[dave_sullivan]

> Does this position make me a hypocrite?

A little bit, but it depends on your personal reasons for supporting legalization. You sound like you are more concerned about bodily harm of a substance, hence marijuana is ok because it's less harmful than alcohol (which we have accepted as a baseline "well of course alcohol is legal!", so we can then allow everything "less dangerous than alcohol")

I support drug legalization more from a "personal freedom of adults to make their own choices" POV. I'd even stretch that to include choices that statistically add strain to the medical system, like motorcycle riding or eating too many unhealthy foods. People shouldn't have the right to tell me what I'm allowed to put in my own body, and there also needs to be commerce allowed to service given needs, so defacto legalization of usage is not a great solution but is a start.

But I've been beating that drum for a long time, argued till I was red with many people who disagreed with marijuana legalization, now it's broadly accepted and those same people forgot how strongly they felt. "People should mind their own business" is a slogan I can broadly get behind and it applies to my opinions here.

[hackeraccount]

How would you respond if someone said they were going buy a motorcycle?

You could say nothing. The person should figure it out themselves, I'll mind my own business.

The implication in the comment is that you understand there's some risk as well as reward to riding around on a motorcycle. Is it really right to just do nothing? What if everyone took that view? What if you rode a motorcycle for a short time and came to the realization that it was all risk and no reward. Shouldn't you say something?

[Vt71fcAqt7]

>"personal freedom of adults to make their own choices" POV

What about when you inevitably have to pay for all the services drug users consume? Not to menrion lost productivity? It's not really a "personal decision" when others are funding your habit under threat of jail (IRS).

[milkytron]

> What about when you inevitably have to pay for all the services drug users consume?

This is why the tax costs of negative externalities should be on the price of products. If cigarette smokers are costing a ton in healthcare, tax cigarettes to cover those costs. If gasoline is polluting the air and having harmful effects, tax it to cover those. Same should apply to sugar, plastic, and pretty much everything imo.

It can be tough to calculate, but if the negative externalities cost a ton of taxpayer money, the people using those products may be disincentivized to purchase them if the costs are closely tied to them.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

Yup, a drug tax would be great. Would probably make it too expensive to use, however, making the black market come back into play.

[jjk166]

If you break your leg then you're going to consume public services and lose productivity. Does that mean every decision where there is a possibility of you injuring yourself is not a personal decision?

People are under no obligation to give up their freedoms to minimize their potential tax burden.

[scoofy]

I think people actually are? Something as simple as a seat-belt law is exactly this.

[SauciestGNU]

I think risk assessment plays into this too, seat belts prevent fatalities and extreme injuries, so it may make sense to require them as a minimally intrusive measure that drastically reduces bad outcomes.

[jjk166]

You don't have a fundamental right to operate or utilize a motor vehicle improperly. You are free to not wear a seat belt, just don't ride in a car.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

>You don't have a fundamental right to operate or utilize a motor vehicle improperly.

You don't have a fundamental right to get shoot up and then send me the bill.

[xboxnolifes]

Lets compromise. No more vehicles and no more drugs.

[heinternets]

What freedom are you losing by wearing a seatbelt?

[Vt71fcAqt7]

The freedom to not wear a seatbelt

[Vt71fcAqt7]

If I was to purposely break my leg because it felt good I should should be sent to a mental institution - not set free to break my leg everyday at your cost.

>People are under no obligation to give up their freedoms to minimize their potential tax burden.

They are.

[jjk166]

Playing sports causes sports injuries, but we still do it because it feels good, and not only do we accept other people being allowed to do it, we encourage them.

Hell one of the most popular activities is to just lay out in the sun and increase your risk of skin cancer, rolling over occasionally to ensure no part of you is safe.

The leading cause of death in the US is heart disease, but you are free to sit on a couch eating pizza whenever you want for as long as you want.

There isn't a red blooded american alive who hasn't done something that was potentially detrimental to their health and in no way productive for fun.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

These comparisons relly on some conflations imo (fun = drug abuse?) but I'll try to address each point as it is.

>Playing sports causes sports injuries, but we still do it because it feels good

There are many major differences here. playing sports is natural. Many mammals play some sort of physical game[0]. There is an intrinsic evolutionary drive at play here. Doing drugs is not an intrinsic evolutionary drive. Sports have an upside of increasing social and physical health. Hard drugs have no upside. Playing sports is not adictive. Playing sports does not preclude you from being a functioning memeber of society. Playing sports is much safer than doing drugs.

>we encourage them

I don't, but I get your point. The encouragement is itself an evolutionary force at play.

>Hell one of the most popular activities is to just lay out in the sun and increase your risk of skin cancer

Another intrinsic evolutionary activity. Be sure to wear sunscreen.

>The leading cause of death in the US is heart disease, but you are free to sit on a couch eating pizza whenever you want for as long as you want.

We banned trans fats and for a good reason. Although some research shows that omega 6 polyunsaturated fats may be worse. We may have been too quick on trans fats but the general idea was good. In any case, consumption of food is the most basic activity of the animal kingdom. Heroin is a chemical that flips evolution on it's head. People adicted to heroin lose their humanity - just ask former addicts what their life was like. We can ban heroin and cocaine because they have no upside while having drastic downsides. (Hopefuly opioids next). The alternative is to allow it but reomve the users from the saftey net (a big no-no).

[0]https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/games_animals_...

[orwin]

Consuming drugs is quite natural too.

THC and nicotine are neurotoxins that kills insects, worms or any parasite that our ancestors had trouble with. Since those substances seem to mostly affect positively mammals who have parasite troubles (a bit like sugar seems to affect mammals depending on the way they pace), the human reactions to those are probably evolutionary too, don't you think?

[mikedelago]

Members of a society don't directly benefit from most uses of tax dollars in the first place. If you're gunning for a society where your tax dollars only go to things that directly benefit you, your quality of life will likely suffer.

It's also fair to note that a large chunk of tax dollars go towards arresting and essentially ruining the lives of people that are responsibly using recreational drugs in privacy.

If they happen to get addicted and decide to seek treatment for it, I'm happy to have the money that I pay in taxes be used to help make someones life better.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

>Members of a society don't directly benefit from most uses of tax dollars in the first place. If you're gunning for a society where your tax dollars only go to things that directly benefit you, your quality of life will likely suffer.

My point was aboit GP's description of drug usage (abuse, if we're being honest) as being a personal choice ("make their own choices"). The point being that it's not a personal choice when people are footing the bill at your leisure. Your commemt here is irrelevant to this point. When your actions come at the cost of other's money it's no longer "your choice." At least no more of a choice than my choice of robbing someone is a personal choice: my gain, your loss ("it's my choice, right?"). If you want to say that we should still service drug abusers, that's fine, but my point is that it's not really a personal choice but a forced payment by others.

>It's also fair to note that a large chunk of tax dollars go towards arresting and essentially ruining the lives of people that are responsibly using recreational drugs in privacy.

I never said we should arrest people that are responsibly using recreational drugs in privacy.

>If they happen to get addicted

LOL! Do people "happen" to get addicted to heroin??

>and decide to seek treatment for it, I'm happy to have the money that I pay in taxes be used to help make someones life better.

I wasn't refering to this. I was refering to the cost of the thousands of drug addicts (including legal drugs like opioids) on society. Maybe you haven't seen steets and parks filled with needles and zombies (who happened to get addicted) but there is a real cost directly or indirectly. If we legalize heroin it has to come with an asterisc that taxpayers wont be paying for your "hobby." That's not me minding someone else's business but minding my own.

[slavik81]

The war on drugs has been incredibly expensive, demanding enormous investments in police services and prisons. Yet it has also been shockingly ineffective at safeguarding public health. We've waged this war for decades, and yet illegal drugs are killing more people than ever.

The status quo is that we're paying a fortune and we're getting terrible results for our money. Even setting aside the freedom argument, a harm-reduction approach via social services could very well be cheaper than policing and punishment.

What we're doing now isn't working. It's worth trying another strategy.

[dave_sullivan]

> I'd even stretch that to include choices that statistically add strain to the medical system, like motorcycle riding or eating too many unhealthy foods.

[Vt71fcAqt7]

This was ambiguous, however, because this could mean simply increasing the strain on emplyees but the individual still pays (making the system larger and more complecated) or passing the costs to others. given "People should mind their own business" and "personal freedom of adults to make their own choices," the latter is somewhat inconsistent, hence the question. But really it's a request for clarification.