{"id":42378,"date":"2021-01-02T10:20:45","date_gmt":"2021-01-02T18:20:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=42378"},"modified":"2021-01-01T23:21:27","modified_gmt":"2021-01-02T07:21:27","slug":"everyday-erinyes-247","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2021\/01\/02\/everyday-erinyes-247\/","title":{"rendered":"Everyday Erinyes #247"},"content":{"rendered":"

Experts in autocracies have pointed out that it is, unfortunately, easy to slip into normalizing the tyrant, hence it is important to hang on to outrage. These incidents which seem to call for the efforts of the Greek Furies (Erinyes) to come and deal with them will, I hope, help with that. As a reminder, though no one really knows how many there were supposed to be, the three names we have are Alecto<\/span><\/strong>, Megaera<\/span><\/strong>, and Tisiphone<\/span><\/strong>. These roughly translate as “unceasing,” “grudging,” and “vengeful destruction.”<\/p>\n

This is an “Oregon Leads the Way” feel-good story. With information, and leads to more information, for any state which wants to do what Oregon has done.
\n================================================================<\/p>\n

Oregon just decriminalized all drugs \u2013\u00a0here’s why voters passed this groundbreaking reform<\/h1>\n
According to Oregon law, possessing a small amount of drugs for personal consumption is now a civil \u2013\u00a0rather than criminal \u2013 offense.
\nPeter Dazeley via Getty<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Scott Akins<\/a>, Oregon State University<\/a><\/em> and Clayton Mosher<\/a>, Washington State University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Oregon became the first state in the United States to decriminalize the possession of all drugs on Nov. 3, 2020.<\/p>\n

Measure 110<\/a>, a ballot initiative funded by the Drug Policy Alliance, a nonprofit advocacy group backed in part by Facebook\u2019s Mark Zuckerberg<\/a>, passed with more than 58% of the vote. Possessing heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and other drugs for personal use is no longer a criminal offense in Oregon.<\/p>\n

Those drugs are still against the law, as is selling them. But possession is now a civil \u2013 not criminal \u2013 violation that may result in a fine or court-ordered therapy, not jail. Marijuana, which Oregon legalized in 2014, remains fully legal.<\/p>\n

Oregon\u2019s move is radical for the United States, but several European countries have decriminalized drugs to some extent<\/a>. There are three main arguments for this major drug policy reform.<\/p>\n

#1. Drug prohibition has failed<\/h2>\n

In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared drugs to be \u201cpublic enemy number one\u201d and launched a \u201cwar on drugs<\/a>\u201d that continues today.<\/p>\n

The ostensible rationale for harshly punishing drug users is to deter drug use. But decades of research \u2013 including our own on marijuana<\/a> and drugs generally<\/a> \u2013 has found the deterrent effect of strict criminal punishment to be small<\/a>, if it exists at all. This is especially true among young people, who are the majority of drug users<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is partly due to the nature of addiction, and also because there are simply limits to how much punishment can deter crime<\/a>. As a result, the U.S. has both the world\u2019s highest incarceration rate<\/a> and among the highest rates of illegal drug use<\/a>. Roughly 1 in 5 incarcerated people in the United States is in for a drug offense<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Criminologists find<\/a> that other consequences of problematic drug use \u2013 such as harm to health, reduced quality of life and strained personal relationships \u2013 are more effective deterrents than criminal sanctions.<\/p>\n

Because criminalizing drugs does not really prevent drug use, decriminalizing does not really increase it<\/a>. Portugal, which decriminalized the personal possession of all drugs in 2001<\/a> in response to high illicit drug use, has much lower rates of drug use than the European average<\/a>. Use of cocaine among young adults age 15 to 34, for example, is 0.3% in Portugal, compared to 2.1% across the EU. Amphetamine and MDMA consumption is likewise lower in Portugal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Woman<\/a>
A mobile drug-services van in Lisbon gives out methadone, a medication for people with opioid use disorder, in 2017.<\/span>
\nHoracio Villalobos – Corbis\/Corbis via Getty Images<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

2. Decriminalization puts money to better use<\/h2>\n

Arresting, prosecuting and imprisoning people for drug-related crimes is expensive.<\/p>\n

The Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron estimates that all government drug prohibition-related expenditures were US$47.8 billion nationally<\/a> in 2016. Oregon spent about $375 million on drug prohibition in that year.<\/p>\n

Oregon will now divert some the money previously used on drug enforcement to pay for about a dozen new drug prevention and treatment centers<\/a> statewide, which has been found to be a significantly more cost-effective<\/a> strategy. Some tax revenue from recreational marijuana sales<\/a>, which exceeded $100 million in 2019, will also go to addiction and recovery services.<\/p>\n

Oregon spent about $470 million on substance abuse treatment<\/a> between 2017 and 2019.<\/p>\n

Not everyone who uses drugs needs treatment. Decriminalization makes help accessible to those who do need it \u2013 and keeps both those users and recreational users out of jail.<\/p>\n

3. The drug war targets people of color<\/h2>\n

Another aim of decriminalization is to mitigate the significant racial and ethnic disparities associated with drug enforcement<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Black<\/a>
New York\u2019s \u2018stop and frisk\u2019 policing most often resulted in marijuana possession charges and targeted young Black men. It was declared unconstitutional in 2013.<\/span>
\nThird Eye Corporation\/Getty<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Illegal drug use is roughly comparable across race<\/a> in the U.S. But people of color are significantly more likely to be searched<\/a>, arrested and imprisoned for a drug-related offense<\/a>. Drug crimes can incur long prison sentences.<\/p>\n

Discretion in drug enforcement and sentencing means prohibition is among the leading causes of incarceration of people of color in the United States<\/a> \u2013 an injustice many Americans on both sides of the aisle<\/a> increasingly recognize.<\/p>\n

Freed up from policing drug use, departments may redirect their resources toward crime prevention and solving violent crimes like homicide and robbery<\/a>, which are time-consuming to investigate. That could help restore some trust between law enforcement and Oregon\u2019s communities of color.<\/p>\n

Risks of decriminalization<\/h2>\n

One common concern among Oregonians who voted against decriminalization<\/a> was that lessening criminal penalties would endanger children.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it sends a really bad message to them, and influences their perception of the risks,\u201d James O\u2019Rourke, a defense attorney who helped organize the opposition to measure 110, told Oregon Public Broadcasting in October<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But U.S. states that legalized marijuana haven\u2019t seen adolescent use rise significantly. In fact, marijuana consumption among teens \u2013 though not among college-aged Americans<\/a> \u2013 actually declined in some states with legal marijuana<\/a>. This may be because legal, regulated marijuana is more difficult for minors to get than black-market drugs.<\/p>\n

\"Woman<\/a>
Customers must be 21 or older to purchase marijuana from dispensaries like Oregon\u2019s Finest, in Portland.<\/span>
\nJosh Edelson\/AFP via Getty Images<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Research also shows that for some people, particularly the young, banning a behavior makes it more alluring<\/a>. So defining drugs as a health concern rather than a crime could actually make them less appealing to young Oregonians.<\/p>\n

Another worry about decriminalization is that it will attract people looking to use drugs.<\/p>\n

So-called \u201cdrug tourism\u201d hasn\u2019t really been a problem for Portugal<\/a>, but it happened in Switzerland after officials in the 1980s and 1990s began officially \u201cignoring\u201d heroin in Zurich\u2019s Platzspitz Park. People came from across the country to inject heroin in public, leaving discarded needles on the ground<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The local government shut down Platzspitz Park. But rather than chase off or arrest those who frequented it, it began offering methadone and prescription heroin to help people with opioid use disorder<\/a>. Public injection, HIV rates and overdoses \u2013 which had all become a problem in Zurich \u2013 plummeted<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Certain parts of Oregon already have higher rates of public drug consumption, namely Portland and Eugene. Because public drug use is still illegal in Oregon, however, we don\u2019t expect a Platzspitz Park-style open drug scene to emerge.
\nThese places should benefit from the expansion of methadone programs and other medication-assisted treatment, which is endorsed by the American Medical Association<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If neighboring Washington state decriminalizes drugs<\/a>, which it is considering, the chances of drug tourism would drop further.<\/p>\n

[The Conversation\u2019s science, health and technology editors pick their favorite stories.<\/em> Weekly on Wednesdays<\/a>.]<\/p>\n

Upside \u2013 and downside<\/h2>\n

There are risks with any major policy change. The question is whether the new policy results in a net benefit.<\/p>\n

In Portugal, full decriminalization has proven more humane and effective than criminalization. Because drug users don\u2019t worry about facing criminal charges, those who need help are more likely to seek it \u2013 and get it<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Portugal\u2019s overdose death rate is five times lower than the EU average<\/a> \u2013 which is itself far lower than the United States\u2019<\/a>. HIV infection rates among injection drug users also dropped massively<\/a> since 2001.<\/p>\n

These policies show that problem drug use is a public health challenge to be managed, not a war that can be won.\"The<\/p>\n

Scott Akins<\/a>, Professor, Sociology Department, Oregon State University<\/a><\/em> and Clayton Mosher<\/a>, Professor, Sociology Department, Washington State University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n

================================================================
\nAlecto<\/span><\/strong>, Megaera<\/span><\/strong>, and Tisiphone<\/span><\/strong>, treating misuses, abuse, and addiction of and to drugs as a public health problem rather than a political problem just makes so much sense. And it’s not as if we don’t have models for how this approach can work, and even for transitioning to this approach from approaches which don’t work. Look at alcohol. (BTW heartiest congratulations to Sir Anthony Hopkins on 45 years sober.)<\/p>\n

And thank you, Oregon, for leading the way.<\/p>\n

The Furies and I will be back.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Experts in autocracies have pointed out that it is, unfortunately, easy to slip into normalizing the tyrant, hence it is important to hang on to outrage. These incidents which seem to call for the efforts of the Greek Furies (Erinyes) to come and deal with them will, I hope, help with that. As a reminder, […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":40592,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3729,3724],"class_list":["post-42378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-furies","tag-oregon","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42378","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42378"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42378\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40592"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}