Crack Addiction Research Paper

In his article, “Toward a Policy on Drugs,” Elliot Currie discusses “the magnitude and severity of our drug crisis” (para. 21), and how “no other country has anything resembling the American drug problem” (para. 21). The best way to describe America’s drug problem is that it is a hole continuously digs itself deeper. America’s drug issues were likely comparable to other country’s at one point in time, but today it can be blamed on the “street cultures” (para. 21) that continue to use and spread the use of illegal drugs. These street cultures transcend the common stereotype of drug users, such as low income communities in cities or welfare recipients, and can be found in every economic class and location. They are groups of people who have

Written and published in 2008 by Paul Gootenberg, History professor and Latin American studies at University of New York at Stony Brook, “Andean Cocaine: The Making of a Global drug” retraces the pivotal stages of the illicit cocaine trafficking, starting from the boundless coca fields in Latin America to the chemistry laboratories in Europe up until the streets of U.S. cities. The aim of this book review is to provide the reader with a short but detailed insight of what is the main content of the book, by paying particular attention to its structure, objectivity and style.

The 1990’s marked the beginning of a new war on drugs. Drug abuse rates had started to increase, wider variety of drugs became more common, and more people started to use. Not a lot has changed, because drug abuse is still very common in today’s society. In the 1990s, drug usage was bad, however a lot of the drugs in today 's society were not as common. Drug abuse is not just in the big cities,the problem is all over.

Although many things seemed good in the 1980’s, there was also issues plaguing America. The drug epidemic had by then spun completely out of control. The use of narcotics like cocaine, claimed many lives and earned widespread coverage by media and news. Following this Nancy Reagan began the “War on Drugs”, a campaign to combat pre-existing drug usage and prevent future

When understanding the drug problems we face today, we have to look at the history of how drugs became popular and what they do. Some historians would say this country was founded by tobacco, the first big cash crop the colonies produced. It was first used for chewing, pipe smoking and snuff. Cigarettes popularity started after World War II but eventually declined after showing the correlations between smoking and cancer. (A Brief History of Tobacco)

Provocative and eye-opening, The Stickup Kids urges us to explore the ravages of the drug trade through weaving history, biography, social structure, and drug market forces. It offers a revelatory explanation for drug market violence by masterfully uncovering the hidden social forces that produce violent and self-destructive individuals. Part memoir, part penetrating analysis, this book is engaging, personal, deeply informed, and entirely

For example, agencies have been established with the sole intent to manage drug use and distribution and technology has been exclusively developed to detect the presence of drugs. Yet, evidence has indicated that such exhaustive efforts have been relatively unsuccessful. First, it has been assumed that drugs have perpetuated violence in society and based on this rationale, it was believed that by the suppressing the pervasiveness of drugs that incidents of violence would simultaneously diminish. However, reality has failed to align with the expectations that had initially been anticipated. Research findings have suggested that the decriminalization of drugs would result in a less adversarial drug market in which conflicts have tended to arise among dealers as well as between dealers and buyers (Common Sense for Drug Policy, 2007, p. 21). Essentially, although drugs have been held accountable for gang violence and other acts of violence that have occurred within communities, the illegality of drugs indeed may have aggravated the situation.

In the 1980’s the introduction of Crack Cocaine which was much more addictive to the users and more profitable for the drug dealers than Powder Cocaine. The prompted the administration to create Reagans War on Drugs which was supposed to make a major difference in the use of illegal drugs. By giving a much stiffer penalty to drug dealers for possession an even a moderate amount of illegal drugs. The fear of jail time was going be a deterrent to reduce the sale and illegal drug use. A minimum five year jail sentence would be handed out to someone caught with 500 grams of powder cocaine or with five grams of crack cocaine. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 focused on crack dealers with the sentence tied into the amount and what type of drug the

Through the years, the world has made substantial progress towards ensuring equal treatment under law for all citizens. However, the cycle continues, as disparities within the justice decision making process is growing at each level of the criminal justice system. Although the drug policies and sentencing guidelines that are put into place by our legislators are said to be “race neutral,” they have actually shown to be pervasively biased, affecting both innocent as well as guilty minority citizens.

The history of this problem started in the late 1960’s when recreational drug use was on the rise with the middle class in America. From 1968-1969 the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs was founded, studies linked crime

Like it is mentioned in the movie 13th “The so called war on drugs was a war on communities of color”. So, now black people are being arrested much more than White people even though the drug use is close to the same as Angela F. Chan points out in her article for the Huffington Post. “Even though Black people use drugs at the same rate as White people, they are incarcerated for drug crimes at 20 to 50 times the rate of White people in some states”. A law that was passed during the war on drugs was mandatory sentencing. This law led to people being arrested crack being sentenced to much harsher punishments than those for cocaine. The people being for crack were predominately black and for cocaine predominately white. “Crack was largely a inner-city issue and crack was largely a suburban issue”(13th). After the war on drugs Bill Clinton became president, and pasted more to crack down harder on crime. One of them being mandatory minimums this didn’t let the judges decide the crimes. It set mandatory sentences for the crimes. So, this shifted the power from the judge to the prosecutor, and 95% of elected prosecutors are white(13th). This shows that still today racism and the effects of slavery are still being felt 151 years

According to Bourgois, he explained that he felt structural oppression was the main cause of what affected Primo and Caesar’s life choices and opportunities. Structural oppression is when people of a society identity group are mistreated and the treatment of these people are supported by society and its institution. Throughout the book, we see several cases in which Primo and Caesar and mistreated in various ways. In the beginning, Bourgois talks about the history of Puerto Ricans and how the immigration from Puerto Rico to New York City consequently affected the growth and development of their own culture in El Barrio.

In the article “The Crime Bust” by Gordon Witkin, it is introduced that in 1994, after a 9 year soar in crime rates, they began falling (1). According to preliminary figures released by the FBI, all across the board, the amount of crime committals were declining at a drastic rate. (Witkin 1). To determine the source of this sudden decline, several factors were examined, such as the economy, dismissed as “Robbery and burglary fluctuate with economic conditions--but murders generally do not…” (Witkin, 1-2) Prevention and domestic abuse were also discredited since “Studies show that prevention programs don’t work, and others may or may not be effective…” and “...in 1996, there were only 447 fewer ‘domestics’ than in 1993, accounting for just 9 percent of the murder reduction.” (Witkin 2) From there, Witkin begins to analyze the connection between the crime decrease and harsher prison sentencing and smarter policing (Witkin 2) As stated by Witkin, “Imprisonment...seems to be important, but not the underlying cause of the crime drop…” and while “...smarter policing was spectacularly decisive in some cities… it probably was not the key factor nationwide.” (Witkin 3-4).

According to a study done at the University of Washington, “ For the developing young adult, drug and alcohol abuse undermines motivation, interferes with cognitive processes, contributes to debilitating mood disorders, and increases risk of accidental injury or death” (Hawkins). When teens abuse drugs, they can damage their brains. This can affect everything from emotions, to memory. The abuse of drugs as a teen can also lead to accidental death, particularly involving overdoses and car accidents. Also, according to Addiction Center, an information center about drug use, abuse, and addiction, “Substance abuse affects teen brain development by: interfering with neurotransmitters and damaging connections within the brain, reducing the ability to experience pleasure, creating problems with memory, causing missed opportunities during a period of heightened learning potential, ingraining expectations of unhealthy habits into brain circuitry, [and] inhibiting development of perceptual abilities” (Health). When teens abuse drugs, they are increasing their chances of becoming addicts as adults due to their changed ability to feel pleasure and to feel good without drugs. They are also damaging their brains, which can lead to memory problems. These are all things that negatively impact the lives of teens and are some of the very negative effects of teens drug abuse on the brain and body. However, drug abuse

As of recent, the war on drugs has been a very often discussed topic due to many controversial issues. Some people believe the War on Drugs has been quite successful due to the amount of drugs seized and the amount of drug kingpins arrested. I believe this to be the wrong mindset when it comes to the war on drugs. The war on drugs isn’t a winnable one so we must do all that is possible to assist those who struggle with drug addiction and decriminalize small amounts of drugs. These minor changes in the way we combat drugs will create significant change and have lasting effects.