I didn't see this one coming - Page 3

xTYBALTx · 05-03-2006, 02:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RandomGuy

To me it is clear that the costs of the prohibition of herion and crystal meth are less than the cost to society if we did not fight these battles.

A common opinion. Which is why Mexico's experiment with decriminalization is so interesting to me.

In related news:

Quote:

Originally Posted by AP

Moreover, 2005 estimates show that, for the first time in a decade, coca production is on the rise in all three coca-producing, Andean nations — Colombia, Bolivia and Peru.

In Colombia, President Alvaro Uribe's two main challengers in this month's elections have used the report's findings to reopen a debate over decriminalization of drug use.

In a Sunday editorial, the generally pro-government newspaper, El Tiempo, called the war on drugs "un fracaso," a failure.

ScratchMonkey · 05-03-2006, 01:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Grunt 70

Despite the logic of your argument I'm stuck on the emotion of the issue. Perhaps that's my own shortcoming. But I can't get over the visceral memory I have of Joanne sobbing inconsolably the day she found out her son was abusing heroin. She bacame a wreck of a human being- and is only now coming out of it several years later.

And that's why people like Sarah Brady want to ban guns. It's the personal experience.

I somehow evaded it. My father died from alcohol and tobacco when I was a teen, but I never felt it was the drug's fault. It was his own doing. Criminalizing the drugs could only make the problem worse.

Yes, I'm for legalization. If I truly own my own body, I should be permitted to put anything into it. And I should be fully responsible for my actions while under the influence. I don't need a nanny state to look after me. I want to live as an adult, with full liberty and full responsibility.

**RandomGuy** · 05-03-2006, 02:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ScratchMonkey

If I truly own my own body, I should be permitted to put anything into it. And I should be fully responsible for my actions while under the influence. I don't need a nanny state to look after me. I want to live as an adult, with full liberty and full responsibility.

Is it ever ok for someone to choose to become a heroin addict? Is it ever ok to take that path that ultimately hurts oneself, everyone around and society as a whole?

I say no and so why then should we grant the liberty to make the wrong choice? Liberty for liberty's sake?

**CingularDuality** · 05-03-2006, 02:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Addict

Seems to me, there is a certain amount of realism and acceptance even in law enforcement for the problem.

I wouldn't call it acceptance so much as I'd label it resignation. Police have a limited amount of resources, so while they'll respond to a call about a drunk/high bum harassing people in front of a restaurant, they're going to ignore the call about a bum that's harassing other bums down on skid row. It's a simple prioritization of resources.

That said, within the LE community, most cops won't advocate the legalization of drugs. But I don't think that it's because the majority don't want to see that happen, though. It's because the subject is taboo. When your job is to arrest drug dealers and drug users, it's sometimes viewed as hypocritical to then claim that you think that the laws should change, even though that certainly isn't the case.

If you pull a cop aside and ask him privately, I think you'll find the majority would support legalization of pot. Ask him in front of his coworkers and you'll find that he'll say he thinks the laws need to be even stricter.

There's a strong occupational culture in that field, for obvious reasons. That culture is strong and slow to change, but it will eventually.

**CingularDuality** · 05-03-2006, 02:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RandomGuy

Is it ever ok for someone to choose to become a heroin addict? Is it ever ok to take that path that ultimately hurts oneself, everyone around and society as a whole?

I say no and so why then should we grant the liberty to make the wrong choice? Liberty for liberty's sake?

There's a difference between doing something to oneself, and doing something that hurts society. Once it starts affecting people other than yourself, it's no longer your right to do it.

icky · 05-03-2006, 05:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ScratchMonkey

Don't tax too much. When Canada raised cigarette taxes too high, organized crime exploded to support smuggling untaxed cigs.

This is not quite true. When cigarette taxes were raised, smokers employed every method they could imagine to fight the increase. This included smokers in the media, law enforcement, and in all walks of life. The result was sensational reports on all of the cigarette smuggling that was happening. They talked endlessly about these smuggling gangs as if they sprang into action the day the taxes increased.

Yes, the natives smuggling cigarettes across the border probably had an increase in business, but there is no way it was as dramatic as it was made out to be.

Giving in and lowering those taxes was the dumbest move I've ever seen the government of Canada make. If they were concerned with the increase in criminal activity, they should have poured cigarette tax money into better border security. If they can get truckloads of cigarettes across the border, then there is obviously a bigger problem.

Buck Fush · 05-03-2006, 09:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Grunt 70

I respectfully disagree with your assessment.

Here in SE Massachusetts we are living in crisis of heroin and opiates abuse. Heroin is 3 times more pure than it was in the seventies and the stigma that went along with it then is long gone. Young people are dying by the score in MA due to herion and opiate overdoses.

Sure people kill themselves by drinking too but its just different.

How do I know this?--

My friend Joanne has been living the worst nightmare any parent could imagine. Her son was given some oxycontin at a party the summer after he graduated high school. He liked it. He liked it so much he wanted to do it again. then again and again and again. He graduated to heroin because he could get high for 10 bucks a day instead of the $300-$400 a day OC costs.

This boy came from a two parent, happily married family, he was a track and football star in highschool. He made the honor roll every quarter and also joined the MA National Guard. He did so well at boot camp he was invited to OCS. He had a gorgeous girlfiend and He was enrolled in college for he fall...he had everything good in his life that you could want.

His life became everything bad you've ever heard about heroin addicts. He stole from everyone he knew to get high and everything in life that was worth something he destoyed. For two years his mother battled with the state to get him in treatment programs, only to see him relapse worse and worse each time. The state remanded him to custody for one last try at rehab. That was 14 months ago. He's had to move away from everything he ever knew and start his life over again from scratch. Because of his drug convictions while using he is eliminated from all kinds of support for school or otherwise. He'll never be able to rejoin the military.

Sure--there are a million stories of alcholoism out there that would rival this story. But Heroin and OC arne't in the same league as alchohol.

My friend started a support group that has now gone nation wide. You can see it at www.learn2cope.org.

She speaks at high shools and other locations around the commonwealth. You can go to her website and then on to the Yahoo forum she started I'm so proud of her--and her son--he just celebrated his 14th month of sobriety.

Ok......sorry to rant but I felt I had to add my .02

So what kind of problems do you think we might have if we were to make alcohol cost $300/day for the alocoholic? All of the problems you listed were caused by the black market in the drug. He didn't get high and go kill someone for no reason, he stole from people to pay the prices of the black market drug.

The story you've told is the exact reason why ALL drugs should be legalized. Your friend's son started doing drugs because something was missing from his life. The drug is already illegal and yet he still did it. Obviously making drugs illegal will not prevent people from doing them. Also, if we could put the ~ $50 billion that is spent on the WOD every year into rehab programs, maybe the state could spend more time working with people like your friend's son.

You can disagree with me if you want, but science agrees with me that nicotine is more physically addictive than heroin. However, you don't see people ruining their lives or anyone else's in their pursuit of nicotine because nicotine is easily available.

We need to remove the stigma of drug use so that addicts can feel comfortable coming forward for help. Right now, an addict risks loosing their job or even jail time if they admit their addiction. Neither Alcoholics Anonymous nor Narcotics Anonymous keep membeship records, so it's hard to determine the exact number of members for each, but in 2005 NA reports having 33,500 groups worldwide. AA reported 105,294. Do you think there are just 3 times more alcoholics in the world, or do you think alcoholics just feel more comfortable seeking help for their addiction? If an acoholic admits his addiction but fails to complete the rehab, he merely remains an alcoholic. At least with my company, if you admit you're a drug addict before they find out on their own, they will allow you to keep your job as long as you're in some sort of treatment program, but if you relapse and start using again, they will fire you whether your drug use has any affect on your work performance or not. An alcoholic on the other hand would receive the support of his co-workers and if he fell off the wagon he'd probably just gain a few drinking buddies, as long as his work life wasn't affected by his addiction. People WILL seek help for their addictions, we just need to be there when they do.

We need to remove the high costs of drug use. High costs do not deter addicts from drug use. High drug costs cause addicts to rob and steal to pay for their addiction. Which makes THEIR problem MY problem. I could really care less if some idiot ODs in his own house.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arf

It wouldn't remove the prime income for organized crime. It could actually give them the opportunity to make more money. The problem with taxing drugs is that we already have a black market system in place. Addicts would simply buy the cheaper smuggled kind. Even if it wasn't taxed organized crime would still sell the drugs but now their funding would be legitimate.

Regardless of the price you're always going to run into the same problems around these drugs. You'd get fired from most jobs for being a drunk; employers are not going to hire heroin addicts. You're not going to be able buy Cocaine at Wal Mart because people don't like to be around crack-heads. The end result is that you still end up with people unable to afford their addiction.

A legitimate market would open and it would swallow the huge profits being realized by organized crime today. Do you really think (un)organized crime can compete with R.J. Reynolds? They can't.

There would be as much black market trade in legal drugs as there is in cigarettes today, which is minimal and mostly dealing in fake tax stamps. No where near the revenue stream that black market drugs produce today.

Of course Wal-Mart won't sell it, but tobacco stores will.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Grunt 70

The conclusion I draw from your post is that heroin should be decriminalized and that the public should be educated on how to use the drug safely--Please confirm.

You know -- on the one hand this makes sense. With more education given to users of the drug less people would die that is for sure.

Despite the logic of your argument I'm stuck on the emotion of the issue. Perhaps that's my own shortcoming. But I can't get over the visceral memory I have of Joanne sobbing inconsolably the day she found out her son was abusing heroin. She bacame a wreck of a human being- and is only now coming out of it several years later.

Just how many lives would be lost if heroin use is decriminalized? Is it more than the lives of the current addicts that would be saved? Surely with decriminilazation will come an even greater acceptance and willingness to use this insipid drug. I'm not sure any of us here can answer this question definitively--but I only hope and pray that my 13 year old son and my 3 year old daughter don't ever live in a world where heroin use is passe.

Heroin is one of the few drugs I never tried. I had the oportunity to several times, however I chose not to. Because it was illegal? No. Simply because I had seen what people look like on it and it didn't appeal to me. Even if they make it legal, I would still feel the same way. I don't think that legalizing a drug removes a person's choice or common sense.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RandomGuy

To me it is clear that the costs of the prohibition of herion and crystal meth are less than the cost to society if we did not fight these battles. With vodka or pot most people would agree that it's the opposite.

As long as children have parents who want the best for their children, heroin will be forbidden and risque. I don't think that whether or not it is sexy or stylish has much to do with it's legal status.

I agree to a point. However, I believe we can fight them much more efficiently with rehab than with prison.

xTYBALTx · 05-04-2006, 07:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by International Herald Tribune

After intense pressure from the United States, President Vicente Fox has asked Mexico's Congress to reconsider a law it passed last week that would decriminalize the possession of small amounts of drugs as part of a larger effort to crack down on street-level dealing.

In a statement late Wednesday, Fox said the law should be changed "to make it absolutely clear that in our country the possession of drugs and their consumption are and continue to be crimes."

Oh well.

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