War over decriminalising drugs

[Mythor]

I truly believe that if doctors were educated on the benefits of these illegal drugs and were allowed to administer them that they would have a great effect in medical science.

How do you think many of the illegal drugs were discovered? You think a bunch of stoners sat around throwing random chemicals together and then ingested them to see what happens?

Science knows all about these drugs because science is mostly responsible for inventing/discovering them. The reason medical professionals don't administer them is because most of them are really **** bad for you and can have catastrophic consequences.
Something doctors typically try and avoid.
The ones that actually have provable medical applications get used.

The push for decriminalisation has nothing at all to do with potential medical benefits of any of the drugs in question. It's solely an effort to free up police resources and to keep people from going to jail for offences that are solely drug related. ie; possession, manufacturing and using.
Illegal acts done while under the influence of a drug (including alcohol) would still be... well, illegal. You just wouldn't get hit with possession charges, for instance, if you still had a bag of whatever in your pocket when arrested.

Most of the people calling for decriminalisation either don't know the facts or are deliberately ignoring them. Decriminalisation provides zero benefit to society and will more than likely lead to a greater rate of experimentation and general usage, once the deterrent of potential police involvement is removed.

There's no compelling reason for decriminalisation that outweighs the benefits of continued deterrence. If you don't want to get in trouble for using drugs, maybe you should just not use drugs? Works pretty well for the rest of society.

[revengous]

If there's enough scientific evidence (I keep hearing there is) that weed (for example) doesn't have m/any serious health affects on adults worse than alcohol/tobacco then why should it be illegal? Bill Hicks infamously said "Remember, it's not a war on drugs, it's a war on personal freedom, keep that in mind at all times". Side question: could the government even ban cigarettes considering how wealthy the companies must be?

get high and go a drive. I wonder why its been made illegal (now that I think about it, alcohol isn't far behind 'weed' on being illegal)

I dont think the government will ban cigarettes, it does make a lot of money - I guess they will just keep hitching up the price (as long as that money goes to something decent [read: not smoking related] then Im kinda happy)

[Marius]

Most of the people calling for decriminalisation either don't know the facts or are deliberately ignoring them. Decriminalisation provides zero benefit to society and will more than likely lead to a greater rate of experimentation and general usage, once the deterrent of potential police involvement is removed.

There's no compelling reason for decriminalisation that outweighs the benefits of continued deterrence. If you don't want to get in trouble for using drugs, maybe you should just not use drugs? Works pretty well for the rest of society.

Except in Portugal where all drugs were decriminalized they experienced a decrease in drug use, decrease in overdose deaths and increase in people seeking rehabilitation...

http://www.time.com/time/health/article ... 46,00.html

Of course, the specifics of each country are different. The comparison problem is that Portugal is vastly smaller than Australia, with a very different culture. But the same arguments 'drugs should always be illegal' were used there to try and dissuade decriminalization. It's not an open and shut case.

I do think that drugs are generally a bad thing. But I'm not going to outright dismiss empirical evidence from countries that have experienced positive success with decriminalization programs.

[cyclobs]

bill hicks has talked a hell of a lot about legalisation of drugs. a fair bit of it i agree with tbh.

but you also got to look at it from a different point other then just are they good / bad for you.

first of all. i think legalising them will do much more good then half. for a few reasons, one of my biggest points here is the fact that if they were legal, the goverment can control the regulation of them. This could result in a lot cleaner / safer drugs.

secondly, we'd be able to tax the use of these drugs much like alcohol and ciggies, giving more money to spend on roads and hospitals.

thirdly, because the drugs are now legal, we don't have to spend billions (well not us but think of the US for example) on policing them. Nor do we have to spend even more money and time on the courts system to punish people that might use them at home in their free time. As well as save tons and tons of money throwing these people in prison.

4thly, this will also destroy major drug gangs and groups completely. Not because they are legal, but because they'll have real competition, they wont be able to sell questionable substances since we know that what gets sold in shops is heavily regulated and safe. This also brings a big bonus of reducing drug related crime. Of course the core of these gangs will probably move on to do some other trade but they'd probably never had it as easy as they currently do with drugs.

5thly, children made to work in major drug chains. (again maybe a US thing) you'll find tons and tons of videos of police on youtube giving talks about this very issue. they can't charge the kids, the drug gangs know this. so they pay the kids to carry the drugs and work off the street. (think of the wire - tv show).

i can't think of much more to talk about right now. But it's something I've been following for a while, best place to start would be bill hicks and his ideas on drugs. This is a guy that was heavily into drugs back in the day.

I think drugs have done good things for us i really do, if you don't think drugs have good things do me a favor. take all your albums, all your tapes and CD's and burn them. Cause you know what, the musicians that made all that great music that's enhanced your life through out the years.. RRREEEEAAAALLL **** high on drugs

love this quote

get high and go a drive. I wonder why its been made illegal (now that I think about it, alcohol isn't far behind 'weed' on being illegal)

How often do you hear of someone high on weed behind the wheel of a vehicle?

How often do you hear about someone getting drunk and then driving?

[MaddMoose]

Most of the people calling for decriminalisation either don't know the facts or are deliberately ignoring them. Decriminalisation provides zero benefit to society and will more than likely lead to a greater rate of experimentation and general usage, once the deterrent of potential police involvement is removed.

The perfect example of this is alcohol, which is amusing since the pro legalisation movement argue that it should be banned as it's dangerous and abused. Yet somehow they also argue that if drugs such as amphetamines and other hallucinogenics were made legal then all our problems with them would disappear.

[MaddMoose]

but you also got to look at it from a different point other then just are they good / bad for you.

Whilst good and valid points it's not that clear cut on the policing side of things. Removing the criminal side of buying and selling them doesn't get rid of the other criminal acts that get committed due to drugs. If you think that alcohol causes a lot of problems in society. Can you imagine the kind of problems we will face with people on amphetamines and cannaboids, which are far more addictive and easier to overdose on. Not to mention Australian's seem to like to punch the hell out of each other when drinking, alcohols a depressant, imagine what we'd be like on stimulants instead.

[Marius]

I doubt police have much impact on the number of drug-related crimes.

The problem with 'police deterrence' when it comes to drugs is that people doing something for an addiction aren't acting rationally. Considerations of consequences don't factor very high in their thinking.

What does have an impact is the quality of society as a whole, since it's difficult to keep a job and relationship if you're a serious addict. This is the main role of police here, to keep society as a whole clean. Not to threaten people into not using drugs, because once someone has made that decision, it's too late. And the decision is often made in situations where there's a lot of peer pressure where police have no power.

So I doubt we're going to have people rolling around in the streets high on drugs... unless we have a society of people looking to lose their jobs.

[Freeride]

Don't get me wrong. Heroine, cocaine and meth are all bad and there will never be a time in my life that I take any or ever encourage anyone too but there are a lot if drugs and hallucinogens that are illegal that do way less harm then most items you can buy off the shelf at your local supermarket and have way more pro's then cons.

The whole "Scientists have tested these drugs and that's why they are illegal" comment is wrong. It wasn't scientists who made these drugs illegal, it was the government, a lot of scientists are all for legalisation of marijuana and LSD etc. and I think you would find a lot of the top scientists in the passed 100 years used a lot of these drugs.

The only education about drugs I got in school was telling me how bad they were, I don't think education on both sides of the matter is such a bad thing seeing that atleast 50% of the people I went to school with have tried an illegal drug of some kind.

Education is what I believe will work, if you tell a teen not to do something then they are most likely going to try and do it.

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[=beast=]

first off. i dont care either way. it will have no or very little effect on my life. iv seen people hurt themselves with food, booze and smokes. in the end its all up to you. people need to stop looking to the government to solve other peoples lack of self control. stop drinking 3 times week ffs. regardless of the health effects, if its destroying your life then show some worth and just stop

everytime this topic comes up, the person arguing is always a regular drug user. in my experience anyway. legalise, tax the bajesus out of it. then maybe all those weed smokies hippies might actaully get god damn jobs and stop trying to convince society that smoking weed (apparently) isnt bad for you

edit: im mostly referring to weed. iv lost friend over it because its all they ever do. sit on their **** with 2 other friends. then fall asleep 2 hours later. yeah, wicked saturday night guys

[cyclobs]

Can you imagine the kind of problems we will face with people on amphetamines and cannaboids, which are far more addictive and easier to overdose on.

some people would say differently.. some say that these drugs are not anywhere near as addictive as nicotine which is legal.

If we were to go down the road of legalising drugs i think the best action would be to do it gradually in a way you can control. for ex: legalise weed for a few years. see what happens with it. before looking into the harder stuff,

I know I'm not going to completely change the opinion of everyone but i do hope it makes you think about it different

[revengous]

So I doubt we're going to have people rolling around in the streets high on drugs... unless we have a society of people looking to lose their jobs.

if drugs were to become legalised I would have thought it would be similar to alcohol - you could buy/consume but be under the influence while driving, in public, clearly 'high', then you would be arrested (current laws?)

as I stated before, I dont support, nor will vote for a party that wants to legalise drugs

[Matty]

Cannabis actually does quite a bit of damage, especially to how the brain functions, hence it being illegal. But it's late and I can't be bothered to find proof, so your own personal research might have to be conducted

[cyclobs]

Cannabis actually does quite a bit of damage, especially to how the brain functions, hence it being illegal. But it's late and I can't be bothered to find proof, so your own personal research might have to be conducted

and alcohol and nicotine doesn't?

[Marius]

if drugs were to become legalised I would have thought it would be similar to alcohol - you could buy/consume but be under the influence while driving, in public, clearly 'high', then you would be arrested (current laws?)

as I stated before, I dont support, nor will vote for a party that wants to legalise drugs

That's true.

What I was more getting at though is that it's not the laws which keep people from doing drugs, it's their societal obligations.

For example, I could, legally, go out, buy a bottle of spirits every day, and drink my life away.

But since I want to make money and have a good life... why?

Keeping those societal standards in place is the best way to keep drugs out of the mainstream, not laws.

This is actually supported by police experience in NYC. The city used to have one of the highest crime rates, and they reduced it not by targeting the big crimes, but the smaller ones, improving society overall. When people weren't being robbed in broad daylight, then actual interactions could take place which supported cleaning up.

[Matty]

Cannabis actually does quite a bit of damage, especially to how the brain functions, hence it being illegal. But it's late and I can't be bothered to find proof, so your own personal research might have to be conducted

and alcohol and nicotine doesn't?

Of course it does. Especially alcohol.