[Exenith]

As far as I'm concerned, all of these drug markets are an absolutely fucking wonderful thing for society. Even if you think drugs should be illegal, incredibly violent cartels still exist. Markets like Silk Road can take all their power away.

100,000 people have died so far in the 8-year Mexican Drug War. How would you like if that number turned into 0 without any need for political intervention?

This is what Ross Ulbricht described his goal as on LinkedIn:

"I want to use economic theory as a means to abolish the use of coercion and aggression amongst mankind."

Is that clear enough? The guy studied organic solar cells and EuO thin-film crystals for 5 years as a grad student, describing his goal then as to expand the frontier of human knowledge.

Do you think a person like that would suddenly plunge himself into a crazy get-rich scheme? Let's be honest here: that kind of person meticulously plans these kind of things, and they do it ultimately to help the world in an abstract way -- not constantly empathetic of each individual person, but ultimately concerned with the total human condition.

[mehwoot]

This is what Ross Ulbricht described his goal as on LinkedIn: "I want to use economic theory as a means to abolish the use of coercion and aggression amongst mankind." Is that clear enough? The guy studied organic solar cells and EuO thin-film crystals for 5 years as a grad student, describing his goal then as to expand the frontier of human knowledge.

And then twice paid money to (what he believed) have somebody killed that was causing him a problem.

[Exenith]

Would you end 2 lives if it saved millions in the future? Someone concerned with direct empathy wouldn't. Someone concerned with the human condition might.

Anyway, I'm not saying that it was right, because that holds the assumption that he 100% would be helping people. What if you're wrong? What if there's a better way? 2 lives gone and nothing to show for it. In reality, it's pretty likely that he just went a bit fucking crazy. The point is that the creation of Silk Road was likely with the goal of changing the world for the better, and I can absolutely see that happening.

[fabulist]

This was my immediate reaction as well.

But upon further contemplation, maybe there was more wisdom behind donning the name Dread Pirate Roberts than Ulbricht realized. Power is a corrupting influence, and theres the old saying about what happens to those who fight monsters.

But ultimately, such corruption was his downfall, and delivered him into FBI custody. Now theres not only a new DPR, but a slew of new Silk Roads to replace him.

[anonbanker]

I still use reiserfs on my drives, ever after knowing Hans Reiser is a murderer. Doesn't make his contributions any less valid.

[mehwoot]

Yes, but the comment I replied to claimed he was "ultimately concerned with the total human condition." I'm saying he isn't, or is at minimum a hypocrite.

[grimtrigger]

Why would these markets take any power from the cartels? Don't they give the cartels a larger consumer base to sell to?

[unchocked]

They make it impossible for cartels to exclude competition, in the same way they make it (theoretically) impossible for governments to prosecute distribution.

[aianus]

Unfortunately you still need the cartels to get the drugs into the US which is where they make most of their money anyways. I imagine parcels from Colombia, Peru, or Afghanistan are not likely to fly under the radar.

[dlss]

Smuggling doesn't benefit from more people the way that violence does.

[aianus]

How so? I'm not an expert, but it seems most of the violence is concentrated in Mexico near the border as cartels battle for prime smuggling territory.

[zo1]

Even us not being experts. Can you honestly say you haven't heard of the destructive and violent effects of drug cartels in the US? Gang wars, turf wars, incarceration due to drug possession, etc.

[tomjen3]

The pot may also be grown illegally in the US or being sourced from states where such purchases are legal.

[anonbanker]

Can you show me where you're getting the data that most silk road drugs are coming from cartels?

[aianus]

I don't know about 'most drugs on silk road' but I've never heard of people cultivating coca, poppies, or sassafras trees for drugs in the United States. That's three major drugs right there (cocaine, heroin, ecstasy).

[glomph]

Eh. I thought MDMA was largely made in Holland and Canada. Hardly hotbeds of violence.

[the_cat_kittles]

if you need an example of a PhD claiming to have altruistic motives gone awry, look no further Ted Kaczynski

[contingencies]

His motives for the violence were to get published somewhere with serious readership... and he succeeded, IIRC?

[ufmace]

Now that's kinda funny to think about. He railed against technology, and his goal was to get his rants read. If it was a few years later, he could have published them on the internet, where anybody in the world could read it... if not for him being anti-technology in the first place.

[contingencies]

Potential readership online is huge, that is true. However, being published in a major global paper is more like a way to ensure immediate global readership. I think the distinction is important, and he was seeking the latter.

[chippy]

From the article:

"Dark net markets make drugs more available more easily, and that's nothing to celebrate. It will, I suspect, tend towards higher levels of use, which -- legal or illegal -- creates misery. "

So, the argument is that increased supply probably will actually increase misery, and will not be "an absolutely fucking wonderful thing".

I think it's this discussion which is the key one to be having - what will happen to society, and what do we want our societies to be?

[ObviousScience]

The statistics from places with lax drug laws, decriminalization, partial legalization, etc suggests that everyone who actually wants to do drugs long term already does, and that most (if not all) of the rise in drug use you see at a law change is just people experimenting and then deciding against routine use.

Similarly, higher drug use isn't necessarily a problem, since legalization would allow for treating drug addiction as a health problem, which would likely lead to decreased health problems as people are now free to seek treatment for their issues without worrying about arrest or other legal consequence.

Also, drug violence is a HUGE source of crime. The Mexican cartels, for instance, receive about 10x the funding of NASA by selling to the US drug market.

There's no way to overstate just how bad it is that we're funding paramilitary groups around the world to the tune of hundreds of billion of dollars a year, and the small increases in misery caused by any rise in drugs (which we haven't seen in nations that have taken laxer stands on drugs) would be offset by removing hundreds of billions of dollars in funding to some of the most violent organizations on Earth.

I don't think anyone wants our society to be a constant civil war so we can lock people in boxes for liking altered states of consciousness. It's clear that people who want drugs aren't going to stop, even if the other people threaten to throw them in cages and murder them for their habit. The only path drug prohibition can lead us down is to continue this civil war.

I think people who are against drug legalization literally don't know what's happening or how things work, because when they try to explain their stance to me, it always critically depends on things that are simply untrue.

There is no debate over prohibition: it's a failed policy and gives us an objectively worse outcome, no matter what your goal was, unless your goal was to see constant violence between large organizations, such as the US government and paramilitary groups.

[robinhoode]

> The statistics from places with lax drug laws, decriminalization, partial legalization, etc suggests that everyone who actually wants to do drugs long term already does, and that most (if not all) of the rise in drug use you see at a law change is just people experimenting and then deciding against routine use.

All the people I've met who took drugs and then became violent or addicted had problems well before the drugs were there.

All the people I've met who could handle drugs were well adjusted, or were on their way to becoming well adjusted.

[Symmetry]

It's a complicated issue which, as far as I can tell, mostly comes down to whether illegal drugs tend to displace alcohol use or not. If someone who regularly uses alcohol to become intoxicated switches to weed that's a big public health win. If they use weed in addition that's a public health loss. If they switch to heroin they're clearly worse off, but they're less likely to harm others due to drunk driving or induced belligerence.

A couple of independent harm analyses: http://welshcouncil.org.uk/english/dangerlist.html http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2010/11/drugs_caus...

[aetherson]

It's not "what do we want our societies to be" -- everyone wants the same ideal society. It's "what do we want our societies to be, within the constraints of what is actually possible," and the key disagreement is over what is actually possible -- indeed, people's assessment of what is possible is so different that their world views are irreconcilable.