Would you vote to Legalize Everything?

[Sickwindsor]

It's a coin toss depending on who I speak with. Some argue the only way to curb criminal activity relating to drugs is to legalize it all. Some argue against saying that harmful substances unlike pot should be regulated. I afirm that is my right to do whatever I want with my body/brain.

Where do you stand?

 

[Czechyourhead]

"Won't somebody think about the the children??"..Yeah, liquor stores/dispensary card people, drug dealers/cartels/pimps do not. Stores pay taxes, follow regulations, buy permits..Dealers/cartels, etc do not. With regulations, quality and purity are not issues. Accidental over-doses and poisoning will decrease. Crime will drop. (With few exceptions, you do not hear of people committing crime to support alcohol/tobacco addiction) Remove the money from the shadows, corruption, prison industry(legalized human slave labor), law enforcement...and apply it to rebuilding infrastructure. Treatment instead of incarceration.

Prohibition creates a demand. Demand creates a black market. Black market causes corruption and misery. All while having a polarizing and divisive effect on the population. Creating an "us against them mentality". People are much easier to control when they are divided.

 

[VaporEyes]

I've had this argument with others before and, to me, legalization of all illicit substances is the only way. Drug use is a civil and medical matter. Not one that should involve the legal system. With legalization scientists will finally be able to, in controlled environments, improve our knowledge of these chemicals and their effects on our bodies. And, when in the hands of legal enterprises, the drugs themselves will become cheaper and purer.

Say, for instance, someone has become(or already is) addicted to heroine. Would you prefer to see them out on the street/prison/dead or in a clinic? There has been not one society in all of human history that has been without drug users. We humans love to exist in altered states of reality. That's why drugs are done.

To come to terms with the true and find how best to deal with this fact is far better than living in a state of denial and trying to "sweep it under the rug".

 

[Jeff-K]

yeah, crack cocaine heroine for everyone!!!

Seriously tho, I think regulations are needed. I'm not defending current regulations, nor am I saying I know the best or correct way to regulate.

But I can think of a few ways this would escalate way to easy.

 

[caseball2051]

yes. with the only regulations being how much someone can purchase at a time. tax it like other vices in our society.

we need to change how we view drug addicted people. they should be viewed as people wtih an illness, not criminals.

not to mention that im 28 years old and should be able to put whatever teh fuck I want into my own body.

 

[lwien]

Look at Portugal as a test case.

 

[Crohnie]

For the first 140 years of the history of the USA, this was the policy. Whatever substance a person wanted to consume was their business. It was less than a hundred years ago that governments decided what we could and couldn't consume legally. Just look at what prohibition has done to our country.

 

[Sickwindsor]

Just something to add.
Europe
On December 14, 2009, the Czech Republic adopted a new law that took effect on January 1, 2010, and allows a person to possess up to 15 grams of marijuana or 1.5 grams of heroin without facing criminal charges. These amounts are higher (often many times) than in any other European country, possibly making the Czech Republic the most liberal country in the European Union when it comes to drug liberalization, apart from Portugal.
Under the law, possession of more than the following amounts of illicit drugs is a misdemeanor subject to a fine equal to a parking ticket:

• Marijuana 15 grams (or five plants)
• Hashish 5 grams
• Magic mushrooms 40 pieces
• Peyote 5 plants
• LSD 5 tablets
• Ecstasy 4 tablets
• Amphetamine 2 grams
• Methamphetamine 2 grams
• Heroin 1.5 grams
• Coca 5 plants
• Cocaine 1 gram

Sale (not purchase) is still a criminal act. Possession of “larger than a small amount” of marijuana can result in a jail sentence of up to one year. For other illicit drugs, the sentence is two years. Trafficking as well as production (apart from growing up to five plants of marijuana) offenses carry stiffer sentences. The Czech Republic now joins Portugal as a European country that has decriminalized drug possession.

Amount limits of small amounts by law is:

• 40 g Hashish
• 3 g Heroin
• 5 g Cocaine
• 30-50 doses of LSD - only punished if it is used in public (with a fine, 301 - 300,000 EUR)

In Portugal. as examples.

 

[Jeff-K]

source?

 

[t-dub]

For the first 140 years of the history of the USA, this was the policy. Whatever substance a person wanted to consume was their business. It was less than a hundred years ago that governments decided what we could and couldn't consume legally. Just look at what prohibition has done to our country.

Just wait, now that we are paying for each other's health care, it will be what you can eat or drink. Or for a what if, how about what level of information you have access to or what level of privacy (control over your own life) that you are allowed. Or maybe you get a better price on your smart phone, at the new store with no price tags, than everyone else . . . The combination of the scientific dictatorship with the police state and the information grid (ie the beast) will be a significant force indeed.

 

[vapirtoo]

Yes. In a free society everything should be readily available.
An old Psych professor, Thomas Szaz, who wrote, The Myth of Mental Illness,
always preached about the evils of prohibition.

 

[Sickwindsor]

source?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_Portugal#Law_enforcement

 

[Seek]

Czech drug law seems to be paradise, but people here are the same brainwashed as everywhere else and maybe small ammount don't mean jail, but it will still shake your life a lot. I know many examples. Also i don't like how low are the limits set for psychs, they probably think they're the most dangerous because they're shedule I in US federal law...

Yes, I would vote to legalize everything, but of course with age limits and take care of drugs with unknown origin. Well, only if here was a real democracy and I had a choice of voting for something like this.

 

[Jeff-K]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_Portugal#Law_enforcement

thx!

 

[Sickwindsor]

I had a cousin visit Prauge and he said everything including herb was 10 times better than Amsertdam. However world wide the stigma is punish the producer not the user. What if it's one in the same. As a American I can stock pile unlimited guns and ammo however only x amount of herb.

What if I want to do a huge mico grow and stock pile for the rest of the year just so I don't have to mess with it year round and spend my time and money and electricity on something else? What if I just wanna buy x amount and stock pile and move to this place or that and travel freely in my country? What if I just wanna be left alone and be treated as anybody else?

 

[tikimaize]

I would vote to legalize only substances that occur naturally, in nature. No chemically manufactured or chemically altered substances. Could you imagine the shit storm if drug companies were allowed to create recreational drugs. Every time you turn around something is being recalled as it is, and that is with strict government regulations behind them.

 

[Jeff-K]

I would vote to legalize only substances that occur naturally, in nature. No chemically manufactured or chemically altered substances. Could you imagine the shit storm if drug companies were allowed to create recreational drugs. Every time you turn around something is being recalled as it is, and that is with strict government regulations behind them.

So no "research chemicals"? How about cocaine? or only coca leaves? Hashoil?

Meh, seems like a verry wrong set of rules...

Also, there can be no (or less) problems with "natural" substances?

 

[Seek]

Imo "synthetic X natural" doesn't really say anathing about safety of a substance. There are deadly natural poisons or very dangerous natural drugs. And there are safe synths too. But a RC explosion concers seems valid. The main problem with RC's is they haven't been tested well so you don't know what they will do even in short term. I believe some RCs are safe but how can you tell which?

 

[tikimaize]

Imo "synthetic X natural" doesn't really say anathing about safety of a substance. There are deadly natural poisons or very dangerous natural drugs. And there are safe synths too. But a RC explosion concers seems valid. The main problem with RC's is they haven't been tested well so you don't know what they will do even in short term. I believe some RCs are safe but how can you tell which?

That's true, there are perfectly safe synthetics out there. I just don't want to see 100s of companies getting into the recreational market just because there are no legal restrictions. There are enough problems with the prescription drugs being recalled due to bad side effects as it is.

 

[Tweek]

My vote is always about the freedom for individuals to do what they please with their own bodies, and not so much about a particular substance.

Legalizing is also a very good way to control the purity of what people are using out there. Many Heroin overdoses, for example, are not caused by taking too much Heroin and are oftentimes triggered by cutting agents in the product. Quinine is a big culprit. Open access to needle exchanges and counselling is also a benefit.

In the end, whether something is against the law or not, if someone wants to try it badly enough, they will. Education is so critical, as is putting infrastructure into place that guides people away from dirtballs and scumbags who take advantage of users be they recreational, medical or addicts.

It is difficult to educate a society when they are fearful to speak up. And I think these archaic drug laws have made people fearful enough, that they are unable to ask the questions they need to educate and protect themselves effectively.

 

[Frederick McGuire]

...Some argue the only way to curb criminal activity relating to drugs is to legalize it all. Some argue against saying that harmful substances unlike pot should be regulated...

Those 2 options are not mutually exclusive...
Any prescription drug is an example of a regulated legal drug.
Hell, alcohol is a legal regulated drug
It's kinda hard for me to think of a legal unregulated drug... maybe caffeine?

I afirm that is my right to do whatever I want with my body/brain.

I agree

I think it should all be legal, and regulated (fairly)

 

[OO]

I want to see a system where everyone can earn licenses from the public by proving they understand the risks of each drug, and sign a statement that they can lose their permission (license) if they are found to be acting in a non-responsible way.

 

[Bouldorado]

I don't think a system of licenses would work that well. Say you lose your license; what's stopping you from simply procuring your drug(s) of choice from the black market?

 

[t-dub]

I don't think a system of licenses would work that well. Say you lose your license; what's stopping you from simply procuring your drug(s) of choice from the black market?

Yeah pass a law . . . lets license EVERY activity we engage in, that will fix the problem. How about procreation? I think people who want to make and care for a human child should be held to at least the same standard. But people who want to legislate procreation are what we call eugenicists.

 

[OO]

I don't think a system of licenses would work that well. Say you lose your license; what's stopping you from simply procuring your drug(s) of choice from the black market?

Legal drugs will be far cheaper than the black market equivalent. Do you lend your car to those that don't have a license? Simply put, the responsibility of the consumption will always fall upon the consumer, this is a way to hopefully educate them, and keep the majority of people from supporting those who are not responsible. If everyone realizes that by showing a reasonable level of education and responsibility in the consumption of a drug gains you easy and affordable access to a drug, the profit incentive for black market dealers goes down, as well as the (would be drug dealing members of the) public are less likely to waste the time on such an unprofitable endeavor.

Are you likely to support someone by giving them access to a drug that you see is screwing up their lives? Neither is most of the public. Those who are will be less willing to engage in the business of such if there is little profit, like there would be if licenses were available cheaply and only required proving understanding of the drug and demonstration of responsibility (In other words, if someone is abusing the privilege (of easy access to cheap drugs and the ability to use them openly) then take it from them).

Furthermore punish those who prove time and time again they are not being responsible. (Reasonable punishment, not jail or prison unless other offenses are involved) People should be given the opportunity to lead independent lives, but if they are proving otherwise they should not be allowed to enjoy themselves at the expense of everyone else. (No, I'm not of the mindset that socialized healthcare will work with this mentality).