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LadyEllen -> RE: Legalize Street Drugs? (12/17/2006 7:49:23 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: petdave
quote:
ORIGINAL: LadyEllen
The key is, that one person's solution is not another's. But even allowing for that, and enabling each person to have access to the drug most suitable for their needs/wants, it would not solve the problem of drugs in society, for it would simply enable a whole nation to become addicts. And any costs saved in terms of policing would be more than outstripped by the costs of monitoring distribution to hinder addiction and overdose, and in terms of health costs, lost working days etc. And given that the legal supply would have to be controlled in that way, the black market would persist as a means of topping up approved supply for those who need a little more anyway.
E
One of the major arguments in terms of legalizing drugs is that drug prohibition is a failure. You said that you tried marijuana, which is illegal. But you got some anyway. Would you have found illegality to be an insurmountable obstacle if you wanted more, and more, and more? Do you think that if you really wanted to try coke, or meth, or acid, you couldn't get them relatively easily in any major city? So what's stopping you from becoming an addict? The laws, or the fact that you refuse to be one? Every person could be an addict. Every person could be a mass murderer. Every person could be a child molestor, a homeless vagrant, an arsonist, a religious fundamentalist. There's more stopping us than just laws.
...dave
Hi Dave
As it happens, where I live right now, the third most deprived area in the county, I am surrounded by drug addicts, alcoholics and every form of broken person imaginable. I'm pretty sure I could be high as a kite on any substance I might choose, within half an hour of leaving my door, since there are outlets all around me.
I live in the reality of a community where anything goes. Sure there are laws and there is some degree of care with regards to possible police presence, but in the main the police dont seem to see any problem, as long as people are not breaking other laws - theft/burglary to support their habit for example. They would never admit it publicly, but the general police attitude to drug dealing where I live is seemingly the same as their general attitude towards the prostitution in this area; as long as it doesnt cause other problems, then it would be a waste of time to deal with it, as it would only spring back up within a week anyway.
But I will tell you now, the reality of living in this place is not pleasant.
Much has been made on this thread of the notion that it is only the "stupid" who overuse whatever substance, who become addicted and who then become a problem to themselves and everyone around them. This is a view which is wrong.
Alcohol is always advanced as the example for this; "I drink regularly and in moderation, and I dont have any problems, ergo those who drink too much, too often and have problems, are stupid". This is all well and good for those whose lives are stable, whose income is steady and reliable, whose living conditions and prospects are reasonable.
But what is interesting is, that anyone, and I mean anyone, can be tipped over the edge by life, into using more alcohol than they otherwise might. Divorce, bereavement, redundancy, eviction - they can happen to anyone. What follows so often then is grief and depression, and a turn to the bottle as something that in the past, stable life, was associated with happiness. Except now it no longer works, and more has to be drunk more often, in order to block out the bad world that has replaced comfort.
Some of course, are born into circumstances which provide fertile grounds for drink abuse, but just looking at the people surrounding me what I cannot get over is how many of them were once "normal" drinkers, whose lives were changed totally by some unforeseen cataclysm, and have slipped into a world of alcohol which whilst it obliterates their circumstances, it does nothing to alleviate them but rather makes them worse.
How such a spiral, which affects so many, can be affected positively by enabling access to even more substances, I do not see. In fact, what I do see around me is a community of addicts and alcoholics which is destined only for death via a life of misery. I would suspect that many posting here on the positives of drug legalisation do not have direct experience of this aspect of the world; after all, the defective and rejected are hidden away in communities like mine, where polite society does not have to see them.
To legalise all these substances, even some of them perceived to be "soft", would be to engineer a disaster on a national scale, alike with the disaster on a local scale where I find myself now. As for your question about whether I avoid drugs because theyre illegal - no, I dont. I avoid drugs because I can see what they do to others every day. I saw the film of a Buddhist monk setting fire to himself in protest at the Vietnam war. I dont need to do the same to myself to know its a bad idea.
I believe the police likely have the right balance in respect of drugs; enforcement only where required for peripheral reasons. Of course, drugs will never be stamped out, but equally it would disastrous to legalise them for all the reasons above.
And regarding the myth of soft drugs leading to harder drugs. There are no soft drugs, for a start. Secondly, whilst evidence of such transition might be occasionally advanced, what I see around me is not a transition, but rather that those who abuse one drug, often abuse others too - seemingly anything to obliterate the pain will be taken. Heroin addiction, for example is strongly associated with cannabis, tobacco and alcohol abuse alongside it; try to find a heroin addict who doesnt smoke.
I also wonder how many here, who are posting about the positives of drug legalisation have ever been addicts, even if they, like me, come into daily contact with addicts?
As mentioned earlier in this thread, I take dihydrocodeine, an opiate like heroin/morphine though not as strong, for arthritis pain. Ten years on, there is no doubt whatever that I am physically dependant; I get withdrawal symptoms from hell, if I dont take at least some every day. Imagine if you will, the worst flu you ever had, the worst diarrhea, the worst headache, the worst hangover you ever had. Add them all together and multiply by ten. I'm lucky, in that I get regular prescribed amounts. I am very sure though, that were I not in that position, there is nothing, and I mean nothing, that I would not do, to alleviate those symptoms.
When I started with this painkiller, as also mentioned previously, it knocked me off my feet in a way that alcohol never did. A totally different effect. Pain gone, a very pleasant sleepiness, warm as toast all over - from two tablets. Within a year though, I was on more than the daily permitted amount (8), not because I needed them for pain, but because of the unbelievably pleasant feeling it caused. To remove pain, few were needed, but to maintain that feeling, more and more were needed. Eventually I was in a position where I needed over 20 tablets a day to evoke those feelings. I had a problem, and I knew it. But at the same time, it wasnt a problem - because nothing was a problem in that state.
Now, I'm not stupid. I'm not weak willed. I was at that time in a stable life, with a good job, regular income, good home etc. Yet, here I was, addicted to something which whilst I had a medical need for it, I used it for other purposes.
My point is, that these drugs which are controlled, are not at all like alcohol. Even a weaker derivative of morphine had me hooked within months, when I didnt have problems in life. Alcohol, like most other people, I can take or leave - usually leave these days. But this stuff proved dangerous, very quickly.
I'm now over that level of addiction; yes, I'm physically dependant, but not psychologically dependant. And I guess thats were the problem with alcohol and other drugs really is - the psychological sphere. If, as someone with few problems I experienced such pleasure (better than sex), and this became so important in my life so quickly, then how much more effective in that role would it be for someone with emotional and psychlogical problems, which this substance whilst it wouldnt solve anything, would remove all those problems? How much more readily psychologically dependant would they become?
Which brings me back to the point that it is in the emotional and psychological pain we bring to bear against others every day, that the roots for abuse and addiction are sown. Since it seems in our nature to bring others down, and then kick them repeatedly, or to gawp at such instances and do nothing, then it is our own fault that some are so vulnerable, and thus our own fault that these substances must be controlled. The bringing down and kicking can happen to anyone.
E
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