Pubdate: Wed, 30 Nov 2005 Source: Up & Coming Magazine (NC) Copyright: 2005, Up & Coming Magazine Contact: http://www.upandcomingmag.com Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3127 Author: Margaret Dickson DRUGS AND VIOLENCE ARE A PART OF OUR CULTURE MORE THAN EVER I saw a stunning sight on the way to my cousin's house in Chapel Hill for Thanksgiving dinner. As we drove out Bragg Boulevard to begin the trip, a jumbo-sized pickup truck of the four-door style favored by many young men today pulled up beside our car. It was green, clean, and highly polished, indicating to me that the driver, who was indeed a young man in his 20s, was proud of his large possession. What shocked me to the depths of my middle-aged soul, however, was his choice of decal decoration for his treasure. Many of us adorn our vehicles with stickers and decals giving voice to what we enjoy or causes we support. Think "UNC Tar Heels," "I Love My Labrador Retriever," yellow ribbons in support of US military troops, and pink ones backing breast cancer research. The young man beside us had opted not for any such positive message. The driver's door of his truck was sprinkled with small decals which looked like very realistic bullet holes, as if someone had sprayed his vehicle with gunshot. There were several along the tail gate as well, and there may have been some on the passenger side, although we could not see them. I cannot imagine why that young man finds the notion of bullets aimed at him satisfying or amusing or whatever he thinks about them. I also cannot imagine where he bought them or who would manufacture such items. The astounding sight of faux bullet holes came on the heels of several other thought provoking events - the apparent drug related murders of four young men in Durham who law enforcement officials suspect may have owed money to a dealer, the Georgia murder of my walking buddy's former office assistant by her youth minister husband, and a lengthy article in the Fayetteville Observer recently about the high number of murders this year in neighboring Robeson County, most involving young people both as victims and as perpetrators. I also read a disturbing piece in the Raleigh News and Observer about young, under-educated, minority men finding themselves on life's dead end street, a route frequently littered with drugs. I know I may sound like your grandfather on a tear about "the world today," but something is seriously out of whack here. Social scientists talk about the mix of poverty and inadequate education which often underlies violent behavior. Ordinary people, including millions of parents, join social scientists in their concern over the zillions of violent images, both real and fictional, we all see on television, in movies, and other mass media. Toss into that volatile pot any level of illegal drug use and sale, as Robeson County authorities say is the case in many of those murders, and the result far too often is violent, even lethal. I do not know how to fix this modern reality any more than you do, but I am increasingly convinced that we must work on it now and quickly. As former White House counsel John Dean famously said during the Watergate scandal of the 1970s, "there is a cancer growing," and to not try to cure it, I believe, threatens the way we live in the United States. No less a personage than Burley Mitchell, former Wake County District Attorney and Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court who is not known for being soft on crime, shocked many observers several weeks ago by declaring our nation's and our state's war on drugs abysmal failures. Mitchell, who has certainly participated in a boatload of drug cases both as a prosecutor and as a judge, now says we should begin talking about de-criminalizing some drugs. He does not believe drug use is a good thing, but says regulating and taxing certain drugs as we do alcohol and tobacco could wipe out most of the illegal drug market and the violence which accompanies it. It could also clear some non-violent offenders from the ranks of the 37,000 people North Carolina taxpayers now house in state correctional institutions at the annual cost of private college tuition each. It is a view I hear discussed more and more often. Perhaps because my own children are young adults, I know and love many folks in that age group. If I could cocoon each of them until they become educated and employed and achieve some level of maturity, I surely would. The realist in me knows, though, that some of these precious young people will, and probably already have, dabbled in illegal drug use, maybe even sale. I have heard whispers of fights and of weapons, of court dates, probation, occasional times away at taxpayer expense. Burley Mitchell and those who agree with him may not have the answer, but I do think they are correct in pushing the discussion forward. We have been waging the war on drugs for several generations now, and while we have had unquestionable successes, we have also had failures and way too many lost souls. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake