Not the grand parent comment and I don't have anything specifically against the NYT or this piece, which I agree is pretty balanced. It is great that they pain

Not the grand parent comment and I don't have anything specifically against the NYT or this piece, which I agree is pretty balanced. It is great that they paint a positive picture of Portugal as a forward-thinking progressive nation, the point that Portuguese people often take an issue with this and other pieces, in american and british press, is that they fail to explain the motivation behind this policy. These measures were not a hippie social experiment, they were created out of a desperate lack of alternatives in the face of a de facto public health crisis due to a heroin epidemic. I cannot put in words that make it justice, you had entire neighbourhoods become drug slums with hundreds of heroin dealers and people inject on the sidewalks in broad daylight. It was crime problem, it was a health problem, it was a whole generation of people lost to this. It's this omission in the 'why' of decriminalization that feels somewhat dishonest.