Heroin used to be a black thing back in the 70’s. For a while, the current opioid epidemic has been a white thing. It looks like it is now spreading to blacks. White addicts have tended to mostly die quietly. Whereas the black-dominated heroin rush of the 70’s fed rampant crime. I think we may be about to see a brand new crime wave, right in the teeth of the recently-passed druglord amnesty and loosened drug sentencing laws.
No, it wasn’t a black thing. But it WAS more of an urban thing. And a celebrity thing. I grew up in the suburbs in the 70’s and heroin wasn’t even something anyone even contemplated.