Terms Which Have Disappeared

[Paisley]

An employer cannot be expected to know whether a particular drug user is going to be an outstanding employee or a dangerous one. They might be like Chris Titus's alcoholic father, who never missed work, never missed a mortgage payment, and never missed a party (and had custody of his children), or like another nephew of mine who wrecked his father's truck and destroyed large, expensive pieces of marble in the back because he was high.

Economist Thomas Sowell has discussed how people sort themselves and others into groups. He observes that some people are going to be unfairly tarnished by association, but sorting out individuals' merits one at a time is costly, and employers in particular run a high risk when they hire the wrong person.

 

[tonyb]

My perspective is every bit as well informed as anyone else's here, and probably more so. It's the world I grew up in, and worked in, and lived in. These are my friends, my family, my closest associates (and a few people I'd rather I'd never met, but not on account of their vices).

I've seen drugs, legal and illegal, glamorized and demonized. And I long ago concluded that neither is a realistic perspective, and as such both lead us to control strategies that just don't work and in many cases make problems all the worse.

Most drug users don't ruin their lives or anyone else's. Some do, but not most. Most people have compelling reasons not to get high. So that moderates their behavior.

However, if you or anyone you know is injecting street drugs, especially heroin, be worried. While there are effective antidotes, an unconscious heroin user alone on the floor is in no position to call for help. A couple of friends met their ends that way. That's been 20-some years ago, and it saddens me yet. Still, I'm acquainted with several others who kicked and now are as unremarkable as Harry and Fran next door.

 

[tonyb]

If the aim is truly workplace safety, it would be infinitely more effective to performance test, to actually measure motor skills, response times, etc.

A test that indicates a person may have ingested one substance or another at some unknown point in the past tells us absolutely nothing about that person's current condition. Sure, it might indicate that that person ingested some substance at some point, and it's not such a stretch to think that person would be likelier to be impaired at work. But if we aren't testing for alcohol, it's plain that there are motives to this policy other than the stated ones.

 

[HudsonHawk]

If the aim is truly workplace safety, it would be infinitely more effective to performance test, to actually measure motor skills, response times, etc.

A test that indicates a person may have ingested one substance or another at some unknown point in the past tells us absolutely nothing about that person's current condition. Sure, it might indicate that that person ingested some substance at some point, and it's not such a stretch to think that person would be likelier to be impaired at work. But if we aren't testing for alcohol, it's plain that there are motives to this policy other than the stated ones.

Perhaps this is unique, but every drug test I've ever taken, and it's pretty regular with my current employer, starts with a breathalyzer. Only if you pass that do you fill the cup.

 

[tonyb]

A breathalyzer has the virtue of giving some indication of a person's current state, which is something peeing in a cup can't do.

My motor skills aren't what they used to be. This is largely on account of age. I don't know that those skills are now so diminished as to make me unfit to be a forklift driver, say, or a crane operator.

I like to think that the average person's judgment improves as his senses diminish. I see some evidence in support of that contention, and some to the contrary.

 

[Fading Fast]

...Economist Thomas Sowell has discussed how people sort themselves and others into groups. He observes that some people are going to be unfairly tarnished by association, but sorting out individuals' merits one at a time is costly, and employers in particular run a high risk when they hire the wrong person.

I've read that and similar statement from the ridiculously smart Sowell. He's the one that made me realize the word prejudice as we think of it today is crazy.

If airport screeners are spending as much time worrying about my 83 year old mother as they are young men with backpacks (twenty years ago, I was a young man with a backpack, now I'm a middle-aged one) then something is haywire. Yup, that is absolutely, cosmically unfair to the majority of honest young men who carry backpacks, but so be it.

It is also unfair that all teenage boys pay higher car insurance rates than teenage girls, as some teenage boys are very sensible drivers (granted, not that many). What is an insurance company to do, hire enough insurance inspectors to anonymously follow around all drivers to give each one his or her own rate based on that inspection? It might be fairer, but all our insurance premiums will go through the moon as, ultimately, we'd have to cover the cost of all those inspectors with higher premiums.

We had drug tests at some places I've worked. Fair - yes, no, maybe, but cosmic justice is impossible. The last apartment house I lived in was evacuated at 2am last year as a young man (an intern at a financial company) got drunk on a Saturday night, came home late, put water on to boil for pasta (this is NYC for heaven's sake - order in if you're drunk), fell asleep and set off the smoke detector. Thankfully, no one was hurt. What's the point - I don't know other than in an imperfect world, I don't blame an employer for trying to vet out the biggest risks. Yes, it's unfair to some fully in control drug users, but it is unfair to an employer to have to hirer a person with a job-impacting drug problem.

Those who read my posts (all two of you) know I'm a believer in the Aristotelean Golden Mean - extremes are rarely perfect, find a reasonable balance in our imperfect world and adjust when it tilts too far to an extreme.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I certainly have judgement enough now to know that I can't perform on stage anymore. My middle-age memory lapses have reached the point where I couldn't work without cue cards -- really big ones, because my eyes aren't any good anymore either.

Thus impaired, I really wouldn't dare to work on the machinery I used to work thirty years ago in the factory -- I'd be a danger not just to myself but to everyone else on the line. Their right not to be put in that danger trumps my right to work on that equipment.

Having sense enough to *know* when you're impaired and the responsibility to act accordingly is not, unfortunately, a quality that all people posess. In such cases, it's society's responsibility to make that judgement.

 

[Fading Fast]

^^^ In particular, if the action risks injury to others. If you perform poorly on stage, my guess is other than a disappointed audience and frustrated fellow actors, no one is really hurt, but an impaired train engineer is another story. Society - government / businesses - have an absolute right and obligation to make those judgement calls to protect others.

I continue to believe we should be retesting drivers - at least elderly ones - as not every family is like mine (although many are) - we stopped my grandmother from driving when it was obvious she was no longer competent - painful as it was to her - to protect her and others. But if we hadn't, she could have killed herself and others.

 

[tonyb]

So let's performance test, then.

 

[Paisley]

Alcohol use isn't the same as recreational drug use IRL. People drink alcohol for reasons other than getting drunk. A visit to a variety of bars shows this--there are bars where people enjoy music, food, conversation and a few drinks without getting sloppy and stupid and others where the patrons are falling down and throwing up. In fact, I used to belong to a wine meetup group. The members didn't get drunk there.

That said, if I knew someone was a habitual drunk, no, I wouldn't employ them.

As for fairness and impairment, I'm totally in favor of performance tests--but a person's performance could be completely different when they're high. That's the whole point of impaired driving laws.

 

[tonyb]

My ancient Mom drove to Vegas with an equally elderly friend from her home in Chelan, Wash. a couple of days ago. I wouldn't doubt she did it in record time.

Mom's driving scared me 20 years ago, when she was merely old, which is to say the age I am now.

It's not that her senses are markedly diminished. I don't think they are anyway, leastwise not to the point that she is unfit to be occupying the left front seat. But she has long lived as though she has a guardian angel perched on her shoulder.

There's no testing for that.

 

[tonyb]

Alcohol use isn't the same as recreational drug use IRL. People drink alcohol for reasons other than getting drunk. A visit to a variety of bars shows this--there are bars where people enjoy music, food, conversation and a few drinks without getting sloppy and stupid and others where the patrons are falling down and throwing up. In fact, I used to belong to a wine meetup group. The members didn't get drunk there.

That said, if I knew someone was a habitual drunk, no, I wouldn't employ them.

As for fairness and impairment, I'm totally in favor of performance tests--but a person's performance could be completely different when they're high. That's the whole point of impaired driving laws.

Almost my amount of alcohol has a drug effect. That's why it's so popular.

So no, it isn't so different from recreational use of other drugs as you would propose. Alcohol is a drug, and drinkers are drug users.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The question becomes "where does fairness to the individual" outweigh "fairness to the collective?" In a workplace, substance abuse puts an unfair burden on everyone else who is affected by the sloppy/incomplete work done by the substance abuser. There has to be a line.

I come from a Methodist background, and Methodists have historically taken a very good-of-the-collective view in their attitudes towards alcohol and drugs. The Methodist Book of Discipline, the document which governs the church, laid out the denomination's view on alcohol over a hundred years ago, stressing that the real reason why the church opposed the alcohol trade was the harm it caused society as a whole, not simply the harm it caused individuals, and the same is true of the drug trade -- this individual or that individual may be able to drink or smoke or toot all their lives and go out in the morning with no ill effect. But taken as a whole, the long-term impact of alcohol and drug use causes considerable harm to society -- and that, it's reasoned, is good and sufficient cause to oppose it.

You can argue all you want that "prohibition is just as harmful," but that doesn't counter the solid argument of the social harm those substances cause, and that the answer is to work to build a society where such things aren't indulged in not just because of the force of law but because people understand and realize anything that harms the weakest person in a society is not good for that society.

That might seem like an antiquated view in this age of the Holy Individual, but it's the one I was raised with, and I think there's a great deal of truth to it.

 

[Paisley]

Almost my amount of alcohol has a drug effect. That's why it's so popular.

So no, it isn't so different from recreational use of other drugs as you would propose. Alcohol is a drug, and drinkers are drug users.

You're speaking from a biochemical perspective. By that standard, many, many thing are drugs, including coffee, Sudafed, sugar, and antihistamines, and everyone who takes any of those is a drug user.

I'm talking about real-life usage. In real life, someone who has a glass or two of wine with dinner, but doesn't use recreational drugs, isn't likely to show up impaired or foul up something at work because of their alcohol use. The point of having a glass or two of wine with dinner isn't to get intoxicated, and it's not nearly enough to get most people drunk. The point of recreational drugs, OTOH, IS to get intoxicated. By comparing light drinkers to recreational drug users, you're comparing people who deliberately get intoxicated to people who don't.

 

[Fading Fast]

The question becomes "where does fairness to the individual" outweigh "fairness to the collective?" In a workplace, substance abuse puts an unfair burden on everyone else who is affected by the sloppy/incomplete work done by the substance abuser. There has to be a line.

I come from a Methodist background, and Methodists have historically taken a very good-of-the-collective view in their attitudes towards alcohol and drugs. The Methodist Book of Discipline, the document which governs the church, laid out the denomination's view on alcohol over a hundred years ago, stressing that the real reason why the church opposed the alcohol trade was the harm it caused society as a whole, not simply the harm it caused individuals, and the same is true of the drug trade -- this individual or that individual may be able to drink or smoke or toot all their lives and go out in the morning with no ill effect. But taken as a whole, the long-term impact of alcohol and drug use causes considerable harm to society -- and that, it's reasoned, is good and sufficient cause to oppose it. You can argue all you want that "prohibition is just as harmful," but that doesn't counter the solid argument of the social harm those substances cause.

That might seem like an antiquated view in this age of the Holy Individual, but it's the one I was raised with, and I think there's a great deal of truth to it.

My first bold above: agree with all that. And I'm a pretty strong supporter of the "Holy Individual."

My second bold above: both cause harm to society, prohibit something and criminal activity will rise to fill the gap (or you'll need a brutal style of justice that this country wouldn't tolerate to enforce the prohibition). I have no idea which is more harmful to society or how we could objectively measure that, but I fall on the side of individual rights should drive leaving it legal, but I am all for a hard enforcement of drunk driving laws, workplace safety screening, etc. With freedom comes responsibility and consequences.

 

[tonyb]

You're speaking from a biochemical perspective. By that standard, many, many thing are drugs, including coffee, Sudafed, sugar, and antihistamines, and everyone who takes any of those is a drug user.

I'm talking about real-life usage. In real life, someone who has a glass or two of wine with dinner, but doesn't use recreational drugs, isn't likely to show up impaired or foul up something at work because of their alcohol use. The point of having a glass or two of wine with dinner isn't to get intoxicated, and it's not nearly enough to get most people drunk. The point of recreational drugs, OTOH, IS to get intoxicated. By comparing light drinkers to recreational drug users, you're comparing people who deliberately get intoxicated to people who don't.

There's a difference without a distinction if ever there was one.

Don't delude yourself. "Light" drinkers get lightly intoxicated. As a one-time drinker, I know that people feel the drug effect of half a glass of wine or a few sips of beer. They like being in that drugged state. That's why they do it. That's the point of it, just as surely as getting mildly intoxicated is the point of taking a pull or two off a reefer.

I know for certain that there are moderate cannabis users, and occasional cocaine users, and even light opiate users. I'm not here to advocate for any of that. But alcohol isn't in a whole 'nuther category just because drinkers don't wish to accept the plain truth that they are drug users.

 

[Trenchfriend]

When I'm "El Commandante", I would first forbid all the really cheap massmarket every-day alcohol-products, by law!

Cheap Industrial massmarket-alcoholic drinks have just to be forbidden, I think!! So, that the kids just can't buy cheap "hootch" illegal and the stuff is even for their big brothers and sisters more or less too expensive, that they generally would avoid buying it.

So, forbid or 5.000 % chemo-therapy tax on daily hootch-products!

 

[Fading Fast]

So it seems Trenchfriend and LizzieMaine will be competing for the role of Supreme Dictator of Earth.

 

[LizzieMaine]

There's two hemispheres. Plenty to go around.

That said, Trench has a good point. Alco-pops exist for no other reason than to suck young people into drinking. It's the same thing as those disgusting grape or strawberry or bubble-gum flavored cheap cigars. No doubt the Boys are already cooking up plans for "Banana Blunts" or "Grapefruit Ganga Surprise."

 

[Fading Fast]

There's two hemispheres. Plenty to go around....

If memory serves, the world was divided into three competing spheres in "1984;" dictatorships need external enemies to justify their existence when things internal don't do so well.