AS Coursework piece two - Drugs addicts are not criminals - they're patients

It is time to offer a more pragmatic approach to the growing drug problem in the UK – and here’s why

Mayor of Chicago Rahm Emanuel has declared and that anyone found with a gram or less of any controlled substance should be exonerated

It’s no secret that drug-related incidents make up a large percentage of the crime in Britain (60% according to the office of national statistics). In fact, a large portion of that is actually only possession for personal use, rather than crimes perpetrated against others.

When the phrase “drug addict” is used, immediately images of criminals and thugs are drawn up; but what about the lonely teenager from the broken home? What about the struggling, single mother? The widowed-man? Surely they cannot be condemned as ‘criminals’?

Drug addiction is not a crime – it’s an illness. These ‘criminals’, as they are so often branded, have an unwavering and impenetrable need to consume illegal substances – they need to take drugs. These people are not criminals, they are patients. We wouldn’t place someone suffering from depression into a jail cell, so what warrants us instead throwing in addicts? Depression is one of the most common causes of drug addiction. These people generally have an emptiness inside of them which they discover can only be filled by ‘getting high’. To them, drugs are a necessity not only for the body, but for the mind.

Of course not all who suffer from depression will use drugs as their escape mechanism, but it is usually funded by external factors as well, like environmental and social influences beyond our control. Broken homes, rough neighbourhoods or hanging out with the ‘wrong crowd’ all constitute, and yet we seem to collectively ignore this when discussing the morals of a drug addict.

It is always easier to fight something you don’t understand, but criminalizing addicts only exacerbates the issue. Rather than attacking the social concerns at hand we are pushing innocent people into cells and lumping them together with murderers and child rapists. We are isolating them even more so than they already feel – how can we condone this kind of social exclusion? How is this ethical?

If we as a community really want to resolve this on-going issue, we must offer a more pragmatic solution. Instead of digging up any mildly incriminating piece of evidence we can find against them, we must help them uncover the roots of their issues and eliminate their disease. Better rehabilitation centres; more advertisement to illustrate the seriousness of drug addiction, advocating a different perspective in schools and putting a halt to these negative associations: there’s so much we can do to help, so why haven’t we yet?

We must stop arbitrarily locking these lost souls in jail; stop labelling them as thugs – stop criminalizing drug addicts. It truly is the people that make a society work: as a community, we fail to work when there is a minority being forgotten and left to die. As a community, it is imperative that we stop cowering behind social tradition and stand up to aid our members who have fallen over, so that we as a community can be functional again.

It is also important to empathize as a community rather than ostracize because then we are one step closer towards the core of this problem. We won’t learn any truth about the nature of a drug addict by sticking them in a cell until they go mad from withdrawal symptoms – we can only learn by understanding.

What also must be remembered is the fact that if we turn our backs on these individuals, it is very possible that they will become a ticking time bomb of hatred for the system: incentive, distrust and rage do not equal something pretty. When we as a community cast out one of our members to the nether regions of rejection and shame - when we create pure humiliation by labelling someone ‘scum’ – we really are acting immoral, and thus essentially manufacturing our own monsters.

In the year 2000, Portugal prevented an epic war on drugs by decriminalizing possession and use. As a result the Portuguese government were able to manage dependence on drugs under the ministry of health rather than the ministry of justice: in other words, as patients rather than criminals. More recently even, Mayor of Chicago Rahm Emanuel has been fighting to instigate a movement on drugs – he has declared that the state laws should be more relaxed, and that anyone found with a gram or less of any controlled substance should be exonerated. He has rightly said that “reducing the penalties for minor drug possession would allow the city and state to focus their efforts on more violent crime”. It is clear that other parts of the world are moving forward and progressing in ideas, so surely it is about time we catch up with them.

Obviously, it is slightly more difficult to change the laws on drugs – but what we can do is evoke major social change. There is a pungent stench of stigma floating around drug users, which must be fought. Truthfully an idea worth spreading, imagine what life could be like in say five years time if we followed through? If we as a community just put that little bit more effort in, we can revive what we once were and rescue our long-lost members. By redesigning the boundaries of what once upon a time constituted as ‘sick’, we can finally start helping those who are suffering from what really is both a mental and physical illness.

I keep using the idea of community because I want to reinforce a truth that many of us appear to have forgotten: addicts are human, just like us. They eat and sleep and pray and have relationships, just like us. They want children and passions, just like us. They have secrets, doubts and fears, just like us. We are all the same and we all should share a sense of unity because we truly are a community. The only difference – the only thing that separates us is that they are sick. We need to help them. Drug addicts are not criminals – they are patients.