Drug Laws as Cultural Lobotomy

Liberty Magazine ^ | 9/1995 | John Dentinger

[Hemingway's Ghost]

Give me some evidence that Marxism hates central government.

What are you talking about? You've never heard of the "decentralized, anarchist" states of China, Vietnam, Cuba, or the former Soviet Union?

[FreeTally]

If drugs caused as much harm as claimed our government would stop setting up it's own protected import scams. Just a franchise protection racket hidden in a morality play, wake up.

Bump for truth!

[FreeTally]

What are you talking about? You've never heard of the "decentralized, anarchist" states of China, Vietnam, Cuba, or the former Soviet Union?

LOL!!

When faced with the truth, the statements and arguments of the drug warriors just get more and more bizarre.

[robertpaulsen]

"In fact," noted Pearson and Shaw, "since smoking is not a disease, the FDA may never approve any treatment, no matter how safe, specifically for the purpose of stopping smoking."
---Liberty Magazine

"Read the listing for Zyban, an FDA approved drug for smoking cessation..."
---RJCogburn

Oh, who to believe. You? Or the article you posted?

Given the above, who are you to lecture me about credibility? What I stated was a fact. You could have tried to dispute it, but I guess it was easier for you just to say that my "comments are simply the product of bring(sic) uneducated."

[thisiskubrick]

At the moment, I'm in Australia, where most soft drugs are decriminalized. The penalty for marijuana posession is a "formal caution" - no fines, no jail, just a "caution".

Heroin is available if you want it, just walk down Smith Street (Smack Street) in Melbourne.

Gambling and brothels are legal also.

And you know what? Overall, for most people, it doesn't make that much difference. Most people usually don't take drugs after their twenties 'cause they have to hold down a job. They don't gamble because it's a waste of money. And they don't induldge in ho's because the wife or girlfriend will break up with them if they're caught.

There are people that abuse all three, but they aren't locked up. Instead, they pay the personal price of vice: bad health, financial ruin and broken relationships.

Making drugs legal won't make for a utopia. Locking up all the drug users won't make for a safe society.

The drug war is about control over your life. Drug use is a medical problem. In Australia, if you have a drug problem, you go see a doc, join a 12 step program, whatever.

However I will say that Heroin is a problem in some sections of town. Sometimes younger people get hooked on smack, and fund their habit through petty theft and the dole (welfare).

[steve50]

They've lead us to believe that marxist and fascist are two opposite ends of the political spectrum. In fact they are both the extreme centralized/totalitarian positions.

Our new found love of public/private partnerships is the same economic philosophy of Hitler. It maintains an appearance of private ownership, when in reality they are little more than government protected monoplies.

[thisiskubrick]

I got as far as the fifth paragraph -- "honest, credible drug education may increase drug use -- but decreases drug abuse", and thought to myself, "Yeah, that worked for alcohol, didn't it?

The article is a bunch of crap. This guy is saying, "I got addicted because they didn't give me information". Well, then why didn't he ask? Not a very proactive sort of person.

All the information is there.. but nobody reads the warning labels on the bottle.

[Eagle Eye]

I'll accept that most doctors have their patients' best interests in mind and that they act in good faith in what they do.

What about the doctors that don't do a good job of finding out what other meds or supplements their patients are tatking? Or simply IGNORE what the patient or family tells them? Not that that ever happens...

Or what about those that prescribe meds like candy and end up getting their patients hooked? Not that that ever happens either, right?

There are, have been, and will be those who cannot handle some aspect of thier lives responsibly. I'm sure that you know better than I that there are very high functioning professionals that take/use/abuse drugs that are not essential to promiting health and fighting disease, who drink alcohol, and/or who smoke pot. Should these people go to jail?

Using a term like "druggie" really is only rheotric and has litle meaning except what you want it to have in any context that can change at your whim.

Do any of us want to see anyone ADDICTED to anything? No, but laws don't stop addiciton, now do they? Heck, the government cannot even keep drugs out of prison, how do you propose that we keep them out of free society?

Remove the criminal penalties and let the families, churches, and non-profit organizations take care of those that cannot/willnot take care of themselves.

[jayef]

Does this apply to all cultures and religions, or just yours? Do you know anything about shamanism? Do you know that early Christians engaged in similar practices and only abandoned them due to the fact that they offended Victorian sensibilities?

[jayef]

Thanks for that contribution Kevin. We'll pull the string when we want to hear you again, mmmmmkay.

[jayef]

Are the behaviors you describe observable in all who use drugs? Are the behaviors observable in those who use drugs not scheduled under the Controlled Substances Act?

Ostensibly, you're a scientist LadyDoc, you figure it out.

[jayef]

Pure drivel.

[jayef]

OK Roscoe, I'll bite. People who are under the influence should not be driving. I have never seen anyone argue that they should. I have seen people make statements that they drive better stoned than drunk. Personally, I think this is irresponsible. That being said, I think that many more people are injured by those under the infulence of alcohol than those under the influence of other substances.

[MrLeRoy]

"comments are simply the product of bring(sic) uneducated."

Ooooh---typo flame! Very impressive.

[robertpaulsen]

"Ooooh---typo flame! Very impressive."

Thank you. It was a two-fer, and I couldn't resist.

[MrLeRoy]

I couldn't resist.

You should try; your Drug War compatriots have committed doozies, and I seem to recall (although I have no evidence at hand) that you've posted a typo or two as well. Glass houses and all that ....

[BeAllYouCanBe]

"Marxists and libertarians, especially pro-dope libertarians, are siamese twin zealots."

The freedom they seek if they do obtain it will be a nightmare not a liberation.

[KDD]

When you read this..."It is thus necessary that the individual should finally come to realize that his own ego is of no importance in comparison with the existence of his nation; that the position of the individual ego is conditioned solely by the interests of the nation as a whole; that pride and conceitedness; the feeling that the individual... is superior, so far from being merely laughable, involve great dangers for the existence of the community that is a nation; that above all the unity of a nation's spirit and will are worth far more than the freedom of the spirit and will of an individual; and that the higher interests involved in the life of the whole must here set the limits and lay down the duties of the interests of the individual."...do you find yourself in agreement with those words? ?

[KDD]

As I read the words of Adolf Hitler, which I posted in #98, I asked myself which American politician, which American bureaucrat, which American schoolteacher, which American citizen would disagree with the principles to which Hitler subscribed to in his beliefs.

Nazi is a term used by Drug War prisoners and non-prisoners alike, as though it were a given that the mentality behind Nazi behavior a half-century ago and the operation of today 's Drug War is no different. The comparison is an uncomfortable one, and one's first inclination is to reject it. A US judge has objected that nothing in the conduct of today's Drug War resembles the terror tactics in Nazi Germany where SS troops could storm into a person's home and no one saw or heard of that person again. The objection is understandable, but it rests on a false premise.

The Nazis were not a bunch of crooks, operating outside the confines of the law. Everything they did had legal backing, and if on some occasion a law was needed they composed one.

Flat out, it will be objected that a world of difference separates a prison from a death camp.

Drug War prisoners are not intended for a holocaust. Ominously for our peace of mind, however, until the last minute neither were the people held in concentration camps.

They were held there to protect the health of society.

[KDD]

As for the moralists here who fancy themselves "conservative", do you agree with Albert Nock when he argues in his essay, "On Doing the Right Thing," that the moral development of the individual is stunted every time the State extends its activity into new areas because the area available for the unhindered and free exercise of the human moral faculties is thus reduced.

In fact, he argues, in moral philosophy there is a fundamental assumption that individuals are responsible for their actions. It makes no sense to say that an individual should or should not do something on moral grounds (e.g. place a bet on a football game) if that individual cannot freely choose between different courses of action (if betting is illegal).

Nock argues that literally there can be no such thing as morality unless one has the freedom to choose between alternatives, without external sources of coercion.

Conservative writers and thinkers throughout history have decried the nanny mentality that moral purists would impose on society. There is no conservative principal which can be utilized to defend the Central Governments War on Drugs.