Amy Winehouse was a criminal

[Stinky The Clown]

Before you unrec and snark at me, hear me out.

Anyone who uses drugs is a criminal. And it is in that sense I use that as my description of her.

Troubled soul might be more apt. Gifted talent is certainly a true description. Trend setter is, too. Quintuple Grammy winner fits. So does tragedy.

It is my firm belief that drug addiction is a personal choice only at the first experiment - and maybe not even then. Addiction is a disease, not a moral failing.

We all see the high profile addicts and we tend to laugh at them or treat them with scorn and derision.

We see local addicts in our everyday life and how many of us walk past them a little more quickly than we walk past others?

That is, until that addict is you. Or your kid. Or another family member. Or the family member of a close friend.

Instead of vigorously treating addiction as a disease, we casually, reluctantly, grudgingly make some grossly inadequate funding available for a few inadequate programs, all the while vigorously treating addicts as criminals.

The drugs take their toll. A felony conviction for a minor drug offense ruins a life just as surely as do the drugs. Maybe more so.

So yeah. Amy Winehouse was a criminal.

And *that* is the crime.

Rest well, great talent. Rest well. I'm glad your struggles are over.

When you're up there, sing a few with Janice. You two would have understood each other.

And when you meet them all, as you surely will, who have walked the path you've walked, celebrate your mutual peace.

[Cleita]

1. How do you know what she did was illegal?

With her money she might have obtained her drugs legally through enabling doctors, or just many doctors who didn't know she was seeing other doctors for the same prescription.

[saras]

35. You mean doctors issued crack pipes to her and Pete Doherty?

We haven't had doctors like that here in America since the Seventies.

[Cleita]

49. I have no idea what drugs she was on. I was just

saying she might not have obtained them illegally. I worked with drug addicts who were able to game the system legally. I mean look at Michael Jackson.

[Sparkly]

51. Somehow this reminds me of a rebuttal to Kerry's mention of Dick Cheney's gay daughter...

There was a debate where he was asked whether being gay is a choice and he said no, they're born that way, they're children of God, and mentioned Dick Cheney's daughter is who she is, or something.

Big brouhaha afterwards, in which (I think) Pat Buchanan suggested we don't know if she actually is having sex with another woman. It was pointed out that she's openly gay, in a committed relationship with a woman, living together etc., but the argument was pressed further -- that doesn't mean she's engaging in sexual behaviors with that woman. (Following which Lawrence O'Donnell went on a rant about "lesbian sex" and how weird people are about even saying the words "lesbian sex, lesbian sex, lesbian sex!" I think they suspended him for a little while after that.)

Anyway, you're right that it COULD be she was addicted to legal drugs which she only GOT illegally, but... it seems to be a very slim possibility.

[Cleita]

54. Actually, I really don't much care. I feel bad for her

however she got her drugs. I don't think that those addicts who get their drugs illegally should be considered criminals any more than the ones who get them legally. Addiction is a disease and it should be looked upon as such.

[Sparkly]

56. I totally agree with you.

[Stinky The Clown]

57. Which. Is. What. The. OP. Is. Saying.

[Cleita]

60. I don't disagree. That's what you said, but I said

maybe her drugs weren't illegal. Just sayin' :shrug:

[Taverner]

2. Sigh...I wish I believed in an afterlife

But I don't

Makes this all the more tragic

:hug:

[XanaDUer]

3. I thought she was British

do they do the same thing over there, or do they treat addiction as an illness?

:shrug:

[warrior1]

4. too soon

to judge. It was her life to do with what she wanted. Let her be at peace.

[Rabrrrrrr]

5. Never cared for her music or for her personally, but still sad and tragic to die that way.

She (and all people) deserve better than that.

Too bad she couldn't kick her addictions and find a way to live sensibly.

[shanti]

50. +1

n/t

[FLPanhandle]

52. I didn't consider her to have any talent

However, 27 is too young to die.

[Rabrrrrrr]

55. Indeed. I'm utterly shocked at the people who call her a giant talent

and want to lump her with Hendrix and Joplin.

Maybe she's a Cobain, but I don't think she was even that far.

I just assumed everyone with a brain knew her to be a talentless, artless blackhole of shit.

[FLPanhandle]

61. Everyone has different tastes

However, I doubt in 10 years anyone will even remember her unlike Hendrix or Joplin.

[Stinky The Clown]

58. Yo *do* realize this post was not a discussion of her talents, except most tangentially . . . .

. . . . right?

[FLPanhandle]

59. "Rest well, great talent"

Just addressing the "great talent" part.

I also, said 27 was too young to die regardless, or didn't you read that far?

[Sparkly]

62. Just addressing the tangential part.

Just saying.

[Kolesar]

6. I am wired on caffeine every day

I had my beer-era, too. Not criminal, but not unlike amphetamines and downers.

[Journeyman]

7. I don't know what happens at death, but I hope it frees us from the demons who haunt our lives . . .

[treestar]

8. These individuals never seem to get arrested for it

Anyone think of an example of a famous musician or other who ended up in jail for doing illegal drugs, like the rest of us would/could?

[Stinky The Clown]

11. Robert Downey, Jr., Lindsay Lohan. To name just two

[treestar]

12. Forgot about old Lindsay

And Paris and her DUI charge.

[pitohui]

13. robert downey jr (well not a musician but an actor)

he got a year and i think it was for possession not for distribution since he was already famous at the time, i think a year just for possession is pretty harsh for anyone but i don't know the details?

however, most celebrity addicts who are on that level of wealth can buy a doctor and keep the prescriptions rolling in, michael jackson being the prime example but it's something a great many upper middle class and even (some) middle class people do it, altho i can never figure out how the middle class addicts know what doctors will give them the drugs, the doctors never give sufficient pain pills to the NON drug addicts i know...it is a puzzle

[Stinky The Clown]

15. If one wishes to push the legal envelope, "buying a doctor" is a criminal conspiracy

The scripts are illegal. The doc is breaking the law. The addict is knowingly taking illegally gotten drugs.

No, it isn't as often prosecuted as sending some college kid to the pokey for selling enough smack to pay for her habit, but both are crimes.

[dionysus]

31. scott weiland, repeatedly.

;)

[Kolesar]

39. Willie Nelson, Freddie Fender, Tim Allen, Stacy Keach

[11 Bravo]

9. Well said, Stinky. Rest easy, Amy.

[wiggs]

10. check it out

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pAz9UpnRKw&feature=player_embedded

[stlsaxman]

14. a criminal...?

no... not at all.

Thanks, Stink- I read your post more in-depth and feel differently about it now.

[Stinky The Clown]

17. Two things:

First, this post went waaaaaaay over your head.

Second, your taste in music and assessment of talent is as spot on as your sense of nuance.

Have a swell day laughing about a woman's death.

[stlsaxman]

25. I just buried two dear friends who died of drinking their livers away....

basically drank themselves to death. I loved and miss them dearly. They couldn't stop. As hard as they tried, as many warnings they got from doctors...

I drank 24/7/365 for 15 years before I was able to stop at 30. For that poor thing to make her big hit out of what killed two of the loves of my life (and my mother- come to think of it) i always thought was pathetic. Making a joke out of denial? Consider if you will every poor soul that desperately needed help that didn't seek it because of this "One-hit Wonder".

I hope she's found some peace from the torment of her addiction, I really do.

I'm removing the ROFL and the "sure- why not".

You are correct- it was/is way out of line.

[Stinky The Clown]

27. ..

:hug:

[Forkboy]

22. You know, I'm no fan of her music (black metal is more my style)...

...but laughing over her death is pretty twisted. Apparently, at least one person could still use some rehab.

[Mudoria]

23. +1

[baldguy]

16. Does that make her any less human? Any less deserving of our compassion as humans ourselves?

Or more?

[Stinky The Clown]

18. Was the OP too subtle for you?

[baldguy]

48. Some people only read the subject line of a post.

Some people read a post a fail to understand what it says.

[SteveM]

26. Well said. nt

[eilen]

19. She was a heroin addict. They don't tend to live long.

Sad to waste a life and talent on a high. RIP

[Electric Monk]

20. and crack, and liquor, and who knows what else

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXr3Abz5ieU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm6CTjk2lfU

R.I.P.

[SteveM]

28. Just a note on addictions...

Heroin addiction can be "maintained" without an early death. While not the best way to go, it is preferable to not "living long." Addiction centers of sorts were used in such counter-culture hotbeds as Shreveport, LA and Jacksonville, FL up to about a hundred years ago, before the first stages of nationalized criminalization were instituted. Curiously, they were a kind of faith-based operation which sought to provide morphine substances to addicts in a clean, safe manner even as efforts were made to cure the addiction. The aim was to keep the folks working and productive.

Also, many doctors say that edema, the lungs filling with fluid, is the chief cause of addict deaths -- due mainly to alcohol addiction, which usually goes hand-in-hand with heroin addiction.

[eilen]

29. People live longer with cancer and AIDS too

but not really long. Crystal meth and cocaine seem to kill addicts faster. Alcohol is a slow death. Maintaining heroin addiction usually involves substituting a less toxic drug that hits the same receptors so the addiction is nursed along but not resolved. It is still a crappy way to live.

[SteveM]

32. Agreed. I think legalization and regulation will reduce the social costs

associated with prohibition tremendously. We have a lot of social costs attached to drink now, but not the corruption, murder, and monetary expenditure we had during alcohol prohibition. Currently, we have a failed social engineering experiment in drug prohibition. And uniquely (when compared with alcohol) a hot war on our border.

[Sparkly]

41. Kind of like Suboxone is used today, no?

Did the old addiction centers work to keep people working and productive? Just wondering... Doesn't seem there's a cure for addiction, but with motivation and support I know some can manage it one way or another.

[misanthrope]

30. Charlie Parker lived 18 years hooked...

...which is far outside the norm.

[jberryhill]

21. People with unusual talent are... Unusual people

To stand out in a crowd of 7 billion takes a very different sort.

[Stinky The Clown]

24. Her talent was uncommon

Her drug issues were common.

[saras]

33. " Before you unrec and snark at me, hear me out. Anyone who uses drugs is a criminal." Too late.

You lost me already.

Adapin, Adderall, Agomelatine, Amitriptyline, Amoxapine, Anafranil, Asendin, Aurorix, Bolvidon, Buspar, Buspirone, Carbamazepine, carbamazepine, Citalopram, Clomipramine, Concerta, Cyclobenzaprine, Cymbalta, Depakote, Desipramine, Desoxyn, Desyrel, Dexedrine, Dosulepin, Dothiepin, Doxepin, Edronax, Effexor, Elavil, Elavil, Eldepryl, Emsam, Endep, Escitalopram, Eskalith, Feprapax, Flexeril, Focalin, Gamanil, Imipramine, Insidon, Isocarboxazid, Ixel, L-Deprenyl, Lamictal, Lamotrigine, Lithane, Lithium, Lithobid, Lofepramine, Lomont, Ludiomil, Lustral, Luvox, Manerix, Maprotiline, Marplan, Meridia, Mianserin, Mirtazapine, Moclobemide, Nardil, Nefadar, Nefazodone, nefazodone, Norpramin, Nortriptyline, Norval, Opipramol, Pamelor, Parnate, Paxil, Pertofrane, Phenelzine, Pirazidol, Pirlindole, Pramolan, Pristiq, Prothiaden, Protriptyline, Prozac, Reductil, Remeron, Ritalin, Savella, Sediel, Selegiline, Seroxat, Serzone, Serzone, Sinequan, Surmontil, Tandospirone, Tegretol, Tegretol, Tofranil, Tolvon, Tramadol, Tranylcypromine, Trazodone, Trimipramine, Valdoxan, Valproic Acid, Venlafaxine, Viagra, Vivactil, Vivalan, Vyvanse, Wellbutrin, Zelapar, Zoloft, Zyban

Granted that she was a self-destructive idiot with awful TASTE in drugs, and that she definitely, publicly, used drugs illegally. The drug laws she broke are only a small proportion of the disturbing-the-peace laws she broke, and she only got away with so much of that because she was such a spectacular trainwreck.

And she was Amy Winehouse before she discovered drugs.

Sorry - you may as well blame her death on the evils of rock music.

[Sparkly]

43. He meant illegal drugs.

And the point was about more than Amy Winehouse.

[Chorophyll]

46. You should have read the post. nt

[Stinky The Clown]

53. Nuance is hard for some people.

[-..__...]

34. What a trainwreck...

I'm shocked I tell you... shocked that she's dead!!

[saras]

37. Wow - the half of my post that I WASN'T going to post...

[-..__...]

40. I was never a fan of her music...

(not my style), so I have no opinion if her demise is a tragic case of fantastic talent gone to waste or not.

Whatever the case, I hope the MSM has the fortitude to show her in her later years and not just the glamor queen she started out as.

[GSLevel9]

38. that's a ROUGH looking 27 year old... RIP

[-..__...]

45. Even worse...

She's closer to 24 in the first pic...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-509083/Dishevelled-unsteady-Amy-Winehouse-helped-court-husband-Blakes-hearing.html

Two of the other pics were taken on her 25th birthday party...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1054873/Ravaged-Amy-Winehouse-gives-best-snarl-eve-25th-birthday.html

[WinkyDink]

36. I read the whole post. "Criminal" is crappy; who are you, the UK govt? And it's "JaniS".

[Sparkly]

42. He's saying it's "crappy." So you agree.

[Name removed]

44. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Chorophyll]

47. Good post. Too bad people are responding before they read it.

I'd suggest you change the title... but no. If they're that lazy, the heck with 'em.

[Stinky The Clown]

63. Among literate readers, the point and point of view are obvious.

[ZombieHorde]

64. Between pot and illegal music downloads, almost all DUers are criminals. nt