For y’allz consideration: Here is a relevant selection from a discussion I had with a friend recently on drugs, crime, personal responsibility and societal responsibility.
Topics: Drug Addiction, Theft, Property Rights, Free Will, Morality, U.S. Prison System
BRETT:
Drugs are the reason most are behind bars. Addiction isn’t weakness. They are either in there for possession of drugs, things they did on drugs, or things they did to get drugs. The fact someone is bound to chemicals doesn’t make them worthless, but our “correctional” institutes don’t correct anything so you end up with people that never get to the root of their problems, and they are bound by a cycle of addiction. If our country aimed at breaking addictions and treating the mentally ill, there would be far less people behind bars. I don’t think either chemical imbalances nor chemical addiction runs hand and hand with stupidity, hence the reason there are intelligent and capable people behind bars. And yes, some who could have been a political leader end up doing little more than hustling people either on the street or behind bars…wasted capabilities that could have been used constructively if the dice had fallen different along the way.
RICHARD:
Drugs are absolutely not the reason most are behind bars and the actions one takes to get themselves addicted to something is absolutely a weakness. It is entirely possible to use recreational drugs and not steal, assault, murder or jaywalk so the excusal of prisoners as being victims of their own behavior (itself a silly circular reasoning) is nonsense.
idk why you equate being in jail with being worthless. if that was the case then we’d have a Singapore or Chinese system of justice instead of the cushy one we have now. the root of these peoples problems is not chemical – its moral. you can be an absolute fiend and it doesn’t require you to harm your fellow citizens. There is no dice in this equation.
It is peoples choices who put them where they are. Not cosmic roulette.
BRETT:
an “absolute fiend” WILL steal, unless you are talking about Wall Street boys with 7 figure incomes powdering their noses. most poor people that become addicted to alcohol, crack, or heroin do not have 7 figure incomes and once they are fully addicted they have no recourse but to steal. i had a friend with decent morals (seems to be what you are stressing that non-criminals posses) who got addicted to oxycontins and proceeded to steal a bunch of appliances to sell on Cragslist. He’s in prison for 11 years now, but not a stupid kid at all . At one point he was making $80,000 a year fixing tanks in Iraq, but then he got hooked on drugs…first recreational treats like acid, and then later, the poor man’s heroin. it does take someone with an addictive personality to get so dependent upon drugs, but that is a genetic lottery, even if you don’t believe it is. Even at the furthest reach, we don’t pick our parents, so we’re all basically products of chance. Criminals are not inherently evil people. Often their lives just took a wrong turn and went off the road before they ever had a chance to turn back.
RICHARD:
People are not driven to steal and assault to feed addictions. entitled people, stupid people and immoral people do. crime is going down despite the economy going down. alcoholics didn’t go on mugging and stealing sprees for speakeasy money during prohibition. it is entirely the prevailing moral compass of the person and no excuses should be made for any violence or theft from a person as there is no scientific data that shows an addiction makes you a shitty person.
Anne Franks mother died in Bergen-Belsen because she didn’t eat anything, choosing instead to give her entire food rations to her daughter. I think the certain death that comes at the end of prolonged starvation will poison the mind into acting selfishly more than the need to chase a high.
Describing a person who steals for pills as being of high morals is incongruent. Oxycontin doesn’t make you a werewolf. it makes you want something really bad. if you have a sense of entitlement, you’ll stomp on whomever you have to to collect your “get mine” tax. people in prison aren’t necessarily ape-like buffoons but wise people dont skip naively down a path of increasingly dangerous and addictive drugs, forming a habit which they steal over and lands them in prison – even if they were talented in their trade as a mechanic.
Genetics do not dictate behavior. Hitler was proved wrong on that. you can have a propensity to be angry, violent, addicted to something, rapey – whatever. but just like average humans have evolutionarily wired responses of rage, selfishness, etc and yet find a way to function in polite society – people with a tick towards another vice area can do the same just as easily.
Hundreds of thousands of criminals are inherently evil people. Others are low intellect fools and then that fraction of a percentage I mentioned before are the supervillian geniuses and the “just got unlucky” rubes. Peoples lives are not predetermined nor sentient so if they take a wrong turn, it is because of the person, not their genes or circumstance. that is – for all except that fraction of a percent that are held hostage in Repunzal towers or otherwise literally and physically prevented from taking action with their own life. If that weren’t true then there would be no explanation for people who will themselves through death, destruction, poverty, violence, abuse, negligence or anything else since if you dont control your own life, such things would necessarily dictate mathematically absolutist numbers of those lives flatlining and never improving.
BRETT:
The kinds of things that lead people to use hard drugs usually stem from a shitty set of initial circumstances – shitty or missing parents, crime-ridden communities, economic oppression being the stem. These people are more prone to use drugs and are not wealthy enough, nor do they have the resources to provide a legitimate income, from which they can blow it all on the drugs. I don’t know of many junkies that work 9 to 5 jobs (not that I know any junkies at all, for that matter), but I would guess this working class addict you speak of is quite the exception to the rule. There are of course alcohol addicts everywhere that don’t cheat and steal to get their drink, but the people that drink alcohol are not always the same ones that get addicted to prescription drugs or hard street drugs.
Making wrong choices is usually the hallmark of what becomes a criminal life. I know it sounds nearly Christian to say, but by keeping away from bad associations people can avoid a lot of trouble, and the problem is that like attracts like, so addicts get to know addicts, and successful people their like. It breeds a cycle, as I referred to earlier, because they keep kicking out god damn children who turn out just like them (our friend [REDACTED], the super piece of shit that said he wanted to rape [REDACTED], has 4 kids. Low class people outbreed the wealthy and fill the prisons). You can’t tell me that a kid raised by a crackhead mother who was selling drugs and using them by age 12 has the same chance — even with an identical twin — speaking theoretically — as succeeding in a middle class “moral” (seems to be your main thrust on most things) family.
Morals are inculcated into children…we agree on that. The fact that some get it and some don’t pretty much is, not a genetic lottery, but a circumstance lottery, which was what I was trying to imply earlier, but I see where I left room for some ambiguity.
“Family Lottery,” Separate twins and put them in opposite circumstances, but only for entertainment value — new reality show.
RICHARD:
It’s not a shock or being contested that people in shitty situations make shitty choices, but that is because human nature is selfish. You’re saying we’re bound to that nature in a predetermined genetic code and i’m saying thats bunk cuz everyone aside from a very small group with psychiatric problems is perfectly able to not just do what is easiest and they do it all the time. a crackhead raised kid and a middle class raised kid have the same opportunities if they’re raised the same way with the same moral code and access to information, i’m saying. The shitty drug addicted mother raises a baby that continues the cycle only because of the way its raised, not because she’s passing on selfish genes. if that were true then the President would be smoking crack and have 14 illegitimate kids somewhere like his dad right now. his dad was shit. his mom was shit, but luckily she dumped him off on his upper class grandmother in hawaii who was able to raise him and thus the genes of 2 selfish drug addicted irresponsible parents produced a united states senator and president.
I would definitely tune into Family Lottery! let’s pitch it to a studio!
Definitely dont disagree (idk how anyone could) that shitty surroundings will handicap a person into keeping the shitchain goin strong. The loss of community is a big deal, but the loss of personal responsibility is also a big deal. Crime went DOWN during the Great Depression in many cities and there was cultural attitude of “be thankful for what you’ve got and be happy”. now these same cities blame everyone else and their dog for their problems and rebel against society instead of work to make it better, as you put it.
