Drug prohibition.

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In my experience, every single person I've ever met who supports drug prohibition falls into one or more of these three categories:

(1) Idiot
(2) Completely ignorant of the topic at hand
(3) Sadistic misanthrope

(Usually (2). I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong with being ignorant, by the way - I'm ignorant of a lot of things - it's just that if you are ignorant of a particular topic, you would be well-advised to refrain from holding any strong opinions on it.)

Are you the drug prohibitionist who violates this trend? Post your reasons for supporting this ridiculous disaster here.

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I am not a prohibitionist who violates your "trend" but I know several people who are/do. Maybe they would fall into your "idiot" category, but they are generally otherwise intelligent and considerate people who simply cannot agree that legalization (of let's say marijuana) would be good for society as a whole.

Their reasoning, while I don't agree with it, makes sense if you take the time to step into their shoes, the same way the reasoning of (honest, religious) opponents of gay marriage makes sense. If you *truly* believe something is a sin (gay sex), or not good for you (weed use)....well, you might support individual freedom, sure, to an extent, which is why you're not campaigning for harsh penalties for possession or to re-criminalize sodomy, but *legalizing* feels like giving a societal stamp of approval to these activities which you want other people to understand are harmful. Before anyone else says it, yes, those people are generally for criminalizing tobacco sale, and usually for criminalizing alcohol sale as well, though they don't talk about it overmuch since that has less popular support than legalizing weed in CA. And no, I don't see why these people won't accept that public safety announcements (like the ones we make for the harmful effects of cigarettes and alcohol) can't be made also for weed, or cocaine, should they be legalized. For whatever reason, despite what I feel is evidence supporting the opposite, they think prohibition is more effective at curbing undesirable behavior than PSAs.

Just trying to provide a view from the other side. Again, you may think they fall into the "idiot" category, but in my experience, they are smart individuals who have an entirely different value set than I do, and have been exposed to vastly different "framing" of the facts.

They would probably into the 'completely ignorant of the topic at hand' category (of course, there could be some idiots there, too). I'm quite familiar with that kind of position: many people I know who support drug prohibition use the fact that drugs are harmful as justification. The problem with this is, as anyone who's spent, say, 5 minutes researching the topic is aware of, that criminalizing drugs makes them a whole lot more harmful than if they were legal.

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I find that the people who feel entitled to these drugs are the idiots myself, but then I also see that this thread can't possibly end well.

^I give you sadistic misanthrope!


Your opinions are yours alone and you're welcome to them up until they harm others; say like with drug laws that cause more poverty, cause more crime (other than simply the possession and sale itself), and more blight (related to the whole crime and poverty aspect...depressed people living in an overtly police state aren't as up for maintaining where they live).

LOL, what a great basis for such a judgment - one short post on an internet forum

IMO, all humans are sadistic anyway, but that's a topic for another thread.

Fact is, there would be none of those drug related problems without the demand for said drugs. So druggies should just get their asses to rehab so the dealers run out of business and the whole drug trade stops.

Of course, that will never actually happen in a million years, but then I doubt drugs will never be made legal like you want either.

Now, as I've said in other threads, making drugs legal won't stop drug related crime. Addicts will still turn to crime if they have to in order to get their next drug fix.

As for drug laws meaning you live in a police state... I just hope that's tongue-in-cheek.

Finally, mind explaining to me how drug laws cause poverty? If anything, the addicts themselves get themselves into poverty by spending all their money on those drugs which are rightfully illegal anyway.

I don't think it's a good idea to take drugs recreationally. I don't even use alcohol or caffeine.

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It won't stop it, but it will reduce it significantly - as was the case when alcohol prohibition in the US came to an end.

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What you seem to be failing to understand is that drugs would have virtually no value as a commodity if they were not illegal; they are expensive not because they are expensive to produce or made from costly materials, but because of the risk that trafficking in them carries. If meth, coke or dope were sold at their "actual" cost, you'd kill yourself OD'ing before you ever reached the point of bankrupting yourself from the purchases and having to resort to crime, even on a fast food salary. Don't even get me started on pot, it's not called "weed" because it's hard to grow.

If you took the profits out of narcotics by making them legal, the criminal syndicates that are causing the associated violence and corruption would get out of the business, the margin simply wouldn't be there anymore and they'd have competition from the legitimate world and all the regulations and enforcement powers that come with it. Violent crime would drop, property crime would drop, political corruption would lose a major source of temptation... There's virtually no downside. Drug users don't need to get themselves to rehab unless that's really what they want; the government just needs to get out of people's business when it comes to their chemical entertainment options.

You disagree with my judgment then go ahead and prove me right in your perception of drugs, drug trade, its effect on the community, and the concept that people can just "not do drugs". But then again, I guess that lacking of comprehension that not everyone is you and thereby won't make the same choices you will or enjoy the same things that you do makes you more of an idiot than a sadistic misanthrope; you're only sadistic because you have to pose like as if your choice of inaction is somehow worthy of applause.

How it causes poverty: people who do drugs can lose jobs or opportunity for jobs due to drug testing (rather than judging a person on their actual in-job performance and behavior) and people can also opportunities for jobs because they went to jail because they got busted for possession. Not to mention if you go to jail, you're losing your job. In addition, you also have to pay your court fees, lawyer fees (if any), bail, and other various fees you may incur. This is how legal standing directly impacts one's ability to generate an income for themselves and how one can lose a significant portion of whatever money they may have previously had. There's also other ways which I'll blend into those other spots.

Police state. I didn't mean a literal police state (though some anarchists would argue we do live in one). What I mean was the illusion created by the cops constantly hovering around such areas like vultures waiting for a fresh corpse. This not only leads to stress but can also lead to more loss of money for others in the area due to the minor infractions that cost a couple hundred dollars every time they get popped for it. This also leads to the feedback loop of cops being impressed that a certain area is a bad area so they will tend to look for and find more crimes and not be as dismissive as in other areas. More money gone, illusion of a police state for those living in those areas, and a general bad feeling all around.

Druggies get to rehab: See my thread on Portugal and the effects of their decriminalization and the results of use dropping and rehab attending going up.

And it wasn't just that one post. You'd previously made a pretty generalized, asinine statement about drugs, users, and in a perfect world no one would do drugs (not a perfect world to anyone who likes the arts).

Can attest to that. I know people who grew/grow in CA and the decriminalization of weed there has basically made it too cheap and discouraged some of them from continuing.

So are you discounting people who work in areas that deal heavily with drugs and drug use/abuse as ignorant? Picking some at random, certain levels of law enforcement, counsellors, medical staff at various levels, or even those who deal in "drugs" such as publicans, shop-owners, barstaff? It seems likely that an emergency room nurse who deals weekly with an intake of undernourished smackheads with no teeth would probably be in a reasonable position of knowledge as far as drug abuse goes, and thus support some form of prohibition? Likewise, a lot of people who work in the industry of drug/alchohol awareness and counselling are ex-users themselves. Would you consider them ignorant as well?

And my years experiences as a game tester makes me qualified to code games.

It is the case in my experience that everybody who supports drug prohibition falls into one of those three categories. It's possible that that there are people who don't. If I thought that wasn't possible, I wouldn't have bothered making this thread.

I know somebody who's in favour of drug prohibition and who deals with drug users (she does something in a hospital - I forget what). Since she justifies drug prohibition on the basis that drugs are harmful, she's ignorant, despite the fact that she's around drugs a lot. I don't think that experience of drugs means you know what you're talking about with regard to whether they should be illegal.

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Only those that are shot know that it f*****g hurts?

So by your standard ONLY those who use drugs could possibly have any idea of their effects or capabilities? Its impossible to observe?

So even though she has first-hand experience of the materials in question, you simply cast her opinion aside as "ignorant"?

What would she have to do/experience/learn where you would consider her opinion to NOT be ignorant? (Regardless of what her opinion actually was.)