Hat tip to Rempelia Prime for this thought-stirring article:
Why the hell aren’t we making all drugs available to all adults? Yes, we’d have another mess on our hands, but it would be a better mess than women’s heads sliced in half and left in buckets. It would instantly drain the power of violent criminals. Yes, prostitutes need protection. But perhaps we could make it unnecessary for them to climb into a car and ride into the fetid, bloody pit of death that we will peer into during this trial.
Why indeed? Perhaps it is because there are no good solutions for government to take to this problem. This is a human problem: a problem of individuals. It cannot be resolved from a decree from our appointed masters.
No, I don’t mean it is THEIR problem. It is OUR problem. It is MY problem. It is YOUR problem. Legalizing drugs to make them readily available will do one thing: it will accelerate the rate at which we incapacitate our own citizens into ineffectual zombies. It will not do one thing: it will not keep women off the street.
The reasons for women entering into the sex trade are legion. They are not all drug related. Yes, many prostitute themselves because they need money for drugs. But why do they value themselves so lowly that they would rent out their orifices for men’s pleasure? Is that the fault of drugs? Will they really do ANYTHING for drugs? Or has something else gnawed away at their sense of self-worth long before the drugs? What caused them to turn to drugs in the first place? What drove them away from their family, their friends? What dragged them out into the street?
Drugs are an answer, but they are not the answer. They are an answer as to the question of what is keeping them down - it is one of many things. Legalizing them is not the answer to their prayers. You and I need to accept personal responsibility for those less fortunate. We need to step up, help people out.
We need to teach our children, our teens about these consequences, about the effects of their actions on their peers, their classmates.
We must raise up a generation that does not let this happen to anyone they know - that stays away from the drugs, that loves and supports each other and builds each other up so that they don’t feel desperate, alone, and unloved.
This begins at home, and it won’t cost a dime of taxpayer money. Its cost cannot be measured, but it will always be treasured, if we have the guts to pay it.
overthesea wrote:
Wow. Great post.
Posted on 31-Jan-07 at 9:03 am | Permalink
C F wrote:
“It would instantly drain the power of violent criminals.”
What a line of B.S. What happened after prohibition was lifted? Criminals moved on to new markets.
Gangs aren’t attached to drugs per se, they’re attached to any product that is illegal and in demand. This can be drugs, guns, stolen cars, prostitution, or a whole lot of other things.
Posted on 31-Jan-07 at 2:08 pm | Permalink
Tom wrote:
“What a line of B.S. What happened after prohibition was lifted? Criminals moved on to new markets.”
What a line of BS. There is no legitimate supply of drugs in this country but a demand for them hence the strong economic niche available for illicit drug trafficing. If it was legal there would still be a demand for illegal drug just as there is a demand for illegal TVs, but since there could be a legal supply availible at some market price the demand for illicit drugs and hence the black market size would drop.
This doesn’t mean that there will be an immediate jump in criminal activity in some other area unless there is a jump in demand for that good and it can’t be purchased by a lot of people on the open market.
All you free marketers should be celebrating legalizing drugs.
Posted on 31-Jan-07 at 3:02 pm | Permalink
metalguru wrote:
I concur with Tom…Legalizing is not a great idea but it’s the best solution. Prohibition is an abysmal failure that creates far more social misery than the few junkie’s lives it pretends to want to save.
- Farmers in South America forced to grow coca leafs at gun point.
- The Taliban in the Ghan.
- The kid that got a bullet in his head for selling pot on the wrong side of the street.
- Little kids who will not get anything to eat tonight because mama is going to get her daily low quality/overpriced heroin fix from some shady character.
- The tremendous amounts of cash poured into and choking the judiscial system.
I am convinced there are sinister reasons why drugs are not made legal:
- The alcool and tobacco industries would loose a good chunk of profit from OTHER made legal DRUGS
- An army in society (Cops, lawyers, prison guards, social workers) could loose their livelyhoods
Why not just pot?
Answer: Unlike tobacco which needs to be cured and flavoured so people enjoy smoking it or alcool which is dangerous to distill without either blowing you up or going blind or dead when ingested if done improperly,
Pot can be grown from seed in your backyard with minimal care. Dried, rolled and smoked, Voila! = NO POSSIBILITY TO REGULATE AND TAX THIS though!!!!
It’s not about your health it about tax returns!
BTW: I am 100% Conservative supporter. Not a hippy socialist you might have already stereotyped.
Posted on 31-Jan-07 at 3:35 pm | Permalink
C F wrote:
My main point was don’t expect criminals to magically disappear when drugs are legalized. Drugs are only one of many markets they operate in.
Regarding drugs specifically, you can argue that alchohal does much more damage to society today than it did during the time of prohibition (think of all the death and injury caused by DUIs alone). Yeah, the government has more control over it now (and profits grandly), but what has that solved besides better access?
Posted on 31-Jan-07 at 4:00 pm | Permalink
Shane wrote:
CF makes the main point. The social ills of which drugs are symptomatic will not vanish, nor will they decrease. What WILL increase is every single societal damage caused by user hooked on the stuff.
It was mentioned above that one thing that will be done away with is mothers being able to feed their kids because they are not blowing their money on super-expensive stuff. Think about what you are saying. Illegal drugs are a) incapacitating, and b)for the most part, pretty cheap. Crystal Meth is one of the cheapest around, most addictive, and probably the most damaging to people right now. It won’t get cheaper, and you can for DAMN sure guarantee that drug use will NOT go down post-legalization.
But back to the first - you are talking about creating a nation of addicts - a nation of people who are too stoned to raise kids, too stoned to work, too stoned to function. I already look around at people I know, here in the Lower Mainland, whose drug of choice is pot. They by-and-large live very messy lives, being too lazy to eat right, too lazy to clean up after themselves, too lazy to look after their kids. And when they aren’t on the pot, they are short tempered and paranoid. And that is just pot, let alone the hard stuff.
It is all fun and games to say stuff like, “you capitalists should love the idea of being able to get rich off a whole new market segment!” Sorry, the truth is that some conservatives indeed do have hearts, and actually care about the well-being of their fellow citizens. You can’t stop people from doing self-immolating things, but can sure do your best to encourage them in the right direction, and keeping dangerous products that are simply bad for people as indviduals and bad for society illegal is a step in that direction.
And before you start pointing the “hypocrite” finger at me about booze, I will say that alcohol has medicinal and healthful properties when used in moderation. I would have no problem with a law that made a criminal offence out of drunkenness. As for other drugs, most have no redeeming features. For those that have similar characteristics to alcohol - ie. they have medicinal uses (like methadone, codeine, morphine, and perhaps cannabis though I have yet to read a peer-reviewed study on its benefits that wasn’t put on by a bunch of potheads looking for an excuse to get toasted), then I would support controlled production and distribution like a pharmaceutical. But I wouldn’t be open to anyone planting some seeds or setting up their own lab. That would do nothing to help anyone, except make a few “legal” suppliers rich.
Posted on 31-Jan-07 at 7:08 pm | Permalink