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Fully agree. Carl is a white collar professor. The worst thing that can happen if his drug indulgence becomes a problem is he knocks over the water cooler or

Fully agree. Carl is a white collar professor. The worst thing that can happen if his drug indulgence becomes a problem is he knocks over the water cooler or loses his job. I work a blue collar job servicing heavy diesel engines. Casual hard drug users are aggravatingly cavalier to work alongside. They forget important things constantly. They show up late and lose things often. You'll spend all day repeating things they'll never retain and at the end of the month they will lose a finger or toe or suffer a massive back injury and get fired. The back injury usually turns the casual heroin into constant endless heroin. Drug tests exist in my field for a really valid reason and it has nothing to do with having a problem but becoming one.

Grustaf 6y ago
Well, how many people will see this headline and rush off to a back alley to buy a shot of heroin from some junkie?
- jboog 6y ago
  That's not the problem though. The issues is "drug decriminalization" people treating addictions like it's not a real problem for many people. Many of these folks want it to get to a point where you can quite easily buy heroin and suffer no legal consequences. I'm not saying our drug laws are just or can't be reformed but the fact that heroin is illegal prevents a LOT of people from using it. How many people will then use, aided by these pronouncements that "Heroin isn't actually that addictive!" and ruin their lives? We already have an opioid epidemic in this country that has destroyed communities. There's a middle ground between our terrible war on drugs and the naive "make it all legal and experiment with heroin!"
  - rflrob 6y ago
    > I'm not saying our drug laws are just or can't be reformed but the fact that heroin is illegal prevents a LOT of people from using it. How many people will then use, aided by these pronouncements that "Heroin isn't actually that addictive!" and ruin their lives? Do you know a lot of people who have expressed to you that they would use heroin recreationally if only it were legal? My gut is that the number isn’t large. My impression of the evidence from places that have tried decriminalization (eg Portugal) is that the number of people who use and then are able to get their lives back on the rails is higher than the extra people who use because it’s decriminalized.
    - jboog 6y ago
      You genuinely believe that there is no large group of people curious about trying a drug that supposedly offers the most euphoric feeling imaginable "better than sex" as many have claimed? What if people tell them it's not addictive? And now it's not illegal?
      - valuearb 6y ago
        Why would illegal stop them from trying heroin if someone thought it better than sex? What illegal does is make it far more likely to die from using heroin.
        Natsu 6y ago
        > Why would illegal stop them from trying heroin if someone thought it better than sex? Lack of access (or not knowing how to access it) comes to mind, among many other reasons.
        valuearb 6y ago
        Illegal drugs increase addiction rates because drugs are often cut with different drugs. How many heroin addicts were created by lacing lesser drugs with more addictive ones?
      - Shared404 6y ago
        Tobacco is legal, and also illegal to tell people it's not addictive, at least in any sort of marketing sense. Also, my understanding of most drug legalization is that the intent is to legalize usage/possession, not distribution. This is done with the intent to make it easier/safer to gain treatment and decrease addiction.
    - bjourne 6y ago
      Decriminalized isn't the same thing as legalized. Legalized means that you will have multinational companies promoting heroin nonstop through massive advertising campaigns. That would completely change peoples' usage patterns. Like how many people would smoke if tobacco was legal? Answer: many.
  - woeirua 6y ago
    The decriminalization folks recognize for the most part that addiction is real. The difference is that they want to use taxes on legal drug sales to fund rehab clinics and treatment programs. The people who want to maintain the status quo want to throw users in jail and forget about them. We already know for certain that throwing people in jail does not solve addiction. So why wouldn't we at least try the alternative?
  - conradev 6y ago
    The central point of the article is actually not “let’s decriminalize drugs”. It is “drug addiction is not brain disease”, which seems like a reasonable argument to me. I don’t know if you read it, but it also talks about how many deaths are from bad education (not understanding drug interactions, i.e. between two depressants), and bad drugs (i.e. lacing heroin with fentanyl) with no easy way for users to test their drugs. It further goes on to discuss that addiction treatment in the US is terrible precisely because it focuses on the drugs as a pathology and does not consider the holistic person or helping the person solve their underlying problems. Progressive drug policy isn’t “legalize it all”, it is “prevent needless deaths and treat addiction properly”. It has been for some time. Here are garden variety articles I found about these policies being implemented in the wild: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/01/04/allow-festivalgoers-test-illegal-drugs-before-consuming-them-some-police-forces-start-liking-idea/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/01/04/allow-festiv... https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/statement-continued-efforts-increase-availability-all-forms-naloxone-help-reduce-opioid-overdose https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/statemen...
  - 4eor0 6y ago
    Most advocates for decriminalization I’ve encountered have a platform of using taxes for counseling and addiction services. The middle ground you seek is already defined clearly. Are you sure your perspective here is as informed as it could be?
  - jfoutz 6y ago
    > There's a middle ground between our terrible war on drugs and the naive "make it all legal and experiment with heroin!" I wholeheartedly agree. a couple google searches showed buying alcohol for a minor was a $1000 fine, but heroin possession for personal use is $20000 and a year in jail. I think there's room to scale back the penalties and still be a deterrent. I think there's room to scale up addiction recovery. Hell, keep the horrible penalties, but waive them if the accused, with counseling and whatever other support makes sense, can stay clean for a year. So much of the system is about papering over problems rather than fixing the root cause.
- lostgame 6y ago
  Dunno about you, but I have never bought drugs from a junkie, but, of course, through dealers, who - in my experience, more often than not - do not actually use many of the substances they sell.
  - Grustaf 6y ago
    I haven’t actually bought or even used any illegal drugs at all, my point was just that I don’t think a lot of people will be inspired by an article like this to try heroin, unless they were already considering it. Most people that fall into heavy addiction are probably driven there more by chaotic circumstances than intellectual considerations.
    - throwawayboise 6y ago
      When I was in high school I toyed with the idea of trying heroin due to how it was described in health class. Never did, though.
      - lostgame 6y ago
        High school is way too early for that, IMHO.
- TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
  Several years ago, I read about the significant nootropic effects of nicotine and spent time on forums that downplayed the potential negative impacts. I ended up trying it and became addicted for years. Social contagion can have significant effects on social issues like this.
  - stefan_ 6y ago
    By that logic, we need to ban cooking shows - the habit reinforcing qualities of food are well known and obesity is a leading cause of health issues. It looks like you got off easy since your "drug" of choice nicotine has entirely negligible negative effects on an organism of the size of a human - it's a neurotoxin that in the quantities we use it for recreationally can't even harm insects (much like caffeine!).
    - TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
      > It looks like you got off easy since your "drug" of choice nicotine has entirely negligible negative effects on an organism of the size of a human You are right. I ended up with easily maintained hypertension and the urge to smoke that probably will never go away.(While on it, I also had significantly worse anxiety, decreased sleep quality, and bubbly urine. I definitely don't recommend trying it) But the social dynamics between it and heroin are the same. If we normalize its use and downplay its risks, more people will use it. And the physical and social harms from heroin use are far worse than nicotine.
  - xibalba 6y ago
    I've experimented with nicotine (in the form of gum) myself, but haven't really observed much in the way of benefits. Did you see benefits? What form(s) were you using? How did you end up quitting? (I was turned onto this after listening to an interview with Dr. Peter Attia [haven't yet made up my mind on whether he is a huckster])
    - TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
      I personally didn't experience benefits, just side effects. I started with vaping, then moved to smoking. To quit, I switched to vaping for a few weeks, then tapered the nicotine concentration to zero over the course of a month or two. Cigarettes have MAOIs which make it more addictive which is why I switched. I was irritable for weeks and still get the urge to smoke sometimes(it's been over 5 years since I quit). I don't recommend starting.
- tmp-20210218 6y ago
  I mean, genuinely, i'm thinking about it right now, however i had a serious heroin habit until recently.
- mrtweetyhack 6y ago
  How many people are flat-earthers, anti-vaccine? Somebody will take this article, make it viral by picking out one sentence. Bam! Heroine and meth become legal.
- wellthisisgreat 6y ago
  people who are familiar with less dangerous drugs may easily become more inclined to try heroin after reading this
- reaperducer 6y ago
  Well, how many people will see this headline and rush off to a back alley to buy a shot of heroin from some junkie? How many people are going to storm a national capitol because of what they see online? It all sounds farcical and easy to dismiss until you actually put some thought into it.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  There's a balance to be struck. You can't just lie to people and tell them that everything is deadly or they're gonna question everything else you've said. That's basically what DARE was. I know a chainsaw is dangerous. But listening to every Youtuber lecture me about how I have lock out tag out to change a lightbulb my own home and every Redditor jump at the opportunity to engage in a monologue about how I should wear safety classes when I use a screwdriver sure lends a lot of legitimacy to the people who say their dad never wore PPE and retired with all his limbs so it must be fine.
fbelzile 6y ago
Not defending drug use at work, but if you're to be fired it should be for the performance related issues you mentioned caused by the drug, not because of the drug itself. Edit for more context: Depending on the drug, substances consumed outside of working hours would still show up in a drug test. Firing someone for something they do outside of work shouldn't be acceptable. If you can prove they consumed drugs that would impair their ability to perform their job during working hours, that'd be a valid cause for dismissal. Drug tests don't measure that precisely enough though. Not to mention, drug tests are not infallible. They can come back positive for morphine if you eat a poppy seed bagel in the morning [1]. [1] https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/poppy-seeds-alter-drug-test-results/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/poppy-seeds-alter-drug-tes...
- snovv_crash 6y ago
  Proactive vs reactive? If you can tell someone will cause an accident, you don't wait until it happens.
  - minitoar 6y ago
    How can you tell they will definitely cause an accident?
    - vorpalhex 6y ago
      The same reason you're not supposed to drive or operate heavy machinery on a wide variety of medications, including legal and over the counter ones.
      - minitoar 6y ago
        Sure, but op is talking about someone who uses controlled substances outside of work. If they’re not under the influence of a substance at work, then it’s not the same situation you are talking about.
        6y ago
GordonS 6y ago
The author is not suggesting you take heroin at work, any more than it would be acceptable to drink alcohol at work.
- ryanmarsh 6y ago
  Are we equating alcohol with heroin?
  - mdoms 6y ago
    The article does this numerous times.
    - GordonS 6y ago
      I read TFA, and didn't see any such mention. I've gone back to it with the search tool, and still don't see any such thing. Would you mind pointing to where these numerous points are please?
      - mdoms 6y ago
        Really, dude? > Hart reports that more than 70 percent of drug users—whether they use alcohol, cocaine, prescription medications, or heroin—do not meet the health criteria for drug addiction > “My heroin use is as rational as my alcohol use,” Carl Hart writes > Let’s just talk about alcohol first. When you’re at a wedding reception, alcohol serves as a social lubricant. People are more gregarious. They talk, they interact. The same is true with cocaine at parties, heroin among friends, or opium among friends, NDMA among lovers. > It’s just like with alcohol. Most people drink alcohol on a regular basis, but they don’t become physically dependent > I don’t know a term. I simply mean people who take drugs, like alcohol users, somebody who may have a glass of wine or two every night for dinner, whereas somebody else may only drink on the weekend. It’s a wide range. And the same can be true with cocaine or heroin > Why do you use heroin? > That’s like saying, “Why do you use alcohol?”
        6y ago
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- deleted 6y ago
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sandworm101 6y ago
>> Carl is a white collar professor. The worst thing that can happen if his drug indulgence becomes a problem is he knocks over the water cooler or loses his job. No. The worst that can happen to him is that he is pulled over by a cop in the parking lot. Gets charged with possession of heroin. Goes to jail for a couple nights, then looses his job/pension/car/house/wife/kids (in whatever order) and winds up on the street. Regardless of the biological realities of heroin, the realworld criminal consequences of regular heroin possession can be worse. And I have yet to meet any longterm drug user who hasn't on occasion sold some to a friend. Get caught "dealing" and you will face an entirely different legal regime.
- soperj 6y ago
  I don't know if you've ever worked a blue collar job with a drug user, but what they were saying is that the Carl isn't going to lose a limb, kill himself, or worse, kill me on the job as a professor because he's on drugs. That can be a very different story working on a drilling rig for instance.
- batmansmk 6y ago
  One dude left his 3 and 5 yo kids in his locked car for a full hot afternoon with no water while using in the heroin den in my appartment complex in San Francisco. He was not a bad guy, just a totally confused person. When we told him what could have happened, he realized his mistake. We never saw him again.
- renewiltord 6y ago
  Everyone wealthy enough doesn't sell. They just share.
  - sandworm101 6y ago
    Most "dealers" are actually charged with 'intent to distribute', a crime that doesn't require evidence of money changing hands. Giving drugs to your friends, even for free, will result in basically the same drug charges as if you were selling. The law is setup this was specifically to avoid the need to money evidence. The cops only need to see you hand over the drugs. They don't need to also see you receive any money. (Actually, you don't even need to hand over the drugs. Possess a large amount, or a smaller amount divided into little bags, and that will be enough for intent to distribute.) Many street-level drug dealers will still separate the drug and money handovers between different people. This isn't to avoid legal issues. It is to avoid the money being seized when the cops move on the guy they see handing over bags of drugs.
basch 6y ago
But, the response here seems to be "this is too dangerous an idea to talk about, or consider" which seems really shitty. It's been 45 years since it was first established that heroin CAN be used safely when accompanied by a social ritual. Part of the problem IS the mindset and stigma around addiction, and that "insanely addictive drugs" have full power over people, and there is no ability to moderate their use, which is false. People are either 100% sober or a social pariah. The response in these comments mostly confirms this sort of black or white thinking. Maybe somebody should ask if its the lack of social ritual / social controls causing the problem, not the drug. Maybe society is failing otherwise responsible drug use by making all users outcasts. Or is a spectrum and complex interaction of multiple issues, and not just drugs. "This is too dangerous of a conversation to have" puts us in danger of not having productive conversations. https://web.archive.org/web/20201111183716/https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2000/03/deep-cravings.html https://web.archive.org/web/20201111183716/https://www.harva...
- steve76 6y ago
  Someone hooks your wife, or kid, or parents to junk and ruins their life. They're a protected class. All those police and soldiers protect them. If addicts get to do that, why can't I do the same to them? Instead of heroin, I'm going to go after a genetic cancer cure, or see what applications of Bell's Theorem I can create on human cellular mitosis and quantum biology.
- robin21 6y ago
  Feels like it’s too dangerous a conversation to have in the open. I think the mistake siliconvalleyites have is that they imagine everyone as intelligent and rational as they think they themselves are which leads them to encourage open discussion. But it’s clear throughout history that all people are stupid sheep on occasion and their thinking needs to be curated in a way. Therapeutic use for diagnosed conditions - interesting. Safety for recreational use - interesting. As a recreational activity - seems like we have enough fun already without adding more risk. Just my 2cents.
Bodell 6y ago
I want to agree with what your saying but with a caveat. Years ago I was an office manager at a battery supply warehouse (car batteries not AA’s). We had an employee that had started working for us for about 6 months when it became vary apparent that he had a drug problem. Because his brother also worked there we knew that he had suffered a major car accident, was in crippling debt from the medical bills, and developed a pain pill habit as a result. He was only 19 at the time. The issues that involved the work place were things like being consistently late, taking 2-3 hour lunch breaks and coming back high. So high, that he could not perform basic job tasks like counting a pallet of battery cores. My biggest concern was that he was licensed to use our fork lifts and so I had our warehouse manager do his best to keep him off the forklifts. At this point I recommended to my boss that we fire him for the repeated offenses, as well as recommend that he seek drug consoling. I felt bad for him. He had a problem. He needed help. But he did not need to be working at that job for his and others safety. My boss and my boss’ boss, on the other hand, decided it was best to send to him to a “random” drug test, so that when the fired him they could do so with indisputable cause. This did not work, he disappeared for many hours, despite the drug testing facility being just down the street, and the results came back clean. I know that people have many ways of faking drug tests. I suggested again that he be fired for the offenses and not the drug test. Again my bosses disagreed and sent him to two more “random” tests each week after that. The employee in question got wise to this. He knew what they were trying to do. So he went to a therapist and got a declaration of temporary disability. My company then had to pay him his full wages for 6 months with out him needed to come to work. And I sat back and laughed at my bosses, as the unemployment claim would have be nominal by comparison. edit: not sure why this would be down-voted. It is just a real story, relevant to the thread. I was only suggested that waiting for test results when possible danger lurks was not the right course of action. i forgot to add the employee did come back after his psychological disability ran out. And of course they sent him to take a drug test again. He failed that one and was fired.
- deleted 6y ago
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khalilravanna 6y ago
His whole point is you can use drugs and keep up all your normal daily responsibilities. He states this several times as the definition of “functioning”. If you show up to work on drugs you’re not functioning and that’s not what he’s advocating for.

Grustaf 6y ago

Well, how many people will see this headline and rush off to a back alley to buy a shot of heroin from some junkie?

jboog 6y ago
That's not the problem though. The issues is "drug decriminalization" people treating addictions like it's not a real problem for many people. Many of these folks want it to get to a point where you can quite easily buy heroin and suffer no legal consequences. I'm not saying our drug laws are just or can't be reformed but the fact that heroin is illegal prevents a LOT of people from using it. How many people will then use, aided by these pronouncements that "Heroin isn't actually that addictive!" and ruin their lives? We already have an opioid epidemic in this country that has destroyed communities. There's a middle ground between our terrible war on drugs and the naive "make it all legal and experiment with heroin!"
- rflrob 6y ago
  > I'm not saying our drug laws are just or can't be reformed but the fact that heroin is illegal prevents a LOT of people from using it. How many people will then use, aided by these pronouncements that "Heroin isn't actually that addictive!" and ruin their lives? Do you know a lot of people who have expressed to you that they would use heroin recreationally if only it were legal? My gut is that the number isn’t large. My impression of the evidence from places that have tried decriminalization (eg Portugal) is that the number of people who use and then are able to get their lives back on the rails is higher than the extra people who use because it’s decriminalized.
  - jboog 6y ago
    You genuinely believe that there is no large group of people curious about trying a drug that supposedly offers the most euphoric feeling imaginable "better than sex" as many have claimed? What if people tell them it's not addictive? And now it's not illegal?
    - valuearb 6y ago
      Why would illegal stop them from trying heroin if someone thought it better than sex? What illegal does is make it far more likely to die from using heroin.
      - Natsu 6y ago
        > Why would illegal stop them from trying heroin if someone thought it better than sex? Lack of access (or not knowing how to access it) comes to mind, among many other reasons.
        valuearb 6y ago
        Illegal drugs increase addiction rates because drugs are often cut with different drugs. How many heroin addicts were created by lacing lesser drugs with more addictive ones?
    - Shared404 6y ago
      Tobacco is legal, and also illegal to tell people it's not addictive, at least in any sort of marketing sense. Also, my understanding of most drug legalization is that the intent is to legalize usage/possession, not distribution. This is done with the intent to make it easier/safer to gain treatment and decrease addiction.
  - bjourne 6y ago
    Decriminalized isn't the same thing as legalized. Legalized means that you will have multinational companies promoting heroin nonstop through massive advertising campaigns. That would completely change peoples' usage patterns. Like how many people would smoke if tobacco was legal? Answer: many.
- woeirua 6y ago
  The decriminalization folks recognize for the most part that addiction is real. The difference is that they want to use taxes on legal drug sales to fund rehab clinics and treatment programs. The people who want to maintain the status quo want to throw users in jail and forget about them. We already know for certain that throwing people in jail does not solve addiction. So why wouldn't we at least try the alternative?
- conradev 6y ago
  The central point of the article is actually not “let’s decriminalize drugs”. It is “drug addiction is not brain disease”, which seems like a reasonable argument to me. I don’t know if you read it, but it also talks about how many deaths are from bad education (not understanding drug interactions, i.e. between two depressants), and bad drugs (i.e. lacing heroin with fentanyl) with no easy way for users to test their drugs. It further goes on to discuss that addiction treatment in the US is terrible precisely because it focuses on the drugs as a pathology and does not consider the holistic person or helping the person solve their underlying problems. Progressive drug policy isn’t “legalize it all”, it is “prevent needless deaths and treat addiction properly”. It has been for some time. Here are garden variety articles I found about these policies being implemented in the wild: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/01/04/allow-festivalgoers-test-illegal-drugs-before-consuming-them-some-police-forces-start-liking-idea/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/01/04/allow-festiv... https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/statement-continued-efforts-increase-availability-all-forms-naloxone-help-reduce-opioid-overdose https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/statemen...
- 4eor0 6y ago
  Most advocates for decriminalization I’ve encountered have a platform of using taxes for counseling and addiction services. The middle ground you seek is already defined clearly. Are you sure your perspective here is as informed as it could be?
- jfoutz 6y ago
  > There's a middle ground between our terrible war on drugs and the naive "make it all legal and experiment with heroin!" I wholeheartedly agree. a couple google searches showed buying alcohol for a minor was a $1000 fine, but heroin possession for personal use is $20000 and a year in jail. I think there's room to scale back the penalties and still be a deterrent. I think there's room to scale up addiction recovery. Hell, keep the horrible penalties, but waive them if the accused, with counseling and whatever other support makes sense, can stay clean for a year. So much of the system is about papering over problems rather than fixing the root cause.
lostgame 6y ago
Dunno about you, but I have never bought drugs from a junkie, but, of course, through dealers, who - in my experience, more often than not - do not actually use many of the substances they sell.
- Grustaf 6y ago
  I haven’t actually bought or even used any illegal drugs at all, my point was just that I don’t think a lot of people will be inspired by an article like this to try heroin, unless they were already considering it. Most people that fall into heavy addiction are probably driven there more by chaotic circumstances than intellectual considerations.
  - throwawayboise 6y ago
    When I was in high school I toyed with the idea of trying heroin due to how it was described in health class. Never did, though.
    - lostgame 6y ago
      High school is way too early for that, IMHO.
TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
Several years ago, I read about the significant nootropic effects of nicotine and spent time on forums that downplayed the potential negative impacts. I ended up trying it and became addicted for years. Social contagion can have significant effects on social issues like this.
- stefan_ 6y ago
  By that logic, we need to ban cooking shows - the habit reinforcing qualities of food are well known and obesity is a leading cause of health issues. It looks like you got off easy since your "drug" of choice nicotine has entirely negligible negative effects on an organism of the size of a human - it's a neurotoxin that in the quantities we use it for recreationally can't even harm insects (much like caffeine!).
  - TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
    > It looks like you got off easy since your "drug" of choice nicotine has entirely negligible negative effects on an organism of the size of a human You are right. I ended up with easily maintained hypertension and the urge to smoke that probably will never go away.(While on it, I also had significantly worse anxiety, decreased sleep quality, and bubbly urine. I definitely don't recommend trying it) But the social dynamics between it and heroin are the same. If we normalize its use and downplay its risks, more people will use it. And the physical and social harms from heroin use are far worse than nicotine.
- xibalba 6y ago
  I've experimented with nicotine (in the form of gum) myself, but haven't really observed much in the way of benefits. Did you see benefits? What form(s) were you using? How did you end up quitting? (I was turned onto this after listening to an interview with Dr. Peter Attia [haven't yet made up my mind on whether he is a huckster])
  - TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
    I personally didn't experience benefits, just side effects. I started with vaping, then moved to smoking. To quit, I switched to vaping for a few weeks, then tapered the nicotine concentration to zero over the course of a month or two. Cigarettes have MAOIs which make it more addictive which is why I switched. I was irritable for weeks and still get the urge to smoke sometimes(it's been over 5 years since I quit). I don't recommend starting.
tmp-20210218 6y ago
I mean, genuinely, i'm thinking about it right now, however i had a serious heroin habit until recently.
mrtweetyhack 6y ago
How many people are flat-earthers, anti-vaccine? Somebody will take this article, make it viral by picking out one sentence. Bam! Heroine and meth become legal.
wellthisisgreat 6y ago
people who are familiar with less dangerous drugs may easily become more inclined to try heroin after reading this
reaperducer 6y ago
Well, how many people will see this headline and rush off to a back alley to buy a shot of heroin from some junkie? How many people are going to storm a national capitol because of what they see online? It all sounds farcical and easy to dismiss until you actually put some thought into it.
throwaway0a5e 6y ago
There's a balance to be struck. You can't just lie to people and tell them that everything is deadly or they're gonna question everything else you've said. That's basically what DARE was. I know a chainsaw is dangerous. But listening to every Youtuber lecture me about how I have lock out tag out to change a lightbulb my own home and every Redditor jump at the opportunity to engage in a monologue about how I should wear safety classes when I use a screwdriver sure lends a lot of legitimacy to the people who say their dad never wore PPE and retired with all his limbs so it must be fine.

fbelzile 6y ago

Not defending drug use at work, but if you're to be fired it should be for the performance related issues you mentioned caused by the drug, not because of the drug itself. Edit for more context: Depending on the drug, substances consumed outside of working hours would still show up in a drug test. Firing someone for something they do outside of work shouldn't be acceptable. If you can prove they consumed drugs that would impair their ability to perform their job during working hours, that'd be a valid cause for dismissal. Drug tests don't measure that precisely enough though. Not to mention, drug tests are not infallible. They can come back positive for morphine if you eat a poppy seed bagel in the morning [1]. [1] https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/poppy-seeds-alter-drug-test-results/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/poppy-seeds-alter-drug-tes...

snovv_crash 6y ago
Proactive vs reactive? If you can tell someone will cause an accident, you don't wait until it happens.
- minitoar 6y ago
  How can you tell they will definitely cause an accident?
  - vorpalhex 6y ago
    The same reason you're not supposed to drive or operate heavy machinery on a wide variety of medications, including legal and over the counter ones.
    - minitoar 6y ago
      Sure, but op is talking about someone who uses controlled substances outside of work. If they’re not under the influence of a substance at work, then it’s not the same situation you are talking about.
      - 6y ago

GordonS 6y ago

The author is not suggesting you take heroin at work, any more than it would be acceptable to drink alcohol at work.

ryanmarsh 6y ago
Are we equating alcohol with heroin?
- mdoms 6y ago
  The article does this numerous times.
  - GordonS 6y ago
    I read TFA, and didn't see any such mention. I've gone back to it with the search tool, and still don't see any such thing. Would you mind pointing to where these numerous points are please?
    - mdoms 6y ago
      Really, dude? > Hart reports that more than 70 percent of drug users—whether they use alcohol, cocaine, prescription medications, or heroin—do not meet the health criteria for drug addiction > “My heroin use is as rational as my alcohol use,” Carl Hart writes > Let’s just talk about alcohol first. When you’re at a wedding reception, alcohol serves as a social lubricant. People are more gregarious. They talk, they interact. The same is true with cocaine at parties, heroin among friends, or opium among friends, NDMA among lovers. > It’s just like with alcohol. Most people drink alcohol on a regular basis, but they don’t become physically dependent > I don’t know a term. I simply mean people who take drugs, like alcohol users, somebody who may have a glass of wine or two every night for dinner, whereas somebody else may only drink on the weekend. It’s a wide range. And the same can be true with cocaine or heroin > Why do you use heroin? > That’s like saying, “Why do you use alcohol?”
      - 6y ago

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sandworm101 6y ago

>> Carl is a white collar professor. The worst thing that can happen if his drug indulgence becomes a problem is he knocks over the water cooler or loses his job. No. The worst that can happen to him is that he is pulled over by a cop in the parking lot. Gets charged with possession of heroin. Goes to jail for a couple nights, then looses his job/pension/car/house/wife/kids (in whatever order) and winds up on the street. Regardless of the biological realities of heroin, the realworld criminal consequences of regular heroin possession can be worse. And I have yet to meet any longterm drug user who hasn't on occasion sold some to a friend. Get caught "dealing" and you will face an entirely different legal regime.

soperj 6y ago
I don't know if you've ever worked a blue collar job with a drug user, but what they were saying is that the Carl isn't going to lose a limb, kill himself, or worse, kill me on the job as a professor because he's on drugs. That can be a very different story working on a drilling rig for instance.
batmansmk 6y ago
One dude left his 3 and 5 yo kids in his locked car for a full hot afternoon with no water while using in the heroin den in my appartment complex in San Francisco. He was not a bad guy, just a totally confused person. When we told him what could have happened, he realized his mistake. We never saw him again.
renewiltord 6y ago
Everyone wealthy enough doesn't sell. They just share.
- sandworm101 6y ago
  Most "dealers" are actually charged with 'intent to distribute', a crime that doesn't require evidence of money changing hands. Giving drugs to your friends, even for free, will result in basically the same drug charges as if you were selling. The law is setup this was specifically to avoid the need to money evidence. The cops only need to see you hand over the drugs. They don't need to also see you receive any money. (Actually, you don't even need to hand over the drugs. Possess a large amount, or a smaller amount divided into little bags, and that will be enough for intent to distribute.) Many street-level drug dealers will still separate the drug and money handovers between different people. This isn't to avoid legal issues. It is to avoid the money being seized when the cops move on the guy they see handing over bags of drugs.

basch 6y ago

But, the response here seems to be "this is too dangerous an idea to talk about, or consider" which seems really shitty. It's been 45 years since it was first established that heroin CAN be used safely when accompanied by a social ritual. Part of the problem IS the mindset and stigma around addiction, and that "insanely addictive drugs" have full power over people, and there is no ability to moderate their use, which is false. People are either 100% sober or a social pariah. The response in these comments mostly confirms this sort of black or white thinking. Maybe somebody should ask if its the lack of social ritual / social controls causing the problem, not the drug. Maybe society is failing otherwise responsible drug use by making all users outcasts. Or is a spectrum and complex interaction of multiple issues, and not just drugs. "This is too dangerous of a conversation to have" puts us in danger of not having productive conversations. https://web.archive.org/web/20201111183716/https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2000/03/deep-cravings.html https://web.archive.org/web/20201111183716/https://www.harva...

steve76 6y ago
Someone hooks your wife, or kid, or parents to junk and ruins their life. They're a protected class. All those police and soldiers protect them. If addicts get to do that, why can't I do the same to them? Instead of heroin, I'm going to go after a genetic cancer cure, or see what applications of Bell's Theorem I can create on human cellular mitosis and quantum biology.
robin21 6y ago
Feels like it’s too dangerous a conversation to have in the open. I think the mistake siliconvalleyites have is that they imagine everyone as intelligent and rational as they think they themselves are which leads them to encourage open discussion. But it’s clear throughout history that all people are stupid sheep on occasion and their thinking needs to be curated in a way. Therapeutic use for diagnosed conditions - interesting. Safety for recreational use - interesting. As a recreational activity - seems like we have enough fun already without adding more risk. Just my 2cents.

Bodell 6y ago

I want to agree with what your saying but with a caveat. Years ago I was an office manager at a battery supply warehouse (car batteries not AA’s). We had an employee that had started working for us for about 6 months when it became vary apparent that he had a drug problem. Because his brother also worked there we knew that he had suffered a major car accident, was in crippling debt from the medical bills, and developed a pain pill habit as a result. He was only 19 at the time. The issues that involved the work place were things like being consistently late, taking 2-3 hour lunch breaks and coming back high. So high, that he could not perform basic job tasks like counting a pallet of battery cores. My biggest concern was that he was licensed to use our fork lifts and so I had our warehouse manager do his best to keep him off the forklifts. At this point I recommended to my boss that we fire him for the repeated offenses, as well as recommend that he seek drug consoling. I felt bad for him. He had a problem. He needed help. But he did not need to be working at that job for his and others safety. My boss and my boss’ boss, on the other hand, decided it was best to send to him to a “random” drug test, so that when the fired him they could do so with indisputable cause. This did not work, he disappeared for many hours, despite the drug testing facility being just down the street, and the results came back clean. I know that people have many ways of faking drug tests. I suggested again that he be fired for the offenses and not the drug test. Again my bosses disagreed and sent him to two more “random” tests each week after that. The employee in question got wise to this. He knew what they were trying to do. So he went to a therapist and got a declaration of temporary disability. My company then had to pay him his full wages for 6 months with out him needed to come to work. And I sat back and laughed at my bosses, as the unemployment claim would have be nominal by comparison. edit: not sure why this would be down-voted. It is just a real story, relevant to the thread. I was only suggested that waiting for test results when possible danger lurks was not the right course of action. i forgot to add the employee did come back after his psychological disability ran out. And of course they sent him to take a drug test again. He failed that one and was fired.

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khalilravanna 6y ago

His whole point is you can use drugs and keep up all your normal daily responsibilities. He states this several times as the definition of “functioning”. If you show up to work on drugs you’re not functioning and that’s not what he’s advocating for.