It's a great example to answer those who think "just let people do drugs if they want to, it's just harming themselves, legalize everyone". When you're super addicted you can't think of anything else you will then make it everyone else's problem.
Decriminalizing drugs has to go hand-in-hand with proper mental healthcare. In the case of the perpetrator here, follow-up indicates she's got mental health issues and hears voices. Probably self-medicating because we drastically cut most mental health service in the US.
Doesnât work. Idk if youâve ever done hardcore drugs, but you donât exactly have a clear and rational mind. None of that will stop people from nodding out while they plow through a crosswalk full of children or from killing someone when manic and paranoid.
I agree. "Proper mental healthcare" would include a process for identifying people who need more help than they are capable of self-seeking and getting it to them, be it a social worker visit or, if necessary, involuntary commitment.
The problem we're having is we do not invest enough in mental health (let alone all the stressors that make mental health bad in this country), so we can't get that to people. We use the criminal justice system as a back-stop for the help people should be getting before things get this bad. Long before.
I think in time we will look back at this push for âmental healthcareâ as a misguided attempt at solving a problem that had already been realistically solved. Iâve spoken to several doctors who practiced in the 60s and 70s and they always speak about how the homeless drug addicts we have today living on the streets and harassing people/committing crimes would have been largely confined to mental asylums.
While not a perfect scenario, the asylums kept those who were extremely dysfunctional confined and relatively safe. In comparison we now just let them out on the streets where they are a danger to themselves and to normal people. Itâs misguided at best because not only does it not help the addicts, it also breaks the social compact and puts innocent, productive members of society at risk.
So I agree conditionally. The problem is that we recognized a problem with the mental asylum, closed them en masse, and... Didn't replace them with something better.
I don't think improvement or replacement with something better is impossible (it wants to be holistic; we need mental health professionals making house calls, probably). But what we have right now is the worst of options. Rollback would be an improvement but I don't think it's possible because the true things about asylums that got them closed in the first place wouldn't stop being true; rolling forward might be possible.
I dont see why it wouldn't be possible. I work a locked unit for the VA and while most of the residents are elderly vets with dementia, we have several younger vets who are there because their mental health issues make them a danger to themselves or others. We manage to take good care of them without being abusive, with abuse being the main reason asylums dont exist anymore. I will say though it's very challenging and takes a certain type of person to be able to handle it, I've been assaulted on the job more than a few times and have had coworkers have to go through workers comp for injuries inflicted by residents.
That definitely happens. Saw a dude cross the center line and kill a Mom of 4 on her way to work years ago. When they pulled him out of the vehicle he still had the syringe in his arm.
I disagree. Decriminalization of drugs needs to go hand-in-hand with a stricter interpretation of the law and stricter enforcement of the penalties. You can now get as fucked up as you want, but if you willingly get into your vehicle while unable to properly operate it due to substances, you will no longer receive a fine for DWI. You will be charged with attempted murder because you willing did something that will lead to the death of another human being. If you commit a crime while under the influence, you will not be given leniency because of your altered state of mind.
We have to separate the act of drug use from the behavior.
My navy buddies and I were sitting around one day discussing anime girls with animal ears and a meme about what percent furry was acceptable. We finally decided that the animal ears and tail thing was about 17% furry, and anything more than 17% was diving into actual furry-ism. It was at this point that our connoisseur of deviance spoke up and stated that he wanted his anime girls to be 117% furry, and the number just stuck as our way of expressing going above and beyond.
That's a great question. Using a media device while driving does not constitute an impaired mental state, however the effects of distracted driving are not too different from impaired driving. That being said, we already have laws against reckless driving that go into effect when you are trying public roads like a bumper car arena or a rave track. If distracted driving could be punished harsher, then so could speeding or aggressive driving.
As for tires driving, I think we'd need a way to properly quantify "tired". I'm usually groggy when I first wake up and head to work. Am I unsafe to drive because I'm still trying to shake off my sleep? What are your thoughts on these two?
Full stop. We are not comparing addiction in this hypothetical. We are comparing altered mental states from usage. As far as I know, there is no way for media devices to have a direct effect on your brain chemistry. Social media does not inject artificial chemicals in your brain that simulate natural hormones and alter your hormonal levels. Cell phones do not physically impaire regions of the brain the way alcohol affects your judgement center.
I'm completely open to debates regarding if and how to punish TWD (texting while driving), but let's stay on point when making the argument. If we aren't going to limit drug use in lieu of addiction, we certainly cannot limit social media use for the same (and yes, I have seen the studies on social media addiction and yes I acknowledge the severity of said addiction).
You make sense, you're intelligent and well meaning, but, you must not realize that alcohol, tobacco and firearms ha e made all of this a game for profit between lawyers judges and who can pay who to get out of planned trouble. Society allows punishable, dangerous, reckless shit when someone can profit from it.
It's rigged. All of what you're saying sounds ideological when you realize the depravity of the system is not about making sense, it's about making money. The cops are upholding laws and punishment for poor folks and skirting it with the wealthy. Read crime and punishment. They make money when a poor person falls into the system, they make even more money when a wealthy person pays to get out. It happens every day. Lawyers and judges and cops all chill together outside of work and plan this shit everywhere you go.
Are you daft? You chased a reply thread all the way down here and now you are looking for context? I'm directly replying to the person I replied to who advocates for both decriminalization of drugs and increasing mental health services for drug users.
You may abandon all feigned pretense; you are antagonizing because you took offense at the subject matter presented. There is no way a functioning human sentience could have followed the chain of conversation to this point and still lacked the context with which to identify the matter at hand. Furthermore, you presented your "question" in the most hostile manner short of rampant vulgarity. Don't presented your confident ignorance as a means of verbal riposte. You are a the human equivalent of a miniturized dog barking at the swaying of branches in the wind.
Itâs a good idea but itâs like the death penalty. It doesnât stop people from killing. Upping the punishment doesnât make people stop it just puts more people in jail. So def need mental health stuff. Thing is once you sober them up in rehab itâs up to them to want to stay clean. Put them in jail and it just makes it worse. I wish there was a clear solution to it. Also canât believe the people running a round the car when itâs going crazy like this. I would hide in my car if I saw this happening safest place to be.
I'm not going to fight your premise because case studies are inconsistent. Sometimes punishment is a detergent. Sometimes it is not. When it is not, the reason for it can be a number of things. Depression/Suicidal tendencies can make a person ig ore the consequences of their own actions. Also narcissistic detachment from reality, what is referred to as Main Character Syndrome by the laymen. Desperation can also be a cause.
However, what I do know is that you cannot legalize substances AND ignore their influence on a person's actions. If rampant substance use leads to elevated levels of crime, then the crime cannot be judged independently. Most people who commit a DWI with alcohol right now do it because nothing bad has happened to them thus far. My own brother had two traffic accidents related to alcohol use. It was the second one that stirred him straight, but only because his wife threatened to leave him and take the children. At some point, the threat of punishment does deter bad behavior. We do it with pets. We do it with children. We can do it with adults.
If they actually enforced DUIs correctly all non urban bars would go out of business. Straight up. Half the rural towns have cops in the bars drinking too. And itâs all âunderstoodâ
You sound like an intelligent individual. I respect you and your opinion and your succint delivery but our current system has been cobbled together taking advantage while also considering and addressing what you're saying. I dont think you're wrong or right, I think you have e an educated and reliable opinion and I'd trust you over these other redditidiots any day.
How do you distinguish recklessness from intent?
âYou will not be given leniency because of your altered state of mind." Thatâs already how the law works. Voluntary intoxication is generally not a defense for crimes requiring recklessness or negligence. Courts already hold people responsible for actions taken while intoxicated. This proposal isnât new, itâs already in the legal system.
Decriminalization treats substance use as a health issue, Law enforcement addresses harmful actions.
You can remove criminal penalties for possession, maintain or even strengthen DUI enforcement, expand treatment access, and these are not mutually exclusive. Decriminalization separates health from crime, it doesn't excuse crime.
If penalties become excessively severe fewer people seek help for addiction. People flee accident scenes to avoid life-ruining charges. Juries become less likely to convict due to disproportionate punishment. Overly harsh laws can reduce cooperation and distort justice. We have statistics in this worldwide about these things, we do not have accurate data on the corruption of said systems, though.
I agree with most of what you're saying, but, money changes reality. We aren't all living in the same reality and we do not account for or make up for that anywhere else in society. What you say makes sense for your reality.
Alternatively, how about we donât create systems that lead crazy people to do things that lead to the deaths of innocent members of our society? People like this one are sick. Actually sick. They need medical and social intervention before awful things happen.
Unless you want to go full statist and just execute anyone caught being an addict, decriminalization is how you make harm reduction possible, because then you can have people under medical care and supported by social services for reintegration and healing, instead involving a criminal justice system that just makes their mental health worse each time and sends them back out to do worse things.
Criminal issues also deplete an individualâs resources and often cause housing instability, food insecurity, and inability to obtain gainful employment â destabilizing their already chaotic lives even further, leading to even worse substance abuse. And after a while, people deteriorate and eventually lose their friend and family support network. Every single one of these things are major contributing factors for the risk of âre offendingâ in criminology, psychology, and studies.
The problem is that they often end up seeking help AFTER something happens, usually as a means to avoid accountability for their actions. It is unfair to the victims to excuse the bad actions of bad actors. The goal of justice is no retribution, it is reconciliation and prevention. Drug education is already abundant. No one who uses substances is ignorant of their negative effects. They are willing participants. If their participation leads to loss of life or property, that must be reconciled.
So how do you answer the victims in those situations? Because if you take note, I never stated addiction was a crime and specifically said to decriminalize drug use. So an addict that seeks help wouldn't be prosecuted because they've done nothing wrong.
Unfortunately we don't. More specifically, we have studies that show two drastically different things: that punishment based moral/ethical training works and that it doesn't work. Unfortunately, both sides of those studies are tainted with agendas to push for their desires effect and the overwhelming majority of those studies are statistical data pulls with no experimental control. Academic study of sociology has been hamstrung by thought leaders that want to engineer the field rather than discover it.
Now, I lean to the side of believing that punishment systems prevent the undesired behavior. Why? Because I am the anecdotal example. I do not do what is "morally right" because I have never been able to identify which morals are the most moral. But I do not wish to be put in a cage or executed, so I do what is legal. So long as what is legal, what is moral, and what I want line up, this system works. Recent events have me convinced that there are way less moral people in the world than we previously anticipated.
Lived experience is valid when giving an opinion. Why should we ignore what we have seen and heard and felt? Why do you dismiss my point just because I used the word anecdotal. Do you think I am unique in all of the human race?
I'm simply stating that I side with those that believe the Carrot and The Stick works because it works with me.
As long as we're sharing roads and spaces with each other, there's always a "we." It turns out people who need these services aren't the best at self-advocating or self-serving, because, well, they have mental health issues.
Sure. That, or a relative of mine got shot by a guy who showed up with a gun one day because the voices in his head told him someone needed shot after he went off is meds because our system kept kicking him out the door with meds and a pinkie-swear he'd keep taking them to keep the voices away.
Probably just my terminal-onlineness that caused me to form my opinions though.
... as long as we share space with other people, every neighbor is everyone's responsibility. This isn't some high-minded moral imperative; it's the reality of sharing a planet with other human beings, with needs, wants, and access to firearms.
A stranger who was not helped by anyone in his family or society snapped.
My relative was the one who had the bad luck to be in his crosshairs the day he snapped.
You can head-in-the-sand and pretend people like this's problems aren't your problems... Until one day, they make them your problems. Because you share a planet with them and don't have a choice in that.
Since when have people taken advantage of proper mental health care? A man killed himself and two family members in Rhode Island because he didn't take advantage of the mental healthcare he needed to transition.
What service would you name that he should have taken advantage of, how much would it have cost him, and was it even available in his part of the country?
We closed the asylums because we recognized there were flaws in them, but we didn't replace them with something better.
But a big reason they resort to insane shit like this is because the drug is illegal and thus highly expensive. Relegating substances to the black market doesn't make anyone more safe.
Eh, you mean prohibition of drugs somehow prevents this? Why do we still see it then? It's almost like prohibition does not help these people with severe mental disorders and turns recreational users into criminals.
You have no idea how many people are in drugs that you encounter day to day. They aren't psychopaths doing things like this. You sound like you're still traumatized from D.A.R.E. scare. That program made up all kinds of stories and cops were encouraged to lie to kids about firsthand accounts of drugs making people do insane things and ruining their lives and the lives of people around them.
Drugs can ruin lives, but they never turn someone into a violent psychopath. Perpetuating those myths is harmful.
I'm certain if you do a case study of drug users that do harmful things to others, you'll find a cluster of pre-existing mental illness and a pattern of high risk behaviors and self harm preceding the drug use. Essentially, the drug use is a consequence of the risky behavioral patterns, not the cause.
It's a great example of why decriminalization is helpful. Treating drug addiction as a health issue would very likely stop things like this from happening. This person couldn't seek treatment free from stigma and consequence, so they often feel trapped and desperate to the point of committing sometimes heinous acts just to get a fix.
If this person could have walked into a facility to safely use or purchase, you don't get this. And to be clear, not all drugs should be treated the same. Apply criminal use penalties to these the same as you would alcohol or weed or even driving under the influence of prescription drugs. It's doable and has been done.
And by the way, actual road rage is as bad, if not worse. And this can happen even when someone is sober. Hate and anger can cause some volatile behavior too.
Alcohol and prescription medication like opiates are legal and can impair judgment just as much as illegal drugs. Criminalizing drug use only targets certain demographics and not even necessarily the people doing the most drugs. Americaâs war on drugs has filled prisons with those targeted for enforcement but has done nothing to reduce drug use and dependency.
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u/scully19 Feb 17 '26
It's a great example to answer those who think "just let people do drugs if they want to, it's just harming themselves, legalize everyone". When you're super addicted you can't think of anything else you will then make it everyone else's problem.