safe injection clinics

[Lulujayne]

That's a fair point Halo, the one in Sydney is only a few streets away from the city centre.

Also, what is it with art students and syringes?

[Boring 7]

Xero, Halo, play nice please.

First, a tangent. Drugs are bad. There are times when drugs are the ail what cures you but that doesn't make them "good" it just makes them a "necessary bad." Legalizing everything would reduce some crimes, increase others, but are another discussion entirely.

NOW THEN, moving on for a moment. Needle exchanges...Huh?

Such an item would reduce the risk of disease transmission and other such pestilences, yes, but how would it reduce crime?

I get that people would not have to *steal* needles but I was under the (perhaps mistaken) impression that the "black-market needle trade" was not really an issue, or existant. Assuming (as I am) that needles can be obtained without black market sales, this would have no effect.

I find it doubtful that it would stop "turf wars" because such "turf wars" are not over where you can get high but where you can do your illegal business (big reason) and what territory is "yours" (dogs peeing to mark territory style). Now maybe your opium den or getting high party club thing is a part of the "marking territory" but it is still rather vague.

Now assuming such a place feels "safe" to individuals and they can do their drugs, this might have a slight decrease on the effect of crime. People who are not paranoid about getting attacked or arrested (or getting AIDS) are less likely to be paranoid, frightened, desperate, fatalistic, and criminalistic. This would be counteracted many times over however, by the nature of people being able to rub the two thoughts of "I want drugs" and "people at needle places have drugs, ready to be stolen by me."

Finally, a junkie who needs and cannot get a needle is most likely a junkie who cannot do a lot of things, like be a productive member of society or NOT be a criminal. This statement assumes needles are legal to buy in the country in question, of course, but even if the market must be black to carry them, usually if you cannot get a supply of needles with your supply of smack you are likely not the kind of person who can get by without committing crimes anymore. Drug addicts who can still get by without crime are the kind with a steady supply and/or an addiction that is "under control."

Someone "worthy" of police time wouldn't be anywhere near an injection room.

Cops need to find a tangle, they start with the loose strings. Not to mention a dealer might find business to scare up right there near the door.

Edit: I forgot the summary.

To summarize: No, I do not think they would reduce crime. Would they be a good, bad or necessary evil? Dunno. They would undoubtedly reduce disease and death but the argument "Why spend public money prolonging the life of someone who wishes to destroy themselves instead of on someone who wishes to live?" is not completely without merit. Such questions and thoughts are ultimately ethical and emotional concerns, with whys and wherefores and prithees and feelings that I try to stay the fuck away from because such questions are hard and I am a lazy coward who runs from such difficult things.

[Halo299]

Xero, Halo, play nice please.

First, a tangent. Drugs are bad. There are times when drugs are the ail what cures you but that doesn't make them "good" it just makes them a "necessary bad." Legalizing everything would reduce some crimes, increase others, but are another discussion entirely.

NOW THEN, moving on for a moment. Needle exchanges...Huh?

Such an item would reduce the risk of disease transmission and other such pestilences, yes, but how would it reduce crime?

I get that people would not have to *steal* needles but I was under the (perhaps mistaken) impression that the "black-market needle trade" was not really an issue, or existant. Assuming (as I am) that needles can be obtained without black market sales, this would have no effect.

I find it doubtful that it would stop "turf wars" because such "turf wars" are not over where you can get high but where you can do your illegal business (big reason) and what territory is "yours" (dogs peeing to mark territory style). Now maybe your opium den or getting high party club thing is a part of the "marking territory" but it is still rather vague.

Now assuming such a place feels "safe" to individuals and they can do their drugs, this might have a slight decrease on the effect of crime. People who are not paranoid about getting attacked or arrested (or getting AIDS) are less likely to be paranoid, frightened, desperate, fatalistic, and criminalistic. This would be counteracted many times over however, by the nature of people being able to rub the two thoughts of "I want drugs" and "people at needle places have drugs, ready to be stolen by me."

Finally, a junkie who needs and cannot get a needle is most likely a junkie who cannot do a lot of things, like be a productive member of society or NOT be a criminal. This statement assumes needles are legal to buy in the country in question, of course, but even if the market must be black to carry them, usually if you cannot get a supply of needles with your supply of smack you are likely not the kind of person who can get by without committing crimes anymore. Drug addicts who can still get by without crime are the kind with a steady supply and/or an addiction that is "under control."

Someone "worthy" of police time wouldn't be anywhere near an injection room.

Cops need to find a tangle, they start with the loose strings. Not to mention a dealer might find business to scare up right there near the door.

yeah, what he said.

i can see it stopping HIV and stuff among drug users. But i can't conceive of a logical reason why it would reduce crime.

which was my original issue with this poll.

health of drug addicts= not my problem, don't care.
crime caused by drug addicts= might be my problem, care a whole lot.

-halo

[Xero]

Xero, Halo, play nice please.

sorry I just can't stand people that only listen to an argument with no intention of actually using this information and just throw up their preconceived notions back again

its like trying to play chess with someone that thinks its checkers

also
people caught selling drugs at the injection clinic, are not allowed back, some are arrested if they don't leave nicely

its a SAFE place, if you go and arrest everyone that shows up like an idiot, not only is that entrapment, but it means it won't be used at all


but then again some people don't think about their arguments

[Lulujayne]

Cops need to find a tangle, they start with the loose strings. Not to mention a dealer might find business to scare up right there near the door.

I see where you are coming from with the yarn analogy, but from my personal experience I disagree.

Also, I can't imagine any dealer who actually makes a decent living by it wanting clients who are the ones who benefit the most from injection rooms. On the whole these are people who fulfill the junkie stereotype. They are not good business. They never have enough money and they are more likely to get you busted via their irrational and unsafe behaviour.

[Lulujayne]

Posting twice because I'm sure someone will post before I finish this

the argument "Why spend public money prolonging the life of someone who wishes to destroy themselves instead of on someone who wishes to live?" is not completely without merit.

Fair enough, I can definitely see that side of the argument, but I would counter by saying that it is not just the addicted individual who is harmed. If anything the saddest part of addiction is how it effects those around the individual, their families, their loved ones etc. These people are not to blame for the individuals behaviour, but they can sure as hell be destroyed by it. Do they not deserve help?

[Halo299]

Fair enough, I can definitely see that side of the argument, but I would counter by saying that it is not just the addicted individual who is harmed. If anything the saddest part of addiction is how it effects those around the individual, their families, their loved ones etc. These people are not to blame for the individuals behaviour, but they can sure as hell be destroyed by it. Do they not deserve help?

while i agree with you on that i think that if you were going to spend public money it should be used to help the people who have been affected by drug users (family and friends and stuff) and raising public awareness about drugs and what a shitty way to go they are. I would be 100% more willing to see my taxes paying to counseling of drug user's families and EFFECTIVE public education that i would be to see it spent to buy needles for junkies.

from what i am hearing, it seems like these places would cause more problems they would fix and send a mixed message to the public about what is acceptable and what isn't.

-halo

[Nithos]

... send a mixed message to the public about what is acceptable and what isn't.

I don't have a real point to make on this one, but it's an odd thought, the government deciding what is and isn't acceptable. Rather authoritarian.

It's going to matter a lot what size of community you're in. A small community isn't going to sustain a full scale underground economy any better than it can sustain it's own economy in the broader sense.

I would expect a needle exchange to have a net benefit to the individuals and the community, the crime reduction part I'm not as sure about, but I'd expect some improvement. A bit of prevention is far more efficient than dealing with consequences after the fact. In that kind of situation, a lot of criminal and dangerous behavior stems from desperation, or having little to lose, and a sick junkie is more desperate and has less to lose, and thus more dangerous than a healthy one. You have the junkies coming through a safe place where you can point them to other services to get them out of the cycle of destitution, and maybe get them off the list of the desperate and dangerous. A junkie that doesn't have a safe, neutral place to shoot up might have to turn to their suppliers for that as well, tying them more closely to the turf war scene in conjunction with their habit.

I think the bigger benefits are unrelated to crime, though, or more tenuously. Cutting the risk of disease helps more than just the junkies, as we are talking communicable diseases. Every extra day of health and life is another chance for them to turn their lives around, or at least minimize their damage. Even in the US system, everyone has access to emergency care, so sick junkies take up time and resources that could be better spent if something as simple as a clean needle had been available.

Their isn't a government on earth that i know of that is willing to take the steps I would be willing to take to end the problem of drugs in society.

Thank FSM.

[Halo299]

I don't have a real point to make on this one, but it's an odd thought, the government deciding what is and isn't acceptable. Rather authoritarian.

to a degree all governments tell people what is and what isn't acceptable. My gov tells me that driving above 70 MPH on the freeway is unacceptably,
and so is killing a random stranger. Right now we are trying to pass a law that would turn animal cruelty into a felony. Why? to send a message that such behavior it unacceptable.

A bit of prevention is far more efficient than dealing with consequences after the fact.

while this is true, i don't think that a needle trading post does ether. it isn't preventing the drug problem nor is it dealing with the consequences. rather it is just a band aid that addresses a few of the problems associated with drug use, but leaves the others ambiguous. To me it sounds like a compromise where no compromise should be made.

Every extra day of health and life is another chance for them to turn their lives around, or at least minimize their damage.

it is also another day for them to commit a crime or get someone else hooked.

Even in the US system, everyone has access to emergency care, so sick junkies take up time and resources that could be better spent if something as simple as a clean needle had been available.

we could always just deny junkies emergency care. that would save money on both ends. that might even reduce the overall cost of health care to others, since recourses won't have been wasted on junkies that can't pay anyway. and i am all for lowing the cost of health care.

Their isn't a government on earth that i know of that is willing to take the steps I would be willing to take to end the problem of drugs in society.

Thank FSM.

if you want to make an omelet, you have to be willing to break the eggs.

-halo

[Vedius Pollio]

Brilliant rebuttal Xero.


Anyways.

So how do you prevent the cops from just nabbing people as they enter or leave these places? or...how do you convince the people that they cops won't just nab them as they enter or leave?

I can see how this would be a perceived problem, but at the risk of sounding callous, I think police would be more interested in the people selling drugs rather than the "bottom of the barrel" addicts who actually benefit from such an establishment. I know that more people are arrested for using than actually selling, but in general that's when the user is being loud and/or obvious. Someone "worthy" of police time wouldn't be anywhere near an injection room.

EDIT: Vedius Pullo, that pharmacist sounds like a dick. Incidentally, if memory serves, needles are distributed free of charge at places like The Langton Clinic.

He was a dick. Another time, I went to his pharmacy to ask if he could witness for my voter registration form. He went and said: "This is a statutory declaration. I cannot sign this."

It wasn't a statutory declaration, but try explaining it to a paranoid schizo who thinks everyone is a criminal trying to hoodwink him.

[MistressMaggie]

A bit of prevention is far more efficient than dealing with consequences after the fact.

while this is true, i don't think that a needle trading post does ether. it isn't preventing the drug problem nor is it dealing with the consequences. rather it is just a band aid that addresses a few of the problems associated with drug use, but leaves the others ambiguous. To me it sounds like a compromise where no compromise should be made.

...the needle trading post isn't INTENDED to prevent the drug problem. it's intended to prevent the sharing needles causing HIV problem.

and your feelings towards drug addicts getting HIV disturbs me. How can you not be against more people having a COMMUNICABLE DISEASE? Haven't you ever seen that chart that they show in sex ed classes where it shows that if you have sex with someone, it's like having sex with everyone they've slept with and everyone those people have slept with and so on and so forth, because if one of those people had HIV, you're fucked? Even in the slums and places where people are starving, people still have sex.

of course, the entire topic of this post feels like a bit of a non-sequitur to me... I fail to see how a program designed to combat HIV is related to reducing crime rates. The best I can come up with is that it might reduce the number of drug dens in which various other crimes are committed...

[Lulujayne]

Good point Maggie, it's not like intravenous drug users only have sex with each other.

[Swordsman3003]

Logically, there is one obvious way that safe injection clinics would reduce crime:

Getting the injection there would be legal.

Currently, injecting yourself with drugs in nearly all parts of the United States will get you a rather long jail sentence.

So, the answer to the poll question would have to logically be that it reduces crime, because the only way to have a safe injection clinic would be to decriminalize the drug use.

It's kind of a backhanded way to answer the question, but it makes sense, yes? If you make something legal, you have "reduced" crime.






Xero, I don't quite understand why you reject Halo's assertion that drugs are "bad" for you.

The alternatives to that statement would be that drugs are "good" for you, that drugs are "neutral" or that drugs do good and bad things to you that cancel out somehow.

I don't really see how drugs are good for you, how any benefits you get from them outweigh the harms, or how they are "neutral" to your body.

While it is true that there are many double standards when it comes to illegal substances, I think it's entirely fair to call alchohol toxic, or cocaine a harmful chemical.


Xero, your defense was the most retarded bullshit I have ever read in my life. "Halo has been hypnotized by American propaganda."

Wow.

Even if that would entirely, 100% true, that response will never dissuade anybody of his position. Telling somebody that they are ignorant - and then not explaining what information they are lacking - is a waste of time.


Halo seems fairly informed about the benefits and costs of drug use, and so am I. Calling people who disagree with you ignorant or propagandized makes you position seem ever the more UNappealing, because it seems that your best argument is some quasi-personal attack.

[Swordsman3003]

Also, I'm prepared to do anything that will combat the spread of AIDS - and I think safe whatever clinic things are just another way to fight HIV.

[MistressMaggie]

Logically, there is one obvious way that safe injection clinics would reduce crime:

Getting the injection there would be legal.

Currently, injecting yourself with drugs in nearly all parts of the United States will get you a rather long jail sentence.

So, the answer to the poll question would have to logically be that it reduces crime, because the only way to have a safe injection clinic would be to decriminalize the drug use.

It's kind of a backhanded way to answer the question, but it makes sense, yes? If you make something legal, you have "reduced" crime.

But it isn't "legal" to inject yourself there, it is tolerated in the interests of public health.

[Halo299]

But it isn't "legal" to inject yourself there, it is tolerated in the interests of public health.

tolerance = bad.

this goes back to that mixed message thing i was talking about. The gov in question needs to be spending its money actually fighting the drug problem and doing what ever is needed to get rid of drugs and punish the people involved with them.

not making compromises where no compromises should ever be made.

public health is one thing. But dieing of aids seems like a suitable way for a junkie to go IMHO, and it seems a fitting end for people who got aids or whatever sickness from sleeping with said junkie. The lesson; don't sleep with junkies. In fact it would probably be best not to associate with them at all.

i'll not get into the drugs aren't bad argument because it is simply not worth my time. The facts of the mater speak for themselves, for anyone who cares to look at the reality of the situation. But drug users have never been one to be that into reality that didn't service their addictions.

-halo

[Foolosophy]

But it isn't "legal" to inject yourself there, it is tolerated in the interests of public health.

tolerance = bad.

We had this kinda approach over here for a while ... didn't really work out, you know?






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godwin's blah I know ...but then again this is an internet discussion...

[Halo299]

But it isn't "legal" to inject yourself there, it is tolerated in the interests of public health.

tolerance = bad.

We had this kinda approach over here for a while ... didn't really work out, you know?






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godwin's blah I know ...but then again this is an internet discussion...

yeah, to make matters worse, this is turning into a discussion that we've already had on here before.

but tolerance just pisses me off. not all ideas are equal, not all choices are good, and their comes a time when some one has to put their foot down and say so.

i am all for community education and public awareness and governments actually taking care of the health of the population (opposed to the way things are done here). And i have nothing but respect for addicts that manage to clean themselves up and become predictive and useful members of society. I wish that their was better treatment available for people who want to get themselves back together.

but, i am not for any kind of compromise that leads people to think that their drug use is ok and accepted. Unless they are actively trying to overcome their problem then, i can't even bring myself to pity them.

-halo

[ManaUser]

The gov in question needs to be spending its money actually fighting the drug problem and doing what ever is needed to get rid of drugs and punish the people involved with them.

That's a great idea. It's amazing no one has thought of that approach before. I think you might be on to something. Now if could just give it a catchy name, something like the war upon drugs؟

...

Nice avatar, does it have anything to do with me using the symbol recently?

[Xero]

The gov in question needs to be spending its money actually fighting the drug problem and doing what ever is needed to get rid of drugs and punish the people involved with them.

That's a great idea. It's amazing no one has thought of that approach before. I think you might be on to something. Now if could just give it a catchy name, something like the war upon drugs؟

...

Nice avatar, does it have anything to do with me using the simple recently?

its not a war on drugs its a war on personal freedoms
/song reference