[austincheney]

So far legalization has not proven to solve the problems of demand or addiction. In the past several years legally available drugs have been the most abused and resulted in significant problems. I am not claiming this as a justification for increased enforcement either.

If you aren't solving for demand you either aren't taking the problem seriously or you have anterior motives to ending drug abuse.

[pizza]

Solving for demand means something like reversing the trend of disenfranchised people saying "fuck off to everything" [0]. How do you reverse alienation? Well, I can't purport to have the answer to that, but I can say that almost every popular political movement today is selling its own path to such a reversal (which, to be fair, they've been trying to sell for forever).

That said, two possible avenues imo would be to reduce criminal penalties for people who are only hurting themselves, and also to try to make the US healthcare model more efficient - to make it like what seems like every other country already has. Those are two spirals that seem to trap a lot of already-burdened people, that drive them either to misery or living in extremis.

[0] https://www.economist.com/open-future/2018/12/06/the-antidot...

[Nursie]

> So far legalization has not proven to solve the problems of demand or addiction.

It solves the problem of peoples lives being (further) ruined by punitive policy. It opens up the possibility of seeking help without risking criminal conviction.

[xienze]

> It opens up the possibility of seeking help without risking criminal conviction.

There are numerous recovery clinics in the US. I’m not aware of any of them having a policy of reporting their patients to the police. What would they even be arrested for? Having been high in the past?

Fear of criminal penalties isn’t a barrier to recovery in the US. I’m not sure where you got this impression.

[Nursie]

I'm not in the US, but it's a barrier everywhere AFAICT.

It's an admission of past criminal behaviour and potential future criminal behaviour. People who are addicted are very likely to be in possession for fear of getting withdrawals as much as anything else.

It seems as though Portugal has had a lot of success with its approach.

[austincheney]

I was pretty clear that I am not advocating for criminalization.

[Nursie]

But you said that legalisation hasn't tackled addiction. So far I'm not aware of anywhere that the majorly addictive drugs (heroin, cocaine) have been legalised. Portugal has made inroads into its addiction problem with its decriminalisation program.

[austincheney]

> But you said that legalisation hasn't tackled addiction.

It has not. Much of the opioid problem in the US is due to legally available drugs. Criminalizing those drugs would probably make it worse.

[thecopy]

I think i've read somewhere that Portugal's decriminalization of all drugs has had positive effects.

[austincheney]

I suspect legalization would have positive effects in the US as well, but I do not suspect it will slow consumption. This is evidenced by juvenile vaping rates. The trends indicate that vaping is on schedule to far exceed historic levels of tobacco consumption by minors. Vaping is generally healthier than tobacco having little or no toxins, but the nicotine content is variable and can occur in far greater concentrations than in tobacco products resulting in greater addiction rates than tobacco. Whether or not nicotine were criminalized demand and consumption would continue to grow. The problem is not legality or even availability. The problem is demand. Children want to smoke nicotine products that taste like candy. The messaging is that tobacco is bad, but vaping is... (not communicated).

I suspect the differences in cultural attitudes between Portugal and the US are a large factor for the differences in evidence of success.

[empath75]

Anybody who tells you that legalization is going to solve the problems of drug addiction is lying, but I don’t think anyone has ever argued seriously that it would.

The point of legalization is to solve the problems of having a massive black market for drugs. Getting people to quit using drugs is a different issue entirely.

[UncleEntity]

> So far legalization has not proven to solve the problems of demand or addiction.

Those are really biological issues.

If they were to make tobacco illegal tomorrow that also wouldn't solve for demand or addiction but would merely make it vastly more inconvenient for people to get their nicotine fix. But, as they've doing for (at least) the last 40+ years, if they try to get people to either not start or stop on their own (i.e. without jail time) then the problem just kind of fixes itself.

Two choices really and one leads to having the largest prison population on the planet with no real end in sight to the "drug epidemic".

[austincheney]

I am not advocating for criminalization.

Demand for tobacco id down specifically because there is ample activity and messaging to influence people away from interest in tobacco. If this same level of influence were applied for all drugs people would be generally much healthier.

[circlefavshape]

+1

Some substances are psychoactive, and can be pleasurable to take. That's at the root of the demand, and can't ever really be "solved"

[austincheney]

Education and behavior are always solvable problems. Denial of such opens people to manipulation and opportunity loss.

[time-domain0]

You're mistaken. Prohibition has always failed. 18th/21st amendments and Portugal decriminalization. It's not to say hard drugs are great, but criminalizing them creates more violence and crime in order to access them.

Legalization solves several bigger problems:

- MIC/PIC over-criminalization for profit

- barriers to treatment

- higher prices plus criminal enterprises lead to violent crime, i.e., Mexico right now, and greater property crime of users to support habits

Solving economic, social issues is beyond the scope of drug policy but giving people hope, purpose, mission and security reduces usage. Having a functional community, society are preconditions to deterring substance abuse... whereas failed states and under/unemployment promote it.

No amount of self-righteous crusaders will change human behavior, but they can certainly make it worse with naïve policies.

[ryanmercer]

>but criminalizing them creates more violence and crime in order to access them.

And fills prisons, which cost tax-payers a LOT of money, with people that often did nothing to actually harm anyone (I'm specifically speaking of psychadelics, marijuana and steroid convictions).

[austincheney]

I am not advocating for prohibition. I am just saying that legalization hasn't demonstrated a solution.

[quetzthecoatl]

It worked for Portugal - https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/dec/05/portugals-radic...

[austincheney]

Yes, it did work for Portugal. Portugal does not have the pharmaceutical industry that the US does.

Due to criminalization of certain drugs and the extreme enforcement thereof demand for legally available drugs has never been higher in the US. The pharmaceutical industry is more than happy to fill that gap and meet the economic demand. By ignoring the data and eliminating access to controlled substances demand has not diminished but instead shifted to alternate products.

Criminalization/legalization ignores all the data and research on this problem.

[quetzthecoatl]

The argument is that people are going for legal more potent, more dangerous drugs in US because much harmless marijuana is illegal (Just as when alcohol was prohibited people switched from wine and beer to moonshine). This is true everywhere including US. Not just Portugal. So when relatively harmless recreational drugs are decriminalized, people won't go for fentanyl or oxy.

Then of course we have the moral argument. The addicts are an extremely at risk, isolated, poor community. They can't seek help as their very existence is illegal (they consume illegal drugs). If drugs were legal, they could seek help without fear or stigma, others could help them without fearing breaking law, NGOs could legally operate in this domain helping them (with disposable needles, safe usage etc.. not just in rehabilitation). All this is true for US. Not just Portugal.

[llampx]

> The argument is that people are going for legal more potent, more dangerous drugs in US because much harmless marijuana is illegal

I'd argue that there is demand for mind-altering substances in the US because of societal reasons. I count marijuana in there because I don't think any other country in the world has made a bigger deal of it than the US. It is a part of pop culture in a way that doesn't happen anywhere else in the world to my knowledge.

No judgment implied on people who use marijuana, of course.

[austincheney]

You are deliberately ignoring what I am saying.

Criminalization/legalization alone does not curb demand for health damaging drugs. The only important goal in talking about drugs is reducing intake to increase personal health. Everything else is either a beneficial byproduct of that goal (crime, dependency, disease) or an antithetical motive.

Marijuana availability would not increase personal health and there is no indication persons consuming legally prescribed opioids would prefer legal and unprescribed marijuana alternatively merely because it is less unhealthy. You can legalize or criminalize all of it, but either way demand for consumption will continue to increase in the US according to the data available.