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Old 08-08-2014, 07:08 AM   #1
Mercutio
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Lilligant Drugs - What Should The Law Be?

So, it is reported that Nick Clegg has announced a new Liberal Democrat policy to abolish all custodial sentences for possession of drugs. The argument is that people who go to prison for drug possession come out as hardened criminals who are now using much more dangerous drugs as a bonus. Rehabilitation is the watch word here.

Thoughts?

More generally, what should governments be doing when it comes to drug policy? Where should the line between punishment and rehabilitation fall? Should drugs be heavily illegal, decriminalised entirely, strictly regulated, sold in corner shops?
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Old 08-08-2014, 07:21 AM   #2
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The argument in favour is criminalisation boils down to "for their own good", but society has a very inconsistent approach to addiction in general. Addicted to nicotine, gambling, etc? Treatment it is. Addicted to coke? Toss you in prison. S'counter productive.

By all means keep the regulation/illegalisation of sale and intent to sell, whilst decriminalising possession/use and encouraging a more treatment based approach to that side of it.
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Old 08-08-2014, 07:35 AM   #3
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I think there's more than enough evidence that some drugs like marijuana are safe enough that sale of them should not be illegal. This logic may be pushed forward into certain hallucinogens like LSD. Not much else, though.

I wrote a minor project on that exact problem with throwing people into jail cells for possession so well...yeah, I support this. I think it's ludicrous for it to be illegal to do something to your own body.
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Old 08-08-2014, 07:49 AM   #4
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Well ok, we can go down that route.

Suppose that it were made possible to give everyone Wolverine Claws. Fully retractable, a foot long, strong and sharp. The procedure was safe and affordable. Should it be legal? We're talking concealed weaponry, but you're doing it to your own body, so should it be legal?

Clearly, that hypothetical has an element of harming others to it, which one might argue the legality of LSD or Coke does not. So, suppose that a drug were invented that gave you great feelings of pleasure, confidence and satisfaction, but it also caused you to experience a loss of motor function with extended use eventually resulting in you being unable to walk or feed yourself etc. It was also wildly addictive. Should that be legal?
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Old 08-08-2014, 07:57 AM   #5
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Honestly I lean more to the side of "Illegal to shoot someone, not to own a gun" just for the record, though obviously those Wolverine claws should be mostly illegal. Anyway, why shouldn't that drug be legal? You just described alcohol on steroids, basically. With side effects like that, very few people are going to actually take that drug.
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Old 08-08-2014, 07:58 AM   #6
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I don't think substances like cocaine or heroin should really be available for consumption. They do some serious damage to your body and to have a massive population of recreational users would be pretty awful. But apparently this makes me a massive hardliner to some people because I won't let you have your precious drugs, like omg let me have my slow fun suicide.

I am of the opinion that anything the US does to protect the health of its citizens is a step in the right direction. If that means legalizing it and de-stigmatizing it in order to give addicts more comprehensive treatment, then that's fine. If it means providing free treatment centers to rehabilitate addicts in lieu of a jail sentence, that is even better. The current system may not be enough, but it's a whole hell of a lot better than ignoring the problem altogether.
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:01 AM   #7
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Should we ban rock climbing too? Rock climbing injuries are pretty bad, could definitely hurt your body. What about tobacco? That does a shitton of damage to your body, too. Alcohol's a bit more dangerous than you'd expect, too. Let's ban being overweight- obviously it's a danger to your health with no positive effects. (It's not a slippery slope- it has the exact same reasoning.)

That's the problem with banning cocaine and heroin- that there are a lot of other things that are dangerous to your health, too.
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:07 AM   #8
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If you like. But then what of the cost of fixing you up (or incarcerating you)? The state, private companies, your community, whatever it is that actually provides it there are going to be resources spent on you because you blitzed your liver on cheap whiskey or gave yourself HIV by being careless on heroin. Or, for that matter, for being careless having fully legal and consensual sex. A libertarian argument for anything is almost always total horseshit because it forgets that there are consequences to one's actions, choices and/or freedoms.

So we have the cost of these policies, be it legalisation or care or punishment. Where does that fit in?
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:12 AM   #9
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First of all, rock climbing is an all or nothing injury activity. You either make it to the top (99% of the time) or you fall (.001% of the time). Everyone who rock climbs knows what they are doing. Rock Climbing has a higher appearance of risk than it actually has.

Alcohol is correlated with increased cancer risk and does major damage to several of the soft tissues in your body. It can also inhibit the growth of the frontal lobe as it develops well into your 20s. And yet it's still around...why? Because it's a major part of American culture. Cocaine...is not.

The public was already educated on the dangers of smoking. The only reason it's still around is because it's 1.) addictive and 2.) there's a major tobacco industry on the East Coast. You can't really say that for meth.

Also "being overweight" is not as simple as you describe. How would you enforce that? Everyone who's above a certain weight gets the axe? What about bodybuilders and powerlifters who bulk but do not cut and thus have the appearance of fat despite being some of the most physically healthy people on the planet? What about differences in height? What does "overweight" mean?

Basically your argument is "BUT WE LET PEOPLE HURT THEMSELVES ALL THE TIME" and that's really not what we should be aiming for, to give people new ways of legally hurting themselves...

>libertarian argument

It's always nice to work through some action or other with a libertarian and watch them struggle not to recreate the current US legal code.
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:14 AM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mercutio View Post
So, it is reported that Nick Clegg has announced a new Liberal Democrat policy to abolish all custodial sentences for possession of drugs. The argument is that people who go to prison for drug possession come out as hardened criminals who are now using much more dangerous drugs as a bonus. Rehabilitation is the watch word here.

Thoughts?
Weighing in as the local criminologist. Clegg's got the right idea in my opinion, as this is what pretty much all of the empirical evidence suggests to us. Short term prison sentences are not only highly expensive to the taxpayer, but offer no real reward. Furthermore, given the state of drugs in prisons at the moment, sending someone to prison for possession is slightly hilarious.

Why yes, this argument is somewhat unnuanced and not backed up or thought through because I'm heading to a wedding shortly.
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:14 AM   #11
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I always try not to fall in to the trap of getting labelled as a particular kind of ideology or political philosophy but if you could sum it up in one phrase it would be "anti-libertarian". Clearly this involves me labelling others which makes me a huge hypocrite but I'm ok with that because it's a free country, man!

EDIT: No need for me to insult people.

Last edited by Mercutio; 08-08-2014 at 10:15 AM.
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:20 AM   #12
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Like Rangeet says, this:
Quote:
Suppose that a drug were invented that gave you great feelings of pleasure, confidence and satisfaction, but it also caused you to experience a loss of motor function with extended use eventually resulting in you being unable to walk or feed yourself etc. It was also wildly addictive.
pretty much describes alcohol. Take out the "wildly" and it is alcohol. Cerebellar degeneration. Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome. Alcohol is not a joke. Our culture likes to scoff at teetotalers and celebrate alcohol consumption, but the truth of the matter is that chronic alcohol consumption is tied to irreversible brain damage. So why do we allow people to consume alcohol, placing at risk themselves in the long term and others in the short term, but we don't allow them to consume marijuana et al? It's an odd double standard.

As for the topic at hand, I'm not confident in my answer. I personally feel that legalizing drugs sends society the wrong message -- that they are perfectly fine to use -- but I also feel that it's true about prisons transforming light criminals into hardened criminals. So on the one hand, I don't think drug users should be sent to jail since it will likely only make them even worse adjusted to be productive members of society; and on the other hand I feel like the scare of jail is a good deterrent for many who might otherwise experiment.
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:30 AM   #13
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I'm not a libertarian. I 100% believe in the government being involved in healthcare, for instance. But what I don't believe in is them controlling basic freedom like the ability to ingest some substances even if they have harmful effects. What about fast food, for heaven's sake? Anything containing fat is also something that's very harmful to the body resulting in more healthcare costs.

Heroin and cocaine are not much different from alcohol in those who use them. (I'd like to take a moment to say that taking cocaine with alcohol is something that is very dangerous for your liver, because it seemed relevant and someone reading this will almost certainly try cocaine sometime in their lives.) Banning alcohol didn't work out, banning cocaine and heroin won't work out either.

Now, as to why banning the selling is useless: Because as long as there is demand, there will be supply. Drug dealers are quite often people from the streets who have very little opportunity of any other job; the people high up the chain will never be arrested. So at the end of the day, they WILL be there, and they'll keep getting arrested and replaced. It won't change anything and it makes little sense. It also highly encourages cartels because there's no legal competition.

So even shoving aside moral issues, banning the selling is quite useless. In any case, addicts who don't get what they want for cheap move on to things like krokodil(and be warned if you google image this because it's very gorey) which result in even more horrible things to the body than cocaine or heroin ever would.

And the most important thing is educate your people properly about drugs. DARE was a complete fiasco, it's the equivalent of abstinence-only sex education. Tell them the good parts(and don't deny there are any), tell them the bad parts, tell them that rehab centers are always open(because they should be) and they're not going to jail if they try to get help(because they shouldn't.) That is the best way of reducing the number of drug addicts.
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Old 08-08-2014, 09:02 AM   #14
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There's a difference between legalization and decriminalization.
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Old 08-08-2014, 09:07 AM   #15
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I don't think decriminalisation will help as much, but it's a step. It really ends up being a lose-lose for everyone involved, though, since drugs still have to be smuggled in, drug dealers still get fined and face minor charges, and the government gets no taxes. It makes little sense, in my opinion.
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Old 08-08-2014, 09:32 AM   #16
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There's a difference between legalization and decriminalization.
Sorry. Given what the terms are taken to mean, I guess I would say that I lean towards decriminalization but I lean away from legalization. I like the idea that the use of drugs is still "wrong" and "punishable" in some sense but I also like that their use isn't attached to a criminal record, jail time, etc.

The thing is, I'm still not confident in my answer. Because when you decriminalize without legalizing, you still force people to partake in these activities secretly. And forcing people to do things in secret tends to come with a lot of the trappings of underworld dangers. (This is one of the topics that comes up in abortion debates -- the whole "clothes hanger in a back alley" argument.) So like ... I kind of feel like decriminalization is (in a sense) pointless? ^^; That it's nothing more than a stepping stone towards or away from legalization. For example, I don't think most gay rights activists would be satisfied with the decriminalization of homosexual acts. I don't think proponents of breastfeeding in public would be happy to be told, "What you're doing isn't criminal, but it's still against the law. Here's your $50 fine." It feels like doublethink, to be told "not criminal yet against the law." It's like saying "not a crime yet a crime." People don't like that. And so, back to the drug debate, I feel like if we decriminalize recreational drug use, it's a double-edged sword. It's meant to help addicts and their communities out alike, but I worry that it inevitably leads to full-blown legalization -- which in turn gives people the wrong impression about drugs. "It's legal, therefore it's okay! Shut up, you prude! " You already see that mentality with alcohol. ("Prohibition died, baby! Long live alcohol!") People, deferring to the perception of the law as a reflection of the nanny state's efforts at keeping her citizens safe, cite the legality of alcohol as proof that "it's okay to drink, so long as I do it in moderation. ¯_¯" So I worry if we'll end up seeing similar arguments with legalized methamphetamine, legalized cocaine, etc. "It's okay if I do it, so long as I do it responsibly. ¯_¯" The problem is that you're probably not going to be doing it responsibly. Because these drugs are simply that addictive.

So I dunno. I don't want people to go to jail and have their lives ruined beyond all hope of salvation ... but I also worry that decriminalization leads to legalization leads to irresponsible partaking of the toxic-but-legal substance. Is it irrational to worry that decriminalization will result in an increase in drug use? Is it further irrational to worry that an increase in drug use will result in an increase in impaired operation of motor vehicles, resulting in an increase of motor vehicular fatalities? Drunk driving and driving while texting are already bad enough. I don't want our country to add driving while high to the pile. But I also don't want to be guilty of worrying about a fictitious bogeyman. I really don't know. :\ I don't even know how much we can appeal to the rationale that "What worked for Country A will surely work for America." I'm sure there's a country out there who has massively harsh penalties for drug use (Singapore, maybe?) and that country is doing a-okay. And I'm sure there's another country out there that is way laid back with drug use (the Netherlands, maybe?) and they're a-okay. But the United States is neither Singapore nor the Netherlands. I don't know if we can really find out what will work best for us without taking the plunge and learning by trial and error. We've tried one tactic in the 1980s, '90s, and 2000s. If the public is willing and the lawmakers eager, I guess we could try out the other approach for the next ten to twenty years and see how it does.

Though that's an American concern. The thread began with the UK in mind. So, apologies for the American thread-hijacking there. There's one benefit the United States enjoys which I don't know that the UK quite enjoys as much: and that's the marked division between state and federal legislation. I'm sure England has county vs. national laws as well, but at least in America, we can more readily experiment with the law in ways that don't put all of our eggs in the same basket. See: Washington state and Colorado legalizing marijuana while the rest of the nation watches. If it backfires, it backfires for only two out of fifty states. If it succeeds, the others can quickly follow suit. As far as I know, British laws of this scope tend to be handled by London. You don't have Yorkshire doing one thing and Sussex doing another and Greater Manchester doing a third. Maybe for traffic laws or zoning laws, you do, but not for recreational drug use, prostitution, or possession of weapons. If you do and I'm mistaken, then what I'd say is that this is great and it would probably be best if the London area (or some other eager guinea pig region) were to try out the decriminalization first and to see how it worked out for them. But if you do not and I'm right, then yeah, this is the kind of shit situation the UK is in: you have to take a leap of faith and see if the plan works well for the people of the British Isles or whether it turns out to be a disaster.
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Old 08-08-2014, 10:17 AM   #17
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American hijacking is fine, if I wanted British concerns only I'd have used the Brit thread
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Old 08-08-2014, 05:14 PM   #18
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What exactly is wrong with legalization? Sure, the fact that possession of hardcore drugs is a crime drives some people away but I was under the impression that the reason most people don't take those kinds of drugs is that they do the most harm per unit consumed so to speak, not the fear of getting caught with them.
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Old 08-08-2014, 08:51 PM   #19
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Not every problem exists in a vacuum. It could be (and is) that funding education would solve the problem, but that's not going to happen until maybe 20 years into the future when the kids finish school with the new funding. What do we do in the meantime?
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Old 08-08-2014, 09:10 PM   #20
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To throw in my 2cents, I'm pretty much completely for legalization. Pulling the profits away from the criminal sector means those profits can be used for other things, like education or road building or soup programs or whatever. The flip side is that people can use them freely. Which really doesn't matter too much to me. If you're using something which is somehow 100% safe? Sure, go ahead, have fun. Using something that's 0% safe? Sure, go ahead, hopefully it's worth dying for.
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Old 08-08-2014, 09:38 PM   #21
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The thing is, drug addicts don't exist in a vacuum. [/expressions shuckle just used] A heroin addict affects the lives of his cohabitants, his neighbors, his employer(s), his coworkers, his servicemen, and even his community at large. What happens when this man, desperate for a fix, commits some other crime to scrounge up money for more drugs? What happens when he gets behind the wheel while intoxicated and crashes into someone else, killing them? If getting high simply meant baking your brain until you run out of cash and then you go back to your normal life, it would be one thing. But the reality is completely different. Hard substance abuse often consumes a person's life. And it often impacts the lives of those around them.
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Old 08-08-2014, 09:45 PM   #22
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Then they're guilty of that crime which they actually committed.
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Old 08-08-2014, 09:52 PM   #23
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Right, but that's the same as with alcohol now. It's besides the point I'm making. My point is that legalization is not something which you can just say, "It's a good thing because it means that everyone can do as they please while harming no one else." You have to assess whether legalization has a measurable impact on the incidence of drug-related crimes. If it does not (e.g. in 2014 there were five motor vehicular accidents involving cocaine whereas in 2015, with the new rules in place, there were six or seven motor vehicular accidents involving cocaine), then okay. But if it does (e.g. in 2014 we saw five such accidents but in 2015 we saw fifty-seven), then I would say that illegalization as a deterrent is validated and that it should probably be employed to minimize the fatalities and injuries suffered by a community. ("Probably," I say, only because a society may have to put a price on lives at some point. Like, if it costs $5 trillion to save those fifty-two lives a year, it simply may not be worth it to the community vs. if it only costs $50,000 to save them.)
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Old 08-09-2014, 03:05 PM   #24
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The people who are going to take a substance like that and then drive are the same kinds of people who are going to do that whether or not the drugs are legalised. If they're going to shoot up heroin and then drive, they're probably not going to have many qualms about toking up and driving or drinking and driving, either. I doubt it will cause any noticeable DWI increase statistically.

Now me, I'm all for legalisation, or, at the very least, decriminalisation. You start regulating the product, make it subject to real standards, and you'll see cartels having real competition, tax revenues, and quality control standards, so the substances are ultimately safer. Just make it subject to the same kinds of laws as alcohol. Talk about it in health classes, not just preaching the horrors of it. We've seen that kind of thing with abstinence-only sex education, and it doesn't work. Talk about some of the pros and cons, say it's really best if you don't do these things, but we know some of you will anyway, so at least keep these safety concerns in mind, etc.
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