[Mustang1]

Then you must also be pissed off when tax money goes to special education, Lupus or HIV sufferers and the unemployed - they're also a minority of society too.

[Blue_Nose]

ridenrain wrote:

I'm pissed off to see such huge health, police and society resources dedicated to such a small minority of people. A small minority of people who are illegal and being used to further a political drug agenda.

Hospitals are full of expensive equipment that will only ever be used by a "minority of people".

If healthcare only ever applied to the "majority" of health issues, the only treatment you'd ever receive is being given polysporin and/or tylenol.

[ridenrain]

Mustang1 wrote:

Then you must also be pissed off when tax money goes to special education, Lupus or HIV sufferers and the unemployed - they're also a minority of society too.

Special education, Lupus or HIV sufferers are not stealing brass plaques off grave markers to buy help. Their not robbing cars, stealing bicycles or electrical wires. Nor are the doctors or aid workers for these people defending their turf with shootouts and murders using illegal handguns.
Even in some of the poorest, most impoverished nations, their people act better than these "super offending" addicts.

I think you're analogy is faulty.

[Mustang1]

ridenrain wrote:

Mustang1 wrote:

Then you must also be pissed off when tax money goes to special education, Lupus or HIV sufferers and the unemployed - they're also a minority of society too.

Special education, Lupus or HIV sufferers are not stealing brass plaques off grave markers to buy help. Their not robbing cars, stealing bicycles or electrical wires. Nor are the doctors or aid workers for these people defending their turf with shootouts and murders using illegal handguns.
Even in some of the poorest, most impoverished nations, their people act better than these "super offending" addicts.

I think you're analogy is faulty.

Big shock - you missed the point. I was commenting on the "minority" aspect of your comment (you'll notice Blue also zeroed in on this), so next time, if that wasn't your intended point, learn to articulate yourself better.

Now, lots of people see these "minorities" as drains on society, just like drug addicts (and do you include nicotine addicts, alcoholics in your little commentary as well?) and others that dearly need society to help them. Should alcoholism receive the same treatment as other addicts? According to your rudimentary logic, it should.

[ridenrain]

You tried to paint these addicts as hapless victims of society or chance. They are not. A minority of true victims is very different than a minority of addicts who may never have intended to end up as skid row addicts, did have a hand in their decent. Very few go from bankers and lawyers to skid row junkies without a few intermediate steps along the way. Somewhere along the line, they made a series of bad mistakes and this is the bottom.
Society is charitable and we should take care of them but that does not mean we lose focus of the greater good. These addicts and their supporters think that this is an acceptable "lifestyle" and society should accomidate them. I do not.

[Mustang1]

ridenrain wrote:

You tried to paint these addicts as hapless victims of society or chance. They are not. A minority of true victims is very different than a minority of addicts who may never have intended to end up as skid row addicts, did have a hand in their decent. Very few go from bankers and lawyers to skid row junkies without a few intermediate steps along the way. Somewhere along the line, they made a series of bad mistakes and this is the bottom.
Society is charitable and we should take care of them but that does not mean we lose focus of the greater good. These addicts and their supporters think that this is an acceptable "lifestyle" and society should accomidate them. I do not.

I didn't paint anyone as unfortuante victims, i merely said society has the means to address their problems. Don't ascribe views to me, it reeks of desperation.

Furthermore, i guess you'll be running away from my point about alcoholics too? Typical. According to your rather fractured logic and medieval worldview, alcoholics fall into the exact same category and I guess intolerant people like you (and let's be honest, i seriously doubt YOU haven't had some help from society) see them as lost causes and social parasites.

It's interesting that someone like you is so intolerant.

[DerbyX]

No matter what you say you cannot change the fact they are people in need of help no different then anybody else.

Should hospitals turn away anybody with a "preventable" disease because they engaged in behaviour that put them ar greater risk?

Arteriosclerosis? Too bad, you should have eaten better?

Lung cancer? Tough. You choose to smoke so now you pay the price?

STD? Hey, you knew the risks when you engaged in sexual intercourse for a non-reproductive purpose.

If you play the "they aren't true victims" card then the same logic can be used to disqualify over half of people using healthcare because they engaged in behaviour willingly and knowingly that caused their problems.

If you play the "minority shouldn't get the resources" card then you have already been busted on that.

If you play the "my taxes shouldn't go to ...." then everyone of us can point to any number of govt spending initiatives they shouldn't have to support.

The bottome line that will always be true is that they are people in need of help and helping them helps others if it helps prevent even a few transmissions of disease especially to people who might not be actual drug users but somehow contracted it from one.

Your lack of compassion is extremely telling about you.

[ridenrain]

If you've got examples of alcoholics snatching purses or breaking into cars for change, I'd be happy to read them. Most alcoholics, like pot smokers, are usually functional within their addictions.
Since you grought it up:

Alcoholics have alcoholics anonymous. A self supporting, private venture with a very high succeess rate.

There is a spin off called Narcotics Anonymous. Why can't we use this very successful model in East Vancouver instead of pissing money down the drain?

After all, the purpose here is to help these people get off drugs, not to perpetuate their dependancy. The only ones who benefit from enabling addicts are the pushers and the doctors and poverty pimps that support this industry.

[Blue_Nose]

ridenrain wrote:

There is a spin off called Narcotics Anonymous. Why can't we use this very successful model in East Vancouver instead of pissing money down the drain?

Who says you can't?

Nobody's pretending that Insite is the final solution to drug addiction - it's merely addressing the immediate dangers facing addicts until they can get the help they need.

Narcotics Anonymous or a similar program isn't going to work overnight, and in the meantime, they're still at risk of getting serious diseases and putting others at risk.

Your strategy - throwing addicts in jail - isn't going to encourage anyone to come forward and participate in such a program, though. That kind of thinking has to go before they can do anything.

[Mustang1]

ridenrain wrote:

If you've got examples of alcoholics snatching purses or breaking into cars for change, I'd be happy to read them. Most alcoholics, like pot smokers, are usually functional within their addictions.

Wait a second! Are you telling me that drunks don't commit crimes?!?!? There's no crimes that involve the abuse of liquor?!?!? Are you friggin' that daft? That has to be one of the dumbest things written on this forum in a long time - and there's been some whoppers, so congrats! Seriously, walk away, because now you're embarrassing yourself, as usual

Quote:

Since you grought it up:

I didn't "grought" anything up.

Quote:

Alcoholics have alcoholics anonymous. A self supporting, private venture with a very high succeess rate.

And there aren't state-sponsored ventures too? And let me guess, you wouldn't support them anyway, huh?

Quote:

There is a spin off called Narcotics Anonymous. Why can't we use this very successful model in East Vancouver instead of pissing money down the drain?

After all, the purpose here is to help these people get off drugs, not to perpetuate their dependancy. The only ones who benefit from enabling addicts are the pushers and the doctors and poverty pimps that support this industry.

I love how intolerant antiquated thinking always thinks that private endeavors somehow are the only answer and yet, they seem to find no problem taking a dive at the public trough when it suits them. Sorry, but who are you to question who uses basic, rudimentary health services, especially if they treat problems that could turn into even greater social ills if left unchecked? The arrogance is astonishing, considering the source

[EyeBrock]

Me, I think we should give up on drug prohibition and control it via taxes and sell it all at government stores.

If somebody wants to snort coke, inject heroin etc, sell it to them for a reasonable rate so they don't mug/b&e/steal from the 99% of the population not into hard drugs.
Legislate offences for being high/using in public as we do with booze and we are good to go.
Isn't that what we do now with alcohol which was the last major intoxicant that went through the prohibition-to-legal route?
Al Capone and his boys got rich off that one, lots of people are getting rich from drug prohibition.
Put a reasonable tax on nasty drugs to cover health care costs and let the loser addicts do what they will do anyway, whether it's legal or illegal. At least then they will stop annoying the rest of us.

These half measures may be palatable but they don't impact on the problem one bit.

[C.M. Burns]

Demian_164 wrote:

I have to agree with him on this one. I dont really give a shit what the doctors say, i refuse to allow my money to be used to subsidize drug use. If insite is so important to these people then they can donate their own money to keep it going.

I refuse to allow my money to be used to pay interest on the national debt just so a bunch of fat, lazy bankers can get a little richer!

Instead, I'll gladly put that money toward some clean needles... maybe even the needle your kid uses one day.

[C.M. Burns]

ridenrain wrote:

After all, the purpose here is to help these people get off drugs, not to perpetuate their dependancy.

No quite - the purpose of Insite is to keep them alive long enough that they have a chance to get into rehab. It's a whole lot to get people off drugs when they're breathing. Similarly, an IV drug user who's been infected by HIV is gonna be pretty hard to motivate into rehab.

[EyeBrock]

Insite is a bad idea but done for the right reasons.
Doing nothing but enforcement is way worse.

I truly believe drug prohibition is a total waste of time.
Controlled but open access to narcotics, in the same way alcohol is available, will cut down on the problems addicts inflict on the populace.

You can't force people to give up their addiction, they have to do that.
What we can do is give them what they want for a reasonable price, taxed and controlled by law.
Any pharmaceutical company can produce this shite for a fraction addicts pay for it.

It’s time to stop the nasty peripheral effects that addicts inflict on us in their quest for the next hit.
Give them the shite for the price of a six-pack and watch robberies, prostitution, b&e’s etc drop to an infinitesimal level.

[ridenrain]

Mustang1 wrote:

ridenrain wrote:

If you've got examples of alcoholics snatching purses or breaking into cars for change, I'd be happy to read them. Most alcoholics, like pot smokers, are usually functional within their addictions.

Wait a second! Are you telling me that drunks don't commit crimes?!?!? There's no crimes that involve the abuse of liquor?!?!? Are you friggin' that daft? That has to be one of the dumbest things written on this forum in a long time - and there's been some whoppers, so congrats! Seriously, walk away, because now you're embarrassing yourself, as usual

Who's being difficult now? Really. You're so intolerant of others yet you are now playing the fool.
Drunks commit crimes BECAUSE their drunk. We're all painfully aware of that.
It's not common for a sober person to commit a crime to buy alcohol. There may be examples of Russian tank crews drinking their brake fluid but most alcoholics are not the ones breaking into houses or cars to get money to buy booze.

Do you need to look up this analogy thing up? I can wait while you do.

Mustang1 wrote:

I love how intolerant antiquated thinking always thinks that private endeavors somehow are the only answer and yet, they seem to find no problem taking a dive at the public trough when it suits them. Sorry, but who are you to question who uses basic, rudimentary health services, especially if they treat problems that could turn into even greater social ills if left unchecked? The arrogance is astonishing, considering the source

A non-profit, pivate industry like AA is far more effective and efficient at getting addicts off drugs.

Insights main purpose is to reduce or stop the transmission of infection among interveinious drug users. It's open to debate if it's doing that but that task alone is not enough. More needs to be done. If these addicts were registered, given metadone or alternative drugs, removed from that surrounding and regulated better, we'd control the desease problem, reduce crime and hopefully rehabilitate them.

Insite is a solution to an offshoot of the addict problem. We need to cure the addict problem instead.


I'm screwed now...
I was going to use Narconon Vancouver Drug Prevention as an example of rehabilitation but I notice on the their website:

Quote:

Narconon Vancouver has been a licensed member with Narconon International since October, 1999. Narconon uses the drug rehabilitation research of humanitarian L. Ron Hubbard® in the pursuits of creating a more drug-free society. When speaking to kids and parents, Narconon utilizes the latest discoveries on the harm of drugs as well as Hubbard’s research into addiction. We provide insight into the bio-chemical effects of drugs on the human body, mind and life. Narconon’s purpose is to work with others to decrease and ultimately eliminate drug abuse in society.

Based on that, I wouldn't send my dog to them, but there are groups that do that sort of work and are not founded on the delusions of failed science fiction writters.