While I suspect myself that there is quite a lot to this story, what amazes
me is that there has been absolutely no discussion of the fact that the
only source of data for this assertation is DUFS data, which is a urine
test in participating jails across the country of people who are arrested.
First, for the social constructionists, it is important to note that it
tests incoming jail inmates, not the entire population, the population of
identified criminals, the population of unidentified deviants, or anything
else.
Second, although the bulk of the stories are about how much more likely
crack is to lead to homicide than cocaine, there is no DUFS test for crack.
All of the newspaper stories use crack and cocaine as synonyms, which is
correct in terms of DUFS - the test cannot differentiate between them.
Yet, pharmacologically, all of the stories are based on the claim that
people are using crack, as proven by the fact that they are using cocaine,
which may or may not be crack. In fact, only a minority of cocaine users
use it in a crack formulation.
Still, I think that there is much to be said for the fact that what is
happening on the streets is due to decisions made by people on the streets.
New York City has become world famous for taking credit for reducing
homicide rates, even though similar rate reductions are taking place in
places where demoralized police are doing nothing (e.g., Los Angeles). In
smaller cities with active police trying to emulate the New York model,
homicide is UP (e.g., Baltimore, Omaha).
When the dope man was a heroin user, it was still possible to see him as a
heroic figure, at least from the point of view of a 15 year old (see Stuart
Hills and Ron Santiago's Tragic Magic on Nelson Hall, for example). It is
a lot harder to see a hard core crack user as heroic. It is easy to see a
lot of kids finding that life style as unattractive. As others have
pointed out, when crack use becomes unattractive, rates of usage decline.
When there is no sales competition, that part of the homicide rate due to
gang wars over sales will decline.
Oh well, the most important thing is that as usual none us really knows
much of what we are talking about. Nothing new there.
Marty Schwartz