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Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

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Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should your drug use, or anyone else's, create obligations for other people to support you, treat you, and help you overcome addiction? The libertarian case for legalizing drugs falls apart if society has to take responsibility for providing support systems as a reaction to the actions of individual drug users. Frankly, most people would rather continue to ban drugs than pay for treatment for people who abuse the…

Your argument is (in my opinion) naively individualistic. You argue that someone's actions should not create any obligations for support. But that denies the interconnected nature of society. If someone gets injured and is unable to work, and has the misfortune of living in the United States (as opposed to Canada or Australia) then he cost of fixing them may be unbearable, meaning that a potential useful human life h…

> a potential useful human life has now been subjected to the sidelines, rendering them unable to contribute to society. Thus we have a responsibility to provide safety nets to restore them to health and a functional member of society.

This implies a commonly held value structure that prioritizes fuller utilization of human resources. Beyond the in-thread demonstrated non-universality of this particular metric, which raises the question of how and whether to apportion responsibility among ideological dissenters (by force? by opt-out choice? by opt-in choice? casuistic contract negotiations? (only the first scales with low implementation overhead)), "responsibility" does not exist in a vacuum. If one is responsible for something else, one is obligated to affect it. If one is to act to modify with legitimacy, one must have legitimate authority over the modified. Therefore, responsibility for the welfare of others implies authority over the status of others. Mutual responsibility thus creates mutual authority, which is a breeding ground for collisions of contrasting decisions, and thus conflict. Because effective decision-making systems nigh by definition reduce the possibility of conflict, executors of explicitly overlapping authority generally must be trained in the harmonious interaction of their jurisdictions. It is difficult to train nation-state scale populations, thus particularly in harmonious jurisdiction overlap. The rules for interaction must then be so simple as to be (or become) obvious and heuristic.

What simple rules do you propose to effectively avoid mass conflicts of authority between humans with the full distribution of domain competencies displayed in a nation-state population, e.g. that of the United States of America?

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#283

I've never taken an illegal drug in my life. I've smoked a cigarette about 5 times. I drank in college but lately I've cut that out of my life as well. I had a security clearance with drug testing requirements for a while and now I just don't like the feeling of a hangover from alcohol or the risk of ingesting random plants/chemicals made by shady people. In short: I'm the most vanilla, square, anti-drug person you c…

Drugs are harmful. Especially in excess. Are you willing to make all illegal drugs available without moderation?

Let it be. We are good as it is. I personally have suffered from an excess of Marijuana and Alcohol and its not pleasant. I've since totally given up smoking for a year (but the Alcohol continues). Why? Because Alcohol is freely available.

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all addicts are in need of help. And many addicts really do enjoy being high or otherwise find opiates help them through life, work, etc. and do not want to quit. And out of those that do want to quit, I'd bet a large amount of it is due to the high prices the legal scheme enforces. With reasonable prices, the biggest issue with being an opiate user disappears.

That's just not true. Opiate addiction is a very serious condition. There are 100 bigger issues than "price". No study ever found anything to back up that claim.

There are not 100 issues bigger than price. There might be a few, depending on the user. Legality, sure. Access to IV equipment, perhaps. Other than that, opiates have little side effects outside of respiration depression and constipation.

Implicit in proper pricing is that it'd be legal and easy to use.

Which issues are you thinking about?

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all addicts are in need of help. And many addicts really do enjoy being high or otherwise find opiates help them through life, work, etc. and do not want to quit. And out of those that do want to quit, I'd bet a large amount of it is due to the high prices the legal scheme enforces. With reasonable prices, the biggest issue with being an opiate user disappears.

We should probably make a distinction between users and addicts. Not all users of drugs, even opiates, are physiologically or psychologically dependent on that drug, i.e., addicted. Of course addicts enjoy being high. I'd wager essentially all addicts enjoy the high, even if the joy is just the abatement of withdrawal symptoms. And while some addicts don't want to "quit", that's true, a vanishingly small percentage e…

By price I mean both price and accessibility/legality. Getting medicine seems to be a huge time waste. It also leads to the worst stereotype, the thieving-"will do anything"-junkie.

Legal morphine is already extremely affordable, about $1/gram.

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m an alcoholic. I’ve cut back on my use significantly, and I’m currently in a period of abstinence. Because alcohol is legal and socially accepted, it’s entirely my responsibility to manage my behaviour and keep my use to non-problematic levels. Not everyone has the social support to make that happen. I think legalisation would be beneficial, as you say, because the criminal justice system does not serve addicts. H…

Why should your drug use, or anyone else's, create obligations for other people to support you, treat you, and help you overcome addiction? The libertarian case for legalizing drugs falls apart if society has to take responsibility for providing support systems as a reaction to the actions of individual drug users. Frankly, most people would rather continue to ban drugs than pay for treatment for people who abuse the…

> Why should your drug use, or anyone else's, create obligations for other people to support you, treat you, and help you overcome addiction?

Well because we don't live an idealized Ayn Randian universe.

Unless someone moved off the grid, cut off all ties with society, and is on a boat in international waters, or some uninhabited island, they are part of a society. They might not like it, but they are.

If they have children, parents, siblings. They are part of the family. If a parent, is using drugs and not providing for their children, I don't think it makes for a healthy society to watch from the sidelines and say "That's ok. Everyone is responsible for themselves. The gospel of Ayn Rand says so. So let the children starve".

That doesn't advocate incarcerating or punishing anyone. But it advocates helping. And it is, and I think should be, a major obligation. At least I would happily spend my tax money on.

> The libertarian case for legalizing drugs falls apart if society has to take ...

It does fall apart. But making sure the liberatrian cause survives and is proven correct, is not a priority. What is a priority though, is making sure children have safety, shelter, are clothed, are not hungry etc. If, as a result, the libertarian cause must falter and be proven to be a joke, I think most people will be ok with that. (Although it seems here on HN quite a few would be rather distraught).

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#287
post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that there are two kinds of drug users, basically. People use drugs because of hardship and people who use drugs because of boredom. When it comes to the hardship camp, I think the best solution is to alleviate the hardship. This means making sure that everyone has a well paying, respectable job and making sure public infrastructure is healthy and so on. When it comes to boredom users though, it's hard to com…

You have no idea why people use drugs, so don't even try. "When it comes to boredom users though, it's hard to come up with a solution besides punishment." Wow. Why should 'bored' people who use drugs need punishment?

I do have a sense of why some people use drugs because I have lived inside of a heroin epidemic. There's no reason to have such a condescending tone. Anyway, they should be punished to prevent them from using dangerous drugs.

You shouldn't mix me up with prohibitionists and Christians. I only want to prevent unnecessary suffering. Heroin and other very hard drugs only cause suffering and death. I have seen this first hand. That's how I know. People seem to hate me personally for having these opinions and I can't imagine why because I only have the welfare of other people in mind.

edit: I have looked through some of your comments. At one point you posed the question: what is the difference between letting someone eat cheeseburgers and use drugs? You practically make my point for me. Regulating the contents of food is extremely effective in reducing health problems. It has been done with success in many places. Saying that hard drugs (not weed and the like) should just be legal is like saying we should let food companies put anything they want into their foods and by extension let people eat whatever they want. Obviously, everything is much better when we regulate our foods.

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#288
post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems the Libertarian mindset would lead someone who survived a plane crash to think that they chose the right seat, and those who died must have had poor seat choosing ability. TBH, that sounds like a complete caricature of a Libertarian thinker from where I'm sitting. Maybe there are people like that out there, and maybe some of them self-identify as Libertarians (or libertarians) but there's nothing inherent in…

Probably not all Libertarians are the same, but most I've dealt with have a selfish arrogance about the outcome of the choices they've made, and ignorance about the plight of others. There is also a strong desire to dismantle regulations and safety nets, because of a belief that it would bring immediate benefit themselves. The Libertopian ideal really does sound like a privatized "hellscape", which the Libertarians o…

Yeah, not just ignorance, but willful ignorance. You have to try really hard not to see how much luck and chaos has to do with every day life.

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#289
post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oversimplification. Water is cheap, do people drink too much, so they loose too much salt? People eat or drink to compensate for other things. Happens with heroine, too, sure. But for some the right drug at the right time is medicine, to get their life back in balance. If you have more options than just overeating or overdrinking, then your chances are higher that you find, what you need to get on with your life ...

Water is not addictive, the body has natural immune reactions to overdosing on water before it becomes fatal.

Sure. Just pointing out the flaws in, if something is cheap it gets used too much - explanation. Besides, nearly every activity can be addictive.

Re: Painkillers now kill more Americans than any illegal drug

#290

Are there any alternative treatments of pain that don't involve drugs? for ex http://www.570news.com/2016/03/06/waterloo-man-praises-local...

Check here: http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2015/12/healing-back-p...

And read comments (search for Todd Hargrove comment). Looks like there is more pain management science without drugs than many know.

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