Posted on 05/18/2002 7:44:57 PM PDT by LarryLied
One measure of a good society is whether its individual members have the autonomy to do as they choose in respects that principally concern only them. The debate about heroin, cocaine and marijuana touches precisely on this. In my submission, a society in which such substances are legal and available is a good society not because drugs are in themselves good, but because the autonomy of those who wish to use them is respected. For other and broader reasons, many of them practical, such a society will be a better one.
I have never taken drugs other than alcohol, nicotine, caffeine and medicinal drugs. Of these, I have for many years not taken the two former. I think it is inimical to a good life to be dependent for pleasure and personal fulfilment on substances which gloss or distort reality and interfere with rationality; and yet I believe that heroin, cocaine, marijuana, ecstasy and cognates of these should be legal and available in exactly the same way as nicotine and alcohol.
In logic is no difference between legal and currently illegal drugs. Both are used for pleasure, relief from stress or anxiety, and 'holidaying' from normal life, and both are, in different degrees, dangerous to health. Given this, consistent policy must do one of two things: criminalise the use of nicotine and alcohol, in order to bring them in line with currently illegal substances; or legalise currently illegal substances under the same kinds of regime that govern nicotine and alcohol.
On civil liberties grounds the latter policy is preferable because there is no justification in a good society for policing behaviour unless, in the form of rape, murder, theft, riot or fraud, it is intrinsically damaging to the social fabric, and involves harm to unwilling third parties. Good law protects in these respects; bad law tries to coerce people into behaving according to norms chosen by people who claim to know and to do better than those for whom they legislate. But the imposition of such norms is an injustice. By all means let the disapprovers argue and exhort; giving them the power to coerce and punish as well is unacceptable.
Arguments to the effect that drugs should be kept illegal to protect children fall by the same token. On these grounds, nicotine and alcohol should be banned too. In fact there is greater danger to children from the illegality of drugs.
Almost everyone who wishes to try drugs, does so; almost everyone who wishes to make use of drugs does it irrespective of their legal status. Opponents say legalisation will lead to unrestrained use and abuse. Yet the evidence is that where laws have been relaxed there is little variation in frequency or kind of use.
The classic example is Prohibition in the USA during the 1920s. (The hysteria over alcohol extended to other drugs; heroin was made illegal in the USA in 1924, on the basis of poor research on its health risks and its alleged propensity to cause insanity and criminal behaviour.) Prohibition created a huge criminal industry. The end of Prohibition did not result in a frenzy of drinking, but did leave a much-enhanced crime problem, because the criminals turned to substances which remained illegal, and supplied them instead.
Crime destabilises society. Gangland rivalry, the use of criminal organisations to launder money, to fund terrorism and gun-running, to finance the trafficking of women and to buy political and judicial influence all destabilise the conditions for a good society far beyond such problems as could be created by private individuals' use of drugs. If drugs were legally and safely available through chemist shops, and if their use was governed by the same provisions as govern alcohol purchase and consumption, the main platform for organised crime would be removed, and thereby one large obstacle to the welfare of society.
It would also remove much petty crime, through which many users fund their habit. If addiction to drugs were treated as a medical rather than criminal matter, so that addicts could get safe, regular supplies on prescription, the crime rate would drop dramatically, as argued recently by certain police chiefs.
The safety issue is a simple one. Paracetemol is more dangerous than heroin. Taking double the standard dose of paracetemol, a non-prescription analgesic, can be dangerous. Taking double the standard medical dose of heroin (diamorphine) causes sleepiness and no lasting effects.
A good society should be able to accommodate practices which are not destructive of social bonds (in the way that theft, rape, murder and other serious crimes are), but mainly have to do with private behaviour. In fact, a good society should only interfere in private behaviour in extremis.
Until a century ago, now-criminal substances were legal and freely available. Some (opium in the form of laudanum) were widely used. Just as some people are damaged by misuse of alcohol, so a few were adversely affected by misuses of other drugs. Society as a whole was not adversely affected by the use of drugs; but it was benefited by the fact that it did not burden itself with a misjudged, unworkable and paternalistic endeavour to interfere with those who chose to use drugs.
The place of drugs in the good society is not about the drugs as such, but rather the freedom and the value to individuals and their society of openness to experimentation and alternative behaviours and lifestyles. The good society is permissive, seeking to protect third parties from harm but not presuming to order people to take this or that view about what is in their own good.
It's safer than driving drunk. Alcohol depresses one's sense of things going on around them, marijuana increases one's awareness of these things and may cause a driver to drive say, 55 instead of 65. Still reason for a ticket but it beats wrapping around a pole 'cause you never saw it.
My error. I am sorry Larry.
So my comments are about the article.
You refuted your own point with that question.
People who can't abide liberty for others.
And just imagine how "aware" some crack would make the driver!
Cause I'm the one who always has to go out and buy the munchies.
Later on, another jerk started snorting coke, so I took out my big 10" ......... Don Diego, lit it up, and the coke guy, went to another section.
Doesn't sound like it to me.
Sounds like you've been living on a desert island all your life, without human contact and just recently, have joined civilized society.
In our civilzed American society, the will of the people, is carried out through the election of individuals, who act as the citizens representatives, using proper judgment, for what is in the best interests of the country. It's a good process and one that works well. OTOH, human beings aren't perfect creatures and from time to time, make mistakes. But all in all, our political system works fine.
We don't need a moral dictator to figure anything out. American's are a moral and ethical people. The Founding Fathers gave us the neccessary tools to operate a orderly and law abiding society, where freedom and liberty reign supreme. That's why our constitutional Republic is the envy of the world.
"Every society has a right to fix the fundamental principles of its association (freedom and liberty), and to say to all individuals, that if they contemplate pursuits beyond the limits of these principles(socialism) and involving dangers which the society chooses to avoid(tyranny), they must go somewhere else for their exercise;
Yet, I gave you a clear course of action to put your philosophy to the test this very night if you liked (you could go to the nearest seedy bar and stop a drug transaction right now). Therefore you are de-facto libertarian (a libertine if you will), and a conservative hypocrit. How conservatives can live with such a paradox is beyond me.
So, the de facto situation is that all drugs are now quasi-legal because the law (and conservatives) blinks their collective eye at the problem of illegal drug sales. In fact, that will always be the case because the cost of perfect enforcement is astronomical, requiring a descent into Herodian dictatorship. Yet, you have the gall to stand on a moral soapbox and shout down those who advocate decriminalization and market regulation of these substances as subhuman. I am not impressed. I think you should desert your soapbox and examine our arguments dispassionately.
Why don't with have street gangs for alcohol or tobacco? You know, we did have street gangs for alcohol before? That was during Alcohol Prohibition. Before Drug Prohibition, there were no street gangs or turf wars for cocaine or heroin, because they were legal. You could order them out of your Sears, Roebuck Wishbook.
It's the Prohibtion that creates 98% of the drug crime. Now, that you know this, you'll be sure to come out against crime and support the RE-legalization of drugs, right?
No? Then crime wasn't the issue with you in the first place, now was it? Come on, admit it.
First you advocate a dictatorial enforcement of drug laws that have no foundation in the Constitution. Now you say, "the Founding Fathers gave us the neccessary tools to operate a orderly and law abiding society" (which by the way I agree with in spades). But the Constitution has a Bill of Rights which guarantees freedom FROM excessive intrusion into the peoples lives. Yet earlier you posited that those who proposed drug legalization had no right to impose their own rights on the rest of society. Hum, someone is confused here, and I suspect it ain't me.
I recognize the fact that we can never stop drugs from entering our country, reaching our children, and polluting our society. That doesn't mean, however, that I don't still believe this is a disturbing problem.
Now, if you see me as some kind of threat to your leftist ways, then that's too bad. So, please, celebrate all you want. Go down to your local bar/dealer and cry out, "I have met the enemy, and he is a pseudonym on an Internet posting board." I congratulate you, sir, on winning this 'logical' debate. You have, however, still lost the much larger argument.
"I have never taken drugs other than alcohol, nicotine, caffeine and medicinal drugs."
There is surely a boiler plate for this disclaimer. I have yet to see an illegal drug user advocating drug legalization. They don't appear to exist.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.