An adult conversation about drugs?!

[feral chile]

Yes, we are talking about people who steal because they cannot afford to maintain their habit in any other way. So, in that respect, they might not steal if they were sufficiently wealthy to fund their habit in other ways. But to conclude that the are therefore offending because of poverty is stretching the point more than a little...they are offending because they have a drug habit which is beyond their means to sustain through legitimate income. take away the drug habit, or medicalise the addiction, and you take away the offending

You've done a sociology essay. I've got a masters in criminology....

Edited September 22, 2012 by feral chile

[feral chile]

Sorry, but it is entirely a causal link. many habitual users of illegal drugs commit property offences in order to fiund their habit. That is the reason they offend. They do not steal because they are pre-programmed to offend. The causality is situational, not hardwored in some way.

The fact remains that, in many cases, take away the habitual use of illegal drugs and you take away the offending.

There are essentially two ways you might do this. Remove the addiction or remove the need to obtain funds to purchase black market drugs

Edited September 22, 2012 by feral chile

[eFestivals]

I'm saying that I dont believe worm was asked to research anything by the government, never mind being asked to falsify his finding

it's certainly the case that no branch of central govt would commission research which would not credit its author and which doesn't come from any recognised academic research foundation(which is what worm claims of the research he does) and then expect that research to be taken seriously both within and outside of govt.

I know this because I have many friends who do or have worked directly within govt research departments (where the academic rigour and independence is beyond question) - the govt don't even get the choice about whether the research that is done within govt is published: it *IS* published, no matter how politically inconvenient that research might be. And all of this research is peer reviewed.

Worm has no piece of research, ever, that has been peer reviewed ... and that's because he has no piece of research that has ever been published under his name.

But yeah, worm is carrying out important research for govt, and the govt is asking that he fakes his research. Hmmm, OK.

Most habitual users of illegal drugs commit crime in order to pay for their addiction - so yes there is a direct link between illegal drug use and crime (mind you, that link would probably be broken if the drugs werent illegal...)

That's complete and utter bullshit.

Most - by a massive margin - habitual users of illegal drugs never once appear on the police radar, because they do not commit crime around their drug use (apart from the crime of the drug use itself of course).

Drug use if off the scale, and if crime were to match that then we'd be barricading our doors against the drugged up criminal masses.

[abdoujaparov]

That's complete and utter bullshit.

Most - by a massive margin - habitual users of illegal drugs never once appear on the police radar, because they do not commit crime around their drug use (apart from the crime of the drug use itself of course).

Drug use if off the scale, and if crime were to match that then we'd be barricading our doors against the drugged up criminal masses.

[abdoujaparov]

What I'm asking, is not whether crime pays for drugs, but whether drugs cause crime.

Edited September 22, 2012 by abdoujaparov

[Spartacus Mars]

In this thread: lots of people who should be chillaxing on good recreational drugs - but aren't.

[Spindles]

In this thread: lots of people who should be chillaxing on good recreational drugs - but aren't.

[worm]

Worm has no piece of research, ever, that has been peer reviewed

Edited September 22, 2012 by worm

[worm]

I'm saying that I dont believe worm was asked to research anything by the government, never mind being asked to falsify his finding

Edited September 22, 2012 by worm

[kaosmark2]

Heh. I've been reading but not commenting, as the opening post states, it's hard to have an adult conversation about such an emotive subject.

Alot of the posts seem to focus on the actions of the most notorious of drug users, heroin addicts, whereas of course the debate is much wider. There are many more negative factors in drug use in the broader spectrum than property crime and there are many drug users who are not in any way anti social as a result of their use.

A complex issue for sure. I read on with interest.

[Kyelo]

I have to use the case of Ketamine, how any educated person can justify lying comatosed out on the ground in the middle of a packed festival in the dark is clever after taking a drug that's for horses which they have paid silly money for from a farmer who is laughing all the way to the bank - yet clearly some intelligent if very misguided young people are doing so.

And how exactly would decriminalising farmerceuticals like ketamine work?

[abdoujaparov]

As is your perogative.

Not falsify. The methodological data was there for all to see. They wanted the write up from the perspective of positivist crime. I insisted on writing it up from the perspective of social constructivism i.e. that the government's attempt to label and control crime creates the crime.

Edited September 22, 2012 by abdoujaparov

[Rufus Gwertigan]

I think you're full of shit

tell us - which government department commissioned this research? Who did they commission it from? What, exactly, was the aim of the research? When was this supposed commission? What was your research methodology? Where was the research undertaken?

[Rufus Gwertigan]

I'm not sure that you are making a real distinction.

Yes, in some cases there is a direct link between consumtpion and an increased propensity to commit crime. Alcohol is the clearest example. Excessive alcohol consumption undoubtedly causes a proportion of violent crime.

On the other hand, habitual use of heroin increases the likelihood of the addict committing property crime, not because of any intrinsic effect of the drug, but because a full blown heroin addiction is difficult to sustain legitimately. In that sense, habitual heroin use significantly increases the risk of an individual offending.

edited to add

Causality and offending behaviour is notoriously difficult to pin down. The best you can ever say is that certain factors increase the risk of someone offending. Being a drug addict increases the risk, but not all addicts offend. Being a psychopath increases the risk, but not all psychopaths offend. And so on. There is no simple causal link....

[abdoujaparov]

I somehow get the impression that if Worm answers all of that you will still say it is shit.

[abdoujaparov]

I am confused. Difficult to link but you have been saying there is a direct link...

[abdoujaparov]

Personally if I was in charge, I'd legalize, control and market cannabis and MDMA. I'd decriminalize the rest for small, personal amounts. Now before anyone says anything, the above 2 are not my drug of choice so I'm not saying that for me. Just seems logical to me.

[Rufus Gwertigan]

No. The point is that it is difficult to say that there is a direct causal link between any one factor and offending behaviour. But it is the case that being an habitual user of illegal drugs increases the risk of committing acquisitive crime. It doesnt mean that you defibitely will, but it makes it more likely

[abdoujaparov]

That is a different argument from last night. Admittedly I said the link was tenuous (and that is based on stats) you were clear there was a direct link. We are in danger of going around in circles, and maybe this is a debate better done face to face so he you dont mind I will any out, otherwise it will get tedious and go on and on and on and on and on ;-)

[grumpyhack]

There seems to be a lot of conflation of arguments here.

Maybe there needs to be a clearer definition of drugs under discussion to begin with.

My drug of choice is caffeine and my drug of addiction is nicotine. Thankfully both are legal and therefore easily available through legitimate sources and relatively cheap.

Whether 'legitimising' or de-criminalising other drugs would do anything for their price or level of consumption is another question.

Prohibition of alcohol in the US in the thirties probably didn't do much to reduce consumption levels but it pushed a lot of people into law breaking and made some organised criminals very rich.

Ending prohibition probably didn't significantly increase consumption but instead of making criminal gangs rich it made major drink companies rich.

If tobacco manufacturers were allowed to produce cigarettes containing cannabis we would at least get a consistent level of strength and quality - in the same way that the nicotine content of cigarettes is clearly labelled.

[Rufus Gwertigan]

There is an irony in that 10 years ago my stance on drug use was the polar opposite to what I believe today. I was always anti drugs but I went through a period a few years back of trying as many as I could. Given that I have had problems with alcohol in the past I was taking a great risk and many drugs are moreish to say the very least. I did begin to have problems with one a bit ago but just cut it, and the people involved, out of my life. I really have no idea what the decriminalising of use or the legitimising of drugs could have. However I do know the positive aspect they have had in my life. That aspect is unmeasurable, especially in the way I have used during deaths in my family. I dont use at all any more and only did for a few years anyway, but I do wonder how things would have turned out if I had access to MD rather than drink at a young age.

[grumpyhack]

I remember having a chat to a police officer one Saturday night at Glasto and I asked what he would normally be doing were he not on Glastonbury duty and he said: "Dealing with the drunks being chucked out of the pubs in Frome,."

I asked which was easier and he said: "Drunks are much harder, we get fights and all sorts of problems. A load of stoned out hippies in a field are much easier."

An adult conversation about drugs must surely include alcohol which can be one of the most difficult drugs of all to deal with.

[eFestivals]

Many of my pieces have been, just not under my name. You know this. I worked as an annonymous research writer. I do the work, they pay me, put their name to it, jobs a good'n.

I don't know of a single piece of work you've done that's been peer reviewed.

I've yet to see a single piece of peer reviewed research where the author's name is not given.

I have seen an awful lot of research where the research assistants names are not given.

So please do point me in the direction of uncredited work being peer reviewed, along with the reasons why anyone would take seriously a piece of supposed academic work where the academic refuses to put his name to it.

I can do with a huge laugh.

As is your perogative.

Not falsify. The methodological data was there for all to see. They wanted the write up from the perspective of positivist crime. I insisted on writing it up from the perspective of social constructivism i.e. that the government's attempt to label and control crime creates the crime.

So which department of govt commissioned this research, then?

No answer equals no substance to your claims.

(Nothing of you naming that department of govt exposes your name or your work*, so don't bother giving that bollocks as a reason why not to ... and then hopefully I can ask a researcher friend of mine in that govt dept why they're commissioning biased research and not doing the research themselves).

(* unless of course you claim it's the only bit of outside work they've ever commissioned, which would make me laugh. A lot.)

I smell bullshit. Watch worm run away here.

[Spartacus Mars]

Also, someone being qualified in a subject does not make them an authority on the subject. That's "appeal to authority". There is debate within even the hard subjects - the actual sciences. For the soft subjects - the study subjects - the likes of history, politics, economics, sociology (all elements that feed criminology) - there is almost always a great deal of debate and contrary opinion between even the most eminent in the field. We cannot isolate and reproducibly study factors in the soft subjects so eventually all the evidence and all the research comes down to opinion, mainly through the selection criteria of the evidence and the assumptions of research.

A friend of mine lectures in criminology, he's a nice guy and bright enough, but I know - just know - his background (public school, full time education to the age of 40, very little exposure to the working classes) has, despite his desire and best efforts, affected his perceptions and assumptions.

Edited September 24, 2012 by Spartacus Mars

[eFestivals]

A friend of mine lectures in criminology, he's a nice guy and bright enough, but I know - just know - his background (public school, full time education to the age of 40, very little exposure to the working classes) has, despite his desire and best efforts, affected his perceptions and assumptions.

Any academic worth their salt won't have their opinions or perceptions affect what their properly conducted research tells them.

But for those who don't do academic and want to believe that the likes of weed is a gateway drug to harder drugs, why do the same people refuse to accept the idea that eating butter leads onto eating cheese?

I reckon that line gets to show how fucking stupid the gateway drug idea is - but for those who are still having problems, why is alcohol not also considered a gateway drug to hard drugs, given that there's a much stronger link for alcohol to hard drugs than there is of weed to hard drugs?

The simple fact is that the 'standard' banned drugs were not banned on the basis of any sense or research, but merely via the prejudices and ignorance of those people who attended that original "lets ban drugs" conference. Weed was banned on the say so of the Eygptian delegate, with few of the other delegates even having the smallest clue about the drug he was talking about.

Edited September 24, 2012 by eFestivals