you will write a 3-5 page reaction paper for the film, “The House I Live In”.

you will write a 3-5 page reaction paper for the film, “The House I Live In”. In this paper, you will be expected to summarize the main points of the movie and, using details from professionals and drug defendants in the film, write an argument for why the focus on drugs needs to shift from incarceration and lifetime sentences to prevention and rehabilitation. Your paper must be in APA format. Here is the link to the movie you need to watch https://fmovies.to/film/the-house-i-live-in.6wnp0/vvoow86

ANSWER

Drug Wars

Substance and drug abuse have been a topic for so many decades. Governments from various parts of the world have put stringent measures and regulations to curb drug trafficking and abuse in their respective countries. Most families have lost their loved ones either in the form of lifetime detention or death concerning drugs. We have seen brutality and actions of inhumanity from the police officers and federal bureaus, more so on other races, especially the African-American citizens. This article focuses its argument on changing the treatment and handling of drug suspects and victims by the authorities from lifetime sentences and incarcerations to rehabilitation and prevention. This article will also highlight various case scenarios of inhuman treatment towards the drug victims and the imbalance in giving sentences by the law courts.

Over time drug abuse has always been related to the blacks in the US, making them look like the only traffickers, sparing the whites rooted in the addiction. Statistics show that over 2.3 million inmates are of drug-related cases; 1 million are Black Americans who are either suspects or drug abuse victims. In the early years of the century, the hard-working Chinese had to be detained for using opium to create whites’ opportunities; Mexicans in the US were also jailed for using cocaine to have whites work in their positions. The blacks in America were incarcerated mercilessly in drug trafficking, leaving the whites addicted to drugs in the leafy suburbs. All these historical wars on drugs led to the current drug wars in the US.

The police and law enforcement officers have taken advantage of the probe, arresting any black person walking along the streets without having any concrete evidence against them. Some police officers have taken this opportunity to use it as an avenue to get a promotion by simply arresting and convicting so many drug dealers and suspects; officers with more arrests are likely to get promotions than those who bring in less than five culprits. Mistreatment of the suspected culprits have been spotted in footage cameras; the police take all the property belonging to the suspects. Those found with vast amounts of money in their cars are considered drug traffickers on the spot, especially when they are black. This act has seen so many people lose their hard-earned money to the law enforcement authority who use them for personal gains. The actions above are typically targeted at Black Americans and non-whites. We have seen orders from elected congresses and ministers to the police to wipe out all those involved in drugs, some being shot on the spot in their families’ presence.

The laws put in place to sentence drug users are practiced depending on class and area of residence. For instance, we saw scenarios whereby crack and cocaine users have been sentenced differently. The only difference between cocaine and crack is that crack is baking powder, water, and heat. Crack users received almost 100 times more sentences than cocaine users because most of the cocaine users were whites who lived in the leafy suburbs, while most of the crack users are blacks from the ghetto. The same restrictions were also applied to the meth users, mostly blacks, hence the massive number of black inmates in the prisons. Some of the drug laws include a minimum sentence of twenty years. Any convicted drug criminal cannot access free healthcare services, cannot vote, cannot live in public houses and cannot get employed after serving their sentences. These laws have not been successful since they push back the same drug victims and their families into drug abuse once arrested or freed. The primary obstacles in changing the current drug policies are the court and Congress; their self-interest outruns the need to solve the problem at hand.

The drug wars approach has not changed because the key beneficiaries in the war are elected congresses, ministers, police and senior government officials. Prisons have been built as business investments and job creation facilities. Nobody cares about the families left behind. Nobody cares about those arrested without substantial evidence, and nobody cares about those framed for the supposed drug deals they did not commit. The inmates who have faced lifetime sentences have left innocent and low-income families back at home who deserve their financial help and parental support. Most of those convicted got themselves into drug trafficking as the only income source to their families; some of them inherited the business from their families, having no option to support themselves. Those who manage to serve their sentences and make it out of jail have no entitlement to jobs and can no longer live in public residential houses. They are also denied insurance and medical covers from the government. These circumstances leave them no choice but to move back to the ghetto where they continue to operate on drug money to survive; the arrest now becomes more of a recycle since the same victims will be arrested with drugs.

The Way to Go

The only way to succeed in drug laws is to implement different approaches in handling those involved. The current policies need to be changed to ascertain success in the fight; some of the recommended policies that should be enacted are mandatory admission to rehabilitation centers of the drug addicts, surety of government support through the offering of jobs to the victims in place of drug indulgence and the court and Congress should come up with fair and second chance giving sentences for the drug victims or criminals. The government needs to take a different perspective on the drug war; instead of focusing their energies on arresting and killing those involved in drugs, they should put more energy into preventing and rehabilitating the victims. This act will see so many families get reformed and focus their attention on different and lawful ways of earning income.

The focus on rehabilitation will also minimize the supposed hostility between the Black Americans and the police; the latter usually feel a sense of hatred and racial abuse towards them, especially during the arrests’ enforcement. The government should educate the drug victims on sourcing other ways of raising money and telling them on dangers of abusing drugs. The victims should also be taken to rehabilitation centers to teach how to control the addiction and survive without engaging in the drug business. Those who have undergone a successful rehabilitation process will be able to reunite with their families and be an example to their fellows experiencing addiction. Some of those in the drug business are well educated; detaining them renders them useless, thus unable to contribute to their economic growth. Admitting the victims to rehabilitation centers will ensure they get back to the community and contribute to their respective communities’ development.

The drug survivors can act as counselors to those undergoing drug addiction in the community by showing them that there is life outside the drug business. The government should also focus on prevention measures by engaging the affected communities in educational programs and awareness campaigns rather than wasting energy on damaging lives directly or indirectly. The prevention measures will ensure generational continuation instead of wiping out families affected and involved in the drug wars. It is high time for the government to take action against rogue and racist policemen and women who take advantage of the drug victims and abuse them physically and psychologically. The time has come for each citizen to take a different direction on drug wars; arresting, detaining, and killing the victims won’t solve the drug menace; instead, it will worsen the situation and lead to more abuse indulgence. Prevention and rehabilitation are the way to go to solve the drug and substance abuse in the USA permanently.