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Article should be titled “Heroin Addicts Who Can Afford To Support Their Habit Often Seem Normal.” His roommate’s klepto friend sure seemed abnormal. Also, my

Article should be titled “Heroin Addicts Who Can Afford To Support Their Habit Often Seem Normal.” His roommate’s klepto friend sure seemed abnormal. Also, my understanding from folk who do use is that heroin doesn’t exist in meaningful quantity in today’s market. It’s all fent. Even the stuff that claims to be h is cut with fent, and maybe xylazine if you are especially unlucky.

mattmaroon 1y ago
This is actually why I think all recreational drugs should be legal. I know of approximately 0 people who have had the thought “I’d try heroin if it were legal”. All making it illegal does is make the supply deadly. I truly believe that there would be fewer addicts and fewer overdoses if you could buy regulated heroin.
- ofrzeta 1y ago
  It's certainly true and in civilized countries (like the Swiss I think) the state offers the possibility to have your drugs screened and you can get clean syringes. Makes so much more sense than to criminialize addicted humans.
  - Nursie 1y ago
    In Switzerland, at the appropriate facilities, the state provides heroin to addicts. This has a dual effect - addicts get clean drugs and take them under medical supervision, reducing deaths, helping funnel some towards programs that will eventually get them clean etc. With this sort of support it turns out that people no longer steal to get their fix either, and can usually even hold down employment pretty well. But also the young folk get to see these tired, worn out, older people queuing outside the clinic in the morning to get their fix and realise hey, maybe that isn't so cool and edgy after all... Seems like a good plan to me, the problem is (as ever) puritans and their politicians, it's an easy thing to screech about. All it would take to kill it dead in a lot of countries would be someone standing up to shout "The opposition party want to spend YOUR tax money giving DRUGS to filthy JUNKIES!"
- tayo42 1y ago
  if anything it being legal would make it less cool IME most people dont want to be addicted, theyre just in a rut or life took them a certain way and just need support to get through the other side. People who dont use drugs are way to hysterical about drug use though to ever see real improvement.
  - mattmaroon 1y ago
    Yes.
- kenjackson 1y ago
  I actually think more people would use if it were legal. Maybe not immediately but over time it would become more normalized. Regular joe character in tv shows would just use heroine. It would be available at college parties next to kegs. Etc…. And heroine companies (now that it’s legal) would find ways to market their drugs even if direct advertising isn’t legal.
  - mattmaroon 1y ago
    I don’t think that’s true of heroin to a large extent, but I do think it would be true of cocaine, psychedelics, and other drugs. But regardless, I think the overall effect would be net harm mitigation given all the downsides of making it illegal. Funding violent crime at home and abroad, stigmatizing it and deterring treatment, overdoses from unsafe supply, etc. It’s entirely possible that more people would use it and it would still result in less harm to society.
    - sfn42 1y ago
      I've been saying the same thing for years. Everything should be legal, prohibition just causes more problems. We learned this lesson with alcohol already. Making it legal we could have things sold over the counter in pharmacies with proper age checks, we could even require further checks like before you can purchase heroin you need to go through a process where it is explained how it works, what a reasonable dose is, what side effects are, how addictive it is etc. Same with other stuff. Most drugs are quite safe and harmless if done by people who know what they're doing. Of course self destructive people and morons would still harm themselves but honestly I'm not too worried about that. They will always find ways to harm themselves. At least drug users wouldn't be funding cartels and warlords etc.
      - jeffhuys 1y ago
        Go to the QuittingKratom subreddit and see for yourself how a legal opioid-like substance destroys lives.
        1y ago
- Bratmon 1y ago
  The US literally just tried that with gambling, and we discovered that making gambling legal increased the number of addicts by so much that it shows up in "total bankruptcies" statistics.
  - mattmaroon 1y ago
    The key difference is people view heroin as something that will ruin your life, but think gambling is a harmless pass time until it is too late. There’s nobody who doesn’t know the perils of heroin, legal gambling existed in most places in some form and had for a long time. People view it much more like alcohol than heroin. Also we didn’t just try that with gambling (48 states have had some legal form of it forever) we just tried it with online sports books, which turn out to be a particularly virulent form of gambling. And we haven’t really begun to sensibly regulate that, a lot of harm may be reduced in the near future as we do.
    - monerozcash 1y ago
      It's worth noting that there's a form of gambling that's exactly the same as sports betting that has been legal for much longer, the financial markets.
      - makeset 1y ago
        The analogy is apt only in that financial markets are "a form of gambling" exactly as much as sports is.
    - lelanthran 1y ago
      > The key difference is people view heroin as something that will ruin your life, Now they do; make it legal and in two generations it won't be viewed that way because, after all, it's legal!
  - michelb 1y ago
    Isnt that more because gambling is ingrained with American culture? It’s seems to be pretty much everywhere.
- presentation 1y ago
  One data point, I live in East Asia, it’s very illegal, and vanishingly few people have drug problems (often they substitute for other problems that are less illegal, like gambling or sex).
  - mattmaroon 1y ago
    Well, that’s really nice, and I don’t know how you pull that off, but it doesn’t translate to western societies. It’s very illegal most places, but how much of a problem it is seems to vary by region.
    - _9ptr 1y ago
      It doesn't translate because you don't get the death penalty for having 1g of Cannabis
      - bauruine 1y ago
        It doesn’t translate to western societies because the vast majority of western societies thinks the death penalty is unacceptable at all. And getting the death penalty for drug possession no mater the scale is absolutely insane.
        kakacik 1y ago
        Well Singapore for example ain't democracy in western sense at all. Rather some longer-term benevolent dictatorship with some smart (and lucky) moves. Canning for what we definitely dont call severe crimes in the west, executing mentally disabled people manipulated into drug smuggling and so on. Its also a society openly xenophobic for immigration to any ethnicity not being part of original mix of population (not race, not language but properly ethnicity, ie tamils from south india big NO, malay tamils YES). White westerners not welcomed, only toleracted for specific set of high flying positions, and only for specific time while they keep economy running. Its a very interesting place to observe some sort of south east asian version of Switzerland (sans most freedoms), but there are hardly any lessons for the west. Sort of like what ideal China could be, but probably never will. If you want to see proper western-possible high point, that Switzerland IMHO is top spot. They have some drug addicts, but have rather sensible approach to them.
- N_Lens 1y ago
  The cruelty is the point.
  - Fnoord 1y ago
    Yes, how very Christian.
- themafia 1y ago
  > I know of approximately 0 people who have had the thought “I’d try heroin if it were legal”. Perhaps it's because they weren't experiencing enough pain at the time. I think most people fall into drugs circumstantially, I'm not sure it often presents as a conscious lifestyle decision. > I truly believe that there would be fewer addicts and fewer overdoses if you could buy regulated heroin. I believe that there would be less drug use overall if our economic system wasn't as rapacious as it currently is.
- ralfd 1y ago
  But is the reverse true? Do you know people who thought “I will try heroin because it is illegal”?
  - johnnienaked 1y ago
    You never heard of forbidden fruit?
- kgwgk 1y ago
  > I know of approximately 0 people who have had the thought “I’d try heroin if it were legal”. How many people do you approximately know of that have had the thought “I’d try heroin”? > I truly believe that there would be fewer addicts and fewer overdoses if you could buy regulated heroin. How many people do you approximately know of that have had the thought “I’d try heroin but only because I cannot buy regulated heroin”?
  - rkomorn 1y ago
    Also... isn't the whole opioid addiction crisis basically because people were in fact buying regulated ~heroin?
    - etempleton 1y ago
      A lot of people in the early OOs got addicted to pills because doctors subscribed them liberally and they weren’t regulated that well in hospitals so medical staff who wanted to make an extra buck could easily steal and sell them. The government cracked down on this and then all of the pill poppers turned to heroin, which now is mostly fent.
      - rkomorn 1y ago
        If we're gonna start factoring how well regulated something is, then sure, as long as there's a problem, something's not "regulated."
      - mattmaroon 1y ago
        They were told by doctors it was non-addictive too.
    - johnnienaked 1y ago
      Lol yes opiate addictions of all stripes for all time can be tied directly back to that oxycontin commercial from 1999
      - rkomorn 1y ago
- sodafountan 1y ago
  That's a very libertarian viewpoint of which I've always tended to agree with, drugs should be legal no matter the circumstances. I remember coming to this forum in the early days of Bitcoin which is also favored by libertarians, I wonder what the majority political viewpoint of HN is. Seems like it would skew toward the libertarian viewpoints of socioeconomics and public policy
- dzhiurgis 1y ago
  We need DRM'd heroin. If you allowed it to be bought willy-nilly unsuspecting people and kids would eventually accidentally OD on it.
saulpw 1y ago
Drugs Now Legal If User Is Employed https://theonion.com/drugs-now-legal-if-user-is-employed-1819566391/ https://theonion.com/drugs-now-legal-if-user-is-employed-181...

mattmaroon 1y ago

This is actually why I think all recreational drugs should be legal. I know of approximately 0 people who have had the thought “I’d try heroin if it were legal”. All making it illegal does is make the supply deadly. I truly believe that there would be fewer addicts and fewer overdoses if you could buy regulated heroin.

ofrzeta 1y ago
It's certainly true and in civilized countries (like the Swiss I think) the state offers the possibility to have your drugs screened and you can get clean syringes. Makes so much more sense than to criminialize addicted humans.
- Nursie 1y ago
  In Switzerland, at the appropriate facilities, the state provides heroin to addicts. This has a dual effect - addicts get clean drugs and take them under medical supervision, reducing deaths, helping funnel some towards programs that will eventually get them clean etc. With this sort of support it turns out that people no longer steal to get their fix either, and can usually even hold down employment pretty well. But also the young folk get to see these tired, worn out, older people queuing outside the clinic in the morning to get their fix and realise hey, maybe that isn't so cool and edgy after all... Seems like a good plan to me, the problem is (as ever) puritans and their politicians, it's an easy thing to screech about. All it would take to kill it dead in a lot of countries would be someone standing up to shout "The opposition party want to spend YOUR tax money giving DRUGS to filthy JUNKIES!"
tayo42 1y ago
if anything it being legal would make it less cool IME most people dont want to be addicted, theyre just in a rut or life took them a certain way and just need support to get through the other side. People who dont use drugs are way to hysterical about drug use though to ever see real improvement.
- mattmaroon 1y ago
  Yes.
kenjackson 1y ago
I actually think more people would use if it were legal. Maybe not immediately but over time it would become more normalized. Regular joe character in tv shows would just use heroine. It would be available at college parties next to kegs. Etc…. And heroine companies (now that it’s legal) would find ways to market their drugs even if direct advertising isn’t legal.
- mattmaroon 1y ago
  I don’t think that’s true of heroin to a large extent, but I do think it would be true of cocaine, psychedelics, and other drugs. But regardless, I think the overall effect would be net harm mitigation given all the downsides of making it illegal. Funding violent crime at home and abroad, stigmatizing it and deterring treatment, overdoses from unsafe supply, etc. It’s entirely possible that more people would use it and it would still result in less harm to society.
  - sfn42 1y ago
    I've been saying the same thing for years. Everything should be legal, prohibition just causes more problems. We learned this lesson with alcohol already. Making it legal we could have things sold over the counter in pharmacies with proper age checks, we could even require further checks like before you can purchase heroin you need to go through a process where it is explained how it works, what a reasonable dose is, what side effects are, how addictive it is etc. Same with other stuff. Most drugs are quite safe and harmless if done by people who know what they're doing. Of course self destructive people and morons would still harm themselves but honestly I'm not too worried about that. They will always find ways to harm themselves. At least drug users wouldn't be funding cartels and warlords etc.
    - jeffhuys 1y ago
      Go to the QuittingKratom subreddit and see for yourself how a legal opioid-like substance destroys lives.
      - 1y ago
Bratmon 1y ago
The US literally just tried that with gambling, and we discovered that making gambling legal increased the number of addicts by so much that it shows up in "total bankruptcies" statistics.
- mattmaroon 1y ago
  The key difference is people view heroin as something that will ruin your life, but think gambling is a harmless pass time until it is too late. There’s nobody who doesn’t know the perils of heroin, legal gambling existed in most places in some form and had for a long time. People view it much more like alcohol than heroin. Also we didn’t just try that with gambling (48 states have had some legal form of it forever) we just tried it with online sports books, which turn out to be a particularly virulent form of gambling. And we haven’t really begun to sensibly regulate that, a lot of harm may be reduced in the near future as we do.
  - monerozcash 1y ago
    It's worth noting that there's a form of gambling that's exactly the same as sports betting that has been legal for much longer, the financial markets.
    - makeset 1y ago
      The analogy is apt only in that financial markets are "a form of gambling" exactly as much as sports is.
  - lelanthran 1y ago
    > The key difference is people view heroin as something that will ruin your life, Now they do; make it legal and in two generations it won't be viewed that way because, after all, it's legal!
- michelb 1y ago
  Isnt that more because gambling is ingrained with American culture? It’s seems to be pretty much everywhere.
presentation 1y ago
One data point, I live in East Asia, it’s very illegal, and vanishingly few people have drug problems (often they substitute for other problems that are less illegal, like gambling or sex).
- mattmaroon 1y ago
  Well, that’s really nice, and I don’t know how you pull that off, but it doesn’t translate to western societies. It’s very illegal most places, but how much of a problem it is seems to vary by region.
  - _9ptr 1y ago
    It doesn't translate because you don't get the death penalty for having 1g of Cannabis
    - bauruine 1y ago
      It doesn’t translate to western societies because the vast majority of western societies thinks the death penalty is unacceptable at all. And getting the death penalty for drug possession no mater the scale is absolutely insane.
      - kakacik 1y ago
        Well Singapore for example ain't democracy in western sense at all. Rather some longer-term benevolent dictatorship with some smart (and lucky) moves. Canning for what we definitely dont call severe crimes in the west, executing mentally disabled people manipulated into drug smuggling and so on. Its also a society openly xenophobic for immigration to any ethnicity not being part of original mix of population (not race, not language but properly ethnicity, ie tamils from south india big NO, malay tamils YES). White westerners not welcomed, only toleracted for specific set of high flying positions, and only for specific time while they keep economy running. Its a very interesting place to observe some sort of south east asian version of Switzerland (sans most freedoms), but there are hardly any lessons for the west. Sort of like what ideal China could be, but probably never will. If you want to see proper western-possible high point, that Switzerland IMHO is top spot. They have some drug addicts, but have rather sensible approach to them.
N_Lens 1y ago
The cruelty is the point.
- Fnoord 1y ago
  Yes, how very Christian.
themafia 1y ago
> I know of approximately 0 people who have had the thought “I’d try heroin if it were legal”. Perhaps it's because they weren't experiencing enough pain at the time. I think most people fall into drugs circumstantially, I'm not sure it often presents as a conscious lifestyle decision. > I truly believe that there would be fewer addicts and fewer overdoses if you could buy regulated heroin. I believe that there would be less drug use overall if our economic system wasn't as rapacious as it currently is.
ralfd 1y ago
But is the reverse true? Do you know people who thought “I will try heroin because it is illegal”?
- johnnienaked 1y ago
  You never heard of forbidden fruit?
kgwgk 1y ago
> I know of approximately 0 people who have had the thought “I’d try heroin if it were legal”. How many people do you approximately know of that have had the thought “I’d try heroin”? > I truly believe that there would be fewer addicts and fewer overdoses if you could buy regulated heroin. How many people do you approximately know of that have had the thought “I’d try heroin but only because I cannot buy regulated heroin”?
- rkomorn 1y ago
  Also... isn't the whole opioid addiction crisis basically because people were in fact buying regulated ~heroin?
  - etempleton 1y ago
    A lot of people in the early OOs got addicted to pills because doctors subscribed them liberally and they weren’t regulated that well in hospitals so medical staff who wanted to make an extra buck could easily steal and sell them. The government cracked down on this and then all of the pill poppers turned to heroin, which now is mostly fent.
    - rkomorn 1y ago
      If we're gonna start factoring how well regulated something is, then sure, as long as there's a problem, something's not "regulated."
    - mattmaroon 1y ago
      They were told by doctors it was non-addictive too.
  - johnnienaked 1y ago
    Lol yes opiate addictions of all stripes for all time can be tied directly back to that oxycontin commercial from 1999
    - rkomorn 1y ago
sodafountan 1y ago
That's a very libertarian viewpoint of which I've always tended to agree with, drugs should be legal no matter the circumstances. I remember coming to this forum in the early days of Bitcoin which is also favored by libertarians, I wonder what the majority political viewpoint of HN is. Seems like it would skew toward the libertarian viewpoints of socioeconomics and public policy
dzhiurgis 1y ago
We need DRM'd heroin. If you allowed it to be bought willy-nilly unsuspecting people and kids would eventually accidentally OD on it.

saulpw 1y ago

Drugs Now Legal If User Is Employed https://theonion.com/drugs-now-legal-if-user-is-employed-1819566391/ https://theonion.com/drugs-now-legal-if-user-is-employed-181...