A Discussion: Needle Exchanges

[Speaker to Animals]

When the Church still was in charge of some of these things in Europe, they took in a batshit crazy painter and cared for him, provided him with canvases, paint, etc., and he went on to paint works like the Starry Night. He discharged himself and later placed himself in the care of a homeopathic quack, and subsequently shot himself to death.

That asylum in those days, I am sure, was horrific to our contemporary sensitivities, but it was infinitely better than the alternative, which cost humanity God knows how many beautiful works of art. Further, there is no reason these places have to be prison-like or depressing at all.

Give me a living Van Goph in a humane institution rather than one on the streets, dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Maybe our institutions were once reasonable...
But we in the west have been f*ing up institutions for some time now.
Before we propose institutions as a solutions we best be very, very careful about how those institutions are going to be run.
How are they going to include families rather than alienate them, how are they going to reintegrate those that are institutionalized to their communities rather than keep them languishing out of sight and out of mind...

I happen to be the medical director of an institution for teenagers, many of whom have substance problems and have a front row seat, working against the institutional grain to make sure we make things better rather than worse....
And believe me, for the most part I see many institutions like mine making things worse rather than better... and it's only due to constant effort on my part that I keep my institution from doing so... (to be honest I'm getting tired of the effort and every day dream of giving this up... but I'm not quitting just yet.)

Just proposing institutions is not a solution unless you are prepared to tackle these questions... which very few people bother to do.

I think the focus on vague concepts like "institutions" helps us very little. These things are happening because increasingly more westerners are becoming animalistic and losing all sense of charity for their fellow man. We saw in an earlier post where Kath just wants programs to mitigate the risk of harm to herself due to her own politics. She wants legalized drugs because she rejects morals and made a virtue of license. But that results in heroin addicts shitting disease on the streets and leaving needles scattered everywhere. When asked about what to do with dying heroin addicts, she said she'd rather just let them die on the street.

Now I ask you, what kind of society do you suppose people like that will tend to create? I would suggest that NO SOLUTIONS will solve the problem if most people in a society lack even the slightest bit of charity for their fellow human beings as was shown there. It doesn't matter what you do when the people carrying it out couldn't care less about the lives of others.

[Hastur]

I’m told progressives are huge proponents of “My body, my choice” ... why would you suddenly abandon that platform and tax the citizenry to mitigate the choices these addicts have made with their bodies?

Does the state control our bodies or not? If it does, then we need to start regulating what people put into them and how they are used. If not, then stop taking money to combat choices you don’t agree with.

You sound like like a Swedish politician. We have the most draconian drug policy in the EU and also the most drug related deaths. It’s all about virtue and pragmatism can just forget about it. The only good addict is a dead addict. An overdose under a bridge? Working as intended.

Allowing people to make their own choices - or as Hastur calls it, DRACONIAN.

Addiction is a disease, not a choice.

[DBTrek]

It's a disease?
How is it transmitted?

It's not a choice?
How did the heroin get into their vein?


I had no idea these were blameless innocents that contracted heroin addiction through the spontaneous generation of smack in their veins. This changes everything.

[Kath]

I don't really have any good suggestions. I'm willing to be that prison is more expensive than the needle exchange program. How do you prevent the spread of infectious diseases in the community?

You can put them in prison, sure, but it is the pricier option.

[DBTrek]

If they commit crimes, to prison they go. That’s the deal. At least, that *was* the deal. The new deal seems to be”If DBTrek shoots heroin, he’s a felon, take his kids, impound his car, foreclose on his House, ten years in lockup.”

If a homeless guy shoots heroin its “oh no! Get this guy a clean needle. Find this guy a house.”

Why the two separate “justice” systems? Are we not both American men?

Maybe neither of us should be in jail. Maybe we both should be. But what kind of system destroys one man and rewards another for the same crime?

[Hastur]

It's a disease?
How is it transmitted?

It's not a choice?
How did the heroin get into their vein?


I had no idea these were blameless innocents that contracted heroin addiction through the spontaneous generation of smack in their veins. This changes everything.

Read a bit from your founding father.

https://books.google.se/books?id=-6UoAA ... &q&f=false

It’s a pretty established notion by now.

[DBTrek]

It's a disease?
How is it transmitted?

It's not a choice?
How did the heroin get into their vein?


I had no idea these were blameless innocents that contracted heroin addiction through the spontaneous generation of smack in their veins. This changes everything.

Read a bit from your founding father.

https://books.google.se/books?id=-6UoAA ... &q&f=false

It’s a pretty established notion by now.

Not familiar with Founding Father Benjamin Rush, from the 1850s.

Why don’t you just tell me? They really were just two simple questions:
1. How is the disease transmitted?
2. If it isn’t a choice, how do the drugs wind up in their veins?

Hardly calls for the entire reading of a 150 year old book, one would think.

[Kath]

I don't think anyone should ever go to prison for being addicted to something. I don't consider that a crime. If they commit an actual crime while under the influence of their drug of choice, off to the rape cage.

For now, heroin is illegal, so if the option is to send them to prison, so be it. That will place a lot more burden on the budget, though. Bezos may have to cough up a few more dollars per prison inmate.

[DBTrek]

I don't think anyone should ever go to prison for being addicted to something.

I don’t think so either, but I do think there needs to be equal justice under the law. Destroying a middle class citizen while accommodating and enabling a homeless citizen for the same crime is no way to run a justice system.
/shrug

[Hastur]

It's a disease?
How is it transmitted?

It's not a choice?
How did the heroin get into their vein?


I had no idea these were blameless innocents that contracted heroin addiction through the spontaneous generation of smack in their veins. This changes everything.

Read a bit from your founding father.

https://books.google.se/books?id=-6UoAA ... &q&f=false

It’s a pretty established notion by now.

Not familiar with Founding Father Benjamin Rush, from the 1850s.

Why don’t you just tell me? They really were just two simple questions:
1. How is the disease transmitted?
2. If it isn’t a choice, how do the drugs wind up in their veins?

Hardly calls for the entire reading of a 150 year old book, one would think.

Just pointing out that the idea isn’t new. It’s fairly established by now.
https://www.therecoveryvillage.com/reco ... oice/#gref
In the end it’s a matter of semantics. Is it useful to view it as a disease? That is the ultimate test. Most successful treatments work from that foundation. Nothing in this world is easy, though, and dissenting viewpoints exist. It wouldn’t be science otherwise.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog ... ly-disease