UK - Peter Hitchens: 'I don't believe in addiction. People take drugs because they...

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edgarshade

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Peter Hitchens: 'I don't believe in addiction. People take drugs because they enjoy it'
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Guardian
Decca Aitkenhead
The Guardian, Sunday 21 October 2012 19.30 BST

With reader comments
The contrarian rightwing journalist claims the war against drugs is lost because no one actually tried to wage it. But despite his outrageous inconsistencies and high moral judgments, he remains hard to dislike.

Peter Hitchens likes to present himself as the Millwall FC of punditry; no one likes him, and he doesn't care. He knows his new book about drugs will go down badly among metropolitan liberals, and says he has "absolutely no chance whatsoever of influencing anything". Fleet Street's patron saint of lost causes, he writes: "Almost certainly the battle to halt the spread of mind-altering drugs is lost." And yet for someone confronting futility and derision, he appears remarkably cheerful. "Well, it's what I've always dreamed of – of being the kind of person who gets written about. I dreamed of being part of the exciting people who were in the arguments."
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We disagree about almost everything, but I find him impossible to dislike. In person he is polite and engaged, and in print always a contrarian but never a controversialist, sincere in beliefs that are almost as unfashionable on the right as they are anathema to the left. He champions civil liberties but abhors libertarianism, would like to bring back hanging and see off pre-marital sex, and is in a perpetual state of lament for the passing of Christian values, which he dates back to the first world war. "If anybody else tells me that I think the 1950s were a golden age, I'll strangle them. I remember the 1950s – chilblains, Wall's ice cream, everybody smoked. I didn't like the 1950s." Hitchens's golden age was the late Victorian/early Edwardian era, a period of "How shall I say? Increasing self-imposed moral conduct."
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The author's great merit is his honesty. "Drug-taking," Hitchens writes, "is the purest form of self-indulgence," for it severs the link between hard work and reward, making "deferred gratification appear a waste of time and a foolish rejection of readily available delight".
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More...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/oct/21/peter-hitchens-addiction-drugs-war
 
Horrible, nasty, close-minded self-righteous man. How he managed to spring from the same gene pool as his intelligent and engaging brother, I'll never know.
 
Sometimes I wonder if he adopts these inflammatory, far right-wing opinions just to draw attention to himself because he felt ignored next to his famous brother? He certainly seems to live in his shadow.
 
Hitchens thinks the legal drug classification system, under which cannabis is considered less dangerous than heroin or crack, is "scientifically meaningless". Has he ever seen someone trying to give up heroin? "No, I can't claim to know what it looks like, no." Has he ever seen anyone trying to give up cannabis? "No." Does he think the two are equivalent? "Well, since I haven't seen either of them, I don't know. But as I don't believe in addiction, it's of no interest to me."
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Blind man writes book about Louvre gallery, movie at 11.
 
Crankinit said:
Sometimes I wonder if he adopts these inflammatory, far right-wing opinions just to draw attention to himself because he felt ignored next to his famous brother? He certainly seems to live in his shadow.
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From article
"Well, it's what I've always dreamed of – of being the kind of person who gets written about. I dreamed of being part of the exciting people who were in the arguments."


Spot on Crankinit
 
He doesnt believe in addiction? Addictions not something you just believe in or not. Give him a few opiates and see if his beliefs stand up to facts.
 
He doesnt believe in addiction? Addictions not something you just believe in or not. Give him a few opiates and see if his beliefs stand up to facts.
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You don't even need opiates, he admits himself that he doesn't function without his morning coffee. Swap it out for decaf for a few days then let's see how he feels about addiction.
 
There used to be a time when you had to speak with accuracy to be in the news. Now any moron with a computer can talk shit. What a shame.
 
Hitchens's golden age was the late Victorian/early Edwardian era, a period of "How shall I say? Increasing self-imposed moral conduct."
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Cause that was such a greaaat time. -.-
 
To me addiction is simply something that you enjoy more than life itself. This goes for every type of addiction stealing, drugs, food, ect. Unless you are phsycally addicted to a substance then addiction can be as simple as a choice.
 
Hitchens's golden age was the late Victorian/early Edwardian era, a period of "How shall I say? Increasing self-imposed moral conduct."
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Yeah, the idea that people were any more moral a century ago is absurd. It was probably a great time to be alive if you were wealthy, healthy, white, straight and male, but everyone else got shafted. Hitchens is like all conservatives, fantasizing about a time that never really existed.
 
dopaminedump said:
To me addiction is simply something that you enjoy more than life itself. This goes for every type of addiction stealing, drugs, food, ect. Unless you are phsycally addicted to a substance then addiction can be as simple as a choice
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For me its different though, I'm dependent on pain pills because of chronic lower back problems
 
How's the saying go? "Nobody wakes up one day and decides they'll be a heroin addict?"
Pete Hitchens is just a turd. He is ranked alongside the Daily Faill for reliable journalism, in my mind..
 
Fresco said:
For me its different though, I'm dependent on pain pills because of chronic lower back problems
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That's not really true. I have had chronic pain for years and only use cannabinoids, Flexeril, Soma, and bromelain+papain for relief. You chose to use opioids regularly until the point you became dependent on them. There were alternatives!

Peter Hitchens is right on the addiction thing. Anyone who thinks that going through opioid withdrawal is not a legitimate option for themselves is just choosing to get high/maintain. There are plenty of people who have the willpower to successfully quit heroin cold turkey. And besides the physical addiction of drugs like opioids, there's nothing left to the concept of 'addiction' other than choosing to give in to cravings for instant gratification via pharmacology. It's delusional to think that one doesn't have the options to ignore cravings and make it through withdrawal episodes.
 
Coolio said:
That's not really true. I have had chronic pain for years and only use cannabinoids, Flexeril, Soma, and bromelain+papain for relief. You chose to use opioids regularly until the point you became dependent on them. There were alternatives!
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Cannabis is (still) illegal in Ontario.
Flexeril doesnt do shit for me.
Soma is addictive, just as codeine is.
Bromelain+papain might help a bit, but not enough for the chronic pain I have.
 
Fresco said:
Cannabis is (still) illegal in Ontario.
Flexeril doesnt do shit for me.
Soma is addictive, just as codeine is.
Bromelain+papain might help a bit, but not enough for the chronic pain I have.
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You're totally confused, man. You're acting as if relief from pain is a fundamental right or necessity. I have severe chronic pain, which opioids would treat, but I actively choose not to ever use them for the pain as I'm aware of how it's an unsustainable method of pain relief!

Some people choose to get addicted to opioids to deal with their chronic pain, others choose to just 'deal with it' without the physical dependence issues of opioids whether they're functional or not with that level of pain.

Flexeril and Soma (Soma is not addictive if you only take it once or twice per week) and bromelain barely do anything for my pain, but they're all I'm willing to take as they're the only readily available healthy sustainable long-term methods for treating back pain pharmacologically.
 
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