The sooner people accept that addiction, like violence, will probably just never disappear completely, the better off they'll be. We're looking at a policy of harm reduction, not the fantasy that we can cure addiction. Some people will always be on the outliers. The question is, do we criminalize their behavior and add an entire criminal subculture or do we accept it in order to reduce the overall harm to society and the addict?

The "making people dependent on the state" argument is also the standard conservative critique of things like unemployment benefit, so it's an argument that an awful lot of people seem to agree with. I expect that is why the author reaches for it so easily (I'm not necessarily saying that the author is a conservative, just that it's a popular way of thinking about these types of issues, hence why the author offers it as 'balance').

Which, in this case, exists in opposition to different kinds (or degrees) of "making people dependent on the state".

Namely, the forced-dependence of the imprisoned.

Hear, hear. It doesn't just improve the lives of drug addicts, it reduces crime (and not just the crime of possessing/consuming/selling drugs)and improves public health. I won't go so far as to say legalizing drugs is a Good Thing, but it's certainly the Least Bad Option.

Now, I believe that full legalization will reduce or eliminate the harm to society caused by junkies, but that should be the talking point that is hammered on. Not "jailing junkies doesn't cure them".

I should add that I am in favor of full legalization of all substances (including the elimination of the requirement for a prescription to obtain pharmaceutical drugs), but I do not pretend that this will reduce the harms which inhere to drug users, or the rest of the citizenry.

Destruction of property value is huge as well. Think about how much your home (or apartment building) is worth today. Now think about how much it would be worth if the neighborhood or apartment building were occupied by large numbers of junkies. Nobody wants to live next to a meth lab.

Copper theft, at least in England, tends not to be addicts because it doesn't fit the lifestyle.

I see your point...

Not criminal does not mean legal.

So, who the fuck cares? People who want to know if Action X advances Goal Y or Goal Z, both, or neither. Like me, for instance. I want to make the lives of people better, but I also want to be able to connect cause and effect in a way that makes it possible to predict the effects of policies.

"...or does it transform them into more docile drug addicts, wards of an indulgent state..."

My point is that this question is nearly pointless to ask. If someone lives their whole life addicted to drugs and leads a productive full life, what does it matter, other than the bad taste that seems to leave in some peoples' mouths.

In either case, it's important to know what effect the programs have actually had. Without that, it's impossible to assess programs. A program you cannot assess is one you cannot improve or learn from.

It also matters because costs must be balanced against benefits in making decisions. Thus is the bloody calculus of government.

Asking this question in this context seems to me not an exercise in good science but an attempt to score a point for opposition based on people's generally icky feelings about addiction.

I don't care if the questions come from the purest of motives or someone's generally icky feelings. I want answers, and provided they're accurate, then I can make up my own mind. I do not accept this ideological filtering.

If I'm writing a piece about the merits of almonds upon your diet and my findings are that almonds are good for you in every way but at the outset of my article pose the question, can we really continue to consume a substance from which deadly cyanide can be derived?

Then my intent is clearly a rhetorical flourish to lend a false counterpoint to my narrative. The science establishing almonds as safe to eat is so overwhelming that raising this false doubt, even temporarily in the minds of my readers is irresponsible.

If you genuinely wish to know the objective factors that contribute to addiction, I'm all for it. Shit, I'll pay taxes to help you get that information because I agree it's important. But if you wish to use worn out cliches in order to make your writing seem more even handed and thus bolster the arguments of those not interested in objective knowledge but interested in advancing their own morals via public policy then I will call you out.

By raising the possibility that the reflexively conservative might be correct, a compelling case is made to all that research is in order.

And that is the fulcrum on which the debate balances. People who believe it is the state's job to "take care of its people" will criminalize drugs, alchohol, and homelessness, applying the power of the state to "fix" those things. For people who believe the state's responsibility ends where the actions of its citizens doesn't infringe the rights/health/safety of others, will legalize drug use, assisted suicide, unlimited "camping", and liquor stores.

Once you get into that argument, one will say a drug addict doesn't "choose" to be addicted, they are just sick. And if they were sick with Cholera would you object to us arresting people who dumped raw sewage into the street? Why object to us arresting people who prey upon these sick people?

The challenge is of course that there isn't a truly "good" solution yet. Once we can "cure" addiction do we then spin off recreational drug use?