Drugs and Violence: A Historical Linkage - Essay Sample

Introduction

Over many years drugs are associated with a recurring theme of instigating users to act violently. The connection between drugs and violence has been the case since the mid-80s when most of the arguments concerning crack and cocaine started. It is during this time when Goldstein conceptualized the phenomenon of violence and drugs into a theoretical framework that was useful that encompassed three models of drug-related violence such as psychopharmacological, systemic, and economically compulsive.

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The psychopharmacological violence model suggests that specific individuals may end up developing exhibit violent behavior, excitable, and irrational as a result of long and short term effects, especially when some substances are ingested. The violence model of economically compulsive shows that some of the drug users get engaged in violent crime that is economically oriented to support costly drug use (Sarker & Faller, 2016). The systemic model concerning violence indicates that violent crime is known to be intrinsic when illicit substance involvement. This systemic model mostly involves the traditional patterns that are aggressive as a result of an interaction that occurs within the process of illegal drug distribution and trafficking.

Psychopharmacological arguments occurred as early statements attributed to violent behavior about the general use of drugs. Recently, this particular model has been applied to barbiturates and cocaine, focusing mostly on amphetamines and crack. The chronic use of amphetamines led to the production of delusions and thought patterns that were paranoid; hence the results of its use were violent acts and homicide (Sarker & Faller, 2016).

The study of cocaine on the same gave the same results, and they were concluded to be correct. Among the chronic and hard-core users, violence was typical. Recent research shows that there might be more violence about the psychopharmacological model associated with the use of heroin compared to all other illegal drugs.

During the 1970s, Goldstein carried research in New York City-based on heroin usage by the prostitutes. He found out that there is a great connection that exists between violent crime and withdrawal syndrome (Lyon & Welsh, 2017). The prostitutes experienced irritability and impatience due to withdrawal syndrome, motivating them to rob their clients instead of providing them with sexual services. Miami registered the highest number of such cases as per Goldstein's study research. This particular phenomenon was also found among other types of criminals. Such cases are among many aspects of violence as a result of paranoia and irritability due to the use of crack.

The model of violence based on economically compulsive can highly be well understood through aggressive behavior of using illegal drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and crack. The interviews carried in Miami revealed that 5,300 robberies took place yearly as most of these criminals depended on it as a source of income, especially among the narcotics users who were found to be around 573 in number. The criminals mainly used a firearm in committing robbery crimes (Sarker & Faller, 2016).

The cocaine users highly used the weapon in this context in committing robbery crimes. According to treatment and assessment, there are various effective means of administering therapy to people affected to reduce the rate of violence connected to drug usage (Lyon & Welsh, 2017). The effective elements of treatment include multimodal programs, structural treatments, and treatment settings, among others. Psychologically this form of treatment can be effective for any violation aspects.

The drug-related acts of violence in the systemic model occur for various reasons such as robberies by the drug dealers, territorial disputes among drug dealers, trafficking hierarchies to enforce normative codes, homicides, and assaults. General disputes among the drug users increase since some even fail to pay debts, causing a lot of fights between them and the drug dealers (Lyon & Welsh, 2017). Most drug users found in the street narrate of experiencing drug-related violence, for instance, women report being victims of rape over many years. Violence is highly associated with the use of illegal drugs, which mainly occur in the drug scene. Drug users can even end up killing each other, which is a form of violence, among many others.

The Ted Talks videos speak to the complexities of the drug-crime connection based on Goldstein's Tripartite Model understandably, and one can understand clearly through watching them. The psychopharmacological link is explained by illustrating how people tend to commit violent crimes after they engage themselves in the usage of psychoactive drugs. Goldstein's framework also involves a systemic link where profit opportunities, as perceived by various drug dealers in the market, create competition that is fierce, encouraging more crime involvement in an illegal environment. Ted Talks also explain compulsive economic model where most of the drug users tend to commit robbery crimes to finance their drug use. Goldstein's framework about committing crime or violence is highly connected to the use of illegal drugs.

References

Sarker, S. K., & Faller, E. M. (2016). An exploratory framework of drug related crime in forensic sciences and criminology. Malaysian applications Biology, 45(2), 93-97. http://journalarticle.ukm.my/11818/1/45_02_14.pdf

Lyon, D. R., & Welsh, A. (2017). The psychology of criminal and violent behavior. Oxford University Press. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327253513_The_Psychology_of_Violent_Offending