To be honest, a lot of the problem is because people–not addicts, nor the people who are trying to help them–aren’t seeing the benefit, and advocates have been terrible at messaging.
I’ll give you an example: the common refrain is that harm reduction saves lives, and that Naloxone saves lives, and that safe-consumption sites save lives.
And while this is true, most people don’t care. In fact, a sizable–and growing–percent of the population sees “saving lives” as a bug, not a feature. They’re tired of being robbed, of having their property stolen, of being assaulted, of being chased out of downtowns. Many have seen their supply of empathy run dry, and a lot didn’t have any empathy to begin with.
They would be quite happy if most addicts died.
I’ve heard a lot of people saying “You know what? Fuck naloxone. Fuck safe-use sites. I haven’t had a doctor for six years, I have to dodge needles and crack pipes while walking, I can’t use the park down the street any more, someone shit on my front lawn and someone stole my kid’s bike. If a junkie ODs, that’s one less junkie who makes my life miserable”. And that’s pretty much a direct quote.
We need to do a much better job of explaining to people how safe consumption sites reduce crime overall, and why safe-supply cuts out predatory dealers and thusly the economic incentives that drive crime. We really need to talk more about social services and treatment. Because, and again, this is hard to hear, an increasing number of people don’t really care if addicts die.
And we need to do it, because the people who vote, are burnt out and the political right is at least talking to their insecurities and anger and anxiety, where the left offers platitudes at best and condescension & condemnation at worst.
It’ll work when government spends real money on it.
That means real institutions, not shoestring strip-mall locations with precarious funding. It also means safe-supply. It also means housing. And–this is the hard one for advocates–it means humane incarceration for people for whom support, housing and safe-supply aren’t enough.
All of this comes with a price tag, but we’d rather build a spa parking lot or give Galen Weston money to upgrade his fridges or some such bullshit.