In Heroin Crisis, White Families Seek Gentler War on Drugs

AZwildcats said:

This reminds me of something I experienced in elementary school, although I didn't really realize it until a few years later. If anyone is familiar with the Tucson area, I went to Davidson Elementary and it had to be closed due to mold problems (TUSD FTL ). The plan was to demolish the school and build a new one about a mile down the street. While this was happening, we were all sent to other schools in the area until the construction was completed. I, along with other kids from my neighborhood, were picked up by bus and sent to a school in a much nicer neighborhood (Manzanita Elementary) everyday for the next 2 years (2nd through 4th grade for me). My pops and older brother went to the school board meetings and I remember them being very upset at the complaints of the parents who lived in the nicer area. They were complaining that we would introduce drugs, weapons, and gang activity to their suburban setting (we came from a poorer neighborhood in Tucson, but they acted like they were shipping us in from a prison). So in response the school implemented a zero tolerance policy on those things, with the punishment being immediate expulsion from the school. Well one day the school was evacuated because a kid brought a plastic toy gun to school and the teacher called the police. The parents were all up in arms until they found out the culprit was a local of the nicer neighborhood. Now instead of expulsion, the student who brought the plastic gun was suspended for a few days and the school made the entire student body attend a seminar on school safety.

Sorry for the long story, but I feel it somewhat goes along the topic of the "gentler war on drugs". It isn't a problem until it starts to affect white people. People in the inner cities have been getting murdered in absurd quantities for decades, but that was just chalked up to inner city problems. Now that white people are getting killed in tragic manners, now America has a violence/gun problem. Possession of crack and other drugs have carried heavy sentences for years, but now that suburban America has a heroin epidemic our laws are too harsh. It's ridiculous how blatantly biased the media and lawmakers are when it comes to these things.

Click to expand...

lobotomybeats said:

You can point to the whiteness and blackness of the differing approaches on the War on Drugs all you want. What's not really discussed is that the nation as a whole has a different view of addiction. This change is welcome. It's unfortunate that it didn't happen earlier, but the climate has changed a lot. Addicts aren't viewed the same as they once were. Maybe it's because more are white now, I don't know. Maybe it's because so many of the drugs abused are prescription. Maybe it's because there are reality TV shows focused on helping people get help instead of imprisoning them. I don't know, but this is a welcome change regardless of who the poster children are.

Click to expand...