Drug Addiction Amongst California S Homeless

Righteous Dopefiend: The Moral Economy of Heroin Abuse

One of the first images of Righteous Dopefiend, an anthropological analysis of California homeless heroin addicts, is that of several men shooting up heroin in a dirty and unsanitary place; even though there are cleaner places to do this, the men are attempting to conceal their activity because they do not want to share their stash: this indicates the extent to which the priorities of the addicts revolve around maximizing the efficacy of the drug and not around their own personal safety. "Fear of arrest exacerbates risky injection practices; discouraging possession of syringes, encouraging injectors to hide paraphernalia in unsanitary locations, and relegating the injection process to filthy hidden locales" (Bourgois & Schonberg 9). However, despite the fact that the addicts struggle with such issues, there are also moments of tenderness, such as when Hank chooses to inject Sonny in the neck to facilitate the other's heroin high (Bourgois & Schonberg 9). The moral economy is therefore one of exchange and mutual support; when addicts give to other addicts both in terms of helping out with the consequences of addiction, sharing drugs, and also showing kindness, they are reciprocated. Addicts that do not are treated with suspicion. The moral economy has parallels with the morality of non-users, even if this may not be immediately apparent on the surface.

In another incident, "Max walks by and when he hears about Hank's eviction, he puts his arms around his shoulders and offers to treat him to a taste of heroin ... he reaches into his sock ... muttering apologetically 'Caltrans took all my clean ones'"( Bourgois & Schonberg 112). Caltrans refers to the state of California, which is often seen as an oppositional force within the book; in the name of law enforcement and treating the addicts like criminals, the addicts are deprived of clean needles and the real type of help that might give them some sort of impetus to recover. Criminalization physically and psychologically (the two are united in the symbolic interactionist approach of the book) relegates addicts to the very margins of public space, causing them to internalize their self-perception of themselves and their community as permanent outsiders and ultimately working against any attempts to effectively police the area and encourage the addicts to reform their behaviors (Bourgois & Schonberg 113). Structural pressures encourage further reliance upon one another in the moral economy, versus those who might extend help.

There are also certain physical components of this specific community which perpetuate it. Septic infections from dirty needles are common although, interestingly enough, not HIV / AIDS which, the authors note, is primarily due to the fact that West Coast heroin tends to be thick and tarry, forcing users to rinse the needles (and therefore clean them), thus flushing the residue of the virus from the syringe (Bourgois & Schonberg 108). This example shows the degree to which immediate assumptions about addiction may be false and also how factors such as the spread of a deadly illness which might have decimated the community are not present in this specific context. The influence of context is also seen in the different racial divisions between members of the homeless addicts: while virtually all members grew up poor, whites often spent the holidays alone, rejected by their parents while African-Americans often spent the holidays with their families where their addiction was viewed more as an illness and not canceling out their other merits as a human being (Bourgois & Schonberg 121).