Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging • Hacker News Board

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

#481

Post by coding123 » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:17 PM UTC

cyberax wrote: post #210

burkaman wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a common theory but it isn't true. There are a lot of homeless people in San Fransisco because there are a lot of people there and it's hard to afford a home. From a huge recent survey of homelessness in California: > Nine out of ten participants lost their last housing in California; 75% of participants lived in the same county as their last housing. https://homelessness.ucsf.edu/sites/default/files/2023-06/…

This data is st00pid. It relies on self-reporting, and the questions are coached to get the "required" result. A while ago I did an experiment, I found the list of people convicted for typical "homeless" crimes in SF, and did a background search on them. About 90% had extensive crime records in other states, far away from CA. This is not a definitive result for sure, but it's suggestive.

Either you are lying or the mainstream media is lying. I am not having ANY luck with mainstream media, but I can't just trust you either. Show me your data.

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

#482

Post by fireflash38 » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:17 PM UTC

dvt wrote: post #473

simonh wrote: post #446

What was done in Oregon, based on the successful policy in Portugal, was decriminalising use and possession of very small quantities. Distribution and sale are still just as illegal as before. Basically I think this is the right approach. Drug use at low levels in endemic. I don't think it makes sense for huge swathes of otherwise law abiding citizens to be technically criminals. It ends up with grossly distorted dem…

> Basically I think this is the right approach. Drug use at low levels in endemic. I don't think it makes sense for huge swathes of otherwise law abiding citizens to be technically criminals. While I do agree that prohibition is probably not the answer, calling the Portuguese policy a "success" kind of misses the forest for the trees[1]. The most obvious problem is funding (which Porto is running out of): life-long s…

Do you think the person pops out of jail completely cured of their addiction? Or would they consume more societal resources afterwards.

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

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Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:19 PM UTC

JoeJonathan wrote: post #338

darth_avocado wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Legalization and decriminalization are two different things. I am all for decriminalizing. From a personal viewpoint, I don’t think drugs should be legalized. And as far as the legal administration etc., that already exists in SF and it has had a poor track record of helping people.

Decriminalizing drugs doesn’t fix the supply problem, which makes drug use such a budensome expense that there are all kinds of knock on effects (theft, poverty, etc). Someone commented on how rich people don’t see drug use, but sure they do. Aside from the fact that most everyone here is pretty rich and complaining about addicts, I come from an upper middle class suburb with a ton of addicts. Lots of people I went t…

[deleted]

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

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Post by waterheater » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:20 PM UTC

retrac wrote: post #414

HDMI_Cable wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not sure about in the United States, but here in Canada, we barely even have "good" and "bad" neighbourhoods. My city is quite well-mixed together economically. This is a joke, right? Like, either you live in a small town not large enough to have distinct neighbourhoods, or you are so isolated as to not see the abject poverty that many live here. Take Toronto, for example. Right on Mt. Pleasant Rd. and St. Clai…

You are forgetting that it's a 10 minute walk from Forest Hill to one of Toronto's poorest communities. They are part of the same community geographically. Same with Jane/Finch -- within walking distance of very wealthy detached suburban homes. It's even more jutted up against each other south of Bloor/Yonge, with some of the wealthiest high-rise condos directly against some of the poorest public housing and tent cit…

> It's the same geographic area sliced differently.

That's called a neighborhood. From what you're describing, those areas are now two different neighborhoods.

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

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Post by trobertson » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:20 PM UTC

HAL3000 wrote: post #468

brightlancer wrote: post #186

Rubbish. Folks made the exact same arguments about alcohol and marijuana. Specifically with alcohol, anyone can walk into a treatment center without fear that they'll be arrested for the mere _use_ of a substance. (Marijuana has very low risk and rates of addiction, physical or psychological.) If "hard" drugs are legalized, then they will likely be treated the same as alcohol and pot and tobacco: highly regulated, so…

In 1970 and 1971, in New York City, more adolescents died of heroin-related incidents than any other cause. Watch what you wish for. Hard drugs are not pot or alcohol; anyone who has used all of them at least a few times will tell you that. As someone who had heroin addicts in the family, and as someone who did a lot of alcohol, pot, ecstasy, cocaine, amphetamine, etc., in his 20s, I'm strongly against legalizing har…

> Hard drugs are not pot or alcohol

In point of fact, alcohol causes more deaths per year than all other drugs combined:

CDC [0]: Alcohol causes over 140,000 deaths per year according to data between 2015 and 2019

CDC [1]: All other drugs caused 100,000 deaths in the twelve month ending in April 2021

There's a lot of arguments to be made as to why (different legal status, different cultural norms around use, etc.) but the fact is that, currently, alcohol use is more lethal than all other drug use combined.

---

[0]: https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/features/excessive-alcohol-death...

[1]: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2021/...

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

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Post by bandrami » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:20 PM UTC

darth_avocado wrote: post #205

brightlancer wrote: post #186

Rubbish. Folks made the exact same arguments about alcohol and marijuana. Specifically with alcohol, anyone can walk into a treatment center without fear that they'll be arrested for the mere _use_ of a substance. (Marijuana has very low risk and rates of addiction, physical or psychological.) If "hard" drugs are legalized, then they will likely be treated the same as alcohol and pot and tobacco: highly regulated, so…

I generally agree with the sentiment that drugs should be treated like we treat other addictions like alcohol. Drugs should be decriminalized, anti social criminal behavior should stay criminalized. If I’m drunk and pee in public or assault someone, I’ll go to jail. That is what should happen if I do it under the influence of drugs. The one difference though between alcohol and some of the drugs is potency and how qu…

One big problem is that while the US has finally wrapped its brain around the fact that incarceration doesn't fix drug addiction, we have mistakenly fallen into the belief that treatment does. But even the absolute gold-standard treatment program (residential group and individual therapy with chemical assistance where appropriate) has about a 25% success rate (meaning still clean after 5 years).

Literally no matter what we do we are going to have a large number of people who have drugged their way out of society and will not be able to come back. And we need to figure out what to do about that.

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

#487

Post by inferiorhuman » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:20 PM UTC

jasonfarnon wrote: post #476

simonh wrote: post #446

What was done in Oregon, based on the successful policy in Portugal, was decriminalising use and possession of very small quantities. Distribution and sale are still just as illegal as before. Basically I think this is the right approach. Drug use at low levels in endemic. I don't think it makes sense for huge swathes of otherwise law abiding citizens to be technically criminals. It ends up with grossly distorted dem…

"based on the successful policy in Portugal" How are you defining successful? The linked article links to a recent wapo article from last week "Once hailed for decriminalizing drugs, Portugal is now having doubts". I don't know one way or the other, I'm just trying to collect more data points. Didn't Vancouver BC try something similar? (Seems a little odd that this Atlantic article, the Wapo article questioning Portu…

Beyond the headline Portugal is having doubts because they decided to gut funding. Where it was seen as promising or successful, now it's basically decriminalized drug use and no treatment or enforcement. Which kinda sounds like what Oregon is doing now and what Reagan did with mental health care in California.

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

#488

Post by tjalfi » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:21 PM UTC

VerminOctopus1 wrote: post #353

brightlancer wrote: post #186

Rubbish. Folks made the exact same arguments about alcohol and marijuana. Specifically with alcohol, anyone can walk into a treatment center without fear that they'll be arrested for the mere _use_ of a substance. (Marijuana has very low risk and rates of addiction, physical or psychological.) If "hard" drugs are legalized, then they will likely be treated the same as alcohol and pot and tobacco: highly regulated, so…

It’s amazing you can log onto this website and spout utter bullshit like “assault and theft have been decriminalized in California”. It’s a totally laughable thing to say and I don’t know why no one else has called this poster out for this blatant lie.

I'm not sure about assault, but Proposition 47[0] in 2014 substantially reduced the penalties for shoplifting, grand theft, forgery, fraud, and other crimes. Stealing under $950 is a misdemeanor regardless of how often someone does it.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_California_Proposition_47

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

#489

Post by ajsnigrutin » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:21 PM UTC

dumpsterdiver wrote: post #439

brightlancer wrote: post #186

Rubbish. Folks made the exact same arguments about alcohol and marijuana. Specifically with alcohol, anyone can walk into a treatment center without fear that they'll be arrested for the mere _use_ of a substance. (Marijuana has very low risk and rates of addiction, physical or psychological.) If "hard" drugs are legalized, then they will likely be treated the same as alcohol and pot and tobacco: highly regulated, so…

To be fair though, you don't really hear much about people selling their bodies (or other similar behavior, I.e. stealing from friends and family, etc) in order to obtain marijuana or alcohol. This kind of behavior is primarily encountered when hard drugs are part of the equation.

I live in a country with a lot of alcohol abuse, and there are many many cases of huge damages due to alcohol. And yes, that includes stealing. And stealing usually comes after all the money is used up, and there's none left to pay the bills or food, even for a spouse and possibly kids.

There are a lot of secondary costs too (traffic fines for drunk driving, especially if they cause an accident, stuff destroyed while drunk, etc.)

But yeah, our national anthem is a part of a drinking song... so yeah.

Re: Oregon decriminalized hard drugs – early results aren’t encouraging

#490

Post by brightlancer » Tue, Aug 01, 2023, 11:22 PM UTC

antisyzygy wrote: post #400

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Marijuana legalization hasn't lead to any major problems. People don't even bother getting it on the black market anymore where it is legal. They go for what's convenient. This is actually really not true at all, and it's important to be honest about the reality. First, in many places where weed is now legal, black markets have continued to thrive because there are high taxes on legal weed, and thus black market we…

Eh I don't know. I would guess in some States that implemented dumb policies it could be the case. WA and CO are where my experience was. The product is more often than not cheaper than the black market prices were. It was pretty common for a black market eighth to cost 40-80 dollars, and you're looking at 20-60 dollars for legal stuff now even with taxes. It's a bit more expensive in WA but I'd say comparable to bla…

I don't smoke (or eat or whatever), but I've been constantly told by folks in Denver how much cheaper it is to get marijuana illegally. I've been told the product is crap but much cheaper.

We should legalize marijuana (and everything else), but if the legal market is taxed so highly that it only targets wealthy users and not Joe Schmoe, then the black market remains. Most people are very price conscious.