In the last couple of years with the rising herion problem in the US I've seen countless times on social media people commenting, liking sharing, and in general fist pumping about "shooting your local drug dealer" as this great idea. As if this will solve anything at all.
●First of all I'm not a recreational drug user.
I used to be. I've often joked in the past that I had done enough drugs and alcohol to kill a couple of people so I didn't really need to party like a rock star anymore. I've drank countless gallons of bourbon, beer and liquor, smoked what seemed like garbage bags of weed, along with a fair amount of methamphetamine, cocaine, LSD, schrooms etc.
These days I try to be very conscious of any compulsive or addictive behavior I engage in.
I've had a few friends and acquaintances who have died of overdose and other drug related causes,so I DO understand the the pain and suffering that can go along with drowning in a pool of self medication.
You know what I have Yet to see?
●A Facebook page or T-shirt telling us we should all shoot out local bookie or pit boss for the lives that compulsive gambling has destroyed.
●Someone advocating burning down your local brewery or distillery for all of the countless lives alcohol related crashes and liver diseases have caused.
●Lynching your local baker for serving up all those tasty treats that cause obesity which has reached epidemic proportions in many western countries, killing far more people than any drug.
●Attacking someone who works for a credit card company for all of the untold suffering caused by handing out credit to people who don't understand it and can't handle it.
It's easy to see in a few sentences how absurd and ineffective this would be. Just have a look at our current drug war, or the prohibition of alcohol in the 1920's.
The reason this bumper sticker logic of "shooting your local dealer" is so popular should be galringly obvious.
It attempts to absolve the one actually responsible a for their own self destruction, which cannot actually be done, but nice try.
It is by every sense of any definition self inflicted, slow kill suicide, by self medication.
There is what seems like compelling evidence to me that the cause of addictive and compulsive behaviors is brain trauma, not the introduction of some substance or your local dealer giving you your first hit for free "the next time it'll cost you kid."
My personal experience with healing and walking away from addiction started with accepting that I was responsible for starting down the path of self destruction.
That I needed to quit externalizing the self abuse I was engaging in.
That I needed spiritual and emotional healing, self knowledge, and recognitions of the causes of the pain I was experiencing and attempting to erase and ease.
None of this would have been accomplished by **"shooting any dealer",or "getting that crap off the streets."
Here is an excellent video on the nature of addiction, points seldom ever heard of or discussed.
Self knowledge, healing, personal accountability.
Selah