Drugsverslaving: aan welke kant sta jij?

Chris Floyd heeft een aangrijpend artikel geschreven op CounterPunch, waarin hij over zijn levenslange vriendschap schrijft met een man die niet ontkwam aan verslaving, niet in de laatste plaats daar hij in zijn jeugd regelmatig werd mishandeld door zijn aan alcohol (harddrug!) verslaafde vader en waar zijn moeder een chronisch patiënt was die in feite weinig voor hem kon betekenen.

Het steekt Floyd vooral over hoe men in de reguliere media en politiek over aan drugs verslaafde personen spreekt en waar men deze mensen op een smerige manier neerzet als waren het onmensen.....* Eén voorbeeld is al helemaal om totaal ziek van te worden: een sheriff durfde te zeggen dat een verslaafde, die als 'draaideur crimineel' (zonder meer een zieke Nederlandse aanduiding) zijn ziekte wilde misbruiken om eerder vrij te komen en tevens behandeld te worden...... Volgens de sheriff heeft de gevangene zijn kansen verspeeld....... De crimineel in kwestie zat in het vierde stadium van darmkanker, waarbij ook zijn lever al was aangetast, ofwel deze mens was terminaal ziek en had nog maar kort te leven en alsnog kon hij het vergeten eerder te worden vrijgelaten..... De sheriff in kwestie durfde te zeggen dat de gevangene zijn ziekte misbruikte om eerder vrij te komen, ofwel een terminaal zieke misbruikt zijn dodelijke kanker als 'excuus' volgens deze hufter >> kortom deze Sheriff is een totale inhumane psychopathische ploert......

Lees dit (nogmaals) aangrijpende artikel en geef ook commentaar als men mensen wegzet als een vals dier of als vuilnis, alleen omdat ze verslaafd zijn, vaak het gevolg van een vreselijke jeugd en dat in een ijskoude inhumane neoliberale prestatiemaatschappij, waar men geen tijd heeft voor psychische problemen (en in de VS geldt dit nog sterker als men niet verzekerd is en geen geld heeft...).... Bovendien ziet het gros van de mensen niet dat alcohol een dodelijke harddrug is, waaraan alleen in ons land gemiddeld 12 mensen per dag sterven, echter daar het om alcohol gaat trekt men de schouders op en gaat door met de bezigheid waarmee men bezig was......

Als we onze maatschappij niet hervormen en de 'neoliberale god' (duivel) blijven eren, zullen nog velen psychisch ziek worden en /of verslaafd raken en zich het leven benemen..... De hoogste tijd voor een ministerie van geluk, gebruik daarvoor maar het meer dan belachelijke hoge budget voor oorlogsvoering (wat uiteindelijk velen het leven kost, terreur creëert en mensen in groten getale op de vlucht doet slaan): 

February 19, 2020

Which Side Are You On?

by Chris Floyd

Photograph Source: Jobs For Felons Hub – CC BY 2.0

My best friend from high school was in and out of the prison system the last two decades of his life. He was a drug addict. This was before the opioid epidemic; his poison was crack cocaine. His father had been a raging, violent alcoholic and his mother was a broken woman with chronic illnesses. My friend spent most of his adult life trying to take care of her.

His addiction put him in dire need of cash all the time, even as it made it impossible for him to hold a steady job. It drove him to do stupid things. He once stole my car and sold my son’s schoolbooks, which were in the back seat, to get some cash. He would bang on my door late at night, asking for some money to keep the dealers he owed from giving him a beat-down. He finally ended up stealing items from his mother’s house and pawning them. 
He went to jail for that, then for the next several years kept going back to jail for various probation violations: often for getting caught drinking in public somewhere.

He eventually did a 13-month stretch in state prison, where he danced a fine line between the violent, racially polarized gangs that the prison authorities allowed to run amok. He refused to join the white racists but was regarded warily by the black gangs. He got beatings from people on both sides but was also able, sometimes, to act as a peacemaker between them.

When he got out of the pen, his life continued largely as before. He tried to set himself up as an independent contractor, doing house repairs, roofing, carpet laying, yard work. His mother died. He had long lost custody of his only son. He still struggled with crack, but dulled his psychic pain mostly with alcohol. He died at some point in his fifties, found in his cheap apartment two or three days after his death, corpse bloated in the sweltering heat of a Tennessee summer.

That’s it. That was his life. That’s all he had. He was a dope addict. He was a convicted criminal. He was a repeat offender. He was a desperate liar and a thief. He was a lost soul of no use to the society he lived in and then he died. That’s it.

He was also — without exaggeration or nostalgic sentimentality — the kindest, most sweet-natured, open and gentle person you could ever meet. He loved music with a passion so deep it touched the core of the earth. His failings tormented him like hot coals. He couldn’t understand what had happened to him, why he couldn’t escape addiction, why his mind was so muddled, why it wouldn’t stop roaring long enough for him to ever gather himself and be real, be whole, be normal.

He was beaten and threatened all through his boyhood. Even in high school he was a nervous wreck. He used to sneak down to our house in the middle of the night after a row with his father and try to sleep in the hedgerow of our yard, or else on our back porch. 

Fortunately, the dogs would always alert us, and we’d find him and bring him in, make a bed for him on the couch. He loved my family with a searing love that never abated for the 50 years he knew us.

I think of my friend whenever I hear some bullshit-bloated politician or commentator dismissing the humanity and dignity of criminals and prisoners. I thought of my friend today, when I read a story about Jonathan Faircloth, a 33-year-old prisoner in Alabama dying of colon and liver cancer that’s being left untreated by the authorities. He too was back in prison for probation violations — another drug addict who, while trying to make a normal life for his wife and children, got slam-banged by his addiction again.

I thought of my friend when I read the reply of Etowah County Sheriff Jonathon Horton after the Alabama media asked him about this human being left to die without treatment:

“He’s using his sickness as an excuse to get out of jail over and over again. In layman’s terms, he just ran out of his chances. So the judge revoked [his probation] and says he has to serve his days,” Horton said.

He is using his sickness — his Stage 4 colon cancer which has now spread to his liver and will kill him by next year if not before — as an “excuse.” An excuse. Stage 4 cancer as an excuse.

I read these words, and I think of the countless sons of bitches across the country — the dimwitted bulls in their stupid, prissy knit uniforms like this Etowah goober, the tee-shirted assholes pounding out inhumane bullshit on Twitter, the sleek politicians in designer suits, and the millions and millions of people committing spiritual suicide by attending to the brutal, barbaric blather of these walking, rotting husks.

I think of them, and I think of my friend — a parole-violating drug-addicted repeat-offending criminal of no use to the society he lived in — and I know — by God, I know! — which side I’m on.

More articles by:Chris Floyd

Chris Floyd is a columnist for CounterPunch Magazine. His blog, Empire Burlesque, can be found at www.chris-floyd.com. His twitter feed is @empireburlesque. His Instagram is www.instagram.com/cfloydtn/.
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* Waar het woord 'junk' in Nederlandse vertaling staat voor rommel, rotzooi of zelfs vuilnis.......