Gee, MSB, I hope you had a fun day mixing concrete!!! At least that is real, and away from the web. It sounds like your brother-in-law might have had some serious problems with his wife before all of this started. My own theory on online addiction is that cyber reality is very compelling, but there needs to be something wrong in a relationship first, for someone to want to escape to that degree.
I think many people jump in gung ho when they discover chat rooms or SI or whatever, but sane and well-balanced personalities soon realize that equilibrium has been lost, and readjust. I know that when the magazines and newspapers and books start piling up at my bedside unread, and I see a lot of my daughter in the doorway by the computer saying "Mommy!!!", I need to spend less time here.
It's a little difficult to go away entirely, though, because I miss people I have never met but have become close to in some weird way. I usually feel I have achieved a reasonable balance when I am on the computer only when my family is watching tv, or early in the morning when everyone else is getting ready for the day and do not need me at all.
If S.J. is complaining, perhaps you should take it easy for awhile. The people right around us are usually pretty good guides to what is happening when we cannot always see as clearly.
I was going to do research on the decriminalization of drugs and write something that was actually a little bit scholarly, but in the interest of time I have decided to just express my opinions about drugs.
Since the beginning of time, people have tried to alter their state of consciousness. This is part of human behavior, and the urge is not easily altered. Perhaps five to ten percent of people have a larger need to kill pain with drugs and alcohol, usually because of personality maladjustments that develop in early childhood from some kind of neglectful or abusive parenting. Drug addicts are victims in a way, because of the influences on their personality development, and because addiction is a illness, although it is certainly their responsibity to get treatment!!!
Since this is all human nature, little positive is accomplished in trying to change it, in my opinion. Prohibition made the Kennedy family rich, because Joseph P. bootlegged liquor in from Canada, and smuggling and distribution of alcohol gave the Mafia a strong foothold in America. The vast South American drug cartels do not have to exist, and do so only because there is a profit motive in drug addiction that we could easily change by decriminalization. I cannot imagine who would harm you physically or financially via their drug use, except that almost all property crime is done to get money to buy drugs. The American governmental inderdiction policy has failed miserably, as 90% of drugs get through all the barriers we erect to detect them.
When you consider that decriminalization would stop this property crime, where people also often get hurt, doesn't it make more sense to decriminalize drugs? Or, on a more pragmatic note, if you add up all the money which is being spent by law enforcement in a futile battle to stop drug trafficking, wouldn't it make more sense to pay for treatment for people who want it? Drug addiction is a medical problem, not really a criminal one EXCEPT that we have made it that way!!! It is also discriminatory against the poor, who cannot afford to pay tens of thousands of dollars for therapy to make things better. I know that in San Francisco there are long waiting lists for free or inexpensive drug treatment. The movie "Gridlock'd" is about this also, if you happened to see it. Probably not, since you have just gotten "Relish" a year or so after we discussed it!! (I'm glad you are enjoying it.)
The countries in Europe which have decriminalized drugs are not falling apart at all. I would add that I personally don't approve of public use of drugs, and the European needle parks with stoned young people are really sad. And I think part of decriminalization should be extensive public health campaigns so that children continue to understand that drug addiction is a sad life that no one wants to lead.
In America there are extensive studies that show that needle exchange programs do not increase the number of drug addicts, but do reduce the number of AIDS cases caused by needle sharing. But because of political pressure from the religious right, almost no elected officials are courageous enough to come out in favor of it.
Why not make legislation regarding drug addiction based on facts rather than morality?
Anyway, I am feeling a little scattered, and probably didn't express myself very well, but it just seems there are ways of handling drug addiction which have a more positive, healthy outcome for the individuals who abuse them, and society as a whole. Someone like Father Terrence who approaches this from a libertarian, rather than a humanitarian point of view, could probably add to the discussion. |
