Drug Ethics


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My thoughts are that if drugs got legalized, drug usage would go up. The reason is you would get the first time experimenters that may get hooked. They in return would tell their friends and so on, where as while they are illegal people will not do them because of the laws and so forth. People will always abuse drugs even if they were legal, so that is a problem within its self.

As for crime and stuff, if drugs got legalized the price of drugs would go down because its not illegal anymore. So crime would go down as well, because there is not such a price demand that it drives people to commit crimes to get money. I think that the price still will be steep that not all crime is stopped. But if it is taxed and becomes more expensive then just to get it smuggled in, I think crime will sky rocket because of it. (that statement is contradictory because how can something be smuggled in if it is legal, the reason is because if it has a tax then you have to buy it through lagit means. If you get it with out tax you are stealing from the gov which is illegal, and can be prosecuted to the full extent of the law)
 
QUOTE
Not all laws were created by omniscient super humans. Some of them were actually passed to fulfill personal agendas/personal moral codes/propaganda. It's not a bad idea to question the existence of a law, or anything for that matter. You're ideas are just as valid as a politicians, if not, more so. This doesn't have to apply to drugs though.

So drugs are bad for individuals (health problems, addiction), it's bad for society (health problem, crimes caused by addiction).
Except because of some libertarian fantasy, why should we allow drugs ? What advantages for the society ?

I'm not adamantly opposed to drugs (I can see why peyote is allowed in the US, for religious reasons and I've now problems with the Netherlands' policy on drugs).
However, I can't see a reason why drug should be generally allowed.

As chiisai_hana said with great wisdom, you can't even draw a parallel with the Prohibition, the two situations are really different.


QUOTE
It's true! FTV is truly an awesome community. We've got some of the most amiable people you'll ever meet!

On the other other hand, you've also got me.
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egg beast, i see your point but the arguments you are using to surport your point is at best weak >.< you cant really argue your case with the ridiculous laws as you've pointed out. perhaps licking a frog is illegal because one its just plain gross and two the frogs maybe poisionous and can harm humans (or third, the frog's skin produces a drug like effect and the gov. is trying to stop people from going high on licking frogs [eww])

About the trumpet thing - some people consider it annoying and if its for the purpose of attracting customers it might pee some other stores around you off as well. its like how food stalls in singapore are not allowed to go up to people and try to get them to buy from their food stall. One its annoying as hell to the consumer and two its purposfully influencing a sale that others might have benifited from as well.

How late are these stores allowed to be opened for in New Jersey? there has to be a reason behind only allowing grocers and liquor stores to be opened. i'm not saying that they will always be for pure reasons but if it benifits the country on the whole (be it taxes or the welfare of citizens and visitors) then so what? its not like this law will horribly alter your life for ever and ever. legalising drugs how ever will, you will have a drug addict walking around near kids play grounds in shopping centers - i mean would you really want your kids to be exposed to this kind of thing? its legal sure, just like alchol and ciggies but you still dont want your kids smoking or drinking that stuff.

May i point out that the reason why they want someone who believes in God to be elected for office is becuase they want moral upstanding citizens to be able to lead the others. sure it may be discriminatory but really you cant deny the fact that there are more christians in this world than any of the other five major religions. And working on probability - i think the people running for office in Tennessee would be part of a christian denomination.

as for ciggies, how many decades have these programs and adverts on the bad effects of smoking have we have? twenty years? thirty years? it is only the recent generation that is fully aware of the impacts of smoking - you still see older people smoking like no body's business (when it really is if you consider the effects of passive smoking) - Same thing goes for alchol consumption.

once something is legalised, the government is saying that 'we surport this and as citizens of this country we believe that you will surport this as well.' So with this in mind, wouldnt more people believe that drug consumption is acceptable? Once something is widly accepted useage will go up for sure.

Think about what tabbaco did and alcohol as well - you can say that these problems are now under control but wouldnt it have been better if we had prevented it? prevention is always better than cure - its hard to cure people addicted to smoking and it takes a huge ammount of will power on the individual, so now we are trying to prevent any other people tempted to smoke. if drugs are legalised we'll be trying to put band aids on a serious problem in need of addressing when we could've avoided this whole mess to begin with.
 
QUOTE (chiisai_hana @ Jan 24 2008, 08:47 PM) You're wording is confusing me, but if you're question whether Prohibition made alcohol completely illegal, yes, it did. It was a movement in the earlier part of the twentieth century in which the production, importation and consumption of alcohol was banned. The movement was led by women and religious groups who were trying to "clean up" society and reinforce family and Christian values. I don't know much about it specifically, but that is a general basis. Because of this, there was a lot of cross-border smuggling and bootlegging of alcohol since people could not get what they wanted legally.

But in the case of Prohibition, something which was legal was made illegal. Drugs have never been legal and are not used by a majority of the population. So while some parallels can be drawn, it's not a completely similar situation.
Thanks for the answer, but I think I have to see it for myself

Europe did "follow" the same step, with christian/women/anti alcohol sub cultural movements
But, alcohol was never completely illegal around here,

Which people think it was (due to how you present it in history classes), but im speaking of Europe of course

Anyways I rest my case..
 
QUOTE egg beast, i see your point but the arguments you are using to surport your point is at best weak >.< you cant really argue your case with the ridiculous laws as you've pointed out. perhaps licking a frog is illegal because one its just plain gross and two the frogs maybe poisionous and can harm humans (or third, the frog's skin produces a drug like effect and the gov. is trying to stop people from going high on licking frogs [eww])
Those crazy laws were really just for fun.
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I realize that they don't directly relate to the issue of drugs. But while I'm a big fan of following the law, I don't take is as an absolute in my life. The people who made those laws were people just like us, so we shouldn't give some some kind of god-like status. That's all I was saying.


QUOTE So drugs are bad for individuals (health problems, addiction), it's bad for society (health problem, crimes caused by addiction).
Except because of some libertarian fantasy, why should we allow drugs ? What advantages for the society ?
I prefer to think of it as a libertarian possibility, rather than a fantasy
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, but I'll not get nit-picky about it. Beyond the libertarian aspect of it, there would be the monetary benefits. At least here in America, we're spending billions upon billions of dollars catching drug-lords and keeping loads upon loads of criminals in jail strictly for drug usage/distribution. The theoretical cost of legalizing drugs (like medical fees, rehabilitation fees, etc.) all pale in comparison to what we're spending now. I'm not hearing any good arguments otherwise. The only other issue that leaves is how much of a social-impact/ethical issue legalizing drugs would present. I'm a big fan of the social contract ideology, that humans are born with every right to do anything they want, but when they form a government, they forgo some of those rights in order to maintain the best interests of everyone. I know that's one of the major ideologies that America's "founding fathers" had in mind when they developed the groundwork for our legal system. Most laws fall into that category of maintaining mutual interests, but methinks drugs may not. In the social contract ideology, individuals have every right to harm themselves, because they're not doing anything to infringe upon the rights of others. The only issue that drugs bring in are the fact that hard-core drug users can go completely crazy from their drug-ness, and by doing so, infringe upon the rights of others. This is true, it happens even now that drugs are illegal, and even if drugs were legal, these actions would still be illegal. So the only issue against legalizing drugs would be if a substantially greater portion of people would start going very hardcore into drug usage, and inevitably perform actions which would impede upon the rights of others (DUI, drug-related violence).

And I personally don't see any valid arguments saying that the world would turn into a immoral, disgusting, drug-ridden world if we stop jailing everyone who want's to "blow their minds".

My example of Prohibition may not be a perfect fit to this issue, but it definitely supports my view. If drug-usage and crime rates had gone down after alcohol was banned, then my arguments would pretty much be destroyed, no? The argument may not be definite, but it's by no means worthless.

*sigh* it seems like most people here have a very negative outlook on humanity. Where's poonk when you need her?
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QUOTE once something is legalised, the government is saying that 'we surport this and as citizens of this country we believe that you will surport this as well.' So with this in mind, wouldnt more people believe that drug consumption is acceptable? Once something is widly accepted useage will go up for sure.
Now that's true. A government permitting something doesn't say "we support this action", but "we support your right to do this. There is a very important difference there. I've used thsi quote tons of times in this forum, but here we go again, I'm quoting a revolutionary war hero.

QUOTE I despise what it is you do, but I'll die for your right to do it!
 
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I prefer to think of it as a libertarian possibility, rather than a fantasy
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, but I'll not get nit-picky about it.

I guess my disagreement with libertarianism is showing. ^^
(The cultural differences between France and the USA may be one big factor here).


QUOTE At least here in America, we're spending billions upon billions of dollars catching drug-lords and keeping loads upon loads of criminals in jail strictly for drug usage/distribution. The theoretical cost of legalizing drugs (like medical fees, rehabilitation fees, etc.) all pale in comparison to what we're spending now. I'm not hearing any good arguments otherwise.

I agree there's a problem with the War on Drugs - If I remember the figures correctly, the number of people in jail is proportionnaly ten times higher in the USA than in Europe and a large number are there for drug-related problems, the sentences are longer. Basically, the USA is putting a whole part of the society in prison -, but it doesn't mean is problem is the drugs being illegal, not by a long stretch.


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Most laws fall into that category of maintaining mutual interests, but methinks drugs may not.

Then here, we should discuss of the medical consequences of drugs.
Just looking at the situation with alcohol (which is a unbannable drug, for cultural reasons - It's been around for too long -) isn't very heartening : DUI, family violences... I live in a traditionnaly heavy-drinking part of France (we must be in the top 3) and it's not nice.
Of course, we already have drugs (mainly cannabis), but at least we can do something.


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In the social contract ideology, individuals have every right to harm themselves, because they're not doing anything to infringe upon the rights of others.

We could argue a lot about what the social contract includes. Especially if becoming a burden to the society is acceptable (Health care are expensive for a drug user, and they are often broke. So the society has to pay. Or has to let him die, which is quite unacceptable).


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And I personally don't see any valid arguments saying that the world would turn into a immoral, disgusting, drug-ridden world if we stop jailing everyone who want's to "blow their minds".

The number of people smoking decrease when the laws are more stringent (even without a ban). I know it's not mathematically correct, but if reverse the process...


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Now that's true. A government permitting something doesn't say "we support this action", but "we support your right to do this. There is a very important difference there.


I guess our governements said "we don't support your right to take any drug you want". ^^
A lot of things are forbidden by our various governments (some with more reasons than others), so it's not a surprise.


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I've used thsi quote tons of times in this forum, but here we go again, I'm quoting a revolutionary war hero.

I'm really not sure it's from a revolutionnary war hero. I've seen this quote in so many variations and from so many people...
 
QUOTE (Dalriada @ Jan 25 2008, 01:08 PM) I guess my disagreement with libertarianism is showing. ^^
(The cultural differences between France and the USA may be one big factor here).
I'm not so much a libertarian myself. I'm all about individualism (not egoism, mind you), so naturally I agree with some of the libertarian ideas, but not nearly enough of them to call myself libertarian. But I do think that, at least in America, what with the "war on drugs", "war on terror", patriot act, no child left behind, all kinds of garbage going on, the government's gotten way out of hand here. I wouldn't mind seeing it back off of our personal lives a bit.


QUOTE Then here, we should discuss of the medical consequences of drugs.
Just looking at the situation with alcohol (which is a unbannable drug, for cultural reasons - It's been around for too long -) isn't very heartening : DUI, family violences... I live in a traditionnaly heavy-drinking part of France (we must be in the top 3) and it's not nice.
Of course, we already have drugs (mainly cannabis), but at least we can do something.
If it's sheer cost we're talking about, any additional medical expenses would pale in comparison with what America's pumping out right now to stop drugs. I don't know about France, really.

QUOTE The number of people smoking decrease when the laws are more stringent (even without a ban). I know it's not mathematically correct, but if reverse the process...
Of course, this assumes a direct correlation between law enforcement and the number of people who smoke, taking out all other factors. I know it may be a lame, totally American example here, but that's not how it worked with the Revolutionary War, in fact, that led to a mass uprising... anyways, don't we both agree that (at least in America) the laws are too strict? Aren't there proportionally some 10 times more people imprisoned for drug-related crimes? Wouldn't this statistic alone go against your simple mathematical view? There are many more important factors into a person's drug habits than simple reward/punishment schematics.


QUOTE I'm really not sure it's from a revolutionnary war hero. I've seen this quote in so many variations and from so many people...
Well, that's what my history teacher told me, but that's not really no important. It's the message that matters.
 
QUOTE (EggBeast @ Jan 25 2008, 09:17 PM) If it's sheer cost we're talking about, any additional medical expenses would pale in comparison with what America's pumping out right now to stop drugs.
Do Americans have to cover their own medical bills? What happens if all the people in prison end up in hospitals instead. Do they pay from their own pockets? Or do people's taxes cover the cost (and if they can't pay, do taxes again cover the costs).

I'm thinking one of the main conflicts in this thread is regional differences. If you could shed some more light on the workings of America it might help because I personally do not know enough about social workings in the US to comment.
 
QUOTE (chiisai_hana @ Jan 25 2008, 06:35 PM) Do Americans have to cover their own medical bills? What happens if all the people in prison end up in hospitals instead. Do they pay from their own pockets? Or do people's taxes cover the cost (and if they can't pay, do taxes again cover the costs).
Ah man/woman, our medical system is in the dumps! And that's not coming solely from my crazy liberal insanity, that's coming from my very conservative mother and sister, who happen to work as registered nurses.

But the way it works (if you can say it works) is that people pay their own medical costs, although we've got a messed up government system where taxes offset the cost for the elderly. And those who cannot pay/do not have insurance are legally obligated to get treated anyways. I guess they take tax money, though I'm not too sure about that.

...at any rate, while America's got some great medical care, the system is in the dumps.

...but even if we did have a fully tax-supported medical system, I don't think that medical expenses would shoot up into the billions (which would make legalizing drugs economically unfeasible).

...and then there's our dang-fangled debt, I think it just shot up to 12 trillion dollars. 12 TRILLION DOLLARS! We can't afford a war on drugs, much less some lame-assed war on terror!!! Bah!!! I'm not happy with the American government at the moment, which could be causing some of these libertarian tendencies in me.
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Bah!
 
if you think laws in america are stringent wait till you try to deal/traffic drugs in some parts of south east asia - if they catch you and let me assure you they will you will be given the death penalty - no ifs or buts regardless of where you came from or what nationality you are you still get the death penalty. but then again the gov. surports this reason by saying that if they do not put a firm stance on no tolerance for drugs, these people who use/deal drugs will in turn affect and influence the lives of the many other people they will be selling drugs to. I'm not in favour of legalising drugs because,
one
- the usage will go up - once something is legalised it encourages young teens (who are most often rebelious in this stage) to 'try' it. even without it being legalised, kids are already being influenced by peers who do drugs to use it - imagine what could happen is it becomes legalised! parents will no have the power of the law to forcibly make their kids stop nor do they have the power to send them into rehab.

two,
- we dont live in a perfect world where people can understand reponsibility. If we were living in a perfect world, we wouldnt need laws - everyone would be kind and considerate of that old lady with no seat on a bus and several people will be more than happy to let her take their seat. everyone will be responsible and not drive whilst under the influence of alcohol or even think 'nahh i'm not drunk so i'm ok to drive', teenagers will understand where their parents concerns are and instead of shouting and arguing until they're blue in the face they will discuss the conflict in a calm manner deviod of any shouting, screaming or throwing of anything.

three,
- the fact that it is illegal puts many people off even trying it'll go something like this in their heads 'oh but its wrong to do so, so i shouldnt.' We all know that drugs are bad for you but would you really care about the long term effects if the short term ones are sooo instantly gratifying?

laws are there to protect people - granted some laws are put in place for personal agendas or motives but then again this proves my point that this world isnt perfect! humans arent perfect, even highly regarded religious people arent perfect! heck! the current pope used to be part of the youth nazi group in WWII!
It is hard to acheive a balance but we are still trying, if anything is too perfect it turns out to become something like the stepford wives - if something becomes too bad it becomes WWIII =.= there are uprisings and coups for a reason, if the people are too supressed something like that will happen, but if the people have too much power it is in danger of turning into a dictatorship. if you'd like to have a case study of such please read Animal Farm by George Orwell - but going off topic now i'll bring it back to my original point.

I belive your point where you say that drugs should be legalised because it surports the rights of the individual but then again, this 'right' is often so badly abused that it often infringes on other people's rights. i wont go in a circle again but after all the other arguments including mine, how can you say that we dont have any substantial arguments to surport why we believe that legalising drugs is a bad idea?
 
Today while watching tv I learned, that in L.A. county there are over 200 medicinal weed dispensing units. All you need is your finger, a credit card, and a prescription. So if you wanted to smoke weed all you would need is to go to a doc and get a prescription. Crazy isn't it.
 
QUOTE (samthebear)- the usage will go up - once something is legalised it encourages young teens (who are most often rebelious in this stage) to 'try' it. even without it being legalised, kids are already being influenced by peers who do drugs to use it - imagine what could happen is it becomes legalised! parents will no have the power of the law to forcibly make their kids stop nor do they have the power to send them into rehab.
Well I never said anything about doing away with age restriction. Whether we should make drugs legal and whether we should do away with age restrictions are two issues. I'm not arguing that we should let wee-babies go crack-headed on the world.
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Albeit I do understand your point. I can visualize it now. Dear little daddy has some hallucinogens stashed away for a rainy day, teenage son finds out where it is, waits till daddy goes out of town, shares with his friends. But of course, there's a similar, non-hypythetical situation we can compare it to. Just replace the hallucinogens with a firearm.

...yeah, I don't think worrying about situations like that justifies making something illegal, firearms aren't illegal, after all. You've got to realize that all of our rights can be abused. Just because something can be abused, doesn't mean it should be forbidden.


QUOTE two,
- we dont live in a perfect world where people can understand reponsibility. If we were living in a perfect world, we wouldnt need laws - everyone would be kind and considerate of that old lady with no seat on a bus and several people will be more than happy to let her take their seat. everyone will be responsible and not drive whilst under the influence of alcohol or even think 'nahh i'm not drunk so i'm ok to drive', teenagers will understand where their parents concerns are and instead of shouting and arguing until they're blue in the face they will discuss the conflict in a calm manner deviod of any shouting, screaming or throwing of anything.
I think you're taking this thing a bit too far. I'm not arguing that legalizing drugs is ok because all human beings are perfectly responsible. I'm saying that if drugs were to be legalized, an emphasis would be placed on teaching people (aka children and teens) about the dangers, consequences, and punishments of drug use/abuse. You'd still be held responsible for any illegal actions you may perform under the influence of drugs, but you'd be allowed the benefit of doing it in a controlled environment. Other than that, I'd agree with your argument if you could convince me that mankind is a vile, disgusting, innately evil species, but I'm not so sure you'd be able to do that. I tend to feel pretty good about humanity.

It simply gets down to a matter of pros vs. cons. There are people who abuse drugs now, and there would be people abusing drugs if they got legalized. There are costs of having drugs illegal, and there could be some costs involved if drugs got legalized. What I'm saying is that in sheer monetary terms, the benefits of drug legalization would be enormous. In addition to that, having legal drugs would help people be more open about their drug usage (as opposed to being secretive, to avoid the hand of the law), and this would encourage more responsible usage of drugs, because drug users wouldn't be trying to hide it from the world.

...and some other reasons too.
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QUOTE I belive your point where you say that drugs should be legalized because it surports the rights of the individual but then again, this 'right' is often so badly abused that it often infringes on other people's rights. i wont go in a circle again but after all the other arguments including mine, how can you say that we don't have any substantial arguments to support why we believe that legalizing drugs is a bad idea?
Yes, the support of individual rights would definitely be sweet. The only reason I'm saying that I'm not seeing any substantial arguments against my stance is, well... a lack of evidence. I'm seeing a lot of arguments based solely off of assumptions that I disagree with (aka, humans are naturally evil creatures who could never understand responsibility, or that having a the right to do something will promote the abuse of that right, or... all kinds of stuff.

Albeit your arguments are not altogether untrue. We would see people abusing drugs, we would see people being hospitalize or overdosing, and we could see some people getting into drugs because they would lose their moral qualms about it (although it begs the question why they wouldn't be smoking in the first place). But we see all those things already, and even if there were an increase in that kind of activity, which is arguable, I don't think it would be anywhere near the level of offsetting the benefits of legalization. And think of all the violent crimes going on because of drugs right now. Drug trafficking, gang stuff, the very questionable and dangerous ways of obtaining illegal drugs, all that would be done away with. Drugs would be sold in a safe, responsible, legal manner, preventing the need for organized illegal activities.

It's not a perfect world we live in, but that's no excuse to stop shooting for one. (and I'm not referring to this "perfect world" as a place where we can all get high in peace
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)
 
QUOTE I'm not arguing that we should let wee-babies go crack-headed on the world.

Pregnant mother takes drugs.
Baby is born addict to drugs.
It's already happening. But at least we can forbid the mother to take drugs (as far as I know, we can't prevent here to take alcohol, even if the consequences are also real bad, can we ?).


QUOTE
...yeah, I don't think worrying about situations like that justifies making something illegal, firearms aren't illegal, after all. You've got to realize that all of our rights can be abused. Just because something can be abused, doesn't mean it should be forbidden.


Only in America.
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(Well, it's not true, a lot of countries have firearms. But the debate on gun control is quite specific).


QUOTE I'm saying that if drugs were to be legalized, an emphasis would be placed on teaching people (aka children and teens) about the dangers, consequences, and punishments of drug use/abuse. You'd still be held responsible for any illegal actions you may perform under the influence of drugs, but you'd be allowed the benefit of doing it in a controlled environment.

It's hypocritical to allow a product that alter your mind and your perception while assuming the user as responsible of what he does (Yes, the same goes for alcohol. the only difference being that banning alcohol is not doable).

Moreover, without assuming than humans are evil, reality force us to acknowledge most of us don't have a very good capacity to understand the long-term consequences of our actions. Especially children and teens.


QUOTE There are costs of having drugs illegal, and there could be some costs involved if drugs got legalized. What I'm saying is that in sheer monetary terms, the benefits of drug legalization would be enormous.

False dichotomy.
The choice is not between what the US have now and making all drugs legal.
There's an infinite number of choices between those two extrems.


QUOTE And think of all the violent crimes going on because of drugs right now. Drug trafficking, gang stuff, the very questionable and dangerous ways of obtaining illegal drugs, all that would be done away with.

You're assuming there wouldn't be gangs and traffick if drugs were legal.
It's a far-stretched assumption.
 
QUOTE False dichotomy.
The choice is not between what the US have now and making all drugs legal.
There's an infinite number of choices between those two extrems.

You speak the truth there. Do you, then, believe that the laws restricting drugs should be loosened? I think that would be good, but I'm kind of an all-or-nothing kind of guy when it comes to human rights.


QUOTE You're assuming there wouldn't be gangs and traffick if drugs were legal.
It's a far-stretched assumption.
Again, you speak the truth. But you can't deny that gangs built around drug trafficking and drug-traficking in general would sharply, sharply decrease, and who knows, maybe eventually disappear. I don't know, leave predicting the future to the fiction writers.


QUOTE Pregnant mother takes drugs.
Baby is born addict to drugs.
It's already happening. But at least we can forbid the mother to take drugs (as far as I know, we can't prevent here to take alcohol, even if the consequences are also real bad, can we ?).
oh-ho, taking another perspective of drug ethics, are we? Yes, pregnant mothers taking drugs/alcohol are definitely harming their children. I don't think (at least in the USA) that pregnant women taking drugs is technically illegal... but it's definitely heavily discouraged.
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The responsibility lies on the individual in this case! lol... I'm just messing with you... almost.

ahhh... drugs... what would we do without them?
 
QUOTE You speak the truth there. Do you, then, believe that the laws restricting drugs should be loosened? I think that would be good, but I'm kind of an all-or-nothing kind of guy when it comes to human rights.

Taking drugs is not a human right.
Not in the UN's Declaration of Human Rights, not even by common sense.

About a loosening of drugs laws, we don't live in the same country so I couldn't answer.
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I do think that the american population in prison is high, so there may be room for a loosening, at least for some soft drugs or for users.


QUOTE
But you can't deny that gangs built around drug trafficking and drug-traficking in general would sharply, sharply decrease, and who knows, maybe eventually disappear. I don't know, leave predicting the future to the fiction writers.

I think that drug, in drug traffick, is a mean (to gain money) more than an end.


QUOTE I don't think (at least in the USA) that pregnant women taking drugs is technically illegal...

Taking drugs is technically illegal, so...


QUOTE
ahhh... drugs... what would we do without them?

We would watch animes.
 
QUOTE Pregnant mother takes drugs.
Baby is born addict to drugs.
It's already happening. But at least we can forbid the mother to take drugs (as far as I know, we can't prevent here to take alcohol, even if the consequences are also real bad, can we ?).
I'm sorry, I meant legal drugs, you know, tobacco, alky-hall, and some prescription drugs.


QUOTE Taking drugs is not a human right.
Not in the UN's Declaration of Human Rights, not even by common sense.
You're right, doing drugs is not a human right, because drugs are illegal (except for the legal ones, that is
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)


QUOTE We would watch animes.
touchee! You're absolutely right! Nothing could match the mind-altering effects of drugs more than anime!
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I can't believe I'm still awake. I'm sorry if everything I just typed out is complete nonsensical jibberish, at the moment, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Peace out, my anime-tripping friends!
 
QUOTE (EggBeast @ Jan 25 2008, 01:21 PM) I prefer to think of it as a libertarian possibility, rather than a fantasy
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, but I'll not get nit-picky about it. Beyond the libertarian aspect of it, there would be the monetary benefits. At least here in America, we're spending billions upon billions of dollars catching drug-lords and keeping loads upon loads of criminals in jail strictly for drug usage/distribution. The theoretical cost of legalizing drugs (like medical fees, rehabilitation fees, etc.) all pale in comparison to what we're spending now.
Eggie-san, and thats exactly the point, where you are wrong. Coz drug usage doesnt ONLY affect the person taking drugs, it also affects the ppl around him. As it has been pointed out, we dont want our chilren to be exposed to drug addicts. Once a drug addict reaches a certain stage of addiction and his brain is all twisted by the drug, he displays a rather anti social behaviour. Such a person drops the injections and needels where he feels like it, in the subway, in the park, near children playground. Now how would you feel if you 4 years old found it and played with it.
How would you feel, if your kids would have a free access to drugs? How would you feel if some idiot, who wants to make business offered drugs to your kids following the motto "make them addicts while they are young and stupid".

But besides that. Ppl should not be driving cars under the influence of drugs. They should also not make any decisions that affect other ppl under the influence of drugs. But by making the drug legal, you are pretty much provoking these things.

Oh and one thing more. You pointed out, that the government spends billions of $ to hunt down drug lords and combating crime, whereas the costs of health care and rehabilitation for drug addicts is low. Now if we legalize drugs, that "low" cost of rehabilitation will sky rocket, because the consumption of drugs will sky rocket as well. By allowing the drugs, you will cultivate a whole generation of addicts and the govermnent will spend billions of dolars to "inform ppl about the effects of drugs", to rehabilitate the drug addicts (by the way, have you ever read a statistic on success rate of an addiction treatment? Because it it alarmingly low) and combating drug induced criminality.

I believe that it makes more sense to spend loads of money combating something that is wrong to begin with (such as drugs and the criminality connected with it), rather than combating ppls stupidity, which can be partially prevented by NOT MAKING drugs legal.
 
Just admit it, drug, no matter how popular it is, no matter if it's the best stuff for trading, no matter how u pinpoint it's worth for human, it's just a bad stuff.
If this thing can be legalized, then all the effort of every nation that cost a lot of time and huge amount of money in order to exterminate the spread of this bad stuff will vaporize into thin air. Everything will go down the drain (including the future of this world)
 
QUOTE (warita200 @ Jan 27 2008, 04:39 AM) Eggie-san, and thats exactly the point, where you are wrong. Coz drug usage doesnt ONLY affect the person taking drugs, it also affects the ppl around him.
lol... this "Eggie-san" thing is really catching on...
tongue.gif


But yes, you do make a valid point about the mind-altering effects of drugs, which goes straight back to my very first post here. Kind of a roundabout way of getting to it, eh? Nevermind, I'm insane (in a good way)

But it seems like we keep arguing this point about whether drug use will skyrocket after legalization, and I really think you're misinterpreting human's motivations for doing, or not doing, drugs. Go back to tobacco, it's legal, most people (in America at least) do not smoke. They don't smoke because the people have become aware of the dangerous effects of drug usage/addiction. I highly doubt that a vast majority of these people would suddenly say "Wow! Meth just got legalized! Now I can finally fulfill my dream of destroying my future!!!". Most everyone knows the dangers of drugs, and that's why most people don't do drugs. Even if drug-usage does increase by a noticable amount, there's absolutely NO WAY that the realitvely trivial medical/rehabilitation costs would come close to what we're forking out now, and every leading official on the matter agrees with that (I could get some links if you insist).

But that way of looking at things isn't everyone's cup of tea, I know. Which is why I'm proud to announce... my roommates idea on the matter! We talked about this issue last night, and I thought he had some very interesting ideas. First of all, my roomy hates drugs, and he'd be all for making all drugs illegal, if that would do anything to control drug usage. The idea is that legalizing drugs would help control these drugs, since the government/corporations would be put in charge of the making and distribution of drugs. Strong restrictions could be put on the distribution/growth/manufacturing of these drugs, and the price of these drugs would be just as controlled.

The America Prohibition actually supports this idea (yes, I've used it before, but it is a very valid example here). A very large portion of the population had a desire to drink alcohol after it was made illegal, so this large portion of the population got their sweet alcohol, and crime rates exploded, alcohol consumption stayed roughly the same (it actually increased a bit, if I remember right), and the government couldn't do anything to stop it. Once the alcohol was legalized again, the related crime rates died down to nothing, and a large portion of society was no longer breaking the law. It's a similar deal drug legalization. There's a large group of people who "need" their drugs, and they're more than willing to go to questionable sourced to get these drugs, and therefore abetting the crime rate. If drugs were legalized, the demand for these questionable sources would gradually die down to nothing. And for those of you who say the cost of legal drugs would be high enough to cause smuggling, do you have any idea just how expensive it is to get your hands on some decent drugs these days? I'll tell you. A helluva lot, that's how much. And another thing, with this newfound drug control we'd get due to legalizing the drugs, we'd be able to limit the individual's drug consumption to (relatively) safe input, yes?

But yeah, that's more my roommate's view than my own. Completely different means to the same end. But for all of you saying "it's better to prevent then to repair", you couldn't deny his argument.

And whatever you do, you can't forget that people are already doing drugs. A lot of people. Just check the "do you do drugs?" thread to get a population sample.
 
QUOTE I highly doubt that a vast majority of these people would suddenly say "Wow! Meth just got legalized! Now I can finally fulfill my dream of destroying my future!!!". Most everyone knows the dangers of drugs, and that's why most people don't do drugs.

If your objective is to keep the percentage of addicted in your country under 50%, it's insane you know.

Besides, it's far from convincing.
Today, we have illegal drugs. They're bad for health, bad for your relations with Lady Justice and people still take drugs.
Tomorrow, we remove one of the disavantages of drugs (and a big one : the wrath of Lady Justice) and for you, the consequences would be 'no more adepts' ?

Besides, you forgot the problem of escalation.
A student is smoking weed in his room. Nothing exceptionnal (smoking weed is pretty common in our two countries I believe)
Today, he will have easily access to weed, but nothing more (not without some efforts)
Tomorrow, he will have the opportunity to try stronger, more addictive drugs.


QUOTE
Even if drug-usage does increase by a noticable amount, there's absolutely NO WAY that the realitvely trivial medical/rehabilitation costs would come close to what we're forking out now, and every leading official on the matter agrees with that (I could get some links if you insist).

I guess this problem could be solved by funding less the War on Drugs program and funding more the medical/rehabilitation structures (which could be improved).
Of course, it would mean beaing soft on crime and being a drug-users' lover, which is quite suicidal.


QUOTE
The America Prohibition actually supports this idea (yes, I've used it before, but it is a very valid example here).

No it's not, as explained before.


QUOTE There's a large group of people who "need" their drugs, and they're more than willing to go to questionable sourced to get these drugs, and therefore abetting the crime rate. If drugs were legalized, the demand for these questionable sources would gradually die down to nothing.

Of course not.
They would still need money to buy drugs. And if they can't have this money legally...


QUOTE
And whatever you do, you can't forget that people are already doing drugs. A lot of people. Just check the "do you do drugs?" thread to get a population sample.

How many are taking heroin/cocain on a regular basis ?
Saying "Look, this person smoking weed is fine, so we should legalize heroin" is plainly stupid.
 
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