In a perfect world people should be free to take it or leave it.
I believe that if everything were legalized, the unintended consequences could be horrific.
Legalizing pot?
What about all the second and THIRD hand smoke?/
There would also be a lot of self cleaning of the gene pool.
I don’t think you’d have the same negative consequences in terms of second and third hand smoke as tobacco. There has not been a single instance of cancer attributed soley to marijuana use, in addition to this, the vast majority of medical users vaporize their medicine so as to not inhale any tars or resins.
The one thing I never see mentioned in these posts concerning legalization of mind-altering and addictive narcotics: ‘legalization’ confers on these products a tacit public approval of their use.
Let me give you an example of what that might entail. When I lived in Spain the personal possession of marijuana and hashish was decriminalized (1982).
The result was a crime wave. Children as young as 7 and 8 years old were breaking into vehicles and residences to steal cash and/or property to fence - all in an effort to get money to purchase pot and hash. There was even one case I personally knew of where a gang of children beat a man to the ground and stole his wallet. Of course the law stated only adults were to possess and use said drugs, but the reality was considerably different than the original intent.
I cannot imagine the U.S. population legalizing heroin. The misery that would cause - and it doesn’t just affect the individual addict but their whole family - would be unfathomable. This will only result in tragedy.