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I'm impressed by your courage, OP. I wouldn't take a road trip into rural America without a small army of armed guards. Rural America is a crime-ridden war zone of meth heads, obese shut ins, and hopeless thugs looking for someone to rob. If it's not nailed down, it will be stolen and pawned for drugs. Why anyone would venture into this hinterland of disease and despair is beyond me.
Welcome. I see you are new to Oz.
Sometimes it helps to tip folks off to sarcasm. Things are so topsy turvey these days, it's not always easy to recognize sarcasm, irony, etc.
No you can't. That's a lie. You have to LEAVE the city do any of that, not just walk down to the nearest park.
So? It's not a far drive at all to do any of that, like half an hour. And if someone wants to do something in the city if they don't live in the city, they have to leave the country & come to the city. So what? What's the big deal?
There is WAY more to do in the country then there is in the cities but I guess that all depends on what you like to do. If you like to sit in bars or spend a ton of money doing hardly anything, then the city is for you. If you like the outdoors with the many things to do that come along with that then the country is for you. I would rather go fishing, hiking, camping, bird watching, riding enduro, 4 wheeling or just simply sitting out back watching the wildlife any day over anything the city offers.
Not everyone settles in the locale that's best suited for their interests and personality. How many residents of the countryside and the small-towns, actually take avid interest in fishing, hiking or the like? I would not be surprised if the ratio of hikers to the general populace, is higher in the more "progressive" cities, than in the countryside. That is, the city-folk go to their various parks, or the countryside itself, specifically to go hiking. But of the country-folk, how many engage in similar venture?
More important than finding useful and enjoyable pastimes, is finding like-minded people, with whom to share said pastimes. Cities offer such opportunities for socialization, finding acquaintances and eventually friends of common interest. This is harder to do in the countryside. For instance, I enjoy playing chess. This can be done in the city, or in the countryside. But it's so much harder to find other chessplayers in the countryside. I don't mean that frustration in finding chess-opponents sends kids to drugs, or that chessplayers never become addicts. Rather, in the countryside one has to work harder to meet like-minded people, and that barrier likely causes frustration and ennui. Those, in turn, can lead to indulgence in chemicals.
I am watching bunnies and squirrels frolic on my lawn as I type this.
Of course, no matter where one does any sort of leisure activity, one has to be secure enough financially, etc. to enjoy those activities.
If you are living day to day, with no positive future in sight, it hardly matters if the landscape is picturesque or not.
One of the things I learned after moving from the close-in living situation of NYC to (first) the suburbs of NJ and then out west is that a well manicured lawn can mask many ills.
Keep your house up and no one wonders how well or poorly the people inside are living.
Perhaps that is one of the reasons why this epidemic is that much more destructive.
People seem unable to accept that those who seem to have their lives "together" are real life junkies.
In certain rural communities, just about the only ones making a decent living are those who work in the medical system or for the government.
Everyone else who wants to amount to anything has already packed up and left these economically depressed areas. Those left behind are often behind for a reason.
Sometimes, they love the rural environment and are satisfied with the tradeoff.
Other times, they just don't know how to do any better and drugs help ease the pain and pass the time.
I'm like a broken record when it comes to this book, but if you want to understand the opioid epidemic in America and the connection between prescription pain drugs and heroin, read Dreamland by Sam Quinones. It's well-researched and easy to read. It answers many of the questions asked here.
Interview with the author traces rural opioid/ opiate epidemic to early- mid 90's:
Because the corporations realize there is big money to be made selling narcotics.
These legal drugs kill more than cocaine, heroin and meth combined. Almost every week you hear about another celebrity dying from prescription drugs which is just one indication of how widespread the problem is.
Big pharma are the new dope pushers, and are even allowed to advertise their narcotics on television. Just form a corporation, come up with a fancy name for your drug, slap a nice-looking label on it and you too can sell dope legally.
Then there's the counterfeit pills, appearance indistinguishable from the real thing.
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