Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[TamerVirus]

Bricks of cocaine. But for building.

[Teneb]

Bricks of cocaine. But for building.

"Sir, Fort Cocaine is under attack by addicts!"

[Frumple]

snip

Nah, re: 3, decriminalize most every recreational drug less dangerous than alcohol or tobacco (or whatever other legal recreational drug you can rustle up, I guess), or criminalize alcohol and tobacco, is a fairly common position, at the absolute least for rhetorical usage.

... mostly 'cause it's blatant hypocrisy to criminalize things less dangerous than something we consider legal, or refuse to make illegal things that are, often enough significantly, more dangerous than things we classify as illegal, unless you're trying to make some kind of argument outside the harm factors involved*. Makes no gorram sense for weed that's bloody close to harmless on an interpersonal level to be illegal and mere possession and use able to net you decades behind bars when you can buy goddamn alcohol that's competitive with non-suicide firearm deaths just on the roads at the corner store.

Anyway, re: 2, counterpoint tobacco, by and large. The anti-lungkiller campaign has been doing a pretty damn good job of breaking tobacco usage's back in the US, and so far as I've noticed criminal production and distribution, especially organized, hasn't seen much of an expansion. Prohibition was a really, really shitty attempt at curtailing something's usage, heh. Though from what I've half-heartedly noticed recently-ish, it still apparently managed to crack the stateside drinking culture pretty hard... which was pretty damn needed at the time.

It's still decent reason to be leery about making use of a particular substance illegal, though. Just also happens to be one of the stronger supporting points for legalization, too -- legal domestic weed farming would tear giant chunks out of a whole mess of criminal organizations, as the perennial example.

So far as 1 goes... if not being as harmful as something legal isn't sufficient reason to let something be legal, what is? It's not like something being illegal means it should be illegal, unfortunately. No small amount of things that can put you in a jail cell for incredibly stupid, poorly thought out, often enough incredibly unjust, reasons.

Something being less harmful than a legal substance might not be a necessary or sufficient reason on its own to make the substance legal, but it's really quite a strong supporting point. "This stuff does less damage to our society than stuff we say is okay" is a pretty solid reason not to throw people in jail over it, basically. Particularly if the jail time is going to cause more damage than the substance use itself, which is really, really likely.

* _{uh, which you can, but those arguments tend to rapidly turn racist as all fuck or still fall in the favor of legalization... which should surprise no one paying attention considering shitting on blacks and/or poor people is exactly what got the US much of its current drug law}

[Lord Shonus]

Here's the thing. Even though people try very hard, it is extremely difficult to accurately measure danger levels between a widely used, regulated, and legal drug and a drug that is illegal, used with much less universality, and varies widely in purity and safety due to lack of regulation.

Of the commonly cited "drugs that should be legal", the only one that is widespread enough to make comparisons reasonably valid is marijuana. This is also the only one that is rapidly becoming legal throughout most of the civilized world.

What data we do have on most other illegal drugs that currently do less damage than alcohol strongly suggests that illegality has severely blunted their effects (thus, they do less damage because they are illegal, and legalizing them would make them much worse than alcohol). We do not, however, have enough data to claim this definitively, however.

[Frumple]

Yeh, true enough. Still, not terribly many ways to get that data without letting loose the hounds, y'know? There's also ways to depress usage besides making something illegal, which... given the state of the US legal system regarding drugs in particular I can't help but think something would have to try real goddamn hard to actually top alcohol with that taken out of the equation, so far as societal level harm goes. Proper regulation and quality control could probably do a hell of a lot to blunt dangers even if freer usage increases them, too.

... really, it's probably annoying the hell out of some researcher or another out there. Stateside's royally fucked up treatment of drug laws and its pisspot penitentiary system has to be throwing all sorts of variables off for some poor bastards. Soft sciences hard like big tom on new intake day ;_;

[Putnam]

Yeh, true enough. Still, not terribly many ways to get that data without letting loose the hounds, y'know? There's also ways to depress usage besides making something illegal, which... given the state of the US legal system regarding drugs in particular I can't help but think something would have to try real goddamn hard to actually top alcohol with that taken out of the equation, so far as societal level harm goes. Proper regulation and quality control could probably do a hell of a lot to blunt dangers even if freer usage increases them, too.

... really, it's probably annoying the hell out of some researcher or another out there. Stateside's royally fucked up treatment of drug laws and its pisspot penitentiary system has to be throwing all sorts of variables off for some poor bastards. Soft sciences hard like big tom on new intake day ;_;

You also have to take into account the harm caused by the drug being illegal--weed's gonna ruin your life more if you're arrested for it than any other reason.

Also, legal drugs have been reasonably curbed in terms of harm; tobacco isn't nearly the problem it was 60 years ago, for example.

[SalmonGod]

Some places like Vancouver have done experiments with legal injection sites and stuff, and found it had a significant effect on hard drug related issues.  Gist of it being the drug is still illegal, but if you go to people who can professionally help you and admit you have a problem, you're rewarded with better legal treatment than if caught with it otherwise.

[scourge728]

tobacco isn't nearly the problem it was 60 years ago, for example.

As far as I'm concerned cigarettes are basically pure poison still

[hector13]

I also think that you’re less likely to get unpleasant diseases as a result of getting basic medical attention in regards to clean needles and such.

Who’da think it: treating people like people is a good thing.

tobacco isn't nearly the problem it was 60 years ago, for example.

As far as I'm concerned cigarettes are basically pure poison still

People got the right to make their own decisions and put whatever they want into their body’s, min.

[Egan_BW]

People got the right to make their own decisions and put whatever they want into their body’s, min.

Well, it generally is considered a good idea to intervene if you see someone trying to commit suicide. So you could argue that as it is, people don't have the right to put whatever in their body, if it's something like cyanide.

[Sirus]

I also think that you’re less likely to get unpleasant diseases as a result of getting basic medical attention in regards to clean needles and such.

Who’da think it: treating people like people is a good thing.

tobacco isn't nearly the problem it was 60 years ago, for example.

As far as I'm concerned cigarettes are basically pure poison still

People got the right to make their own decisions and put whatever they want into their body’s, min.

The problem with some things, cigarettes being one of them, is that the stuff can easily get into other people without their consent. And don't just say "oh well they can move away from the smoker", secondhand smoke can do incredible damage to any children that you might be living with and they have next to zero say in the matter.

[redwallzyl]

The problem with "my body I can do whatever I want" is that people are not in fact an isolated system. you effect others by your very existence. Anything you do will in all likelihood have effects beyond yourself.

[SalmonGod]

The problem with "my body I can do whatever I want" is that people are not in fact an isolated system. you effect others by your very existence. Anything you do will in all likelihood have effects beyond yourself.

“I enforce my will upon the quantum field that composes my being. I enforce my will upon the cycle of events that unfold as a result of my shifting of energy states through action. I enforce my will upon the perceived world by categorizing it in whatever manner I see fit and serving my purposes or wants.

I am a violent tyrant, and must be such so as to maintain the Cosmos (the Ordered Creation), as opposed to the non-differentiated Chaos (the Non-Ordered Uncreation).

Through my very being I am clenched of jaw and bloody-handed, for the act of existing, and to utter “I am” is the greatest act of rebellion of all.

Reach Heaven through Violence. Reach Heaven through Being. It is the same.”

— Karam Saal the Crazy-Wise, Avadhuta.

[hector13]

Pfft, what are y’all, Communists?

Y’all forgot to mention the addictive nature of nicotine, so even if a person decides they don’t want to consume cigarettes no more, it is infinitely harder when they are physically and psychologically addicted to smoking

[Putnam]

tobacco isn't nearly the problem it was 60 years ago, for example.

As far as I'm concerned cigarettes are basically pure poison still

whenever i'm talking about how harmful things are i'm always talking about how harmful they are in total not to the individual but multiplied over every individual who comes into contact with it.

by this metric tobacco isn't nearly the problem it was 60 years ago.