Zwald:
Your post is difficult to read.
May I gently suggest capitalization and formatting. If you make paragraphs and leave a space between them, it’s a lot easier to read.
forgot to add (because i didn’t see subsequent posts), that the my post above is based on my opinion that the drug trade will never be exterminated. shifted from power group to power group, but never eradicated.
Forget gentle suggestion. You should DEMAND capitalization and formatting. Why should you go blind trying to make sense of my juvenile rambling?!
This has nothing to do with gun exchanges, or key exchanges, or money exchanges, or carjacking. And, drug dealers are in it for the money like everyone else. If you choose to demonize them as well-poisoners from scripture, then you are right to not expect a rational debate. Some drug dealers are cops and politicians trying to raise cash and taking advantage of their monopoly.
Dirty needles are a public hazard, it costs money, money, money to take care of a hepatitis or AIDS victim, and more money to allow it to spread at all. Preventing one case of hepatitis would probably pay for the entire program. You values are all screwed up here, IMO. It is a win-win solution and nobodies rights were violated, only your sense of morality, which sounds like biblical-genocide to me. Dirty needle, dirty gun barrel, your either a comic genius or a waste of time.
Listen Bunnyboy:
It’s not amusing anymore. If you would like to have a discussion with me, you will actually have to respond to the points and issues I have raised in reply to your ideas. Simply restating them doesn’t further the debate.
I’m not going to waste my time pointing this out to you again.
Reprise: search Great Debates using the keywords “Gun”, “Gun Control”, or “Second Amendment”. That should keep you occupied for the next couple of months.
Unless you come up with a totally new angle, it would also save us from rehashing the same old arguments.
Re: the current argument.
Firearms and shooting sports/activities are legal; recreational narcotics use is not. There is no moral or legal comparison between the two.
Scylla: a better analogy might be a gun turn-in program for suicidal people; we’ll give them a brand new, fully loaded firearm so they don’t accidentally blow off their hand while trying to eat a bullet.
False. One can declare a health emergency and suspend existing laws: See http://www.sfaf.org/prevention/needleexchange/ and
http://www.sfaf.org/prevention/needleexchange/emergency.html
Nice summary. The extent to which needle exchanges increase the number of heroin addicts is an empirical issue. I speculate this effect is positive, but extremely small. The studies in the following link back this claim up:
http://www.sfaf.org/prevention/needleexchange/studies.html (but I admit I have not read them.)
On a related point, whether a punitive approach -or any other approach for that matter- is the most cost effective method for reducing addiction is also an empirical matter. I, for one, would like to see a varied set of pilot projects.
If something is in short supply and in great demand, it will be expensive. The supply of heroin is short because it is illegal. Make it legal and the price will be lower. A lower price means the user doesn’t have to rob people to get his next fix; he can just stand on the sidewalk and panhandle.
And if heroin use is legal, SPOOFE can’t object to needle-exchange programs. (Or can he?)
BTW, the Los Angeles City Council is threatening to make it more difficult to purchase ammunition. Draw your own conclusion.
I suggest we pass a law requiring the Pistol “Packin’ Drug Dealer,” to exchange new needles for old needles, with each sale.
My apologies, let me rephrase: “There is no way to legally justify the existence of the needle exchange program short of a national emergency.” I didn’t think anyone would think that I wasn’t speaking in a general sense… but hey, Murphy’s Law sure is a funny thing.
Not on a legal level. I don’t currently object to it on a (purely) moral level. In other words, I’d have no moral qualms with it if it weren’t for the simple fact that the IV drug use in question is illegal.
I notice that Mr. Bunnyhurt, finding that he’s completely wrong, has chosen instead to ignore the issue. I’m still waiting for an answer from him. Perhaps he should change his name to fatherbunny?
What other viewpoint should I take? Something’s either illegal or it isn’t.
You’re the kind of person who uses phrases like “slightly pregnant”, aren’t you?
No. No, I’m not.
But returning to the argument in hand, you still haven’t answered some questions. Are you actually against a needle exchange, or are you adopting a stance for the sake of argument.
If you are against an exchange scheme, can you give reasons why you think it will be harmful, or is your stance based based upon moral objections to something that could be construed as encouraging drug use?
Pretty easy analogy to poke holes in, ExTank. By cutting down on the risk of cross infection, you’re making IV use safer rather than more dangerous.
Of course, that still leaves all the inherent risk of IV drug use, but do you honestly think an addict would not inject because he didn’t have a needle to hand?
Ok, I admit it: I’m confused.
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Non-profit needle exchange programs operate in many jurisdictions in the US. Some of them probably depend upon the police looking the other way (or they depend upon it “not being a law enforcement priority”). In other places, a regional emergency is declared periodically, which allows a legal justification.
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If needle exchange programs were made national, presumably Congress could pass the appropriate implementing legislation. What could and could not be done by Presidential decree is not entirely clear to me.
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Do I get to say Hi to Opal if I don’t know her?
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Here’s an analogy: marijuana is illegal. Bongs (water pipes) are sold in head shops in many localities. I see nothing contradictory making heroin a controlled substance, while taking steps to reduce the harms associated with its use. Whether the latter is good policy is a separate issue: (discussed elsewhere in this thread).
Gary…
I don’t see how that hasn’t been answered. I also don’t see why it matters.
Needle Exchange programs exist to make sure that people who indulge in illegal activities don’t put others at risk. I’m just fine with the latter part of that premise… it’s the former, dealing with “illegal activities”, that I have problems with. Considering that I’ve already mentioned this several times in this thread, I must conclude that you are either simply being stubborn or trying (and failing) to launch some semblance of a strawman attack.
That’s been answered, pal. I don’t know why you see the word “legal” and translate it as “moral”.
flowbark…
Rather than quote your whole post (maybe it’s just my sleep-addled brain, but I don’t see the problem you’re having), I’ll simply try to clear something up…
HEROIN USE IS ILLEGAL.
As is the use of many other IV drugs.
As such, the Government should NOT be doing anything that would make this activity - since it is illegal - any more desirable or “safe” for its users. In fact, the only dealings Gov’t institutions should have would be shutting down the suppliers of the drugs (since Gov’t also says it’s illegal).
I don’t see why “national emergency” or “Presidential decree” has to enter into the equation. Personally, if they really wanted to help people rather than coddle them, they’d put more effort into finding a way rather than enacting hollow, “feel-good” legislation that does nothing to address the underlying problem.
By saying that IV drug use (talking about heroin et al here) is illegal, and THEN supplying materials for the purpose of allowing people to use said IV drugs (the intentions behind the act are immaterial… legally, it’s the ACTIONS, not the intentions, that matter), is the height of hypocrisy. The “do as I say, not as I do” syndrome.
(And, just because I haven’t said it in a while, the comparison 'tween drug use and gun ownership is idiotic… can’t stress that enough)
Spoofe, do try not to be rude. If I ask a question, it might just be to clear up a point of detail, rather than
Anyway, the main point of your argument seems to be that:
But how can you reconcile that with your other statement:
Let’s be honest. There’s no way to provide protection to those “others” without protecting the IV user first, is there?
On top of protecting these innocent “others”, shouldn’t we consider the savings to healthcare costs by reducing cross infection in IV users? After all, it’s the taxpayer who’d have to cover these.
Now, I’m just theorizing possible advantages here, and wouldn’t be surprised if a better informed person can produce reason or evidence to dismiss these points. Failing that though, it would seem that you advocate passing on all these goals just because you think that an exchange scheme could be construed as advocating drug use.
Consider this scenario, SPOOFE: Joe Heroin User uses a dirty needle and gets AIDS or hepatitis. Later, he has sex with his wife and gives her AIDS or hepatitis. Giving him a clean needle would have protected her as much as it would him. It also would protect his kids, if he has any.
And if Joe’s wife can’t talk him out of doing heroin, what makes you think the government can? Even jail time doesn’t stop some of them.
I’m still trying to wrap my mind around the concept of people defending the government sponsored facilitation of a physically destructive, illegal habit in the name of public health on one hand, while tearing into and decrying a constitutionally protected right enjoyed by considerably more law-abiding citizens than not, on the other, also in the name of public health concerns.
How ass-backwards is this country getting?
Are we waxing nostalgic? Back when things were really righty-tighty:
http://lhc.nlm.nih.gov/M3W3/phs_history/phs_history_106_content.html
Check to see where heroin came from, and be sure to send the Royal family a thankyou note:
Spoof: Hey, maybe I’m being thick as well.
Yes, Heroin use is illegal. It also (IMO) erodes the body and spirit and in some cases can lead to theft, fraud etc.
Shooting up with unclean needles also spreads AIDS and hep, both within and outside the addicted population.
A policy which, as far as I can tell, does very little to encourage heroin use but a lot to limit the spread of Aids should be encouraged. There is little that is contradictory in this stance. The extent to which needle exchange programs are characterized by the preceding is an empirical matter, of course.
I suppose there may be similar issues. Should prostitutes be given free condoms? (PROSTITUTION IS ILLEGAL. 
) Should health services be extended to street prostitutes to reduce the harm caused by the trade? I’d say that if such interventions are a cost-effective method of enhancing public health, then they deserve our support.
OTOH, if Scylla or anyone else could propose a program which was both mutually exclusive with needle exchange and more cost-effective with regards to reducing Aids transmission as well as heroin usage, then I would be all for it (truly authoritarian methods aside).