So, as a kindly PSA, here it is: the bell curve is real. Depending on the data set being analyzed, it accurately depicts the distribution of characteristics/results across a continuum. With respect to drugs, there will always be a certain percentage who will never partake given any circumstances, and another segment that will always indulge regardless of penalties.
It's the latter category that becomes the issue at hand: the chronic abuser, the ones who create a drag on law & society. Society has two options, both which cost time and money. Once you understand that there's no free lunch or alternative to avoiding the bill, then the discussion can focus on preferences.
Here it is: (a) spend $billions on the criminal justice system; or (b) spend $billions on lost productivity and outreach programs; the total tally will be approximately the same. Option A keeps the abusers off the streets, but compromises basic civil rights and corrupts the very notion of liberty. Option B allows the abusers to congregate in public, creating an eyesore, diminishing property values, and creating a possible public nuisance/local crime problems.
Which one we want/choose should try to eliminate any artificial moral component. Already, we're getting posters complaining about homeless panhandlers; that's the cost of legalization. The cost of prohibition is no-knock raids, asset seizure/confiscation and a huge prison complex.
Up until just 100 years ago, societies since the dawn of time have had to deal with some percentage of the population basically committing "living" suicide. That is, having no purpose or intention of doing anything other than doing nothing, all the while under the influence of some substance. It's human nature - they drew the bad genes.
How we, the actively living, choose to deal with it is simply cosmetic, not fundamental.
kindly psa-
Option C
Private property and individual responsibility.
You damage me or my property, you are responsible to make things whole. Debtors prison/Workhouse for those that cannot.
I can choose who to hire. You’re on drugs? Good bye.
It’s actually quite simple.
We had a problem with vagrants long before legalization of pot.