[Closed] Local (Heroin)Crack heads what do you think ?

Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using.

It is in society's interest to help them get off the stuff, but the initial decision was theirs. This places them some way down the scale of 'ill' people who need help.

I could tell you my opinion on thieves if you like?

We all have different ways of dealing with the stresses of life, some make it easier for us to look down on them and scorn, other do the right thing and keep their anti social behaviour behind closed doors.
At the end of the day we're all human and the day we lose a bit of that hunanity is a sad day and we should look at ourselves being as part of the problem.

They're human beings with often terrible problems, have made the wrong choices, and are driven by desperation which transcends any notion of self-awareness or respect.

But they're human beings, as you say. And are as deserving of respect as any other. Many of their issues are exacerbated by some very negative, narrow-minded morally righteous attitudes in society, and an unwillingness to engage with such a human problem.

When such addicts steal/rob/cheat in order to obtain their ext fix, they aren't deliberately setting out to harm or deprive others, they genuinely don't have sufficient awareness or empathy to be able to consider this. They are blinded by such a strong physical need, it overweighs any other consideration.

Having seen happy, healthy people close to me descend into a world of suffering with addiction (of all kinds), I know that it's not that they possess 'evil' like some might think, but that they are in need of help and support, which society is unwilling or unable to offer them. Whilst I can hate what they do, I can never get really angry towards such people, because at the end of the day, I know just how lucky I am by comparsion. We none of us are immune from slipping down the same path. Fear is not the answer, it solves nothing. Whilst it may be very difficult to empathise and try to understand others, we should at least try to make the effort. Getting involved in schemes that can offer support and assistance to addicts is really important, and giving someone a purpose, some self respect and social value, can be so vital to their potential recovery.

So they actually Did steal the charity box.
No doubt the charity box was for a more worthy cause than that of purchasing smack.

"Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using.

It is in society's interest to help them get off the stuff, but the initial decision was theirs. This places them some way down the scale of 'ill' people who need help."

It's attitudes such as this, which show the depth of ignorance and lack of empathy that actually exacerbates the problem of addiction in the first place. 🙁

Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using.

Pity mostly.

A lot of societies ills get blamed on them, but they're a symptom not a cause.

If you want to look for the people who are ruining communities then you need to start at the top and work your way down.

And, who else 'steals' from charities to fund their vain ambitions? George Osborne and (But I hate)Sebastian Coe! http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/Olympics/article1072137.ece

Fwiw I think you dealt with it the right way, i.e., didn't put yourself in harm's way.

This has been discussed on here before but it still looks like Portugal got it right when they decriminalised all drugs, gave hard drugs away in a controlled manner and instigated sensible programmes to give users a chance to change their futures.

Drug related crime is way down and perhaps more importantly, far, far fewer people die.

Unlike the news here in NE England this week which tells us that our fair region now has the highest drug related death toll in the UK...

I also find it interesting that this substance is SO appealing that they willingly give up a reasonable life to get high every day. I am curious as to what it feels like but not going to... perhaps when I'm few years from death.

So what's your attitude towards heroin addicts ?

Before they become addicted, they may have been nice(ish) people with problems. Once addicted they are scum.

Nothing else matters apart from getting the next fix. Nothing.

zippykona - Member
So they actually Did steal the charity box.
No doubt the charity box was for a more worthy cause than that of purchasing smack.

They did borrow charity box !

Having seen happy, healthy people close to me descend into a world of suffering with addiction (of all kinds), I know that it's not that they possess 'evil' like some might think, but that they are in need of help and support, which society is unwilling or unable to offer them.

basically this. It's easy to demonise a group of people, but when you've seen it close up you realise how complicated it all is. And when you've tried to get help for someone, and find out how little there is, really, it's a lot easier to sympathise.

Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using.

what choice was that? and how does it differ to the 'choice' that alcoholics made?

Oh and the one who returned the box will be back for it as soon as he needs another fix.

The OP wasn't asking about the social reasoning behind becoming a drug addict, the question was about drug addicts.

Alcoholics are in the same addiction cycle too. However smack heads do appear to commit more crime/violent crime to feed their habit? (happy to be proved wrong)

I also find it interesting that this substance is SO appealing that they willingly give up a reasonable life to get high every day. I am curious as to what it feels like but not going to... perhaps when I'm few years from death.

Honestly. try volunteering at a local drug support group. It will answer all these questions and more, and you'll be doing something very valuable to boot.

I think your attitude does you credit OP.

Some of the replies on here are shocking, but not surprising.

its different peoples perspectives on life i guess. I try and do things for people. others just take and dont care about who it effects. Its the same if they are on heroin or not?

They did borrow charity box !

I don't understand they took it away and then brought it back, still full of cash?

Well what a surprise. A total lack of empathy and understanding by the usual suspects. I wonder how long it is before we get the achingly predictable "I didn't get where I am today......" lectures as a thinly veiled excuse to wax lyrical about how bloody wonderful they are, having made all the right decisions in life....

Some of you lot haven't got the first bloody clue, wrapped up in your comfortable middle class ivory towers. about how miserable some peoples lives are, and how traumatic their upbringings were, putting up wit all types of shit that you could barely imagine.

Tell you what... go and do some volunteering work with some challenging young people from less cosseted backgrounds, and hear their stories, then you can start passing judgement!

You shower of sanctimonious, self-regarding ****s!!!

So what's your attitude towards heroin addicts ?

If I collect a prescription before work and nip to the local chemist just before 9, I get to queue with the local addicts waiting for their daily supervised methadone dose, they seem perfectly normal....

"Alcoholics are in the same addiction cycle too. However smack heads do appear to commit more crime/violent crime to feed their habit? (happy to be proved wrong)"

Alcohol is the cause of far more social damage than Heroin/Crack. Visit any town centre in Britain on Friday or Saturday night. Talk to police, paramedics etc.

I've never felt particularly 'threatened' by Heroin/Crack addicts (who seldom actually use violence tbh), but I've left pubs because of the behaviour of drunken thugs. And I actively avoid going through areas near football stadia, when games are on, as I've encountered nasty behaviour from drunken louts there as well.

I don't understand they took it away and then brought it back, still full of cash?

Empty !

Fair point clodhopper.

However alcoholics are not usually the ones out on the town on a Saturday night.

Plenty of alcoholics out of a weekend evening. Even those who only binge drink once a week. Addiction isn't a binary thing, it takes many different forms and levels.

Fair point clodhopper.

Of course, I forgot, this is STW, where stealing charity boxes to buy drugs is a victimless crime but anyone who parks at a trail centre without paying should be strung from the nearest tree! 🙂

I learned recently that dopamine levels increase by around 50 times during sex. Whilst taking heroin these can increase to around 1500 times that.

I've got nothing else.

"What about the gang violence associated with dealing/territory, and the countless lives destroyed by the criminals back where the drugs are produced?"

That is far more about politics though; criminalise something, and you will get criminals. Countries which have decriminalised drug possession/use have seen huge drops in drug-rlated crime. Criminalisation of drugs leads to an increase in price, as supply is much more difficult, which inevitably leads to crime.

" You don't see turf wars in Belgium and pits full of hundreds of headless corpses over who gets to brew Stella."

Read up on Prohibition in the USA. Educate yourself.

"Of course, I forgot, this is STW, where stealing charity boxes to buy drugs is a victimless crime"

Who said that?

Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using.

2/3rds of problematic drug users are self medicating due to a very traumatic childhood. study after study proves this point. I've heard more than once, users say "if I come off heroin I want to kill myself". they simply cannot deal with what happened to them in childhood.

Read up on Prohibition in the USA.

What about the gang violence associated with dealing/territory, and the countless lives destroyed by the criminals back where the drugs are produced?

this is due to the legal vacuum created by prohibition, not the drug users. You could eradicate criminality, or massively reduce it if you moved to a more grown up system, in line with an advanced society, rather than carry on with this ludicrous idea that drugs are a problem that can be policed. It can't. How many more years do we have to go down this totally discredited route, before we'll admit as a society that it has absolutely failed?

And imagine the police resources that could then be released to do something more useful too. Not to mention the health benefits of addicts being able to access a purer (licensed) supply rather than gear thats got any old shit mixed up in it. Thats what kills them.

But we're not even allowed to discuss that like grown ups, are we? And why not? Because the Mail reading blinkered idiots would piddle their petticoats with righteous indignation at the very idea of it. And no politician has the will to actually tell this particular group of people what they don't want to hear, and challenge their ill-informed prejudices

"I didn't get where I am today..... blah, blah, blah....."

"And that is relevant to 2016 how?"

I'll let you figure that out. 🙄

Couldn't really tell you until I had experience of meeting a specific individual. Their addiction will have little bearing on my initial thoughts.

zilog6128 - Member
Read up on Prohibition in the USA.
And that is relevant to 2016 how?

You're correct there are no parallels that can be drawn, none what-so-ever...

[quote=FunkyDunc ] Once addicted they are scum.

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FunkyDunc » Once addicted they are scum.

Yes, at the point that they are coming in to your property/business looking to steal something.

Asking them to sit down, and discuss the relative merits of stealing v finding a job to feed their habit is not really going to help the situation.

Having had experience of them from around my work, speaking to people in hospitals who have to deal with them, and friends who work in the Police, you are completely on your guard with heroin addicts and expect the worst at all times, to do anything else may put your on health and safety in jeopardy.

The OP wasn't asking about the social issues surrounding becoming an addict or what to can be done to help drug addicts.

In fact Bob if you tried to steal from me, I would suggest you are scum too 😀

You could eradicate criminality, or massively reduce it if you moved to a more grown up system, in line with an advanced society, rather than carry on with this ludicrous idea that drugs are a problem that can be policed.

Lots of people seem to be confusing addicts and thieves. Lots of addicts never commit crimes. A lot more thieves never take drugs.

Addicts deserve all the compassion and support that society can provide them to recover. They are not criminals.

Thieves deserve to be locked up in jail or face other appropriate societal sanction. They are criminals.

Addicts who steal deserve all the compassion and support that society can provide them to recover whilst they are in jail ( or otherwise sanctioned) for stealing shit.

Society can't condone crime to support a drug habit. Where would you draw the line?

If it's OK to steal the charity box, would it be OK to steal the OP's bike? Or stab him with a used needle if he refused to relinquish the charity box?

How does decriminalising heroin stop people from getting addicted to it and throwing away their lives?

It doesn't. People will still get addicted. In considerably lesser numbers, if decriminalisation is done in a conjunction with spending the money saved on policing, on proper treatment instead. Which is all but non-existant in the present system.

The impact that the drug use has on the wider society would be massively reduced though.

Our attitude to the whole issue of drugs is totally dysfunctional, and stuck in the 1960's. It simply doesn't work. We need to completely change the priority from one of combating criminality by trying to police the none-policeable, to one of trying to deal with the issues that cause it, and properly treating addiction

Mrs Daz worked as a drug worker in a Manchester community drug team for 15 years. She saw pretty much every horrific situation and story that it was possible to see. Very rarely was it simply a case of people 'making the wrong choices'. Instead the usual pathway to becoming addicted to heroin/crack/alcohol (all 3 in many cases) involved poverty, homelessness, lack of family/friends support, domestic and/or sexual abuse, and just horrifically bad luck. In many cases it was young kids being sent to prison for petty crimes and coming out as addicts.

Incidentally the heroin addicts were generally the easier more sensible ones she dealt with. The real chaotic ones were the alcoholics. In actual fact if clients came in addicted to both, the alcohol addiction was often prioritised for treatment.

Once addicted they are scum.

Idiot.

and properly treating addiction

I thought this was still a holy grail thing though, and addiction (cure) still not understood from a medical point of view.

Apart from alchohol the major problem drugs in terms of anti-social behaviour are the new " legal highs " which have just been criminalised and are making massive problems in prison , as others have said the whole issue of drugs needs to be looked at root and branch .No one could pretend current policies are even seeming to work .

I thought this was still a holy grail thing though,

No, it's not. People are being successfully treated and 'cured' all the time. The tragedy is that this support is now being withdrawn as a result of austerity and puritanical political grandstanding. It's the main reason my Mrs got out.

and addiction (cure) still not understood from a medical point of view.

Yes, it is. You appear to not have the first clue about any of this, yet are happy to label all addicts as 'scum'. Maybe go away and do some research before spouting any more bollox?

Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using.

Next time one decides to open up to me about how their parents abused them, they were passed around between uncles for sexual pleasure I'll tell them it was their choice.

Dazh all the stuff I have read says it can be managed, but not cured. Happy for you to point me in the direction of medical papers that say it can be cured

Drac - Moderator

Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using.

Next time one decides to open up to me about how their parents abused them, they were passed around between uncles for sexual pleasure I'll tell them it was their choice.

well said drac, some on here need a reality check, and its not yet available on the nhs.

Stuff happens in peoples lives, some react in different ways,to the normal to cope, until youre in that position or meet someone who is that position, treat everyone with respect and listen when they talk.

Dazh all the stuff I have read says it can be managed, but not cured.

Depends what you mean by 'cured' (it's not a word used by practitioners TBH). In the drugs treatment world that means 'detoxed', where the user is no longer physically dependent on the drug or any substitutes like methadone. Obviously they will probably have to live with the psychological side of it forever, which I guess that's what you're alluding to. In many cases detox is not a realistic proposition, so it is managed with the use of substitutes like methadone so that users can stabilise their lives and get to a position where detox is a realistic prospect. Sadly due to financial pressures the harm reduction approach is now being replaced with a more abstinence based model, forcing many addicts to detox when they have neither the motivation or support to do so, and they end up relapsing and buying heroin on the street, starting the whole cycle again. My Mrs had clients who she'd worked with for years end up back on the streets as chaotic smackheads when previously they were leading relatively normal lives.

My Mrs had clients who she'd worked with for years end up back on the streets as chaotic smackheads when previously they were leading relatively normal lives.

Oh so its ok to call them smackheads but not scum 🙂 semantics apart, the ones coming in to the workplace to steal a charity box would be unlikely to be the ones on a managed rehab programme....

The OP has two distinct parts. Bottom line is addicts need help and support but stealing can not be justified to support an addiction.

And the chaps who took the money were sound of mind enough to know they were stealing.

Make of it what you will but I think the OP handled the situation in probably the most appropriate way.

wasnt David Camerons brother in law a smackhead?

and allegedly SamCam attended rehab for her coke habit

then theres osborne....

so maybe[b] some [/b]junkies are scum, but not coz of their addiction 😉

I knew a guy, friend of a friend who used to come for a pint with us now and then.

"Normal" life, job, house girlfriend.

Did the Classic "Daily Mail" gateway drug thing. Got into dope in his late 20's and just seemed to love it. Within 3 years his was in rehab for heroin addiction and his mother had sold her house to sort the finances out.

He always seemed a real sound bloke when I met him.

Pretty sorry tale.

Not sure what finally happened to him.

If it was an RSPCA box it rather see the junkies smoke it.

In September, my cousin tried reefer for the very first time
Now he's doing horse, it's June, *
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*I may have heard that somewhere else

My wife had a work colleague who did the classic middle age heavy drinker... always up for lunchtime beers, empty vodka bottles found in random office bins, working late, caught sleeping in the office after his wife booted him out, got fired etc

Everything binners said.

Addicts need help.

Not beating with a stick.

Usually, they've already been beaten with a stick, and it doesn't work.

Some will never be free of it, that's just something that has to be accepted. With help most can be stable. I believe.

I also believe almost anyone can become an addict, given the right (wrong?) circumstances.

For anyone interested in this subject I can thoroughly recommend Professor David Nutt's book 'Drugs:without the hot air'.

Plenty in their about evidence based approach to reducing harm, the reasons for addiction and Portugal's approach to decriminlasing drug use.

There but for the Grace of God go I...

Next time one decides to open up to me about how their parents abused them, they were passed around between uncles for sexual pleasure

I think we shop at the same ASDA? 😯

But on a slightly more serious note, in my experience not all addicts (of any variety) have suffered the above, but lots have and worse. But, the same can be said about people who significantly over or under eat, or for people who seem 'normal'. I just take folk on their own merits, the labels just make it easier for ignorant twits to treat people as lesser beings.

Domwells - would that be the same David Nutt who was sacked by Tony Blair for having the bare-faced audacity to use his lifetime of expertise in the field to calmly propose a sensible aproach to drug policy, decriminalisation and treatment of addicts, instead of simply screaming hysterical tabloid nonsense?

That one decision alone sums up the wilfully blind, evidence-free stupidity of the drugs policy of successive governments.

"We'd like you to conduct a totally independent inquiry, and we'd like you to reach the following conclusions...."

Take all the drugs you want, I dont care as long as you can afford your habit but once you are at this level then I would suggest termination as the only solution.

Sorry, but they made a choice when they started using

I've met a lot of addicts and I've been to the funerals of quite a few heroin addicts..
I've only ever met one addict that started using as an adult, and she had a very tragic story and very little else to live for..
Every other addict that I've ever encountered started their drug use as a very broken child from a pretty dismal background..

If you're one of the fortunate majority that don't fall into that lifestyle then good for you, but don't think for a second that it gives you the right to occupy some sort of moral high ground..

Walk a mile in another man's shoes before you judge and all that

Correct Binners. There is plenty in the book about successive governments' inability to make decisions based on evidence, and even breaking their own laws so they don't have to listen to the drugs advisory committee.

Take all the drugs you want, I dont care as long as you can afford your habit but once you are at this level then I would suggest termination as the only solution

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Oh so its ok to call them smackheads but not scum

Hardly the same is it?

the ones coming in to the workplace to steal a charity box would be unlikely to be the ones on a managed rehab programme....

On the contrary, they're entirely likely to be in treatment. It's not a black and white thing. Many continue to use illicit drugs on top of the prescribed stuff. It's a transition that needs to be managed, and the drug workers, doctors and social workers do that pretty well in most cases. The only prerequisite to getting treatment is that the user wants it, and is willing to engage with it.

I'm currently working on a project relating to an improved pharmacological treatment for opioid dependence and it's really opened my eyes. It's a horribly stigmatised and overlooked condition. It doesn't take much to get addicted, and then it causes physiological changes to the brain which make it impossible to quit without help. In America there is a massive problem with addiction to opioid painkillers. All these people, whether they're addicted to heroin or prescription painkillers are human and need help.

Google the study done in Liverpool were addicts were medicated with heroine instead of methadone, addicts held down normal jobs, held normal lifestyles crime went down, addiction rates tailed off once users hit mid 30's
Until John Major's government put a stop to all that nonsence

Once more the sensible informed voices on stw win out to the DM diatribe types

"I didn't get where I am today......" lectures as a thinly veiled excuse to wax lyrical about how bloody wonderful they are, having made all the right decisions in life....

Agreed. Luck or chance has the biggest influence on how well you do in life. Frankly, if people believe otherwise they are deluded. Life is a lottery that begins at conception.

Self-satisfied, smug and vain people who believe their success is due to simple hard work and effort really gall me! It suggests they believe they are 'better' hence why they deserve more.

Re: recovery; I am professionally acquainted with and mates with a total of four registered health/social care professionals who are former herion users. 2 from poor socially deprived backgrounds and 2 a bit more lower/middle/ptofessional class backgrounds. That's the ones that I know of anyway, and plenty of colleagues know these folk and don't know their past.
Would be interesting to know for the purposes of stats whether this is representative of the possibility of recovery as a whole.

As above plenty of cost and complication to society with heroin in particular is a consequence of it being illegal and underground. And of course 'legal highs' exist because the original illegal ones are illegal: you wouldn't bother making and selling them if it was easier to make and sell real cannabus and mdma, because they are more predictable and (apparently) more fun. Legislation needs to look at what has evolved because of legislation and take a pragmatic stance. Also consider tax revenue if you could go to the chemist and buy properly regulated and taxed recreational drugs!

Think a few here need to listen to [url= http://ukleap.org/scroobius-pips-podcast-war-on-drugs/ ]this[/url] - then see if your attitude is the same.

I've seen 2 friends go completely off the rails through prodigious soft drug misuse and it's a sad thing to see. It's quite likely neither of them will be the same again.

Although there's the example of Portugal where drugs have been decriminalised and usage has fallen, the more recent example is Colorado, where cannabis was decriminalised a few years back and usage has been rising year on year since - particularly amongst kids.

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Wait till a pair of the rattling scumbags stab you for your wallet and then see how you feel about them.

has that happened to you km79? In my experience they tend to prefer stabbing each other

Who the f*** said get a job instead of stealing?
6.5 million unemployed underemployed, sanctioned, or financially inactive, plus the churn of those in poorly payed or insecure employment, all chasing around 500000 available positions.
Take one bone and bury it, release 10 dogs, one gets the bone. Chastise the other 9 dogs for not getting the bone. Force the other 9 in to bone finding workshops. Chastise and demonize them for not finding the bone. Remove their kennels and force them in to starvation if they still refuse to find a bone.
No wonder drugs look attractive if that is Blairite /Tory Neoliberalists mentality

Ones opinion of them normally reflects the amount of exposure you have had to them IME. I have known 6 people die of ODs now, none of them were bad people but whilst they were using they would not think twice about burgling friends houses. One tried to do mine, and he was a friend since childhood. Dog bit him (pretty badly too). Good old mutt got steak for tea that night.

It did indeed yunki, walking through town minding my own business and attacked from two sides at once.

It did indeed yunki

have you considered that maybe you're one of them?

I've experienced enough of the actions and chaotic life of a heroin addict to form an opinion that some people would probably choose not to believe. They are just normal people who made a bad decision at some point and cant find a way back.

My best friend from around 4 years old became a heroin addict at around 14/15.
He was always in the lower end of the class for performance and had a bit of a daring naughty side to him. His home life was unloving and his family was split, and very strange (mum was a 'massage parlour owner/sex worker'). So I guess he was always destined to fall through the cracks.

I supported him, as did my family, as much as I could, but once his addiction really hit him, after 10 or more years of total dependancy on heroin, its hard for someone to believe that they could cope or function without it. He'd quit and then relapse, and quit again, going round in circles, but ultimately he'd not have the final push to help himself. He needed help with everything and his family would just give him money and free board instead of emotional help, which just encouraged him to fall deeper into it.

I ended up giving up on him 5 years ago when I realised that he was becoming too much of a burden on my life and he'd be a liability around my children. He'd burgled my house before, stolen money and things from me. I couldnt have that keep happening. Havent seen him for a while now but have heard he is off and on it, always will be I guess.
He was just a normal little kid, my friend, we played in the park, climbed trees, rode bikes and ate birthday cake together. He had a bad start and made a stupid decision at some point and it just got worse and worse. He'd tell me how he wishes he'd never tried it, but he couldnt stop.
The things i've seen him do, the stories he'd tell me about how he'd feed his addiction sometimes. Crazy, crazy things.

Heroin addicts are human beings, but they are not part of society, they are in a world of their own. They dont even realise it.

Nah, obviously not hip enough like yourself.

[url= http://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/14738390.Blackburn_shop_worker_stabbed_with_hypodermic_needle_after_chasing_thief/ ]Headline in the local paper tonight.[/url]

A thieving smackhead, or 'just' a thief?

Many of you that are comparing this to alcoholism and choice are missing the fact that there is a certain set of genetic and environmental triggers which can combine to make it no choice at all.