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Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

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Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#551

Post by K0balt »

andrepd wrote: post #450
K0balt wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life is misery by default, as a natural consequence of life itself. The never ending tyranny of the need to eat and avoid being eaten is the normal state of affairs. Honestly, if a person isn’t up for it, we need to stop trying to convince them to stay around and be miserable. Elective suicide should be a basic right, and drugs are one way out. We only create misery by “helping” people that don’t want hep. Criminaliz…

> Life is misery by default, as a natural consequence of life itself. The never ending tyranny of the need to eat and avoid being eaten is the normal state of affairs. Edgy, I would definitely have posted that on myspace when I was 14. Of course, that's not true. We are not hunter-gatherers, or pre-industrial farmers. We have abundance of all of life's necessities and even more. >We only create misery by “helping” pe…

Maybe you missed the parts in my comments where anyone who wants to move back into society just has to walk outside and get on a bus?

And by default, I mean if you take no action. If you don’t believe me, try it some time. Do literally nothing to improve or maintain your living situation and see if that does not lead to misery.

People up inhere acting like I’m locking up addicts in death camps lol, but if you read my comment you can clearly see that what I am advocating is to let people do what they want without screwing up society at large.

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#552

Post by K0balt »

mike4ty4 wrote: post #511
K0balt wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life is misery by default, as a natural consequence of life itself. The never ending tyranny of the need to eat and avoid being eaten is the normal state of affairs. Honestly, if a person isn’t up for it, we need to stop trying to convince them to stay around and be miserable. Elective suicide should be a basic right, and drugs are one way out. We only create misery by “helping” people that don’t want hep. Criminaliz…

If you say they are just self-destroying and "want to create suicide" and "don't want to help those who don't want help" then why not both not help AND not punish at the same time, and just let "nature" do it all? That is, you have elective suicide AND you say they have a free pass out of punishment (basically they can whinny out of public use without ANYTHING adverse), and because "life is misery" just you yourself…

Because their actions are endangering others. Our rights to self determination end where we infringe upon the rights of others. Public drug abuse has deleterious externalities. So just do it in your home, or go get a free home to do it in, no questions asked.

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#553

Post by K0balt »

gruez wrote: post #502
K0balt wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Concrete. Everything concrete. Anything not concrete is removable.

So the equivalent of putting them in jail cells, minus the bars?

At the lowest levels, yes, because people at that level destroy everything they touch.. and if they are above that level then they can decorate as they wish, rugs and furniture are a thing.

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#554

Post by K0balt »

HumblyTossed wrote: post #464
K0balt wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life is misery by default, as a natural consequence of life itself. The never ending tyranny of the need to eat and avoid being eaten is the normal state of affairs. Honestly, if a person isn’t up for it, we need to stop trying to convince them to stay around and be miserable. Elective suicide should be a basic right, and drugs are one way out. We only create misery by “helping” people that don’t want hep. Criminaliz…

> Life is misery by default, as a natural consequence of life itself. The never ending tyranny of the need to eat and avoid being eaten is the normal state of affairs. > Honestly, if a person isn’t up for it, we need to stop trying to convince them to stay around and be miserable. Elective suicide should be a basic right, and drugs are one way out. We only create misery by “helping” people that don’t want hep. What a…

We should, I agree. But not everyone wants to participate.

I believe life is wonderful and precious… but it is , by default, misery.

If you do nothing (the default condition) to sustain or improve your existence, you will be miserable. That is the never ending tyranny of imperative action.

That is the fundamental nature of life, and not everyone is up for it. And that’s ok.

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#555

Post by 4RealFreedom »

reducesuffering wrote: post #540
4RealFreedom wrote: post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely agree with you. The only reason drugs are expensive is because they've been made illegal. Don't get me started on the secondary aspects like people not being able to get pain killers after surgery. Legalize all of them and make them cheap or just hand them out. Public use should be met with harsh penalties. The war on drugs has been so expensive in cash money and the human cost. We need to try something ra…

> should be met with harsh penalties > war on drugs has been so expensive > we need to try something radically different You want something different and then advocate for the same?

What!? Really!? That's your takeaway? I don't even know what to say other than taking select talking points and attempting to use those as a gotcha is disingenuous. Argue against what was posted. The point was I don't think children should be exposed to drug use. Why do you think that's a good idea? If it's not, then how do we keep children from seeing it?

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#556

Post by JTon »

robocat wrote: post #539
alsetmusic wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t see an argument against the social merit of alcohol here. I dated an enabler who knew that alcohol helped ease my social anxiety around strangers. She told me we’d get a couple of drinks into me at the bar when going to office parties. It worked. Made me very sociable. I’m genuinely curious how you define sociability of a drug or substance. I know alcohol is detrimental to society at large. On an individual b…

Calling alcohol social feels like an evil marketing gimmick - certainly our advertising pretends it is social. Alcohol is deeply socially destructive - we know the stereotypical examples of damage in the the poor and the indigenous communities. The examples of damage in middle-class homes of the wealthy (e.g. doctors) and the average working class (tradies and nurses) is much less visible. The words “social” and “alc…

We're very far apart on this issue. I feel like you must not drink socially, so you're not exposed to the milder effects of alcohol. Alcohol enables both social and anti-social behavior. It doesn't have to be black and white.

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#557

Post by Salgat »

boredumb wrote: post #354

Anyone who thinks funding rehab centers and getting homeless drug addicts into free apartment units are people who have never been around homeless drug addicts. There may be some wonderful examples of this working but 99.8% of the people you will encounter on your commute are not about to participate in rehab, and if you ask them they will give you a history of apartments and homes they've been asked to leave due to…

I hate to say it but the type of folks who are homeless and suffer from mental illness usually have a fundamental incompatibility with society and should be forced into mental illness institutions. If they can be rehabilitated, great, if not, at least they are in a place that can help them and protect society from them.

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#558

Post by dang »

EA-3167 wrote: post #477
dang wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you please stop posting in the flamewar style to HN? You've been doing it repeatedly in this thread, plus we've had to ask you about this more than once before. We're trying for curious conversation here. Posting aggressively and swipily really kills that. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I apologize, I was getting overly passionate about the topic, I'll rein myself in.

Appreciated!

Re: Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts

#560

Post by DropInIn »

peoplefromibiza wrote: post #549
DropInIn wrote: post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 4 walls they get are literally a single room... If you put another person in there outcomes will be even worse. What everyone's missing is the Quality of the housing. If the place is so roach infested and you fight bed bugs others bring in and you constantly lose everything you own to the conditions of the building, then in what mind would that have better outcomes than on the street? The depression that they ter…

> The 4 walls they get are literally a single room. Theoretically yes. In practice, no. I've dealt with heroin addiction in my family, believe me when I say that privacy is not the solution, the solution is giving people a purpose outside of their constant quest to find ways to shoot up. As I said, 4 walls can be beneficial, unless it's 4 walls to hide and keep everybody else out, except their dealers. I'm all for re…

Society can't have it both ways - they can't be both receiving constant direct intervention and be invisible at the same time.

So long as the majority just want them out of sight or dead, we need to focus on ensuring that they are seen as members of the community rather than a blight, right?

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