WHAT MAKES METH SO BAD

Pioneer Press ^ | February 22, 2004 | Amy Becker

[FITZ]

Addiction is not your normal market/economic response, and it's absurd to treat it as such.

Without the supply first there would be no demand --- addicts of course have a demand but they wouldn't be addicts if the drugs weren't first available long enough for them to become addicted. I wonder how many addicts started from legal prescriptions and how many addicts intended to maintain control over the drug --- maybe using it to stay alert working 2 jobs or for a graveyard shift job?

[Kozak]

Look. It's a dose and delivery phenomenon as well as potency. If I snort a small line of cheap cocaine I get a little rush. If I smoke a rock of pure cocaine, or inject the same IV I take off like a rocket. Ditto meth, ditto any amphetamine. Granted Ritalin is a little different but, trust me, your personal experience not withstanding, people who abuse do so because it makes them feel GOOD. People react differntly to drugs, so do not generalize your personal experience.

The reason meth has taken off across the US is that it is cheap and easy to manufacture. If they could easily manufacture dextroamphetamine, it would be just as bad a problem. And trust me I know meth is a real, real bad problem. I spent 7 years working in Central California, one of the meth capitols of the World. I'm now in the Midwest and have been telling people what was comming, and now it's here. Part of the reason I knew this was going to be a problem here is one of the locals strengths, their work ethic. Thats how many otherwise sane people get hooked on meth, it starts as a pick me up to work through double shifts etc. It gradually transforms into a party, and then an obsession. NOTE that is far different from the pattern with Crack, which due to it's potency, method of delivery and INTENT leads to almost instant addiction.

[FITZ]

True --- probably a lot of people first take speed to help them stay awake --- either because they're working long hours or trying to stay up all night --- or because the pot and booze and other downers they first took make them sleepy at parties. I always think it's weird how drug users will take one drug --- then to counteract that drug they take another --- I've seen cocaine users realize they finally need some sleep and will change drugs so that can happen. I wonder if there is a difference between those who use speed but manage to sleep at some point are better off than those who just go on and on without sleep. I think sleeplessness is partly what makes them snap.

[FITZ]

I know you can hallucinate just on lack of sleep alone --- no drugs at all.

[MileHi]

Using a reaction to the WOD as a justification for the WOD is faulty.

I agree with you. When I was younger and living in Phoenix there was pot around. As the WoSD started to intensify, cocaine started to show up. See, if you are going to risk arrest there is a lot more profit in an ounce of coke than an ounce of pot. Crack is the same concept, it was invented to put more profit into a smaller package, with devastating effect to inner cities. Meth was another weapon in the war, no smuggling.

One can argue that the most dangerous drugs today are a direct unintended consequence of the WoSD. I would say things were preferable back in the 70s before we entered this quagmire.

[TKDietz]

"Without the supply first there would be no demand --- addicts of course have a demand but they wouldn't be addicts if the drugs weren't first available long enough for them to become addicted. I wonder how many addicts started from legal prescriptions and how many addicts intended to maintain control over the drug --- maybe using it to stay alert working 2 jobs or for a graveyard shift job?"

But Fitz, you imagine somehow that there is a way to cut off the supply of a drug like meth. That is ludicrous. It's absolutely impossible, especially with a drug like meth that can be manufactured anywhere in a few hours by toothless morons with a recipe and either a couple of hundred bucks or the wherewithal to steal the supplies they need. They bust meth labs every week where I live but there are so many people cooking the stuff they aren't even coming close to putting a dent in the supply. They can crack down and double and triple prison sentences but it really doesn't do a bit of good because by the time these guys start cooking it they are too far gone to care about what could happen to them if they get caught.

You can go after supply to keep the market from becoming absolutely flooded with the drugs, but that should not be the main focus because realistically there is just so much that can be done in that regard. Our main focus should be in reducing demand. We need to be educating people, finding out who the addicts are, getting them clean and teaching them how to stay clean.

Meth will run its course. It takes people a while to comprehend the seriousness of a drug like that but there will be a time when everyone knows that meth is more addictive and dangerous than even a drug like heroin and the popularity of the drug will drop off sharply. But still we'll be left with addicts that we need to deal with. Putting them in prison keeps them off the streets for a while, but it rarely changes anyone for the better and often it screws people up worse than they were already screwed up. Many even continue to use drugs in prison. There has to be a better way and I would suggest that at least a big part of the better way would be a combination of community/church/government sponsored voluntary rehab programs along with drug court type programs for those who can't or won't quit voluntarily.

[dirtboy]

One can argue that the most dangerous drugs today are a direct unintended consequence of the WoSD. I would say things were preferable back in the 70s before we entered this quagmire.

I agree partially. I think pot should be decriminalized, especially since making it illegal has had the unintended result of making it more expensive than far more dangerous drugs.

However, when it comes to addiction, the rational calculus that you and I apply to the WOD falls down. I know someone who used meth for awhile, and they'll tell you it should not be legal in any form - it's just too damn destructive, not just to the user but those around them. I think anti-drug efforts should place far more emphasis on the demand side, with flexible sentencing laws that allow a judge to look at a drug user in his docket and decide whether they are an occasional user or a hard-core addict, and sentence with a carrot (treatment) and a stick (prison time if the addict fails treatment). If the demand goes down, the supply side dwindles. But attacking supply without addressing demand only grows the black market and all the associated problems with such.

[MileHi]

As usual I agree with your analysis.

I know someone who used meth for awhile, and they'll tell you it should not be legal in any form - it's just too damn destructive, not just to the user but those around them.

Can't disagree with that. I have known people who have used meth because it was available and cheap. They would have used coke but it was hard to find and really lousy quality. THAT is the unintended consequence of the WoSD. Those are people who would not have used meth if they had their 'druthers. I think that may be true in a great many cases. The crackdown on one substance leads to it being replaced with something worse.

FReegards, DB

[dirtboy]

Do you mean "decriminalized" as in "fines for users, jail for dealers"? Because that won't have any downward effect on pot prices -- if anything, it would drive prices up by increasing demand.

I would decriminalize by a combination of small fines for possession (with the option to connect possession to criminality if some other criminal factor is involved), decriminalization of small levels of cultivation for personal use, and reduced fines/criminal sanctions for dealing. These three steps would probably drive the price of pot to where it was in the 1970s, and would make it free for anyone doing their own cultivation.

[dirtboy]

They would have used coke but it was hard to find and really lousy quality. THAT is the unintended consequence of the WoSD.

I think there is a base number of the population that is drawn towards addiction, and rationality doesn't come into play. The former meth user I know didn't even like cocaine that much, but said meth hooked her immediately. She was able to shake it after a few months, and that was bad enough - and that indicates she didn't have that strong of an addictive personality. The hard-core addict needs both a carrot and a stick to come clean.

[Xenalyte]

A kind FReeper sent me this:

From the U.S. Department of Justice's National Criminal Justice Reference Service (publication NCJ 145534): "Of all psychoactive substances, alcohol is the only one whose consumption has been shown to commonly increase aggression. [...] Marijuana and opiates temporarily inhibit violent behavior [...] There is no evidence to support the claim that snorting or injecting cocaine stimulates violent behavior. [...] Anecdotal reports notwithstanding, no research evidence supports the notion that becoming high on hallucinogens, amphetamines, or PCP stimulates violent behavior in any systematic manner."

[NWOBLOWS]

Drug-prohibitionists have a track-record of hyperbolic descriptions of the effects of drugs on a person. This is a cry-wolf problem for them, now that they "really mean it". I reluctantly think we still need to wait for the drug-user to harm someone other than himself, just as we do, or should do, with other crimes. Preemptive arrest sure seems like a steep slippery slope into a police state which, by the way, is coming. Thanks largely to the do-gooders of the WoD.

[small_l_libertarian]

...One of them was seeing Janet Reno all the time...

NOOOOOOOOOOO!

[nobody_knows]

"Marijuana and opiates temporarily inhibit violent behavior"




Please pass the Cheetos.

[small_l_libertarian]

You make too much sense! Off to reeducation camp with you!