Cycled Out of Proportion! The Drug Scandal!!
STIGMA EXPOSED!!
Name: Jongsil Adamedes
Student Number: n6818285
Tutor: Michelle Newcomb
CULTURAL ARTEFACT
Lance Armstrong throughout his career has been many things, but recently much has
changed.
This picture depicts the stigma that drugs have done to Lance’s reputation, a liar, a cheat, but
most of all an addict, who is now the new face of addiction. It wasn’t long until all the
sporting codes were bent on trying to find what was happening in their own sport, sparking
the question, “if Armstrong does, who else?” With illegal drug use under the microscope,
what must be done to understand this stigma? Is he accountable for his act or is he a victim?
The act of lying, we can generally perceive it as socially and morally wrong, but what about
this addict stigma? Is it socially acceptable to shun all who are addicts? Regardless of what
he did, he still has to face addiction.
PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE
As a society, we have come to associate drug addicts with many different perceptions, be it
good or bad. However, this instigates a burning question, why is there a stigma on illegal
drug addicts? What can be done to fix it? This negative stigma is the public issue, denying
self-worth and deflating self-esteem. Whereby stereotyping people in our societies who are
addicts with undermining nicknames such as “Drugo” and “Junkie”. How did this come
about?
Even more so, what about the addicts, how do they feel? What are they going through? How
are they coping? All of which are important to address this public issue.
LITERATURE REVIEW
According to The War on Drug: Promoting stigma and discrimination, (n.d.), the globe has
been in a struggle for over 50 years, to combat the “war on drugs “. With no luck preventing
the long-term effect and trend of increasing drug supply and use, the “unintended
consequences” of this war has infected ranges of populations in our global communities
promoting stigma and discrimination. According to Room et al., (2001) drug addiction is the
most strongly marked with stigma among a range of health and social conditions including
homelessness, leprosy, being unhygienic or unkempt and possessing a criminal record,
further marginalising and threatening to those who use illicit drugs.
White, (2009) describes stigma at its core, “involves processes of labeling, stereotyping,
social rejection, exclusion, and extrusion as well as the internalization of community attitudes
in the form of shame by the person/family being discredited.”
Palamar, Halkitis, and Kiang, (2013) describes that there is a debate that stigma has a
potential to be a protective tool in public health to deter non-users away from illicit drugs, for
example the stigma of tobacco and the decline in its use. The War on Drug: Promoting stigma
and discrimination, (n.d.) explains that by in large these legal and social controls are desirable
and helpful to establish healthy norms.
However, most studies sampled suggest illicit drug users were “socially disgraced” obviously
becoming socially disadvantaged from stigmatisation. Furthermore it’s needed to be
supported by empirical data of the effect on illicit drug stigma and how it’s affecting people
for both illicit drug users and non users, thus there is yet more to be accounted for and
considered. However, it is important not to undermine the complexity of the situation, which
requires involvement through politics, social environment and individual education for both
physical and mental outcomes. (The War on Drug: Promoting stigma and discrimination,
n.d.) (Palamar et al., 2013) and (White, 2009)
Illicit drug stigma is multilayered, as those who are subjected to stigmatisation are generally
the ones who aren’t able or have limited access to resources to cope with drug stigma. This in
turn isolates them from society, reduces them from seeking help, compromising long term
physical and mental health outcomes (White, 2009).
Users confined with the perception of stigma result in psychological consequences which in
turn is brought by the guilt of social disapproval, thereby developing: secrecy, shame, low
self-esteem, a preoccupation with non-disclosure and social withdrawal (Palamar et al.,
2013).
Ahern et al., (2007) summaries this fact of the illicit drug user that turns to negative societal
attitude and adopts negative self- characterisations. While stigmatized they are also faced
with possible unjust incarceration which furthers their experience of rejection and unequal
treatment attributed to drug use.
It doesn’t stop there, in fact Ahern et al., (2007) explains illicit drug stigma exacerbates not
just mental but also contributes to physical effects with those who are chronically stressed,
impeding them and others to seek help from the health care system therefore lowering their
quality of health as a consequence.
This continues with ethnicity, in which The Justice Policy Institute, (2007) explains the
American drug stigma is a conduit for institutionalised racial prejudice of the ethnic minority.
Blacks and Hispanics are significantly more likely to be stopped and searched, arrested,
prosecuted, convicted and incarcerated for drug offences, even when the rates are identical
across the whole population. Black people are 10.1 times likely to be imprisoned than white.
This similarity is also represented in Australian and Canadian’s Indigenous groups which are
also a shining example (Human Rights Watch, 2009) (Australian Institute of Criminology,
2011).
Harm Reduction International (2012) highlight the overlooked casualties, which are the
women convicted commonly on low level drug offences, known as “drug mules” transporting
illicit drugs inter-state, overseas in their luggage or ingesting inside the person. Usual
characteristics are ethical minorities who were unfortunately disadvantaged financially and
with histories of low level literacy, mental health or drug dependency issues and sexual or
physical abuse, which are exploited by men in the drug trade.
The term “crack mum” is a great example of the unwanted stigma given to women who have
been stigmatized by the vice of illicit drug abuse. Enslaving them to drug dependency and
using their body as a means of currency in the drug trade, which is very dangerous for the
well being of pregnant women and their unborn children. This in some case for women there
are horrific forms of abuse and are deemed disposable. (Human Rights Watch, 2003)
(Koutsoyannis, n.d.)
Children are no exception to the demise of drugs abuse and the stigma it carries, suffering
from the parents’ drug related conviction or violence, contributing to countless orphans (The
War on Drug: Promoting stigma and discrimination, (n.d.).
Poverty is another alarming revelation that explains the damage and stigma drugs have placed
onto the lives of many living in the slums and low socio-economic areas. However it is a
misconception that illicit drug use is marginalized in these places, which isn’t the case, poor
does not amount to those more likely to use drugs (The War on Drug: Promoting stigma and
discrimination, n.d ). For the poor who are involved in the drug supply or drug trade in these
areas it is a means of survival, and even so they unfortunately received only 1% of earning,
while most goes to the traffickers themselves. If there were intervention to stop the
production, the consequences will force people in greater levels of poverty and restrict the
access of health services and education thus increasing human trafficking and women into the
sex trade. (The War on Drug: Promoting stigma and discrimination, (n.d)
Media is yet another significant point in shaping what drug’s stigma means to people.
According to Hughes, Lancaster, and Spicer, (2011), media has heavily distorted
preconceptions of crime and deviance framings and is capable of controlling social issues
which can change the perception of the actual report incident or severity of the problem.
Harm Reduction International, (n.d.) demonstrate words such as “junkie” or “clean/dirty
“does imply that to the public that these are a part of a person’s character.
CULTURAL AND SOCIAL ANALYSIS
Goffman is crucial to define and explain what is stigma. Goffman defines stigma as “a ‘mark’
of social disgrace, arising with social relations and disqualifying those who bear it from full
social acceptance,” defining each “mark takes various forms: ‘abominations of the body such
as physical deformities, alleged ‘blemishes of individual character’ such as mental illness or
unemployment and ‘tribal identities’, such as religion or ethnicity” and “a shared belief that
person ought to behave in certain ways at a certain time” (Ahern etal., 2007) (Campbell &
Deacon, 2006).
Goffman describes a divide of what is deemed to be fine, desirable or morally right by social
agreement, but what does not fit is given a “stigma” a distaste to something which the
majority don’t particularly find appealing or healthy, this in turn creates a negative effect on
particular societies and minority groups who slip into these stigmas. Link, Struening, Rahav,
Phelan, and Nuttbrock (1997) describes that this perceived devaluation is most damaging
when the illicit drug user thinks that most believe in common negative stereotypes about drug
use and that alienation according to Boyd Ritsher, Otilingam, and Grajales, (2003) also
suggests that it is a result of the user internalising the view of being a stereotype thus
marginalizing themselves. Additionally, compounding the effects for those who are also
stigmatised from vulnerable population such as minority ethnic group and living in a low
socio-economic class who are at the mercy and receiving stigma from multiple sides of the
spectrum mentioned before.
It is vital to continue to discuss and address stigma, as in the past it has been generally dealt
as a criminal problem rather than a health problem which could be prevented and treated.
(Ahern et al., 2007). However if unresolved, stigmatisation will continue to aggravate these
circumstances whereby they have marginalized the world’s most vulnerable populations
producing the negative cost of people’s lives. Thus creating the need to urgently look at ways
to reduce the stigma and discrimination by those who use and supply drugs. (The War on
Drug: Promoting stigma and discrimination, (n.d.)
Campbell and Deacon (2006) explains the importance of understanding stigma as a social
psychology topic, whereby it primarily dwells within the individual psyche but is constantly
mediated by material , politic institutions and symbolic context. As a result, it does involve
the majority it is society whose framework determines what stigma is. However it is a multifaceted intervention and requires health education and improved service delivery, along with
self help and social support for stigma to be reduced.
Public health offices should focus their efforts to deglamorize and discourage use while
aiming to reduce stigma toward users by treating use as health behaviour and not a deviant or
moral behaviour. (Palamar et al., 2013)
ANALYSIS OF THE ARTEFACT AND LEARNING REFLECTION
Here is a man, who has done wrong, nothing which I can’t deny, but it was also killing him
inside and the world is giving him nothing more that disgust and disappointment, which
could be less stigmatised.
In this case there is a need to understand the situation and in the process remain unbiased and
informed and not conform because of the stigma. Not only drug stigma, it is imperative to
understand the purposes and the effects of all stigmas which can heavily affect lives, because
after all “to ere is to be human” especially in tough circumstances.
I would like to conclude by saying that an unbiased, informed empathy and forgiveness is the
key! Although it’s necessary to accept the consequences, it would be gratifying to know that
the world has sympathy and has moved on, preventing more stressful and tortuous outcomes.
I believe, by instilling integrity, equality, and the capacity to forgive, as a global tradition,
which is also mitigating and adapting to the times, I personally would like to live in a world
like that.
In saying so, based off what I have researched. Firstly, I am more consciously aware to what
it means to recognize another person, and secondly, as a human right and of ethical
importance to help others see it in themselves too, drug addict or not.
REFERENCE LIST
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