They lost the war on drugs

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Awrrr
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#1686412 12-Dec-2016 10:59

Here is yet another item that makes one question the intelligence, leadership, courage and maybe even the morals of our so-called 'leaders'. I find this kind of willful stupidity both enraging and depressing. What a load of gutless dishonest morons!

http://www.radionz.co.nz/programmes/from-zero/story/201827085/from-zero-partying-hard

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SepticSceptic

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#1686609 12-Dec-2016 17:13

Crazy narrow mindedness - prosecuting doctors who want to help minimise the effects of adulterated drugs.

Like adding methanol to ethanol. Tastes great, but hideous after effects.

Thanks for the podcast link though

sdav

846 posts

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#1703279 14-Jan-2017 20:15

I would treat domestically consumed drugs on a case by case (or drug by drug) health bases while still having Customs stopping them at the border and nailing the organised criminals.

Alcohol related offending is ridiculous and a huge waste of government resources. I'm guessing offending rates for alcohol dropped after prohibition ended but that's a digression.

There is more and more evidence linking alcohol to cancers. Are we a few years away from treating alcohol as we currently do tobacco? Personally, I wouldn't mind it. Most people would hate it. Same thing with drugs, do we legalise and then in a few decades go, wow it harms people, lets raise taxes to stop people taking them so much. Lets start another quit line, lets have drug ban areas much like liquor ban areas now etc.

The black market will never go away. They will A: move on to a new commodity (who knows what) or B:commission fake cheap alternatives.

The problem with this whole debate is that humans are involved. Humans affect every part of this debate from the user who has never had a bad trip to the mother whose son lives in a decrepit state waiting for his next hit, to the politician who's too scared to lose their job to the lobbyist whose job it is to scare the politician.

Geektastic

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#1703321 14-Jan-2017 22:38

sdav:

I would treat domestically consumed drugs on a case by case (or drug by drug) health bases while still having Customs stopping them at the border and nailing the organised criminals.

Alcohol related offending is ridiculous and a huge waste of government resources. I'm guessing offending rates for alcohol dropped after prohibition ended but that's a digression.

There is more and more evidence linking alcohol to cancers. Are we a few years away from treating alcohol as we currently do tobacco? Personally, I wouldn't mind it. Most people would hate it. Same thing with drugs, do we legalise and then in a few decades go, wow it harms people, lets raise taxes to stop people taking them so much. Lets start another quit line, lets have drug ban areas much like liquor ban areas now etc.

The black market will never go away. They will A: move on to a new commodity (who knows what) or B:commission fake cheap alternatives.

The problem with this whole debate is that humans are involved. Humans affect every part of this debate from the user who has never had a bad trip to the mother whose son lives in a decrepit state waiting for his next hit, to the politician who's too scared to lose their job to the lobbyist whose job it is to scare the politician.

Politicians do come up with some bizarre ideas.

Another example of their "brilliance" is a ban on importing knives with two sharp edges (cos they must be twice as dangerous...) without a Police permit - yet no ban whatsoever on a NZ knife maker producing and selling the same thing.....

Pumpedd

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#1703340 15-Jan-2017 00:12

Tobacco is fast becoming the latest black market drug...

Education will always be the key..not prohibition.

riahon

946 posts

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#1703351 15-Jan-2017 07:39

Just watched "How drugs work" on Netflix. It confirmed my stance that mj should not be decriminalised and anyone who thinks so is just blowing carcinagenic smoke out of their lungs.

Rikkitic

Awrrr
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#1703391 15-Jan-2017 09:42

No-one here is claiming drugs are good for you. Just that banning them has been tried, hasn't worked, can't work, and only creates more problems than the drugs themselves (think gangs, crime, expense and waste of prosecuting and imprisoning people just for using them, etcetera).

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JimmyH

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#1703417 15-Jan-2017 10:37

riahon: Just watched "How drugs work" on Netflix. It confirmed my stance that mj should not be decriminalised and anyone who thinks so is just blowing carcinagenic smoke out of their lungs.

I think this debate is going round in circles a wee bit now. But you seem to be assuming that people who are arguing for legalisation don't think drugs are harmful. In most cases, that isn't true.

Most of the people who have been posting here are pretty clear that recreational drug use can carry material health risks, and they aren't advocating that drugs are good or harm free.

The key question is which having them legal, decriminialised, or illegal (there are three different things, decriminalised does not always mean legal) causes the least harm.

Firstly, there is a technical question:

1. is there a likelihood of increased consumption and harm (including health costs etc) if drugs are legalised; and, if so

2. does the harm from this outweigh the harm that results from keeping them illegal (keeping gangs in business, lost tax, stigma causing people not to seek help, random substances being sold with no quality assurance, police costs, corrections costs, lives ruined by criminal convictions)?

Secondly, there is a moral question - should adults be able make decisions for themselves even if this means incurring risk? This is relevant to drugs, but also to lots of other things as well (playing dangerous sports, scuba diving, working without scaffolding).

It's not a black and white issue. It's very much an "on balance" one, weighing up the pros and cons.

JimsonWeed

126 posts

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#1704306 16-Jan-2017 17:26

JimmyH:

riahon: Just watched "How drugs work" on Netflix. It confirmed my stance that mj should not be decriminalised and anyone who thinks so is just blowing carcinagenic smoke out of their lungs.

I think this debate is going round in circles a wee bit now. But you seem to be assuming that people who are arguing for legalisation don't think drugs are harmful. In most cases, that isn't true.

Most of the people who have been posting here are pretty clear that recreational drug use can carry material health risks, and they aren't advocating that drugs are good or harm free.

The key question is which having them legal, decriminialised, or illegal (there are three different things, decriminalised does not always mean legal) causes the least harm.

Firstly, there is a technical question:

1. is there a likelihood of increased consumption and harm (including health costs etc) if drugs are legalised; and, if so

2. does the harm from this outweigh the harm that results from keeping them illegal (keeping gangs in business, lost tax, stigma causing people not to seek help, random substances being sold with no quality assurance, police costs, corrections costs, lives ruined by criminal convictions)?

Secondly, there is a moral question - should adults be able make decisions for themselves even if this means incurring risk? This is relevant to drugs, but also to lots of other things as well (playing dangerous sports, scuba diving, working without scaffolding).

It's not a black and white issue. It's very much an "on balance" one, weighing up the pros and cons.

Apply those questions retroactively to alcohol, tobacco, and caffeine. What do you come up with? If tobacco was outlawed tomorrow, do you think there would be a black market for it? Likewise, tobacco and caffeine. Bear in mind, a LOT of things contain caffeine in them, including plain old aspirin.

You're right about the moral question but, can you combine the moral question of self-control to that of the question of impact on society? One can argue that we should be able to do as we see fit but, where is the line in the sand?

BTW, I'm an advocate for legalisation or, the at least the decriminalisation of certain drugs. Kill off the black market and you reduce the violent crimes. Then all you are left with are the social impacts of those decisions. Unfortunately, the knuckleheads selling weed in the US for the same price as the black market value, are only hurting themselves in the long run. They entice black market competition.

JimmyH

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#1704332 16-Jan-2017 18:53

Absolutely right.

And the answer won't be the same for each substance. Plus, they may well be inconsistent for substances with deeply-rooted cultural traditions (alcohol and coffee).

Balancing the pros and cons is why I favour, for instance, legalising marijuana but not meth (incidentally, I don't and never have used either), keeping tobacco and alcohol legal (and I'm not a smoker, but do like the odd craft beer or wine).

But if they ever ban coffee, I will be first in the queue at whatever the caffeinated equivalent of the local tinny house turns out to be. I do drink coffee. A lot!

Ultimately, I think the bar for harm to others has to be set quite high to ban something for adults. I tend to think that the default should be that adults can make their own decisions about what they do to themselves, and there should be a pretty overwhelming case for serious harm to others before the government takes that freedom away.

I don't objectively care if you enjoy tobacco and are prepared to risk cancer. I do care if you enjoy meth and have a material probability of killing me or someone else in a psychotic rage. Hence how I got to the position above.

gzt

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#1704911 17-Jan-2017 21:15

riahon: Just watched "How drugs work" on Netflix. It confirmed my stance that mj should not be decriminalised and anyone who thinks so is just blowing carcinagenic smoke out of their lungs.

I just watched the same. Only two episodes, marijuana and ecstasy. Both show predominantly young people. Both are a good intro to the dangers and effects and young people should definitely watch those.

They are British and some of it will be a bit irrelevant to young people here and hard to connect with.

Drug (including Alcohol) education is urgently needed in NZ.

NZ is a lot smaller [and therefore less anonymous] and it's kind of unlikely that level of candid discussion would occur here but I hope someone gives it a go and creates something useful on a similar basis.

blakamin

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#1704915 17-Jan-2017 21:30

You what I think?

Crap like THIS could be stopped with pill testing, but "war on drugs" to keep some religious a-hole voters happy.

Three people die in Melbourne, 20 hospitalised.

I'm soooo effing angry.

gzt

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#1704922 17-Jan-2017 21:49

JimmyH: Ultimately, I think the bar for harm to others has to be set quite high to ban something for adults. I tend to think that the default should be that adults can make their own decisions about what they do to themselves, and there should be a pretty overwhelming case for serious harm to others before the government takes that freedom away.

I don't objectively care if you enjoy tobacco and are prepared to risk cancer. I do care if you enjoy meth and have a material probability of killing me or someone else in a psychotic rage. Hence how I got to the position above.

In general I tend to agree. I particularly think the basis of application of convictions for these things is somewhat arbitrary.

In the sense that a ridiculous proportion of people are using these things, but only a small subset of users have a very high chance of conviction for using.

A huge proportion of those are the police investigating something else entirely or doing something else entirely and finding a user of drugs in possession is just a coincidence and not what the police are out there for. For the vast majority it's really just a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Rikkitic

Awrrr
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#1714090 1-Feb-2017 17:30

Another obscenity from our exceptionally useless Associate Health Minister Peter Dunne, who must be too busy rearranging the seasons, or fluffing his hair, or poking a hole in water, or whatever it is he does.

http://thewireless.co.nz/articles/this-cannabis-product-won-t-even-get-you-high-so-why-is-it-illegal

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