August 24, 2007
Skeptical about the whole heroin thing
David Copperfield, the British cop who pseudonymously posts at The Policeman's Blog says what many line workers in the sausage factory that is the criminal justice system think -- on both sides of the Atlantic.
I’ve long suspected that heroin addiction may not be as bad as all that. Probably because all the heroin addicts I meet are pathetic losers who would be just as pathetic if they weren’t addicted to drugs. It all strikes me as something of a winge, “Oh, the thing is officer, I just want the help.” “I started taking heroin when a close family friend died.” “I’m not on heroin any more, I’m on a ‘scrip, so I don’t know why I stole the DVD.”
When you compare the worries a heroin addict has (getting a fix, are there any more hot chocolate maxpacks in custody) to the concerns of non-addicted taxpayers (can I pay the mortgage this month, where are my kids, has the wife crashed the car, will I get the sack from work) there doesn’t seem to be any comparison.
The crime argument is even less compelling, “Heroin is so addictive, I have to mug old ladies.” Nonsense. As I look at the addicts coming into custody from the local shopping centre, I cannot believe that the absence of heroin would magically turn them into productive (or failing that, honest) people.
I’ve always had a nagging doubt that everything we get told about addiction is a lie and that heroin addicts get a free ride from honest people who’ve been conned into being sympathetic by the legal and medical establishment. And now I’ve found someone who agrees with me!
I think that Theodore Dalrymple’s “Junk Medicine: Doctors, Lies and the Addiction Bureaucracy” is a reprint of “Romancing Opiates: Pharmacological Lies and the Addiction Bureacuracy” Which is a very good book. Dalrymple himself was on the Radio 4 Today programme arguing with a heroin addict, the latter claiming that he has to steal constantly to fund his addiction. Unfortunately, Dalrymple doesn’t come across on the radio as well as he does in his books, which is a shame, because his arguments are very compelling.
So here are five questions about heroin and addiction that I need answering:
1. If addiction is a disease how come it can be cured by group-therapy?
2. If methadone works how come all the people I arrest are on it?
3. If heroin requires so much money, why are so many heroin addicts unemployed?
4. If heroin is so expensive, why do all the addicts I arrest wear designer clothes?
5. If drugs cause crime, why do all the drug addicts I arrest have criminal records beginning before they actually started on heroin?
I think I've asked myself these same questions -- usually while in court, listening to some pathetic loser's unoriginal tale of woe.
Much interesting debate follows in the comments to Copperfield's post.
Posted by Mike Lief at August 24, 2007 07:06 AM
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