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Comment by jrowley | Hacker News Reader

Just the other morning I got off of bart in downtown Oakland, 12th street and there was a guy just laid out, unresponsive right on the steps outside the station. He had smoked something out of a can. I stuck with the guy while the paramedics came, but the most tragic part was that he had a plastic "No Allergies" bracelet on. When the paramedics took off his shirt he still had adhesive on his skin from the EKG straps or what not. So he had gotten out of the hospital and then immediately ODed (presumably again).

I'm not sure what we need to do, but if you haven't encountered the epidemic first hand, it's only a matter of time until you do.

View on HN

I recently re-read the story about the rat park experiment.

http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comic/rat-park/

The gist of it is that yes, rats do get addicted to morphine and prefer it to food, but only if kept in cages.

The rats living in a much less confined space with other rats, allowed to play, nest, have sex and do pretty much all the rat fun things not only did not get addicted to morphine but even waned themselves off of it.

Speaks a lot to the causes which this epidemic is a symptom of and makes me think that addressing it will not be an easy or quick process.

Something I often think about is whether having a job - the agency to by one's own hand change one's prospects in life, to "provide for one's family" - is our equivalent of this "less confined space." In a post-automation post-scarcity world, despite boundless entertainment and resources (things that would make rats perfectly happy)... would ennui still drive people towards self-destructive behavior? And in fact, would the optimization of that entertainment (see: usedopamine.com ) actually prime people's brains towards addiction, towards whatever form the next opioid epidemic might take? We understand so little about our own minds and how they might respond to the world we are ushering in.

Post scarcity? Where, when, and for who? Our current economic models don't work for that unfortunately.

Edit: I should add there are a couple post scarcity instances in recent history. Establishment of America, and post WW2. These also coincided with the least income inequality. But those periods don't last.

In what ways were the Establishment of America, and post WW2 post scarcity?

US inflation adjusted per capita GDP is higher today than at either of those times. While I do not think GDP is a great metric, I cannot think of any metric where we, as a society, have less "stuff" to go around then before.

It’s not the amount of stuff, it’s the inequality.

Interesting hypothesis. How does it explain the doctor in the article, or the lawyers, entertainers, and other wealthy people who wind up addicted?

It probably doesn’t and the uptick in the deaths of comparatively advantaged groups doesn’t fit the model well. Addiction and distress have well documented links with things like unemployment rates correlating well with ODs and deaths. However despite wealthy people featuring in the article the vast majority of the deaths, ODs and incarcerations aren’t in the group you describe.

https://www.google.co.nz/amp/s/www.theatlantic.com/amp/artic...

Fair enough. Still, I'd suggest that the wealthy group indicate opiates scratch an itch which is probably unrelated to inequality. Even if we drastically reduced inequality, that itch would likely still exist. I'd also find it interesting if there was a comparison of the per capita ratio of wealthy addicts to poor addicts. It seems entirely plausible that a causal, not simply correlative, link exists between unemployment/poverty and 'bad' addictive behaviors, but something is hooking highly functioning, wealthy humans on opioids, too.

On a tangent, while I've never had chronic pain, I've had friends who have, and I know it can destroy anyone's life. I don't want to see the abuse of effective pain meds by some lead to difficulties in obtaining pain relief for those who really need it. Someone in chronic pain has enough to handle without worrying about maintaining access to appropriate medication.

Thanks for that.

One of the traps with pain is the assumption that medication is the answer. It isn’t unfortunately and chronic pain should not be treated with medication alone - at least thats what I took away from discussion with a pain specialist who I happened to be working with on something unrelated. Source required.

Right, but "post-scarcity" is about stuff, no?

If you look at Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the need for meaning / meaningful contribution is extremely important.

I’d say that jobs in the context of survival are useful, but we as human beings also need a sense of accomplishment, of being useful to others beyond the value associated with mere profit.

It's not really a well designed study and it's one that hasn't replicated well.

But people still love bringing it up, especially here on HN where people seem to think they know better than the experts on everything to do with medicine.

Some sources on this? I’d love to read more.

http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/10/25/against-rat-park/ has links, e.g.:

http://sci-hub.io/10.2466/pr0.1996.78.2.391

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2616610

But there are other studies linked that seem to confirm it.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3696469

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18463628

Not sure where that leaves us.

Makes the guy who brought up sources look stupid

Not at all. Seeing what the OP has seen allows a better evaluation. I wish more online groups put more weight on sources.

Says sources discredit his point then provides sources that do neither.

I agree that rat park isn't great.

But there are very different patterns of prescribing of opioids across the US and eg UK.

Why is this?

Reminds me of https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/01/teens-dru...

Opiate ODs are given naloxone in hospital. It's really effective but they feel like shit. If it's still in their system when they leave, and they try to use, they're more likely to double-dose to get the feeling back.

The problem with opiates (esp in the US) is they ones that are available are too strong and completely unforgiving. Fentanyl is an elephant gun but it's supplanting heroin on streets due to its prevalence (through overuse).

You've got to wonder what a regulated generally-available recreational opiate could do for street safety. It's not just about making sure of the purity, we need help people take the right dose of the right things, so they're not just taking however much of whatever is available.

That, and weaning. I'm sure a lot of these people would prefer not to feel like they do. Quitting opiates cold turkey is not easy.

That sounds like a really complicated issue without a clear solution and no benefit to whoever solves it.

By comparison I think it would be easier to make a self driving car or automated robot that does most of what a heroin addict does.

Sounds terrible don’t care I’m out of sympathy for addicts in society.

I think what is becoming clear now is that not all opiate addicts are recreational users. Many are victims of inappropriate prescriptions and lack of follow-up and supervision.

For how long though? Having watched it first hand you can make whatever excuse you want for the first use, bad boyfriend, pharma industry, etc.

My sister has been on heroin for probably 8 years now. She will call and ask for money and if anyone says no she spouts this same bullshit about it's not her fault etc. and she's an addict. We send her to rehab, she runs away, can't even tell you how many times I've seen it.

Her 4 kids are taken away from her she doesn't even attempt to visit them in any capacity.

Look close enough at a heroin addict you'll find a regular shitty person underneath it.

And that stinks. For everybody involved. You can only do your best.

But it sounds like you're writing them all off, writing the problem off, as something that's just unavoidable, untreatable. It can be both avoided and treated, it just doesn't always work.

Why didn't you notice the dirtiness before heroin?

The main point of my post was that them being shitty "because of heroine" is a false premise.

Like I said in my post, it's only a matter of time until you encounter it first hand, especially if you take a short stroll through select neighborhoods in most large cities. Its obvious you've thought about the issue but I urge you to engage with it by witnessing it first hand. Addicts are people too - they deserve compassion from society just as much as you or I do.

My sister is a heroin addict I've encountered enough =)

Also I have lived in Salem, Oregon look up it's statistics.

Just because my heart doesn't bleed for people who wouldn't do shit to help you doesn't mean I don't understand the problem.

Fair enough - sounds like we may irreconcilable ethical differences. Maybe I'll get more exposed to the issue and more jaded over time. Thanks for explaining your perspective.

I got up to get something to eat and the restaurant I wanted to eat at couldn't open because a group of heroin addicts outside sleeping on the steps refused to move until they were given food.

That was about 40 minutes ago.

seems like a power play the restaurant could win by grabbing some taco bell.

This was at 6AM - Taco Bell near it doesn't open until 7AM silly!

The police don't care about that?

The local Walgreens is now closed between the hours of 12AM - 6AM because the police won't respond to any theft calls during this time.

You're going to have to teach that automated robot to rob cars, prostitute, shoplift, neglect children, and beg for money on the streets too, if you want it to be realistic.

Even if you gave up on sympathy for addicts (and I understand, I was in Portland and have been along that hellish amtrak line) - the problem affects all of us, whether we like it or not.

You can actually purchase the naloxone spray and carry it as a regular person. I've been thinking about getting some but I've heard gnarly stories about people reacting pretty intensely/dangerously after receiving the drug (eg attacking the person administering the drug)

Yeah the nasal spray should work within a couple of minutes. But even IM (5 minutes) is going to be pretty brutal.

You imagine going from a numb high... to feeling everything you were blocking out with opiates. Many of these people have legitimate pain. You'd probably not be too happy.

I'd certainly be wary about administering it to a stranger, without their consent and without knowing what their reaction would likely be. It's legally sketchy, especially if the drug is —as it is— not generally available (it's prescription-only in many places). Still, don't let me put you off saving somebody's life from an accidental overdose.

> Many of these people have legitimate pain.

I think you meant "physical pain"

Yep. My uncle died from an OD earlier this year. Drugs cut with fentanyl. It's truly a terrible epidemic.

Sorry to hear. Partaking in heavy drugs to any degree invites those dark unknowns. The number of hands these drugs pass through to reach the end-user is more than a couple. I recall on average it's 8 different turnovers. Each time, likely being cut down. They operate a margin business without concern for where it ends up. It's likely safe to say that a vast majority of drugs are cut these days.

A friend I grew up with just shot himself to death. He was on a TV show, model and had it all going for him..until the night he tried black tar heroin through a needle, off a spoon. An older friend convinced him and four others to try it one night at a wrap party for the TV show. Grew up affluent but drugs immediately nosedived his life. Ended up in and out of jail, losing it mentally, mental institutions, broke every window at his parents house, just living a really rough existence. The part that got me: the older friend who introduced him to it showed up to his funeral.

The other one of the four is on his third strike for heroin, just got his second DUI trying to "live it up" – drugs i.e. heavy drugs, are a game that you do not win.

> Each time, potentially being cut down.

Drug potency follows something like an S-curve. As enforcement increases a drug will get increasingly stepped on, until the purity is low enough that the drug gets replaced with a more potent analog. Consumer Reports wrote about this in their guide to drugs from the 70s.

> Consumer Reports . . . guide to drugs

Whoa. Care to further elaborate?

It’s free online: The Consumer Union guide to licit and illicit substances.

I will check it out today, thank you!

I can see how people move to something like heroin after being on pain meds and getting addicted, but who really just 'tries' heroin? At this point, the mix danger and addiction danger is well known and publicized. I'm asking, because I cannot mentally put it together, particularly if someone has life going in the right direction.

Alcohol is the biggest gateway drug and it's not really close.

As someone posted below on his usage, his misunderstanding was thinking Heroin fell into same category of drugs "ok to try" .. but, it isn't just one trip. It's a shift chemically unless I'm mistaken.

I think it is, but how quickly it occurs seems to depend on the person. I've known people who tried heroin once or a couple of times and never touched it again - one such person once said she stopped when she did because she knew that after another time she wouldn't be able to stop. With others, it's one and done - instant addiction. I don't really have a metric, but the existence of the variation is interesting in its own right.

Terrifying stuff. I've had a run-in with it myself, when someone slipped me a cut pill of molly, in my younger or dancing-at-parties days lo these many years ago; luckily I had friends there who realized something was up and looked out for me, or almost missing a flight the next morning would no doubt have been far from the worst consequence. I've never had the urge to go back to that particular well, but what I remember of the experience makes it easy to understand why someone would; there is that about it which, while under its influence, makes it impossible for the world to touch one in any meaningful way. Of course, when not under its influence, the opposite is true and very emphatically so, which I think is in large part what keeps people going back even when they're as dedicated as they can be to the goal of kicking.

This is just a specific model of how people act you just conjured up in your head. People in many situations try heroin all the time, whether or not it seems coherent.

Chronic pain escalation, sure, but also: kids.

I've come to realize that the concept of gateway drugs is bullshit. Kids are going to try whatever they have available. If heroin suddenly enters the scene, then heroin is what they're going to try. Same thing for meth.

Also, it's a different sort of high. When you want to get drunk, you drink. When you want to feel stupid, you smoke weed. But when you just want to feel like everything is beautiful and nothing is wrong, you try opiates (or amphetamines).

> But when you just want to feel like everything is beautiful and nothing is wrong, you try opiates (or amphetamines).

Interesting, this is exactly what weed is giving me, without any nasty effects and addictions of hard drugs. If in nature, this effect is super strong. I came up with most important decisions in my life when high, and they are still solid and best choices possible, even when looking back after 10 years. Different perspective on situations, in some cases really proactive thinking and resolving issues before they arise and so on...

I guess it really affects us differently. I've seen few people get weird/aggressive on it, but then again I would never want to drink with them either. Something badly broken deep inside, with no real chance of fix, ever.

It's also worth noting that you can smoke heroin, which probably requires a significantly lower mental barrier to cross.

And once you're in the throes of addiction from smoking it, I'm guessing injection seems less and less objectionable.

There are people that do base jumping that are otherwise well adjusted adults. It’s very dangerous and no level of expertise reduces that danger.

Some people are just attracted to the crazy unknown. Many can’t believe they could become addicts because they’ve never been addicted. Others still don’t care because they’re just one step removed from suicide.

>Some people are just attracted to the crazy unknown

Yes. "Find what you love and let it kill you" somebody said. And most people don't feel safe unless they're living fearfully close to the edge of what is possible for them. In the past men worked till they dropped dead in their 40s to keep their families alive through the winter; women had baby after baby until they died or couldn't otherwise cope.

The strange thing is that, absent those harsh historical conditions, people still want the feeling of an edge, an existential risk. So they gamble, they do drugs, etc.

But these aren't good edges to be on. There are many real, urgent problems the world faces that could benefit from obsessive, risk-seeking commitment to the 'crazy unknown'. Addiction-level commitment. It shouldn't have to be to drugs. How do we funnel ourselves towards these problems?

Drug users often take as a group, so if the group has no money to buy their regular drugs that day and one of them has heroin to snort or inject they will do it. That's how most addicts I met while living in a shitty drug filled area got addicted. Heroin is the cheapest street drug here right now too since it's cut with dirt cheap and easy to import fentanyl. For years it wasn't even illegal to export it from China, so anybody could get it direct off sites like Alibaba and try and smuggle it in.

PLEASE READ AND PUSH TO THE TOP!! this is a direct result of the war on drugs. the fentanyl and carfentanil coming from china are responsible. before these two were being imported at such high rates opioid deaths were 4,000 per year vs 400,000 for alcohol. Which at first was being blamed on fentanyl being prescribed legally, but was incorrect data. Check the numbers yourself at wonder cdc. attached is the screenshot form cdc data. https://imgur.com/a/fFBTe

Please don't use uppercase for emphasis, please don't post the same comment more than once, and please don't ask people to upvote, even when the topic is important.

You know that people made unable to assess risk. This is why children are driven everywhere, and why we have to take our shoes off to board a plane.

Heroin, tried once, is not instantly addictive for most people.

> "but who really just 'tries' heroin"

Natural. Selection.

> Sorry to hear. Partaking in heavy drugs to any degree invites those dark unknowns. The number of hands these drugs pass through to reach the end-user is more than a couple. I recall on average it's 8 different turnovers. Each time, likely being cut down. They operate a margin business without concern for where it ends up. It's likely safe to say that a vast majority of drugs are cut these days.

Drugs have always been cut. Historically it was just cut with OTCs or detritus, which was a problem that could be solved in most cases by simply doing more.

The problem as of late has become when they lace it with things like fentanyl, which is a cheap filler that actually improves the high (thus encouraging repeat business) but can be lethal in large doses.

Unfortunately "larger doses" in terms of Fentanyl is not that much: https://www.statnews.com/2016/09/29/fentanyl-heroin-photo-fa...

> Historically it was just cut with OTCs or detritus, which was a problem that could be solved in most cases by simply doing more.

Well, until you get a more pure batch and you try to do the same amount you do with the dilute batch.

This is how prohibition is killing people: by removing any sort of quality control for the customer. You can die by drinking bad wine or eating contaminated food, but we have processes and laws that make sure wine is done properly and food is not contaminated, so the consumer knows that, when she buys pasta, it's going to be pasta, not a bunch of random chemicals that look like pasta and might taste somewhat like pasta. Can you imagine buying unlabeled pasta from a shady guy in an industrial estate near a plant manufacturing yellow plastic? That's what buying drugs is today, thanks to prohibition.

Yeah, people think they're too good to have a problem with this stuff, but there's a real physical damage going on that is not something that one can shake off.

I lost a relative to drug abuse. I think one of the reasons they got into it was she they were very intolerant to boredom and just scoffed at everything. Nothing was serious, everything got a do over.

I do wonder how fentynl is getting in, or is it being made here?

If a chemist is reading this, I would love your imput. I was under the assumption fentynl complicated to produce.

That said, my wish is the government would provide generic bupenorpine to any person that wants the drug. It needs to be easily available to anyone. No b.s., just give out the drug. Save all the drama. Give them a long half life drug that will get them off the hard stuff. Let them taper off the bupenorpine when they see fit.

Now--they will say the addict needs counseling, nalaxone, and blah, blah, blah.

Just give out generous bupenorpine. It has a long half life, and you have to be determined to overdose on it.

I will be shocked if anything is done for most addicts.

Hell--when my psychiatrist retires, I honestly don't know what I'm going to do. I'm on two very controlled substances, and so tired of hearing the experts opinion, and their outlandish prices.

So yes, we will see commercials, etc., but just give out bupenorpine. Most addicts don't need extensive counseling--I believe. They are just afraid of widhdrawls. Withdrawals that might be less severe than they imagine?

> I do wonder how fentynl is getting in, or is it being made here?

Imported from China. Wasn't regulated at all there until recently, then the producers started messing with the formula.

> I'm not sure what we need to do

Fund recovery centers and programs to rehabilitate users and provide them with ongoing assistance so they can get by and stop using. Most addicts who come out of prison say this because they know they will immediately relapse.

[removed]

what the fuck are you on about? wrong thread?

Actually, I'm trying to have a nuanced conversation on a sensitive topic with an open mind.

I get the feeling this is one of the things that no one wants to discuss, or at least it's a bad idea to try to discuss it.

Note how violent and immediate the reaction was, right when I tried to point to a segment of people who are the most likely to be in the target segment of the original article. I don't feel like martyring myself, so I won't push it further. But suffice to say, it does not seem like we as a society are ready to have hard conversations about why people turn to drugs.

Just to be clear for those coming to this after the fact: the reaction was not violent and immediate. Your comment was not nuanced. And it was very much not sensitive.

You attempted to claim that such overdoses are in part due to Reddit (and society in general) ostracizing neo-nazis and members of hateful groups. Not only is this just wrong, it implies that many affected by the crisis are members of such groups, which they are not (as someone who has a family member addicted to opioids I'm very annoyed by your comparison).

You just wanted to talk about your Neo-Nazi subreddits getting taken away and people called you out on it. Frankly, a Neo-nazi should be an outcast. A racist, sexist, etc should be excluded. And if they don't like that, then they should stop being a Nazi before turning to drugs.

I claimed no such thing.

My point was solely "A certain subreddit got banned. Those people seem to have very few options, and maybe they were using it as a support group. They might turn to drugs now."

The reaction violent and immediate: within 5 minutes of posting the comment, you're now trying to imply some very strange things about me. You're even going so far as to "clarify" things for readers by posting something I did not say.

I'd like to end this conversation, because HN is optimized for good conversation and this isn't heading anywhere productive. Agreed?

I have a family member affected by a similar crisis, though thankfully not quite as intense. I'm sorry that the comparison annoyed you, but I was just searching for answers.

That is not a violent reaction.

"We need to kick you out of the country" is a violent reaction.

"What are you talking about this is dumb" is not a violent reaction.

You shared your ideas, they obviously weren't taken as good ideas by the group here, and people told you so.

No one called for violence against you, no one called you names (as far as I can tell), just no one agreed with you, and maybe a liiiiittle discourteously.

That's not violence, that's discussion.

It was violent in the sense of a chemical reaction. It also violently curtailed any chance of intellectual conversation. For that, I regret saying anything.

I'm not upset about mere disagreement. I'm upset that I was searching openly and honestly for an answer to this crisis that affects all of us, and in exchange I was labeled a neonazi sympathizer. On HN of all places.

The conversation shouldn't be about me and my ideas. That's selfish and counterproductive to HN's aims. The goal is to gratify intellectual curiosity, and the subthread I started here is the opposite of that.

HN isn't a place for ideological battle. The fact that two members of the community decided to immediately call out my bullshit suggests that HN wasn't the appropriate venue for this conversation.

I think your own post curtailed any chance of intellectual conversation, and you're taking it out on other posters.

And you've posted you figured it would go like this.

Take the hint you are giving yourself: best re-consider what it is you're about to post, given your past experiences.

> I have a family member affected by a similar crisis, though thankfully not quite as intense. I'm sorry that the comparison annoyed you, but I was just searching for answers.

Sorry to read about your family situation. That said...

There is an entire field dedicated to this. In the spirit of DRY, let's not spin our wheels with hackneyed theories, thinking we'll do better than the individuals that dedicate their lives to rigorously testing hypothesis and formulating therapies.

Why did you delete your comment? I'm compelled to hold you in a negative light just based on principle that you don't stand behind your own words.

It may be worth examining that tendency. I elected to take the Kolmogorov option: https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=3376

The question of whether or not your arguments have merit won’t even get entered upon, nor will the authority ever be able to repeat back your arguments in a form you’d recognize—for even repeating the arguments correctly could invite accusations of secretly agreeing with them. Instead, the sole subject of interest will be you: who you think you are, what your motivations were to utter something so divisive and hateful.

Suffice to say, it wasn't too smart to even broach the topic. It derailed the conversation, for one. For two, it didn't lead anywhere productive.

Personally, I appreciate your efforts at discussing sensitive topics. I encourage you to keep doing so, as honestly but sensitively as you can. While the "Kolmogorov option" might maximize your personal outcome, this doesn't mean it's best for the group to encourage you to take it. You probably already read the recent discussion by another Scott A? https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/10/23/kolmogorov-complicity-...

Probably the wrong thread :)

You're implying the opioid epidemic is in part due to Reddit banning subreddits filled with hateful speech?* Or what? You're also making some odd as hell "both sides"-ish argument somewhere in there that I can't even parse.

I'm sorry, but we don't have to give spaces for people to be hateful - Reddit banning those assholes was the highlight of my week. I'm not trying to claim that these people should just be ignored, but you're conflating very separate problems.

More importantly, the people being affected by the opioid crisis are predominantly not members of these hateful groups, and I'm pretty frustrated you would conflate them in such a way just so you can have an excuse to talk about the loss of a safe space for hateful rhetoric.

*EDIT: After rereading what the poster wrote a few times, I believe they were attempting to claim that the subreddit bans would encourage more people to head to drug use, rather than vice-versa as I originally interpreted it - it's still pretty off-topic though, and again I'm not very sympathetic to people being sad they no longer have a place to be hateful.

I'd appreciate it if you'd remove your comment since I tried to back out immediately from that line of conversation. Would you mind agreeing?

If so, edit your comment to [removed] and I'll delete this one.

Otherwise, I can try to explain my original motives, and what I observed. But it's a tricky conversation to have, and there's a high chance people's tendency to instantly turn to hatred will focus on me. I'd rather pass.

Calling people out on nonsense isn't hatred.

"Black people are stupid, we need a white ethno-state" is hatred.

"You're wrong and your ideas are wrong" isn't hatred.

Calling people out on bad ideas is a necessary part of the discussion, to weed out bad ideas.

> I'd appreciate it if you'd remove your comment since I tried to back out immediately from that line of conversation. Would you mind agreeing?

Two days ago, I saw you post something asinine and I tried to respond. You deleted your comment before I could hit the reply button, and I lost the opportunity to quote and refute you.

If this is a recurring problem (that you change your mind about statements on a public forum), think a bit more before posting.

If I delete my comment and you can't respond, that's a feature, not a bug. This kind of comment is best left to an email.

The reason I backed out of this subthread is very simple: the first few replies were vaguely insinuating I might somehow be sympathetic to neonazis. That was enough for me to hit the "forget this" button.

> the first few replies were vaguely insinuating I might somehow be sympathetic to neonazis.

Please stop being so defensive. People dog-piled on you because they thought you said something dumb. They're not being "hateful" or "violent". Those words have meanings, and their meanings are actually directly related to why Reddit banned those subreddits. If you can't tell the difference between me saying "Yo your opinion is dumb and here's why" and "You're black you need to leave" then just wow, you may need to take a step away from the Internet for awhile.

I brought up Neo-Nazis and the Alt-Right because they were the main ones affected by the Reddit bans and your comment did not do enough to distance whatever you were talking about from them. Also, the Alt-Right had a large overlap with the subreddits you do seem to be talking about.

If you want to have a conversation about such a thing, I'm happy to engage over private message. But you bringing it up was so tangental, so unrelated, and so odd that I could not resist calling you out on it.

But again, it was just so out of place in a discussion where people are talking about the opioid crisis. The argument you're trying to make is horribly tangental and out of place.

To be especially frank: people are reacting to you so negatively because your comments are completely unrelated and showed an intense desire to discuss the subreddit bans. When we called you out on this, you got extraordinarily defensive and realized the conversation wasn't going to go your way. So you backed down. Welcome to intellectual discourse. If you don't feel confident defending your opinions in such a space...well maybe they're not opinions that you can defend very well.

If you don't feel confident defending your opinions in such a space

The point of HN is to be a search for the truth among colleagues, not a verbal barfight. The fact that you wanted to get into one immediately says a lot about both sides of the conversation.

your comment did not do enough to distance whatever you were talking about from them

You didn't even briefly pause to question whether I might be associated with them. Why should I need to distance myself from them when I'm merely talking about them? The causal linkage is backwards here.

Maybe you feel bad about reacting so harshly and are now backpedaling. Either way, you shouldn't get to force the conversation into a private message:

If you want to have a conversation about such a thing, I'm happy to engage over private message. But you bringing it up was so tangental, so unrelated, and so odd that I could not resist calling you out on it.

If I bring up a topic substantively, honestly, and in a way that's a search for the truth, it shouldn't matter whether it's done in public or in private.

I see Silly doing this everywhere. Asking people to remove their comments.

Edit: See what I did there, bud?

If I recall correctly Silly accused me of slandering some app developer because I posted a negative article.

You're posting about an accusation you can't even remember with incomplete information and out of context. That's like a trifecta of incivility.

If you can't remember exactly what I did, maybe don't spin a half-told version of it?

> the most tragic part was that he had a plastic "No Allergies" bracelet on.

Oh my god. I bet you had to stifle tears at this point. It sounds like something you would see in a movie, with the last cut of the scene slowly bringing the bracelet into focus just long enough for you to realize why he was wearing it.

It is all relative I suppose, but I think it's a reflection on a serious issue plaguing society, if you don't care about the guy, as a technical person you have to say it's a tragic waste of public resources to repeatedly admit someone to ER when they should in a treatment program.

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