed white tendons and pus, the sheared flesh was hot and red. To stave off xylazine’s excruciating withdrawal, she said, she injects tranq dope several times a day. Fearful that injecting in a fresh site could create a new wound, she reluctantly shoots into her festering forearm.
> The only person who would let her use a cellphone was a guy whose arm and leg had been amputated because of his tranq wounds. He was still injecting into his leg stump.
If a drug that literally turns you into a melting, oozing zombie with flesh dripping off your bones doesn't make you find a different drug - not even quit, I mean, find a different drug to get fucked up on - I think that person is suicidal. This is some morbid shit right here.