Reopen Riverview to ease mental health conflicts | Vancouver 24 hrs.       They never quit.The police state and ex police officers who think the way to deal with addiction is to lock people up and leave them to rot.This double diagnosis thing scares me to death.Not because I think there are not people who are better off in a institutional setting.We can see there certainly are.The thing about this is that it is an obvious attempt at making  addiction itself a crime with the use of the mental health act.The police state has tried to pull this off on many occasions.Most were back in the 70’s and 80’s when the police were telling anyone who’d listen that heroin addiction was a plague on humanity and something had to be done.I attended several such meetings with friends and as soon as the people behind the plan saw we were there they shut the meeting down and left.They knew they had no validity behind what they were trying to do and had been subjected to our exposure of that fact before.Headlines such as 30,000 addicts in lower mainland were the rule of the day.The recent death of a Hollywood star and a 15 year old were tragic to be sure but nothing new.The governments back in the 70’s and 80’s were still in the dark ages of prohibition.People were still getting double digit sentences for small trafficking charges.Mere possession could get you a couple of years.I got two for my first sentence for simple possession.It’s not that the powers that be haven’t tried the harsh approach.People who weren’t around back then can be forgiven for thinking we are too easy on addicts.The truth is that the current judges were lawyers in the bad old days and saw that putting a person in prison for years for a drug charge did nothing but take that person off the street for a few years.Every time you get out you have more connections and know more addicts.The simple fact that I have been out for decades has stripped me of both.Of course I was active until I was struck down by a bone eating virus and that’s what stopped my activity.Most hard core addicts will die addicted.That’s not to say that most addicts will die addicted.Some do drugs for fun and others out of necessity.Some have lives to get back to or dreams they still hold and others are just doing what they have to to survive.I,personally,would rather die than be put through a forced treatment that would never take because I don’t do opiate drugs for kicks.I do them for basic survival.Reading this article brought back all the old fears that the police state would declare addiction a crime and force all addicts into compounds like river view.Who’s to say who is addicted because of a mental health issue and who is addicted because they like it?As soon as you start to put people under lock and key because of their drug problems.You will not see those that want treatment looking for it for fear of being locked up indefinitely.Addicts are already stigmatized enough.The vast majority of heroin users are part timers and the rest are just targets.They are branded as chronic offenders and harassed and imprisoned for the way they get their cash.Then there are the vast army of binners.People living on the edge of society,trying to stay out of jail and do their drug of choice without breaking the law.They are certainly prone to do illegal acts but are usually just scavenging scrap.Something that often leads to trespass charges or minor theft issues.These people could be cared for with the minimum of cost to the public and savings to the criminal justice system.Just change the safe injection site to a heroin maintenance program and the so called chronic offenders that take up so much of the police time,the courts and jails will be no more problem.Even a person like myself,who has been an addict for 45 years and is now a chronic pain sufferer is forced on Government methadone which I can’t stand and which is a very poor pain medication.I was once on opiate drugs but was stripped of all such assistance by a government methadone doctor with an agenda.That agenda had nothing to do with my health.It had everything to do with the indoctrination the College puts it’s methadone doctors through.Methadone is a chemical concoction,first invented as a cure for heroin addiction.It turned out to be worse that the disease but because it didn’t require a needle it was approved by many governments.It may have had a place in another time but we know enough now to know that it is far worse than prescription heroin for the user.It destroys the liver.So what this former police officer is asking for is forced confinement for addicts until and only if they are cured will they be released.So the hard core addict will have to play the old game.Pretend to be cured so you can get out and get back to it.Nobody likes to see obviously ill people living like animals on the street to get their fix.Even worse is the sight of mentally ill persons being hauled to jail because they are disoriented and out of control.Something must be done.The closing of horrors like riverview were done for all the right reasons.The fact that the on street care that was proposed,never happened, is a travesty.It was a cheap cop out by a negligent government that was more interested in bridges,hiways and hotels accommodations for conventions than the mentally ill.Trying to slide an addiction impound component into the current mental health problem is just another police state ,back door, slide around that will not stand.That this particular police officer is taking this stance on an issue that I was foolish enough to think we were in agreement on is no real surprise.I see the need for a place for mentally incompetent people.I will never agree to any such proposal that tries to make addiction something punishable by imprisonment for the duration.I am well aware that such people are out there and they always have been.There are still people in politics that were there when this was tried the last time.The fact that it has no basis in scientific study or behavioural study makes no difference to the Stephen Harper’s and the Leo Knights of this world.Luckily,they are dinosaurs,near extinct.They see everything in one light.They think might is right and only force is respected.They will never see addicts as people with serious problems that they deal with the best they can.The current prohibition of drugs even has some drug users looking down on other drug users.Everybody seems to need someone to hate.Addicts seem to be on the very bottom of everyones totem.We are just people.People with some serious issues and some major problems but we get by on very little and need even less.We are not worth all the major money that is wasted trying to convince us of what we already know.Sure we’re sick.

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