The so called War on Drugs is a sham. It has accomplished precisely nothing; drugs are as plentiful as ever. Untold billions of dollars wasted and millions of lives ruined for precisely nothing. The best thing that our country could do about drugs, both morally and pragmatically is end their prohibition.
To me, the best reason to end drug prohibition is the issue of personal freedom. Do people own their own bodies, or do they belong to the state? If the answer is the former, how can anybody justify criminalizing the ingestion of chemicals that make you feel good?
I fully realize that many people are fully willing to let individual freedom go out the window if it means keeping drugs off the streets. But the thing is, it hasn't. Drugs are cheaper and more plentiful than ever.
And the fact of the matter is that the War on Drugs has benefited most the people that the government is fighting against: drug dealers. Most notably, Mexican drug cartels. Because of drug prohibition, these people are making literally billions of dollars a year. And these people are willing to do anything, to kill anybody who gets in their way. More than 15,000 people have been killed in Mexico alone as a result of the drug wars there since Dec 2006. But I suppose that's OK, so long as kids in the USA have a slightly harder time obtaining cocaine.
In the US, streets gangs are huge problem in many cities. And these gangs are, of course, funded primarily through the sale of illegal drugs. FSM knows how many people have been killed in the US at the hand of gang violence fueled by drugs and drug money.
If drugs were legalized these drug cartels and street gangs would lose their source of income and likely fall apart for the most part. I think everybody besides them would agree that this would be a very good thing.
Back to the drugs themselves. I fully recognize that many drugs can be very dangerous, but this problem is exasperated by prohibition. Because drugs are illegal, they are not regulated at all, which means one can never be sure what one is getting. Meth is often full of toxic by-products. Heroin can be cut with fentanyl or even be unusually pure, both of which makes overdoses much more likely. Virtually anything can be in "Ecstasy" pills, most of it more dangerous than MDMA - caffeine, (meth)amphetamine, DMX, exotic research chemicals including deadly PMA. If drugs were legal, they could be regulated and purity and dosage could be assured, making them much safer.
While I think that they are misguided, I can understand why people would want dangerous drugs like heroin and meth to be illegal. But I am baffled as to why people would want relatively safe drugs like marijuana, MDMA (the stuff that is supposed to be in Ecstasy), LSD, and psilocybin (magic) mushrooms are be illegal. Those drugs are all less dangerous than alcohol or tobacco. It just makes no sense to me.
I suppose that is enough rambling for now. In short, all drugs should be legal because it is morally wrong to make somebody a criminal for putting chemicals in their body and because the costs far outweigh any possible perceived benefits.
Thoughts?
To me, the best reason to end drug prohibition is the issue of personal freedom. Do people own their own bodies, or do they belong to the state? If the answer is the former, how can anybody justify criminalizing the ingestion of chemicals that make you feel good?
I fully realize that many people are fully willing to let individual freedom go out the window if it means keeping drugs off the streets. But the thing is, it hasn't. Drugs are cheaper and more plentiful than ever.
And the fact of the matter is that the War on Drugs has benefited most the people that the government is fighting against: drug dealers. Most notably, Mexican drug cartels. Because of drug prohibition, these people are making literally billions of dollars a year. And these people are willing to do anything, to kill anybody who gets in their way. More than 15,000 people have been killed in Mexico alone as a result of the drug wars there since Dec 2006. But I suppose that's OK, so long as kids in the USA have a slightly harder time obtaining cocaine.
In the US, streets gangs are huge problem in many cities. And these gangs are, of course, funded primarily through the sale of illegal drugs. FSM knows how many people have been killed in the US at the hand of gang violence fueled by drugs and drug money.
If drugs were legalized these drug cartels and street gangs would lose their source of income and likely fall apart for the most part. I think everybody besides them would agree that this would be a very good thing.
Back to the drugs themselves. I fully recognize that many drugs can be very dangerous, but this problem is exasperated by prohibition. Because drugs are illegal, they are not regulated at all, which means one can never be sure what one is getting. Meth is often full of toxic by-products. Heroin can be cut with fentanyl or even be unusually pure, both of which makes overdoses much more likely. Virtually anything can be in "Ecstasy" pills, most of it more dangerous than MDMA - caffeine, (meth)amphetamine, DMX, exotic research chemicals including deadly PMA. If drugs were legal, they could be regulated and purity and dosage could be assured, making them much safer.
While I think that they are misguided, I can understand why people would want dangerous drugs like heroin and meth to be illegal. But I am baffled as to why people would want relatively safe drugs like marijuana, MDMA (the stuff that is supposed to be in Ecstasy), LSD, and psilocybin (magic) mushrooms are be illegal. Those drugs are all less dangerous than alcohol or tobacco. It just makes no sense to me.
I suppose that is enough rambling for now. In short, all drugs should be legal because it is morally wrong to make somebody a criminal for putting chemicals in their body and because the costs far outweigh any possible perceived benefits.
Thoughts?
