You haven't got the slightest clue what you're talking about. Drug addiction is very much about self-medication. Drug addicts almost invariably have mental problems or insecurities of one form or another - many have histories of childhood abuse. It is not at all a rarity to find a drug addict who was sexually abused as a child. These are considerable psychological burdens, and from the point of view of someone who finds himself struggling with deep-rooted insecurity and traumatic memories on a daily basis, the allure of opiates - capable of taking away not only physical pain but mental pain as well - is powerful. Throw in some other circumstances, such as being impoverished or uneducated (or both), and drug abuse is practically inevitable. No, it is not the ideal form of self-medication - far from it. But to say that it's not a form of self-medication at all is blatantly wrong and shows a fundamental lack of understanding of the nature of drug abuse.

Your post is so chock-full of unnecessary hyperbole and alarmism that it's hard to know where to start picking it apart. First of all, you don't need to look to illegal drugs to find something that's insidiously addictive and "freedom destroying"; nicotine, an already-legal and freely available drug, is as addictive as heroin (and I should point out that it's the tobacco corporations, not the government, who are profiting the most from the millions of cigarette addicts.)

Second, you're making the false assumption that everyone who supports legalization of addictive drugs also supports the recreational use of these drugs. This is not the case at all. The philosophy behind addictive drug legalization has two main facets; one is that - yes - we should not legislate what others may or may not do with their bodies. If someone wants to turn themselves into a slave to opioids, they can be my guest. Even though I don't approve, I'm not going to stop them; it's their choice, and even if they might find themselves without a choice to stop down the road, that doesn't change the essential fact that they had the freedom to inflict their addiction upon themselves in the first place. Secondly, and more importantly, it's about harm-reduction. People are going to use drugs no matter what; legalizing them would simultaneously dramatically reduce the health risks (by allowing addicts access to pure, regulated, measured doses) and positively impact society (by cutting out a gigantic source of profit for criminal organizations across the world.)

In fact, on that note, I'll show you the flip side of the situation: By allowing drugs such as coke and heroin to remain illegal, we are handing billions of dollars to Mexican drug cartels, the Taliban, and other major criminal organizations, who then terrorize local populations, bribe and corrupt government/military officials, and generally speaking threaten the very foundation of civilized life in the countries that they operate in. Are you telling me that the bloodbath currently happening in Mexico - which is costing thousands of people their ultimate freedom, life - is less important than some heroin junkie's self-inflicted "freedom destruction"?

I guess it's typical with the Slashdot crowd to immediately favour the poor, defenseless little guy over the big scary corporation and rich author with their team of lawyers, no matter what the facts are. For those of you who couldn't be bothered reading four pages into the document before sharing your malformed opinions on Slashdot:

Rowling has stated on a number of occasions since 1998 that, in addition to the two companion books, she plans to publish a "Harry Potter encyclopedia" after the completion of the series and again donate the proceeds to charity.

Oh, shit! Could this be a case where the intentions of the "big guy" were actually better than the intentions of the "little guy"? It can't be!