hey by the way, do you guys get amc channel in taiwan? if so, i highly recommend the show breaking bad.
i think it’s the BEST show on tv!!! (well, american tv 
) it’s such an interesting portrayal of the meth world. really fascinating how they show how meth is made. it’s almost like a sexy art form. this is what i meant when i said the entertainment industry glorifies drugs. but good show anyway!
[quote=“Confuzius”][quote=“Charlie Jack”]
When I was living in the U. S., I didn’t see any hordes of addicts roaming the streets, and I didn’t see any obvious effects of drug abuse on the population at large. To see open drug dealing, I would have had to make a special effort to seek it out. And I don’t recall ever being approached to buy any of the drugs which are considered to be within the scope of this discussion. So if I were to apply your method of analysis to my home country, I guess I would have to conclude that the U. S. doesn’t have a drug problem.[/quote] This is absurd.
Where did you live in the US, a little frikkin bubble? Or perhaps WAYYYY out in the boonies (where, nowadays, meth and OC are a HUGGGE problem).[/quote]
When I was a teenager in the South in the 1960s, some of the people I hung out with were doing hallucinogenic drugs–mostly marijuana and LSD, psilocybin, mescaline, and maybe some other substances by accident (to cite two examples, a lot of the acid was known to contain speed and strychnine, and I think someone I knew may have accidentally taken PCP thinking it was something else). Without going into details, at that time I also became acquainted–and not from reading–with the idea that some people injected demerol and seconal, and that they took desoxyn. I remember once in my teens, a friend of mine identified a couple of his casual acquaintances as heroin addicts. I never did any of the non-hallucinogenic drugs mentioned above, and I only dabbled in hallucinogens: I smoked a little pot, and I took LSD once. At age 17 I began drinking.
I don’t recall anyone during that time offering to sell me any of the drugs mentioned above.
Over the years, I’ve known people who did cocaine. To the ones I knew, it didn’t seem to be a big deal. I’ve been involved in a twelve-step program, so I’ve known people who have used various kinds of drugs, including crack, amphetamines (including crank), and heroin. I don’t remember any of these people ever offering to sell drugs to me, though.
I lived in various neighborhoods in New Orleans for brief periods in the 1970s, sometimes in apartments, but also in rooming houses. I once lived in a rooming house on South Gayoso Street in the late 1970s. The rooming house had winos, at least one guy on methadone that I knew of, and some people just down on their luck. This was before crack, but heroin and methamphetamine were being used in the U. S. There was probably drug use going on in that neighborhood, but except for the methadone, I never got wind of it. And if I recollect rightly, no one offered to sell me drugs at that time.
I spent eight years in the military. I witnessed or heard about occasional drug use, and smoked a little pot, but not much. When I was in infantry training in Southern California, we took liberty, and I remember walking down Sunset Boulevard, and hearing somebody openly hawking hallucinogens (he used the word “psychedelics”). That’s the only instance I can think of which I could interpret as an offer to buy drugs, but it was an offer to the general public.
In one apartment I lived in in Baton Rouge, the people across the stair landing were almost certainly selling crack cocaine. But I had to figure that out by inference. Someone informed me that crack was being sold in that neighborhood, but I’m very nearly certain that the person who gave me that information had serious mental issues, so I couldn’t rely completely on that. On one occasion, a person knocked on my door and asked me whether I knew “where the two white girls live[d].” Because of the wording of his request, I figured that drugs were being sold. On another occasion, a guy knocked repeatedly and loudly on the door across the stair landing and then left. But before getting into his car, he shouted (I’m making up the apartment and street number), “Number seven is a bitch! Six two five, number seven is a bitch!”
Still later, as I was coming back from class, a large, obviously-powerful-looking man was standing at the top of the stairs, trembling slightly, and with a look of anxiety on his face. He asked me if I had seen the two girls. I hadn’t. Some time later, a middle-aged, middle-class-looking couple showed up at the top of the stairs, and asked after one of the girls. After I said I hadn’t seen her, they said, “If you see her, would her tell her that Mr. and Mrs. ________________ would like to talk to her?” I consented. A short time after that, I read the couple’s surname in the paper, but in the article the surname belonged to a young man who was involved, along with some other young men, in a murder. A certain group of young fellows had been hanging out in the across-the-landing girls’ apartment, and I figured that maybe the young fellow in the paper, and perhaps his friends who had also made the paper in connection with the murder, had also hung out in the apartment across the stair landing. But in order to verify things, I asked the landlord’s secretary whether the person mentioned in the papers was one of the fellows who had been hanging out in the girls’ apartment, and she confirmed it. She also mentioned that someone had raped one of the girls (I don’t think she meant that the young man in question had committed the rape).
Sometime around the events described in the paragraph above (I’m not sure of the sequence), I was in my apartment studying for a property law exam, when I heard someone outside say, “Man, just do what the f*** he says!” I went to the window, and I saw a clean-cut, middle-aged man, wearing nice clothes of the casual sort, and holding what appeared to be an automatic pistol to a young, white, long-haired fellow’s head, while the young long-haired fellow’s friend, a young black man (probably the person who had given the wise advice), stood to the side. Very strangely, the conventionally-dressed man set the pistol down on top of the tool compartment in the bed of his pickup truck and began to talk to the young man. I called the cops, but everyone was gone by the time they arrived. At the time, I tried to make sense of the event by speculating (of course I couldn’t be sure about this) that the nicely-dressed middle-aged man was a relative of the murder victim.
One night some time after that, a couple of guys got an urge to go to a place across the street from my apartment building and fire their pistols off in the air. I think they pretty much emptied their pistols. I don’t know whether those were the same two guys who later noisily burglarized the apartment below mine.
Not too long after that, I heard some noise and looked out my window, and across and down the street a ways, a biker-type guy, stripped to the waist, and surrounded by police officers, was lunging at them with some kind of sharp weapon. The police had their guns drawn, but they behaved in a very restrained fashion, and simply dodged the weapon. I think the man had already cut himself up a little bit. They finally got him restrained and put him in an ambulance.
As far as I can recall, no one offered to sell me drugs when I lived in that apartment.
There were other things, so I moved out of that apartment and into an apartment close to the State Capitol. That was an old neighborhood. Some longtime residents told me that some of the kids around the neighborhood had pagers that they employed somehow to help them be drug couriers, but I never saw any of that. Some things in the neighborhood looked suspicious. For example, after seeing and hearing some other clues about a particular person in my apartment building, I heard him quarreling with his girlfriend, who in the midst of the quarrel shouted, “You spend your money on bull****!” Adding that to other clues, I was pretty sure what kind of bull**** he was spending his money on.
But I don’t recall anyone in that neighborhood offering to sell me drugs.
In one small Southern city that I lived in for a total of about eight years, it was widely known that one could buy crack cocaine on a certain street of that city.
About five years before he died, my dad got very sick and was hospitalized. I think he must have thought he might be on his deathbed, because he told me some family history that I wasn’t aware of. One of the things he told me was that his father (who had abandoned his mother, his four sisters, and him) was a drug addict. To me this is somewhat interesting, because his father was born in the South in the nineteenth century.
Now you can be the other three Yorkshiremen.
Charlie Jack, well written and I’ll take your point on not getting offered drugs. I have been offered drugs a few times on the street in various countries but it is pretty rare, for obvious reasons. There was the time I visited Nimbin in Australia and was offerered bags of fresh grass by both a granny and a 14 year old kid on a bike before I had even stopped the van. THAT town had a drug problem LOL.
Their product was pretty good by all accounts though 
.
消す
[quote=“Charlie Jack”][quote=“Confuzius”][quote=“Charlie Jack”]
When I was living in the U. S., I didn’t see any hordes of addicts roaming the streets, and I didn’t see any obvious effects of drug abuse on the population at large. To see open drug dealing, I would have had to make a special effort to seek it out. And I don’t recall ever being approached to buy any of the drugs which are considered to be within the scope of this discussion. So if I were to apply your method of analysis to my home country, I guess I would have to conclude that the U. S. doesn’t have a drug problem.[/quote] This is absurd.
Where did you live in the US, a little frikkin bubble? Or perhaps WAYYYY out in the boonies (where, nowadays, meth and OC are a HUGGGE problem).[/quote]
words…
I don’t recall anyone during that time offering to sell me any of the drugs mentioned above…
As far as I can recall, no one offered to sell me drugs when I lived in that apartment…
But I don’t recall anyone in that neighborhood offering to sell me drugs.[/quote]
So your definition of not an obvious drug problem is not people offering to sell drugs to YOU. Thats a pretty narrow definition I must say. Maybe you look like a snitch?
EDIT
I cannot count the amount of times I have been offered to buy drugs…by complete strangers…in every single city I have ever lived (in the US that is).
But…I don’t look like a fuzz.
That depends on where you go, I guess. Wander around the downtown core of any major U.S. city and you will see “homeless” sitting around begging for money. Most of them spend it on alcohol, but a lot of them are meth or crack addicts. Open drug dealing is all over the place, too, although you might have to drive a few miles to your local meth dealer’s place if you live on a farm in the middle of Iowa.
I haven’t read every post of every page in this thread, but the big news in Taiwan for the last 2 weeks or so is ‘famous rich heir of Taiwanese elite family accused of drugging and raping starlets and videotaping the aforementioned drug-induced sex acts’.
Yeah, no drugs in Taiwan. No crime. Everything good and perfect as Confucius would want. Evil and corruption are western influences.
[quote=“Charlie Phillips”]
Yeah, no drugs in Taiwan. No crime. Everything good and perfect as Confucius would want. Evil and corruption are western influences.[/quote]
Guess ya gotto make your post absolutely idiotic and inaccurate to make a point?
Lets see…did I say everything is good and perfect? (look yourself)
ACTUALLY if you hadn’t been so lazy, you’d see all I did was diss the US’s drug problem and tell people how to make a cheap and easy crack pipe (but I guess that would require actually reading what I said before dropping my name in a post, which is evidently below you, even though posting inaccurately clearly isnt).
消す
[quote=“Confuzius”][quote=“Charlie Phillips”]
Yeah, no drugs in Taiwan. No crime. Everything good and perfect as Confucius would want. Evil and corruption are western influences.[/quote]
Guess ya gotto make your post absolutely idiotic and inaccurate to make a point?
Lets see…did I say everything is good and perfect? (look yourself)
ACTUALLY if you hadn’t been so lazy, you’d see all I did was diss the US’s drug problem and tell people how to make a cheap and easy crack pipe (but I guess that would require actually reading what I said before dropping my name in a post, which is evidently below you, even though posting inaccurately clearly isnt).[/quote]
I wasn’t talking (writing) to you and I wasn’t talking about you. I was referring to Confucius; don’t put tickets on yourself. You think too much.
[quote=“Charlie Phillips”][quote=“Confuzius”][quote=“Charlie Phillips”]
Yeah, no drugs in Taiwan. No crime. Everything good and perfect as Confucius would want. Evil and corruption are western influences.[/quote]
Guess ya gotto make your post absolutely idiotic and inaccurate to make a point?
Lets see…did I say everything is good and perfect? (look yourself)
ACTUALLY if you hadn’t been so lazy, you’d see all I did was diss the US’s drug problem and tell people how to make a cheap and easy crack pipe (but I guess that would require actually reading what I said before dropping my name in a post, which is evidently below you, even though posting inaccurately clearly isnt).[/quote]
I wasn’t talking (writing) to you and I wasn’t talking about you. I was referring to Confucius; don’t put tickets on yourself. You think too much. [/quote]
Confucius say Confuzius overreact on flob at times 
[quote=“Confuzius”]
Confucius say Confuzius overreact on flob at times [/quote]
You are truly a gentleman and worthy of the name, however it’s spelled.
i was living in san diego about 2.5 years ago. moved there for work. i never knew much about the city except what i read/see in media and i always thought it was a nice sunny safe surfing town and they had the republican national convention couple times there before. i was surprised when some of my coworkers told me that san diego county used to be the meth capital in the country. apparently they had a huge problem with it before; i think it’s gotten better over the years as the govt/police been cracking (no pun there) down on it but the problem is still there. they also taught me the word “tweeker”. i worked in a more boonie part of sd county in a town called santee that’s 20 min east of downtown. it’s very rural and looks like iowa but with mexicans and palm trees. everyone had like a beer belly and goatee and drove a huge big-ass pickup truck and wore plaid, even the women. it used to be called 'klantee" cuz there’s some conservative anti-immigrant kkk-type people living there. i’d walk to the 7-11 down the street to get lunch and noticed that some of the clerks had really terrible skin like they looked like lepers, like this:
it didnt dawn on me til later on that they might be meth users (or used to be) as i didnt really know much about meth and what it physically does to you. i really dont understand why anyone would want to use such a nasty drug that makes you look like you’ve been beaten with the ugly stick. if i was gonna use a drug i think i’d use cocaine or prescription drugs - at least it keeps your skin looking nice (i think) as i value my appearance!
anyway i read much of the meth production moved to mexico. drugs is tearing that country apart and the govt/military seems totally helpless and/or incompetent to do anything about it. but as long as there is demand on the american side it will be tough for them to stop the drug production. here’s some photos of drug busts at the border: http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/Border-Busts–67754217.html
did you know meth was invented by a japanese scientist named Nagai Nagayoshi? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methamphetamine#History i wonder why the japanese didnt develop a meth problem? i really do think it’s primarily cultural. westerners are just generally more laid-back and open-minded about drugs and taiwanese/asians arent. like if you’re open minded to trying one drug like marijuana and dont think it’s a big deal then you’re more apt to being open minded to trying other drugs like E and K and this and that. then if you keep trying this and that then eventually it leads to addiction. where in taiwanese culture it’s like “OMGOSH…YOU SMOKED POT!!! YOU TOOK E??? THAT’S TERRIBLE!!!” i’d say most american parents probably smoked pot at least once and some other drugs and most taiwanese parents havent. typical american parents would probably say to their kids, “look son, i dont want you doing drugs. i tried it when i was a kid and it was stupid, but you’re an adult and i trust you to make the right decisions.” where a typical taiwanese parent would be like 'NO!! NO!!! NO!!! (SLAP!! SLAP!! SLAP!!) YOU JUST STICK TO YOUR BOOKS AND STUDY HARD IN SCHOOL SO YOU CAN BE A DOCTOR!!! I’M YOUR PARENT, I DIDNT WORK HARD TO SUPPORT YOU SO YOU CAN BE SOME DRUG ADDICT!! YOU RESPECT AND OBEY ME!!" look at bill clinton who admitted to trying pot. can you imagine ma ying-jeou or some taiwanese politician saying that in public? i think that would be grounds for impeachment!! yup, it’s definitely cultural. 
.
I agree. In the West, everyone from politicians to movie stars to world-class athletes has smoked dope, not to mention 90% of school kids. Despite what some forumosans claim, I don’t believe the percentage is anywhere close in Taiwan.
Do we see photos like this in Taiwan?
Arnie
Willie
Charlize Theron
Paris
Rihanna
Cameron Diaz
Joan Rivers
And, of course, Michael Phelps
Not to forget Steve Jobs, Carl Sagan, Stephen Jay Gould, Francis Crick, Margaret Mead, Richard Feynman, Oliver Sacks, and a host of others.
coedmagazine.com/2011/02/02/the- … -admit-it/
I don’t recall ever hearing about any prominent stoned Asians. I think it’s largely because many here don’t view it as something politicians, or scientists, or athletes or intelligent people would try, but more like this . . .
THE GATEWAY DRUG!!! :snivel:
What would happen to the careers of A-Mei or Jolin or S.H.E. if they appeared on the cover of NEXT smoking a doobie?
Can you imagine anyone being elected to high public office in Taiwan after confessing to having indulged in god’s glorious herb?
Heck, can you name a single well-known and widely-respected Asian speaking out in favor of marijuana? I can’t.
Or how about this. . .
Can you imagine a TV series running for 7 or 8 years in Taiwan about perfectly ordinary housewives, soccer-moms, lawyers and accountants who regularly buy, sell and smoke dope?
A show like this one:
I can’t.
Looks like good dope too lol. That’s pretty crazy, but dope is on the way to legalisation or semi-legal status in lots of countries already. It’s not addictive either, although the strong forms can bring on hallucination. If the US could tax dope that would help enormously with local government deficits.
Beetlenut could be considered a mild form of dope in my opinion. I’m not convinced of the gateway drug argument myself, although I could see that the permisveness in society of using an illegal drug of any sort (as well epitomised above) trivialises the use of harder illegal drugs in society.
Prescription drug abuse and alcohol abuse would seem to me much bigger issues than illegal drug use in Taiwan. The penalties for using illegal drugs here make people think at least twice before trying let alone becoming a regular user. I know people who have smoked dope overseas, and they would never try it in Taiwan for exactly this reason. Then I know people who do smoke it in Taiwan, and I think they are being pretty dumb and cavalier, the fact is, the penalties are severe when put against the casual enjoyment.
Taiwan generally doesn’t have a breakdown in the working class, while they may abuse substances and face issues related to poverty, a lot of them still know what hard work is and they have ambition for their family. Societal values writ large.
[quote=“forealz”]there’s even a yahoo question about it. some of the answers are funny. one person said “15 million taiwanese are suffering from drug addiction”. thats a HUGE drug problem!! LOL
answers.yahoo.com/question/index … 538AA1EiS7[/quote]
I’m quoting UN stats and reports from the Taiwanese government and what do you have – yahoo.answers
The title of this post should be changed. What the OP is actually thinking is ‘’ the drug problem in the US is worse than Taiwan’’.
[quote=“headhonchoII”][quote=“archylgp”]From the United Nations:
‘‘The largest methamphetamine seizures at the global level during this period were made by China, Thailand, USA, and Taiwan, Prov. of China.’’
---------I can’t see how Taiwan can be listed as having one of the largest methamphetamine seizures in the world without having a drug problem.
'According to the UN, in 2002, 2003, 2004, more meth was sized in Taiwan than the US. In overall rankings from 2000-2006, Taiwan is ranked just under the US. China is ranked first with more than double that of the US.[/quote]
You need to learn more about Taiwan’s history, I have indirectly given you the reason already. Taiwan was a major transshipment point for illegal drugs back in the day, mostly through Kaoshiung (Gaoxiong). The huge heroin seizures were destined for other places. Even the latest shipment may have been destined for somewhere else, who knows.
.[/quote]
You need to learn how to read…This has already been addressed.
Many! Most of them go to China afterwards. Read the Taiwanese newspapers. Rehab in Taiwan is jail, though. And you don’t define what a drug is.