legalize all drugs - free money and freedom

Actually there weren't more addicts. The percentage of people using narcotics has fundamentally been about 8% historically regardless of whether the drugs were illegal or not. Today the greatest problem with drug abuse actually relates to prescription drugs and not prohibited drugs.

 

We found out that practice only makes privateers prefect, with Prohibition.

 

Who the (*)(*)(*)(*) do you think you are? By what divine providence do you possess the authority to tell free people that they cannot drink? FREEDOM. It's a difficult concept, I know, do try to keep up.

 

I don't care if people harm their own health by drinking, I'm just concerned about them harming other people that are around them.

 

Banning the consumption of alcohol is not an option. It's been tried, and was a dismal failure. So is the so-called "War on Drugs". See, here's the thing. Humans WANT mind altering substances. Not everyone, but a substantial portion. This is what is referred to as "demand". Where there is demand, there WILL be "supply", whether provided by legitimate business, or by criminal enterprises. You cannot legislate "demand" away. It simply exists because it exists, and you can't change that. Fercrisssake, we can't even keep drugs and alcohol out of PRISONS!! It's literally IMPOSSIBLE to keep them away from free people, and continuing to try is CAUSING more problems than it would cure, even if it had a chance of winning.

 

So what? Should all crimes be legalized, just because people are going to do them regardless of their legal status? Should stealing, murder, fraud, and everything else, be legalized, just because we're not going to stop those crimes from happening 100%? Of course not! Keeping something illegal is mainly just intended to reduce the instances of some crimes happening.

 

See, the thing is stealing, murder, and fraud have something in common that drinking and using drugs does not have. That is a victim. Now, it may be true that some drugs are unhealthy for the person taking them, up to and including the potential of death, either acute or chronic. But, since we own our own bodies, we have the right to damage them if we choose to.

 

Actually, stealing, murder, and fraud does have one very big thing in common with alcohol and other substances, and here's what this is.

Alcohol and other mind-altering substances causes car accidents, murders, rapes, domestic violence, which all involves VICTIMS.

 

Then punish the actual crime. Lots of people use mind altering substances without committing crimes. In fact, I'm going to smoke a bowl in just a little while, but don't fear, I won't be committing any violent crimes as a result.

You are a control freak who does not comprehend what freedom means. You need to be reeducated.

 

"Of liberty I would say that, in the whole plenitude of its extent, it is unobstructed action according to our will. But rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add “within the limits of the law,” because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual. "

-Thomas Jefferson

 

Since the usage of mind altering substances means that some people may use them and commit violent crimes on them, why not ban these substances? The fact that some people use these substances responsibility does not minimize the harms that happens as a result of violent drunks or violent people that are high. I don't care if people harm themselves with drugs. I care about those innocent people that die from drunk drivers and stoned drivers.

 

Maybe we should use that same argument with the religious since the abomination of hypocrisy is worse than Any drug addiction known to Man.

 

Because we don't tell Person-A that he can't do something because Person-B was irresponsible. Freedom, man. Get with the program.

 

I stop taking Nanny-Statists seriously if they can't justify Nanny-State tax rates.

 

Why would doing harder drugs get somebody interested in smoking marijuana, but smoking marijuana doesn't get somebody interested in doing harder drugs?

One of your analogies makes a lot of sense to me. For the vast majority of people, listening to rock music doesn't get them interested in listening to other totally separate forms of music, such as classical music. You compared smoking marijuana to listening to rock music, and doing harder drugs to listening to classical music. However, listening to classic music doesn't get people interested in listening to rock music. So why does doing harder drugs get people interested in smoking pot?

 

Driving:
Driving under the influence of any substance that adversely effects driving performance is already illegal. Sometimes I wish the police would enforce that related to screaming children in the back seat because I've seen more than one woman driving down the street dealing with an unruly child in the back seat and not paying any attention to her driving. How many people are aware of the fact that on the Autobahn in Germany a driver can't even drink a cup of coffee and they'd lose their license if caught on a cell phone. Anyway, driving under the influence is already prohibited.

Murders, Rapes, Domestic Violence
There really isn't the establishment of a "cause and effect" relationship between illegal drug use and these crimes against persons. Anti-drug groups use "correlation" and not "cause and effect" in their statistical analysis. Correlation does not establish "cause" and the linkage really doesn't exist. If "correlation" established "cause" then we must accept the Pastafarian proposition that the decline in the number of pirates is the cause behind global warming and other natural disasters today.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster#Pirates_and_global_warming

Arrrrrrrrrrr

Of course all of these acts are also against the law so whether drugs are legal or illegal these acts are still against the law.

 

Marijuana is more accessible than harder drugs so its more likely that someone would try marijuana first but that isn't always the case. There are those that start with "harder drugs" like cocaine or meth and then take up smoking marijuana to "take the edge" of the effects of "speed" inherent in these drugs and sometimes end up by stopping the use of the harder drugs altogether becoming quite satisfied with marijuana alone.

I haven't read an actual study but I would hazard to guess that many longtime drug users previously used harder drugs but today only smoke marijuana. If we're going to "measure" going one direction isn't it logical to "measure" going the opposite direction? How many former hard drug users only smoke marijuana today?

BTW many major rock musicians, like John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin, were classical musicians and then took up rock music. The street goes both ways.

 

I'm confused what your opinion is now. You seem to have changed it somewhat. By comparing drugs with music, you said that for John Paul Jones, there was a cause and effect relationship between him listening to classical music, and then him moving onto rock music. Doesn't this also mean that there may be a cause and effect relationship between smoking pot (rock music) and doing harder drugs (which is classical music.)?

The AMA's statistics about harder drug usage states that people that are addicted to harder drugs either have emotional problems, are habitual criminals, were once alcohol drinkers, or they are daring people that want to experiment with taboo things. Your argument states that smoking pot does not cause people to develop those psychological factors. However, I disagree with that statement. In fact, I believe that the AMA's statistics which you had quoted earlier in this thread, may support the gateway theory.

And I would also argue that those psychological factors definitley do predispose, but they aren't the sole cause of, harder drug usage and addictions. One of the factors that the AMA had stated was the desire to experiment with things which violate social customs.

Some people smoke pot because they have the psychological factors to experiment with taboo things, and smoking pot is somewhat taboo. Smoking marijuana may "amplify" those predisposed psychological factors in that individual which makes them want to experiment more with taboo things, which some people find to be exciting.

But yes, some statistics have shown that many harder drug users don't even start off smoking pot, but some of them do. I'm not sure if most harder drug users started out with marijuana, or not. However, some government statistics have shown that the vast majority of marijuana smokers don't even move onto harder drugs. Less than 1% of pot smokers move onto harder drugs. This is because of one or more of these reasons.

1-They're satisfied with just marijuana, and they don't feel the need to do anything else.
2-They know the dangers of harder drugs, and they chose not to do them.
3-Since other statistics have shown the vast majority of people that try out marijuana do not even become habitual users, most marijuana smokers may simply not have the personality to experiment with substances in general.

 

You're quite right in thinking that the Statist is, of necessity, a bigoted, racist, anti-liberty schmuck.

 

What?! I thought we were friends!!!

You see, I don't think it is morally acceptable to punish someone based on what he might do. That's what source-preventive crimes are - punishing certain acts that may, for some, cause an individual to POSSIBLY commit a crime.

You know what else might cause someone to POSSIBLY commit a crime? Being a black man in the inner city. Inner city black men are far more likely (by %) than any other group to engage in violent criminal behavior; therefore, we should imprison all black men since they might commit a crime.
Same reasoning.
Dangerous reasoning.

 

Well, that kind of sums up my view of each. You just mentioned the 2 most significant similarities between them, so I'm not really sure what else would apply there.

 

Some studies have also shown that drugged driving-and I'm not talking about people driving while drunk or stoned on pot, but I'm talking about people driving under the influence of any substances, including harder drugs. Drugged driving has already caused thousands of deaths, and these numbers will most likely skyrocket if all substances become legalized. This is why all drugs should not become legalized.

 

Decriminalization doesn't seem to have that effect for Portugal.

 

Yes, but that's decriminalization. Decriminalization does not make drug usage less taboo or more available, unlike full-blown legalization.

 

Well, maybe we can at least agree that pot should be decriminalized nationally.