- Banned
- #1
Common arguments and responses against legalizing drugs:
Legalizing drugs will result in everyone doing it: this is just simply not true when you view the legal drugs in society. Despite the availability of tobacco and alcohol large numbers of people do not use them. Even larger numbers do not abuse them. Will there be an increase if legal trustworthy drugs are available for adults? Yes, I would imagine there would be and i cannot see any argument there would not be. Just like other legal drugs there will be those who try them and do not use them. there will be those who do them, like some are already, who act as responsible drug users. yes, there will be those who have problems with them, which I will address further when I discuss the need for rehab programs. Use does not mean misuse or abuse. We already have laws to criminalize destructive behavior in society, and we already have police, a justice system, rehab programs, and prisons to deal with these people in america. Right now these are funded solely by the taxes of all people in the US, and by allowing a new revenue stream for the government we can put the money spent on these drugs towards fundung these things and other society improving programs which are presently being slashed as we argue over who pays for them.
Drug users are criminals: First off this is merely true because illegal narcotics use is criminal. Many people use legal mind altering drugs like alcohol, psychoactive medications, and pain killers every day without doing any criminal actions. If you remove the legal stigma from drug use you come to the more correct argument of drug use being moral or immoral. that argument is more of a personal choice than a fact. Actions like murder and assault crimes result in the direct damage and loss of life for people. When you kill someone or punch them in the head you cause direct harm to that person that is unavoidable. It happens 100% of the time in assault and murders. A high person may commit a crime, but it is actually unlikely, given the amount of drug use, that they will do such things. We have laws to cover the instances where people cause harm to others. We also have laws like hate crime legislation which increase the penalties for people who commit regular crimes in regards to the mindset behind their actions. We have the tools to convict and punish those who commit 100% harmful acts to society, and even can make tools to increase the severity of the punishment and crime by adding in the circumstances which lead to the crime. Like I said, drugs do not cause a person to commit a crime. It may be a contributing factor we want to punish more severely when we find out they are present in criminals, but punishing those people who do not harm other people while under the influence is costly and ineffective. This is an inefficiency that does not accomplish the goal of the drug war, while lumping more expense on our overburdened government.
Drugs cause harm to society: Not directly. About the only place it can be argued that drugs cause harm to society is by funding criminal organizations and people through sales. If you take away the illegality of drugs and put drug sales into the realm of legitimate businesses you destroy that claim. Then it becomes the same choice anyone else has to participate in criminal activities, and we have laws to punish those who chose to do criminal acts. We would also have more available police, courts, jail space, and revenue to fight those people who directly harm society including those who do so under the influence.
Why legalize them since they are already illegal and we already have the organizations to fight them: First, it is not working. No matter how illegal you make it people are still going to do drugs in a recreational manner. People are still getting high, and will still seek it out. Second, public safety. With legal drugs you cripple the criminal organizations main revenue. You can also regulate safety of these drugs from ingredients to the transmission of disease by making rules to their sale and their quality. Finally, the US government simply needs the money. We are not in a position to have a surplus ion our budgets for the costs of fighting this war. For all the money we have thrown at it we have seen no results. We do spend lots of money on programs and and users. On top of that we have an industry that has shown incredible resilience and profit that we do not tap. We have all expense and no profit from it, but if we legalized it we would chop expense and get revenue in multiple ways including taxes and job creation which is something we need desperately right now.
Criminals will still sell drugs if legal: As we can see with both the tobacco and alcohol industry there are criminals who inch out profits on counterfeit or tax free products. I would imagine the same to happen if drugs were legalized. So this is probably right to an extent. However, with the legalization of drug sales we have a large burden taken off the shoulders of law enforcement and prosecution. Now those people can focus on counterfeit or tax dodging criminal strategies and underage sales. These are actually criminal things which we have far more resources to prosecute and to incarcerate real criminals.
What about the kids: When legal we can regulate these industries like we do with alcohol and tobacco and prohibit sales to minors. Minors already get drugs, and this will allow the us to weaken and limit criminal presence while having resources to track and prosecute people who sell to children harshly. Present dealers not only do not ask for ID, but also employ youth in sales and other activities that are far worse. This allows us to focus on those people much more directly and efficiently. I have also noticed that our present legitimate warning about tobacco and alcohol use to have an effect on the usage by the youth. We would have extra money to warn youth about the dangers of drug use, and to hopefully provide some very real reasons for kids to not use drugs.
Drugs are bad: This solutions puts the choice to remain sober in the hands of those who want to. They are out there, and they are not going away. Just like some humans look to an altered state of perception, others find this to not be something they enjoy or want to participate in. We would have the money to educate people on the dangers of drug use. Our war on the abuse of drugs would have far more financial backing from the increased revenue, and that can be spent on rehab, PSAs, and the cost of medical problems that result from abuse. It would also lower health problems by allowing people to seek medical advice on how to do drugs in the most harmless fashion they can. This could actually save lives through things like medical tests that would get early detection of developing health problems, and by allowing medical professionals to diagnose potential deadly personal reactions to specific drugs which clearly result in catastrophic disaster with uneducated use. Like I said, drugs are already used. Wouldn't it be nice to have a professional medical opinion that might tell you of allergies or physical weakness which might result in immediate injuries on use?
I may add more reasoning as more arguments are presented, but I will conclude at this point. The recreational and medical use of mind altering substances has been around for a long time. It is clear it is not going away. From the results of alcohol prohibition to the use of illegal narcotics despite the harsh criminal penalties designed to punish and deter t6he use of these substances. Every year criminals make billions from this industry that they use to bring real crimes to our streets. Every day people use drugs without ever endangering th health and safety of society. It is not going away no matter how hard we fight against it.
Worst yet is we spend a lot of money on the incarceration of users who have never harmed another person by their use of illegal narcotics. We have government funding of rehab programs and anti-drug PSAs. There is an industry out there despite every bit of punishment and bullshit we throw at it still is in demand. This is an industry that has no sociel revenue, yet we have all the expenses.
In a real war there is a tactic called siege. This tactics is to limit the resources of an opposing army from reaching them, and to weakened their offense, defense, and to help the attacking army to get a surrender or opening for victory. this is a very real tactic of war. this tactic is a siege tactic on criminals. It reduces their resources and ability to do criminal activities while it captures revenue and support for the attacking forces. If you believe in a real war on crime this is the tactic that makes most sense. It cripples the major revenue of the criminal organizations while putting more resources in the hands of the attackers. It allows the attackers to have more revenue to cover their costs and to overcome the effects of the enemy and their damage. Finally, in a time when our government is weakening, and with that so does their opposition of drugs, it increases our income wile giving a substantial blow to criminals we have to fight for the safety of our society. You will notice I have never said the use of drugs should be encouraged, nor that the concerns of those who see the dangers of drugs should be silenced. Instead i have tried to show a better way which not only helps out in our present problem, but also would fund those messages that one does not need drugs, the dangers of drugs, and the attempts te rehab people who already do them with a large and profitable economic plan. It is not a perfect solution, but in the area of drugs i do not know what is. We already pay for the negatives, and perhaps it is time for those who participate in this activity to pay their own way through taxation rather than putting the burden on everyone.
Legalizing drugs will result in everyone doing it: this is just simply not true when you view the legal drugs in society. Despite the availability of tobacco and alcohol large numbers of people do not use them. Even larger numbers do not abuse them. Will there be an increase if legal trustworthy drugs are available for adults? Yes, I would imagine there would be and i cannot see any argument there would not be. Just like other legal drugs there will be those who try them and do not use them. there will be those who do them, like some are already, who act as responsible drug users. yes, there will be those who have problems with them, which I will address further when I discuss the need for rehab programs. Use does not mean misuse or abuse. We already have laws to criminalize destructive behavior in society, and we already have police, a justice system, rehab programs, and prisons to deal with these people in america. Right now these are funded solely by the taxes of all people in the US, and by allowing a new revenue stream for the government we can put the money spent on these drugs towards fundung these things and other society improving programs which are presently being slashed as we argue over who pays for them.
Drug users are criminals: First off this is merely true because illegal narcotics use is criminal. Many people use legal mind altering drugs like alcohol, psychoactive medications, and pain killers every day without doing any criminal actions. If you remove the legal stigma from drug use you come to the more correct argument of drug use being moral or immoral. that argument is more of a personal choice than a fact. Actions like murder and assault crimes result in the direct damage and loss of life for people. When you kill someone or punch them in the head you cause direct harm to that person that is unavoidable. It happens 100% of the time in assault and murders. A high person may commit a crime, but it is actually unlikely, given the amount of drug use, that they will do such things. We have laws to cover the instances where people cause harm to others. We also have laws like hate crime legislation which increase the penalties for people who commit regular crimes in regards to the mindset behind their actions. We have the tools to convict and punish those who commit 100% harmful acts to society, and even can make tools to increase the severity of the punishment and crime by adding in the circumstances which lead to the crime. Like I said, drugs do not cause a person to commit a crime. It may be a contributing factor we want to punish more severely when we find out they are present in criminals, but punishing those people who do not harm other people while under the influence is costly and ineffective. This is an inefficiency that does not accomplish the goal of the drug war, while lumping more expense on our overburdened government.
Drugs cause harm to society: Not directly. About the only place it can be argued that drugs cause harm to society is by funding criminal organizations and people through sales. If you take away the illegality of drugs and put drug sales into the realm of legitimate businesses you destroy that claim. Then it becomes the same choice anyone else has to participate in criminal activities, and we have laws to punish those who chose to do criminal acts. We would also have more available police, courts, jail space, and revenue to fight those people who directly harm society including those who do so under the influence.
Why legalize them since they are already illegal and we already have the organizations to fight them: First, it is not working. No matter how illegal you make it people are still going to do drugs in a recreational manner. People are still getting high, and will still seek it out. Second, public safety. With legal drugs you cripple the criminal organizations main revenue. You can also regulate safety of these drugs from ingredients to the transmission of disease by making rules to their sale and their quality. Finally, the US government simply needs the money. We are not in a position to have a surplus ion our budgets for the costs of fighting this war. For all the money we have thrown at it we have seen no results. We do spend lots of money on programs and and users. On top of that we have an industry that has shown incredible resilience and profit that we do not tap. We have all expense and no profit from it, but if we legalized it we would chop expense and get revenue in multiple ways including taxes and job creation which is something we need desperately right now.
Criminals will still sell drugs if legal: As we can see with both the tobacco and alcohol industry there are criminals who inch out profits on counterfeit or tax free products. I would imagine the same to happen if drugs were legalized. So this is probably right to an extent. However, with the legalization of drug sales we have a large burden taken off the shoulders of law enforcement and prosecution. Now those people can focus on counterfeit or tax dodging criminal strategies and underage sales. These are actually criminal things which we have far more resources to prosecute and to incarcerate real criminals.
What about the kids: When legal we can regulate these industries like we do with alcohol and tobacco and prohibit sales to minors. Minors already get drugs, and this will allow the us to weaken and limit criminal presence while having resources to track and prosecute people who sell to children harshly. Present dealers not only do not ask for ID, but also employ youth in sales and other activities that are far worse. This allows us to focus on those people much more directly and efficiently. I have also noticed that our present legitimate warning about tobacco and alcohol use to have an effect on the usage by the youth. We would have extra money to warn youth about the dangers of drug use, and to hopefully provide some very real reasons for kids to not use drugs.
Drugs are bad: This solutions puts the choice to remain sober in the hands of those who want to. They are out there, and they are not going away. Just like some humans look to an altered state of perception, others find this to not be something they enjoy or want to participate in. We would have the money to educate people on the dangers of drug use. Our war on the abuse of drugs would have far more financial backing from the increased revenue, and that can be spent on rehab, PSAs, and the cost of medical problems that result from abuse. It would also lower health problems by allowing people to seek medical advice on how to do drugs in the most harmless fashion they can. This could actually save lives through things like medical tests that would get early detection of developing health problems, and by allowing medical professionals to diagnose potential deadly personal reactions to specific drugs which clearly result in catastrophic disaster with uneducated use. Like I said, drugs are already used. Wouldn't it be nice to have a professional medical opinion that might tell you of allergies or physical weakness which might result in immediate injuries on use?
I may add more reasoning as more arguments are presented, but I will conclude at this point. The recreational and medical use of mind altering substances has been around for a long time. It is clear it is not going away. From the results of alcohol prohibition to the use of illegal narcotics despite the harsh criminal penalties designed to punish and deter t6he use of these substances. Every year criminals make billions from this industry that they use to bring real crimes to our streets. Every day people use drugs without ever endangering th health and safety of society. It is not going away no matter how hard we fight against it.
Worst yet is we spend a lot of money on the incarceration of users who have never harmed another person by their use of illegal narcotics. We have government funding of rehab programs and anti-drug PSAs. There is an industry out there despite every bit of punishment and bullshit we throw at it still is in demand. This is an industry that has no sociel revenue, yet we have all the expenses.
In a real war there is a tactic called siege. This tactics is to limit the resources of an opposing army from reaching them, and to weakened their offense, defense, and to help the attacking army to get a surrender or opening for victory. this is a very real tactic of war. this tactic is a siege tactic on criminals. It reduces their resources and ability to do criminal activities while it captures revenue and support for the attacking forces. If you believe in a real war on crime this is the tactic that makes most sense. It cripples the major revenue of the criminal organizations while putting more resources in the hands of the attackers. It allows the attackers to have more revenue to cover their costs and to overcome the effects of the enemy and their damage. Finally, in a time when our government is weakening, and with that so does their opposition of drugs, it increases our income wile giving a substantial blow to criminals we have to fight for the safety of our society. You will notice I have never said the use of drugs should be encouraged, nor that the concerns of those who see the dangers of drugs should be silenced. Instead i have tried to show a better way which not only helps out in our present problem, but also would fund those messages that one does not need drugs, the dangers of drugs, and the attempts te rehab people who already do them with a large and profitable economic plan. It is not a perfect solution, but in the area of drugs i do not know what is. We already pay for the negatives, and perhaps it is time for those who participate in this activity to pay their own way through taxation rather than putting the burden on everyone.
