Alcohol and drugs are mutually exclusive. We tried banning alcohol once, remember? People can drink without the goal of mind alteration (ie, getting drunk)
Just because one is harmful doesn’t justify adding another harm. Don’t we have enough cultural/behavioral problems without adding more? Legalization isn’t the answer, all it would do is create more dependencies and addictions and a host of political problems.
We did fine without dope in the 60s. Then came the 70s and all the associated problems. Ban it for good, get rid of it. It’s simply not worth the costs.
Only by the artificial construct of legality. Pharmacologically, alcohol qualifies by every objective measure as a psychoactive drug.
Yes - remember how it failed in pretty much the same ways that pot criminalization is failing?
People can drink without the goal of mind alteration
When that drug was illegal, people drank almost exclusively with the goal of mind alteration.
Did you read my post? Yes, we tried banning alcohol once, and it created the same problems that banning other psychoactive substances has: deaths due to impurities in the alcohol supply because it was being produced by unregulated criminals, rather than legitimate businesses regulated for product safety; the trade going into the hands of increasingly ruthless criminal gangs as the level of enforcement increased; eroding respect for the rule of law by making criminals of otherwise law-abiding citizens who frequented illegal establishments to get their drinks.
We were “without dope” in the 60’s? Which 60’s was that the 1660’s?
We’ve been trying “bann[ing] it for good”, and when the “ban” by Federal fiat didn’t work, we’ve shredded the Constitution to chase dealers with no-knock warrants, “criminal forfeiture” laws that seize even innocent people’s property without benefit of due process if its “associated with drugs”, made drug crimes into scarlet letters that prevent people from taking out student loans, instituted urine tests to toss even casual users out of jobs,...
“Ban if for good, get rid of it,” is the same sort of policy prescription the left usually makes: an idea that sounds good but depends on changing human nature or the laws of economics to have any chance of success.