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Comment by DubiousPusher | Hacker News Reader

> Yet there is much to debate about the Portuguese approach to drug addiction. Does it help people to quit, or does it transform them into more docile drug addicts, wards of an indulgent state, with little genuine incentive to alter their behavior?

Who the f* cares. It makes their lives better where nothing else has worked so far.

This is like saying, I beat my disobedient kid because I'd rather have a bruised disobedient kid than a non-bruised disobedient kid.

Whether or not someone living addicted to drugs is existing in a state of moral decline is a personal judgement call and it's no business of the state's, so long as that addiction isn't affecting the lives of others in a significantly negative way.

Only a wishy-washy equivocating, journalist can write, "everything about the new system appears to be working and it's making the lives of all better but is it really a good thing."

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Yeah, this is a common argument against drug legalization: "But are we really helping the addicts?"

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 question isn't "Are we really helping the addicts?". The question is "Are we helping the addicts as best we can for a reasonable investment of resources?".

>Only a wishy-washy equivocating, journalist can write, "everything about the new system appears to be working and it's making the lives of all better but is it really a good thing."

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').

> The "making people dependent on the state" argument

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.

> This is like saying, I beat my disobedient kid because I'd rather have a bruised disobedient kid than a non-bruised disobedient kid.

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.

Yeah, I support full-drug legalization, but I don't think that pretending that locking up junkies currently does nothing positive for society will do us any favors. In the current system, they account for a large amount of property crime and even violent crime. Locking them up isn't pointless, even if it does nothing to cure their addiction it does stop them from robbing others to pay for their addiction (for as long as we keep them locked up anyway).

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".

The cost of incarceration is almost certainly higher than the losses from property crime (including violent crime), but it's distributed more evenly-- a fraction more taxes is less objectionable than a friend being mugged.

Heard a figure on NPR the other day that it cost $35K to house/feed a prisoner.

I am not certain that the cost of incarceration is higher than the cost of the property theft and damage by drug addicts. Cost of incarceration seems to vary between 15 and 40 k$/yr in countries like Canada, USA, and England. Property theft and damage costs vary widely depending on the individual addict, and can be between 0 and 1000000 $/yr. In my city, there are many drug addict thieves who have been convicted of hundreds of car thefts each, and that is probably only a small fraction of the number they have committed. It is also common for these criminals to break a car window (costing hundreds of dollars) to get a few dollars that were sitting in the car; this can add up to a lot of damage very quickly if one needs to make as little as 50 $/day to feed an addiction. Another common income source for these people is to steal items like computers, cameras, and bicycles, which they sell for as little as 5% of their purchase cost; this can cost 1000 $/day for a 50 $/day habit, adding up to >350 k$/yr (roughly 10 times the cost of incarceration).

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.

Yeah, particularly when junkies get into things like copper theft, their cost to society can add up really fast. Things like destroying commercial AC unit to steal $100 of copper, causing tens of thousands of dollars of damages in one night alone.

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.

Drug users are "only" about one third to one half of acquisitive crime.

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

* Portugal does not have full legalization. They have full decriminalization.

Not criminal does not mean legal.

Yes, I understand that. I support full legalization, not merely decriminalization (which leaves production and distribution in the hands of criminals).

Hmmm and how about locking up junkies that commit property crimes and violent crimes on the basis that they commit property crimes and violent crimes?

So what you say is that it is good to incarcerate drug addicts, not because they have committed a crime, but because they may commit a crime.

I see your point...

The question at hand wasn't "Does it make lives better?". The question at hand was "Does this help people quit?".

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.

Why is quitting drugs an implicitly desirable goal?

"...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.

Asking the question is significant because it bears directly on the question of resources, which tend to be finite. If legalization has the effect of dramatically reducing addiction rates, then its costs can be expected to drop over time as lives are improved and addiction rates drop. If the latter scenario is the case and addicts are becoming wards of the state, then costs cannot be expected to decrease over time, and addiction rates will not drop. How might other lives be improved with those resources?

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.

Then it comes to this, it depends upon why you are posing the question. If you are a researcher and it's important to you to isolate factors that can decrease addiction in the name of science then that is one things. But my feeling is this question is usually asked because it can be used to poison the well of this kind of policy.

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.

The questions need answers, regardless of the reasons behind them. It's not a good idea to attempt to cut off answers because you suspect the person seeking them may be impure.

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.

My point isn't that we should "filter" the question. It's that the author, by posing this ideologically loaded question and addressing it in no quantitative way nor addressing why it is a question of import regarding this policy is either being naive or intellectually dishonest.

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.

Given that the New Yorker is often a political publication, I thought that the context of why the question is posed was obvious and not in need of being explicitly explained.

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

"Whether or not someone living addicted to drugs is existing in a state of moral decline is a personal judgement call and it's no business of the state's .."

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?

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