| 1) Yes, we should carefully consider every aspect of prohibition and analyse how we can set policy to bring levels of harm down to an absolute minimum. If this includes decrim of everything, we shouldn't balk at it but follow best available evidence. This is not easy. For example, is it acceptable to decriminalise and prescribe heroin for addicts if the results are (hypothetically):
- increase in the number of heroin addicts by 50% due to easier availability
- decrease in 95% of deaths due to heroin and heroin-related HIV due to clean needles, known doses, no impurities etc
- eliminate 95% of the acquisitive crime by these addicts as nobody steals for a fix any more I would say yes. But it's a hard sell at the political level, particularly when western society seems to regard addiction as a moral failure and a sin in need of punishment. I find it particularly perverse that when you explain to people that providing a fix and (hopefully) a slow, easy, managed detox program for these people is not only more humane but likely to save insane amounts of tax money AND cut violent crime, some folks are still against it because 'they broke the law!' 2) If the popular and less harmful drugs (weed, E/X , probably a few others like LSD) are legalised and made available then the available customer base and cash for the criminal gangs shrinks massively. Nobody expects them to go home to mommy and start an honest career but if you cut the cashflow, you cut the ability of the gangs to function, and you cut the number of people coming in because it's less attractive. Surely you can't think that cutting off a lucrative revenue stream from the cartels is a bad thing? 3) Drugs really aren't as dangerous as you've been told. Read a real book on them sometime. I recommend 'Drugs: Without the hot air' by Professor David Nutt, one of the UK's foremost scientists in this area. |
I guess no one here watches the TV show "Intervention". Pity. That TV show is a better education on the real impact of hardcore drugs than any book you might read. This Colorado vote is a relatively minor issue, really. But, it does indicate that we're heading down a slippery slope. Since those running the meth clinics say that only one person in 50 can stay clean for a year, there might come a day when half of society are hardcore drug addicts. But, we will never face that kind of zombie apocalypse because the life expectancy for a meth addict is only seven years from the moment they get hooked. Let the down-voting commence!