> Anyone who thinks that our recent dramatic swing toward extreme leniency regarding opioid addiction and opioid-related crime isn't rooted in racism is fooling

> Anyone who thinks that our recent dramatic swing toward extreme leniency regarding opioid addiction and opioid-related crime isn't rooted in racism is fooling themselves. It's no coincidence that the white majority in the U.S. changed course when they began to fear the consequences of over criminalization. The phenomenon you describe (of folks ceasing support for a policy once they worry about being subject to it) is not racism; it's self-interest. Neither is the prior phenomenon necessarily racist, although it might be. If folks had previously supported criminalisation as a means to the end of harming black folks, that would of course be racist, but if they supported it as a means to the end of increasing public safety without respect to the race of offenders, that would not be racist. The rest of your post is excellent and well-reasoned.