[dhritzkiv]

My reading of the parent comment suggests that they're in favour of decriminalizing them, but not permitting the commercial sale of them. Acquisition would then be achieved by e.g. prescriptions / medical studies, growing for personal use, or from "friends".

The important thing is that no one is charged criminally for possession.

[skidd0]

Ah, that's not as bad. Still, I'd prefer full legalization. Commercial sale as well. The less risk, the better. Risk from still being illegal, from bad sources, from bad product.

[distract8901]

It's something that has both extremely positive and extremely negative effects. We should treat it like other dangerous medicines

[JoshTriplett]

> We should treat it like other dangerous medicines

We should decriminalize those, too.

[distract8901]

I find adderall to be nothing short of life-changing, should we sell it over the counter to anyone? Should buying it black market be legal?

How about antibiotics? Codeine?

Some drugs have very little risk when used improperly, and some can fuck you up for life. The average person isn't really equipped to make that kind of judgment for themselves, they need a medical expert in the chain who knows how much is safe and whether it's an appropriate treatment.

That's why we have OTC drugs and prescription drugs. Some drugs just are not safe to use without guidance.

[JoshTriplett]

Lots of things will kill you if you consume them or misuse them, yet you can buy them from many stores.

People should absolutely consult medical experts before using most medications. I will consistently say that that does not mean they should be restricted from purchasing arbitrary medications.

(Antibiotics are a potentially interesting case that may require some additional complexity, precisely because they're a commons, and taking them incorrectly or even taking them correctly can affect people other than yourself. That doesn't apply to anything that only affects yourself.)

[tux3]

The first step to protect adults from accidental poisonings with medicines is by making better safety caps, and storing them on a much higher shelf where adults cannot reach them

But you cannot only rely on storing medicines up high and using adult-resistant caps to protect your adults. Also, it is just not possible to watch adults every second. So, other strategies need to be put in place to prevent your adults from gaining access to medicines.

[thereisnospork]

It's not exactly the "fairest" policy but maybe there's something to the approach used to qualify investors? Allow drugs to be sold to 'qualified' users (aka persons with a demonstrable net worth). Ostensibly this would try and keep drugs out of the hands of people who abuse them to the degree of losing functionality in society while letting 'responsible' people enjoy them.

Linking money to rights so directly grates with my idealistic sensibilities, but my realist sensibilities are against policies that would exacerbate the homeless situation.

[skidd0]

Seriously? So someone who is poor can't get legal access to some potential life altering drug just because they're not affluent enough? And that'll somehow have an impact on homelessness?

Many people in the open-air drug encampments are there because they aren't getting real help. Your proposed plan would do nothing to help those that might just be assisted by the new perspective psychedelic therapy can give. It would only let the rich keep living the untouchable life they already live.

[adolph]

> So someone who is poor can't get legal access to some potential life altering drug just because they're not affluent enough?

This seems to be the case for most things across human existence. Did something change recently?

[anigbrowl]

Yes, and that's a problem. Structuring society around capital acquisition is unhealthy for the social body, much as structuring a diet around sugar and complex carbohydrates is a fast route to diabetes. Dysfunctional as drug addicts are, obsession with money can be equally pathological.

[adolph]

The current model is an improvement over previous methods of value distribution which trended nearly exclusively toward warlordism or hereditary monarchism (but I repeat myself).

A model which on the margin (not totally) allows decisions about value allocation to be made by people who generate value seems to follow homeostatic principles which are evolutionarily fitting for a relatively peaceful time.

One may quibble that this equilibrium is largely limited toward English speaking nations and European peninsula, and that even there exist edge cases on the high and low ends. Thats focusing on the empty end of a glass that is generally getting fuller over time.

[anigbrowl]

decisions about value allocation to be made by people who generate value

I don't believe this to be the case in most instances. Value agglomerates due to preferential attachment, and greater a capital accumulation the less effort is needed to increase it.

relatively peaceful

Compared to what, historical nadirs? Substituting economic conflict for kinetic warfare has had only limited success and had drastic atomizing effects upon society. I don't regard this as a great improvement over the historic methods, which were more pragmatic than you suggest and where excess could be tempered by replacement. The elevation of property rights over virtually all other considerations has been a net negative in my view.

a glass that is generally getting fuller over time

Sure, if you look at naive measures like GDP growth or the like. Capital proponents recoil fromt he idea of factoring in all externalities, viz environmental impact. There's a reason insurers are scrambling to get out of many markets. I used to believe in the cis cornucopian version of capitalism, but have come to think it's much closer to zero-sum than proponents care to admit, preferring to take refuge in idealistic accounting than frankly appraise reality.