drug-abuse

In response to claims that Harlem is overburdened by drug-addiction rates and overdoses, a methadone clinic is being built on 145th Street and Amsterdam Avenue in West Harlem. However, community members argue that this clinic is not needed in the area.

At a school as stressful as Columbia, a pill with the power to keep you focused for hours has a strong appeal. Many students at Columbia pop some Adderall before hitting Butler, study longer, stay up later, and get more words on the page at the end of the day. Some may say that Adderall makes them feel “superhuman.” Fooled by the subjective experience of enhanced concentration, many students misguidedly believe that the drug reveals a superior state of mind. Yet even as a first-year, I have seen some of my closest friends abuse Adderall as they wrongfully normalize the drug as a convenient study aid.

A couple weeks ago, David Hanzal had a bout of déjà vu. Someone came into People Against Landlord Abuse and Tenant Exploitation, the West Harlem nonprofit better known as P.A.’L.A.N.T.E., asking for advice—someone like Hanzal, four years ago. “He walks in, he says, ‘I’ve organized my building, I’ve done 311, I don’t know what to do, the landlord’s doing this.’” The client lives right near Columbia’s 17-acre Manhattanville expansion, in the neighborhood of the same name. “He's got a long road ahead of him. You know, he’s where I was in 2014.”

I used to literally skip out of Tom Harford’s office on the third floor of Lewisohn. I distinctly remember having a massive grin on my face every time I walked down the staircase, going out of my way to declare to my friends that he was “a homie.” To this, my friends would roll their eyes and call him my “academic sugar daddy” or my “fairy godmother.”

Bacchanal is approaching, and with it comes a week of excitement. Midterms are long forgotten, receding more and more into the past with each new day. The tarps are pulled off of the lawns, and everyone prepares for one well-deserved day of pure fun. Part of this preparation, at least for a good segment of the population here, involves acquiring a bevy of "fun-assisting" substances.

Most broke college students can appreciate a good slice of pizza, but few go to the level of using it as an artistic muse. That is, until a group of WBAR-ians started making music together last year and chose the name Drug Pizza.

The number of forcible sex offenses reported on campus jumped from three in 2011 to 12 in 2012, according to a report from Public Safety released on Tuesday.

When I describe the need for treatment instead of punishment for the mentally ill and substance dependent, I split into two Loxleys. One inhabits the real world and lists reasons why he belongs in treatment facilities as opposed to correctional ones; another is trapped in a time-warp, re-experiencing the days and weeks he went missing, that time he abandoned us in Virginia, and the endless fights and screams and broken glass. Every time I say I believe in treatment over punishment, I feel like a liar because, to me, his is the face of drug addiction. And few things would please me more than to see him waste away in the hells that we call "correctional facilities." A little dark, I know, but that's what having a loved one addicted to drugs will do to you.

In Tina Fey's new comedy, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, the cheery titular protagonist moves to New York City after being freed from an underground cult where she was held captive for 15 years. In one episode, her roommate Titus throws her a birthday party and, to Kimmy's repulsion, his stereo blares, "I'll beat that bitch with a bat, I'll beat that bitch with a bat."