I put this here because it was getting way off topic at the other board.
In general any large scale study that touches on rates of addiction, 1999 IOM had a comparrison section, shows that rates of addiction for most drugs actually aren't that high. I recall alcohol being basically as addictive as cocaine, however no one would argue the problems of alcohol would justify the known problems of prohibiting it. What's more some of the more heavily prosecuted drugs like marijuana have extremely low rates of addiction, lower than most legal over the counter drugs. The last study I read had marijuana around 8%, significantly below most levels of addiction for most legal drugs.
Before prohibition doctors, lawyers and all other professions had people who were fully functional, did their jobs, were productive members of society, and also addicted to opium or heroin. When the behavior is criminalized though, and addicts have to pay black market prices and associate with violent criminals to continue their addiction, that's when problems arise. Some people have problems and can't funtion and do drugs. However, they are not the majority. Nor does their behavior justify throwing all users in prison or even forcing them into rehab.
As for health care costs, you can blame the government for forcing you to foot the bill by making addiction treatment required coverage, when it's not technically an insurable risk, and forcing providers to offer it to all people whether the need it or not or want it or not. Further, they force you to pay for it in government provided health care too.
Were insurance companies allowed to discriminate and place people in their proper risk classes you would not have to pay for someone else's treatment, because companies would be free to not offer it or only offer it to those who request it, in which case the premium cost is paid by that group and not you or I.
Were the government to get out of the business of criminalizing lifestyle choices and legalize the drugs, most of the people you're paying to put through government sponsored rehab would be living relatively normal lives, as most did before prohibition.
Furthermore, prohibition has more practical problems. In any one group of users, even if the majority of users are a problem to society there is always a group that isn't. However if mere possession, use and sale are made illegal all people are swept up in the prohibition net. This means people are unjustly arrested, fined and imprisoned.
Prohibition spreads already thin law enforcement budgets even thinner, and the alure of assett forfeiture makes law enforcement efforts gravitate towards the crimes that have the biggest future payday for their individual departments. There's not much money in solving rapes, murders and robberies. There is however in busting drug rings. You get a misallocation of police resources because of inentives to solve some crimes before or instead of others.
Prohibition creates a black market and all the problems associated with it, like violent crime. Many, many people are addicted to over the counter a prescription medications, but the providers of those medications are not gunning each other down in the street as the providers of illegal drugs do.
Prohibition puts drugs outside the reach of quality control regulations, and gives users of tainted products no legal or civil recourse should they use an improperly manufactured product. If your aspirin is contaminated you can sue Bayer and possibly even level criminal charges if they are warranted. If your cocaine is contaminated, you're screwed and what's more, the dealer is most likely still out there selling tainted products. Even if the dealer gets nabbed, the manufacturer probably won't.
Prohibition and the drug war, as in other wars, sacrifices truth for propaganda. This means little correct and true information is available for most people, especially users. This leads to poor decision making, on the part of users and policy makers and the general public. It fosters hysteria where none is needed. It leads to an escalating war of propaganda, usually a moral equivilancy of drugs with pure evil, which leads to a no cost is too much attitude. Since eventually the prohibitionists are fighting evil itself, whether or not the drugs in question truly warrant such harsh restrictions and punishments is no longer a consideration. This is not surprising since sin taxes and prohibition stem basically from the evengelical desire to create a kingdom of heaven on Earth.
Prohibition does not address demand for drugs. Without addressing demand, supply will always flow, legally or illegally. This leads to the black market and all the problems listed above. No prohibition in the history of the modern world has ever been successful, ever. The fight against evil, the no cost too high attitude and the lack of correct information leads to an ever escalating war with ever escalating costs, where small battles are won but the war is forever being lost. A policy Vietnam basically. A perpetual war for perpetual sobriety that will never be won. But it will always be used to justify an ever inflating budget for prisons and law enforcement. It will be used to erode the rights of all citizens as law enforcement demands and gets more and more power over the population in general. And the problems it creates will be used for an escalation of the same policies. It's circular reasoning at its worst.
If someone does drugs and drives a car, it's the government's business. If they rob a home or business to support drugs, or more to the fact for any reason, it's the government's business. If an addict's behavior provably harms another human being it's the government's business. If an addict neglects their kids because of their addiction it's the government's business. If they do not however, if a user or an addict is peacefully making their way through society in every other way and simply occassionaly puffs a joint, snorts some coke, shoots some heroin, uses some steroids, it's not the government's business at all. Even if they mainline themselves into their own grave, it's not the government's business at all.
That's the legitimate definition of freedom, where your right to engage in any behavior you wish is only limited when it interfere's with another's equal rights. Aesthetic critiques of lifestyle choices and substance usage are not the makings of proper laws in a free society.
This disagrees with facts on the matter though. Most users of drugs with heavy phsycoligical effects decrease their use as they enter into their thirties. Some stick with it, most don't. If they are addicted they generally settle into a maintenance dose schedule.The rec drugs you mentioned have a characteristic that differentiates them from AAS. They have the propensity (and in the case of heroin, the extreme likelihood) of causing physical addiction. Addiction makes "responsible" use of these drugs less likely as time goes on.
This is also incorrect. Not many users develop a tolerance to marijuana for one, which is one of the reasons quite a few doctors argue it is habit forming but not phsycially addictive. Most people level off with usage levels, and yes a few keep going for more and more. It's not the majority though. Most health problems can also be avoided in almost all cases. With specific regard to marijuana the active ingredients can be vaporized without combusting the substance, or eaten, which completely eliminates carcinogenic effects. As with steroids, risks exist but are overblown.This addiction also causes long term use in increasing amounts, causing increasing health problems.
In general any large scale study that touches on rates of addiction, 1999 IOM had a comparrison section, shows that rates of addiction for most drugs actually aren't that high. I recall alcohol being basically as addictive as cocaine, however no one would argue the problems of alcohol would justify the known problems of prohibiting it. What's more some of the more heavily prosecuted drugs like marijuana have extremely low rates of addiction, lower than most legal over the counter drugs. The last study I read had marijuana around 8%, significantly below most levels of addiction for most legal drugs.
This is the result of prohibition, not drug use. The vast majority of users settle into a maintenance dose pattern, basically taking enough so they don't feel like crap but can also function without going through withdrawal. The founder of Johns Hopkins was an opium addict if I recall correctly.Since junkies and cokeheads often end up unemployed (and cokeheads, when unemployed end up being crackheads, since crack is so much cheaper), the taxpayers foot the bill.
Before prohibition doctors, lawyers and all other professions had people who were fully functional, did their jobs, were productive members of society, and also addicted to opium or heroin. When the behavior is criminalized though, and addicts have to pay black market prices and associate with violent criminals to continue their addiction, that's when problems arise. Some people have problems and can't funtion and do drugs. However, they are not the majority. Nor does their behavior justify throwing all users in prison or even forcing them into rehab.
See above. This is the result of the black market, not the drug use. You can't logically blame the problems caused by prohibition, they did not exist to any great extent before prohibition, on the drugs.Not to mention the fact that the addiction often drives other criminal behavior, such as robberies and muggings.
Those costs are largely caused by prohibition. There was no organizaed crime involvement in the manufacture and distribution of narcotics before prohibition. There were no gang drug wars before prohibition. There were few if any criminal addicts before prohibition because the price of the drugs was affordable for almost anyone, even a bum. Addicts did not have to associate with criminals to get their drugs.Is prohibition very effective? No. But given the dangers of the hardcore rec drugs and their cost to society over the long run, legalizing them is not an option.
As for health care costs, you can blame the government for forcing you to foot the bill by making addiction treatment required coverage, when it's not technically an insurable risk, and forcing providers to offer it to all people whether the need it or not or want it or not. Further, they force you to pay for it in government provided health care too.
Were insurance companies allowed to discriminate and place people in their proper risk classes you would not have to pay for someone else's treatment, because companies would be free to not offer it or only offer it to those who request it, in which case the premium cost is paid by that group and not you or I.
Were the government to get out of the business of criminalizing lifestyle choices and legalize the drugs, most of the people you're paying to put through government sponsored rehab would be living relatively normal lives, as most did before prohibition.
Furthermore, prohibition has more practical problems. In any one group of users, even if the majority of users are a problem to society there is always a group that isn't. However if mere possession, use and sale are made illegal all people are swept up in the prohibition net. This means people are unjustly arrested, fined and imprisoned.
Prohibition spreads already thin law enforcement budgets even thinner, and the alure of assett forfeiture makes law enforcement efforts gravitate towards the crimes that have the biggest future payday for their individual departments. There's not much money in solving rapes, murders and robberies. There is however in busting drug rings. You get a misallocation of police resources because of inentives to solve some crimes before or instead of others.
Prohibition creates a black market and all the problems associated with it, like violent crime. Many, many people are addicted to over the counter a prescription medications, but the providers of those medications are not gunning each other down in the street as the providers of illegal drugs do.
Prohibition puts drugs outside the reach of quality control regulations, and gives users of tainted products no legal or civil recourse should they use an improperly manufactured product. If your aspirin is contaminated you can sue Bayer and possibly even level criminal charges if they are warranted. If your cocaine is contaminated, you're screwed and what's more, the dealer is most likely still out there selling tainted products. Even if the dealer gets nabbed, the manufacturer probably won't.
Prohibition and the drug war, as in other wars, sacrifices truth for propaganda. This means little correct and true information is available for most people, especially users. This leads to poor decision making, on the part of users and policy makers and the general public. It fosters hysteria where none is needed. It leads to an escalating war of propaganda, usually a moral equivilancy of drugs with pure evil, which leads to a no cost is too much attitude. Since eventually the prohibitionists are fighting evil itself, whether or not the drugs in question truly warrant such harsh restrictions and punishments is no longer a consideration. This is not surprising since sin taxes and prohibition stem basically from the evengelical desire to create a kingdom of heaven on Earth.
Prohibition does not address demand for drugs. Without addressing demand, supply will always flow, legally or illegally. This leads to the black market and all the problems listed above. No prohibition in the history of the modern world has ever been successful, ever. The fight against evil, the no cost too high attitude and the lack of correct information leads to an ever escalating war with ever escalating costs, where small battles are won but the war is forever being lost. A policy Vietnam basically. A perpetual war for perpetual sobriety that will never be won. But it will always be used to justify an ever inflating budget for prisons and law enforcement. It will be used to erode the rights of all citizens as law enforcement demands and gets more and more power over the population in general. And the problems it creates will be used for an escalation of the same policies. It's circular reasoning at its worst.
If someone does drugs and drives a car, it's the government's business. If they rob a home or business to support drugs, or more to the fact for any reason, it's the government's business. If an addict's behavior provably harms another human being it's the government's business. If an addict neglects their kids because of their addiction it's the government's business. If they do not however, if a user or an addict is peacefully making their way through society in every other way and simply occassionaly puffs a joint, snorts some coke, shoots some heroin, uses some steroids, it's not the government's business at all. Even if they mainline themselves into their own grave, it's not the government's business at all.
That's the legitimate definition of freedom, where your right to engage in any behavior you wish is only limited when it interfere's with another's equal rights. Aesthetic critiques of lifestyle choices and substance usage are not the makings of proper laws in a free society.