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Jeez, it's like they think they were ever -winning- the war on Drugs.

In order to actually lose, there has to be some level of comparable competition in the first place. Can't say I've ever seen that on a national, or international, level.

It's what some teens do. Teens who 'act out will do it overtly(assault) or covertly(breaking non-violent laws) and it usually isn't about 'pushing boundaries' its about seeing who's the baddest of the bad in their peer group.

I got a cigarette--> I got alcohol--> I got marijuana--> I got cocaine.

This thread amuses me.

Karon wrote:This thread amuses me.

Adolescent psychology was the second most interesting class I've taken, being below Abnormal Psychology.

halonachos wrote:

Karon wrote:This thread amuses me.

Adolescent psychology was the second most interesting class I've taken, being below Abnormal Psychology.

What exactly is 'abnormal psychology'

youbedead wrote:

halonachos wrote:

Karon wrote:This thread amuses me.

Adolescent psychology was the second most interesting class I've taken, being below Abnormal Psychology.

What exactly is 'abnormal psychology'

Abnormal psychology is a class college kids take for fun that usually involves a college professor who has never actually worked with the mentally ill teaching about various mental illnesses to college kids that will most likely never will work with the mentally ill except for the rare few who decide to get a job in a psych hospital or criminal justice that then find themselves woefully unprepared to deal with the mentally ill if they actually do end up working on a psych unit or in criminal justice.

I thought of a good counter argument to legalizing weed in the form of the rise in the obesity rate. Surprised no one has mentioned it

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:I thought of a good counter argument to legalizing weed in the form of the rise in the obesity rate. Surprised no one has mentioned it

Don't forget the possibility of a grim future where all of America is ruled by a conglormate of all the snack food companies. All hail the FLH! (frito-lay-hostess)

micahaphone wrote:Don't forget the possibility of a grim future where all of America is ruled by a conglormate of all the snack food companies. All hail the FLH! (frito-lay-hostess)

All hail BNL!

I don't understand how the war on drugs can fail. It has no win or loss state. It's never had clearly cited objectives. It's just an ongoing effort to enforce international drug trafficking laws and it's been relatively successful in the Americas (where its actually called the war on drugs).


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"Political leaders and public figures should have the courage to articulate publicly what many of them acknowledge privately: that the evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that repressive strategies will not solve the drug problem, and that the war on drugs has not, and cannot, be won," the report said.

Instead of punishing users who the report says "do no harm to others," the commission argues that governments should end criminalisation of drug use, experiment with legal models that would undermine organised crime syndicates and offer health and treatment services for drug-users.

It calls for drug policies based on methods empirically proven to reduce crime and promote economic and social development.

The commission is especially critical of the US, saying it must abandon anti-crime approaches to drug policy and adopt strategies rooted in healthcare and human rights.

"We hope this country (the US) at least starts to think there are alternatives," said former Colombian President Cesar Gaviria.

"We don't see the US evolving in a way that is compatible with our (countries') long-term interests."

Great you just traded some organized crime for a massive and dramatic influx of drug related crimes, deaths and health issues. Goody. Glad the health care system is capable of shouldering that burden, it's got so little else on it's shoulders.

hell, most of the drugs grown in conflict regions aren't even sold in the US or europe where the "war on drugs" is even a coined term, most of it just goes to Asia or Africa where enforcement is backwards and the state is often times the purveyor illicitly.

This entire article is based on a bum statistic that lead them to believe that because south east asian and african drug use rates (the actual drivers for those increased numbers) are on the rise that the western "war on drugs" is a failure. This is stupid. That article is stupid. most of the comments in this thread are ignorant in the extreme. Why do I keep coming back here.

Toastedandy wrote:

Melissia wrote:And for those anecdotal evidences, I have plenty of friends who haven't done anything "harder" than marijuana. Meh? Better proof would be research.

I dont understand
Research from me? or you?
and proof for what?

No, no, and proof of marijuana being a gateway drug.

You do realize that there have been studies on this issue, right?

schadenfreude wrote:

youbedead wrote:

halonachos wrote:

Karon wrote:This thread amuses me.

Adolescent psychology was the second most interesting class I've taken, being below Abnormal Psychology.

What exactly is 'abnormal psychology'

Abnormal psychology is a class college kids take for fun that usually involves a college professor who has never actually worked with the mentally ill teaching about various mental illnesses to college kids that will most likely never will work with the mentally ill except for the rare few who decide to get a job in a psych hospital or criminal justice that then find themselves woefully unprepared to deal with the mentally ill if they actually do end up working on a psych unit or in criminal justice.

Abnormal psychology is a class college kids take because they are minoring in psychology and sometimes involves a professor who has a doctorate in psychology or has been a psychiatrist and worked with the mentally ill. Its also a class taken by some members of the Sheriff's department due to their close proximity to inmates who may show signs of mental illness. Someone is sure angry at abnormal psychology classes, which is the second most ridiculous thing I've heard someone get angry about, the most ridiculous being the mention of the words 'frozen yogurt'.

All sarcasm and personal anecdotes aside, its a class that puts the spotlight on mental illness, the causes, possible treatment, and the DSM compared to just having mental illness as an aside in the chapter about glandular influence on thought.

There's also cognitive psychology, industrial psychology, organizational psychology, etc...

Industrial and organizational are the two with the most real world applications because they're the guys who come up with the interview questions and promotion testing. If you ever take an ASVAB test, thank and Industrial or Organizational psychologist.

Psychology: Damage to this part of the lobe causes hallucinations.

Abnormal Psychology: Hallucinations can be caused by damage to a lobe, or...




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Melissia wrote:

Toastedandy wrote:

Melissia wrote:And for those anecdotal evidences, I have plenty of friends who haven't done anything "harder" than marijuana. Meh? Better proof would be research.

I dont understand
Research from me? or you?
and proof for what?

No, no, and proof of marijuana being a gateway drug.

You do realize that there have been studies on this issue, right?

Not necessarily a gateway drug unless the marijuana given was laced with something else by the dealer. Sometimes a dealer will lace marijuana with bits of cocaine to get the marijuana user hooked on cocaine and then start selling the higher profit cocaine.

Not necessarily a gateway drug unless the marijuana given was laced with something else by the dealer. Sometimes a dealer will lace marijuana with bits of cocaine to get the marijuana user hooked on cocaine and then start selling the higher profit cocaine.

Gateway drugs are low impact low value drugs like marijuana that increase your likelihood of encountering harder drugs. The theory is not based on codependant addictions developed because of nefarious drug dealers, it's a sociological idea that states that once you've started taking one drug you have an increased likelihood to take others due to the insular and mixed nature of drug scenes and the common human behavior of curiosity. It is a well researched and thoroughly vetted concept with parallels in many other fields (advertising uses similar concepts constantly).

I can't believe people still have this conversation with eachother. It's even worse then videogame violence link denial or global warmin denial.

The whole "well if I did this then might as well do this?" aspect?

But videogame violence can do good, there was a story about how a girl pulled one of her family members from an overturned car because she learned in Grand Theft Auto that overturned cars explode.

We also learned that violent actions are more likely to occur in the future if the child is exposed too early to violence.


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Also interesting is the drop in murder rates after the release of the game Quake.

The whole "well if I did this then might as well do this?" aspect?

Among many other things, yes. The nature of the illicit drug industry and the general pairing and multifarious accounts of dealers means that someone exposed to a common and easily obtained street drug like pot is several orders of magnitude more likely to then be exposed to other, harder drugs. The issue isn't so much that they are more willing to try (though statistically they are), it's that they have a significantly higher risk of contact and thus a significantly higher % chance of trying as opposed to someone who never started.

But videogame violence can do good, there was a story about how a girl pulled one of her family members from an overturned car because she learned in Grand Theft Auto that overturned cars explode.

Wat

We also learned that violent actions are more likely to occur in the future if the child is exposed too early to violence.

Age increases frequency and severity of mimicking perceived or carrying out learned actions, but it effects people of all ages.

Also interesting is the drop in murder rates after the release of the game Quake.

No. It's really not. Blank observations without supporting research are useless and meaningless. I can just as easily say that murder rates go up because of solar eclipses when I look at a single case rate and do no research. That would make me a troll though.

ShumaGorath wrote:

Also interesting is the drop in murder rates after the release of the game Quake.

No. It's really not. Blank observations without supporting research are useless and meaningless. I can just as easily say that murder rates go up because of solar eclipses when I look at a single case rate and do no research. That would make me a troll though.

Holy gak! Quick, when's the next eclipse over Australia? Damn it, Professor Gorath we need answers and we need them now!


Check it again!

ShumaGorath wrote:The issue isn't so much that they are more willing to try (though statistically they are), it's that they have a significantly higher risk of contact and thus a significantly higher % chance of trying as opposed to someone who never started.

To illustrate. I did my undergrad at an expensive private school. I now do my doctoral work at a public school. At the expensive private school cocaine and oxy were common sights. At the public school I see none of this, and I'm a fairly big party guy. In fact, most of my friends at the current school have never done, or seen, any illicit drugs. The variable of access (in this case determined by money) absolutely controls the variable of use rates, though not necessarily addiction.

I mean, if it didn't, there would be as many cocaine uses as drinkers.

halonachos wrote:
Not necessarily a gateway drug unless the marijuana given was laced with something else by the dealer. Sometimes a dealer will lace marijuana with bits of cocaine to get the marijuana user hooked on cocaine and then start selling the higher profit cocaine.

You don't actually believe this do you? Please tell me this is a joke


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Chrysaor686 wrote:

Do you think it would lessen, at all, with legalisation?

Ever seen anybody suck dick for some alcohol?

My ex?

On a serious note Chrysaor686 I agree with what your saying and I think we should share a j over a game of 40k sometime.




Should drugs be legal? Yes. Should the drinking age in America be 18 like everything else? Yes. But I also realize that to do so now would have disastrous consequences. We've created a pandoras box and now we really cant open it. Shame really but thats the way it is.

Melissia wrote:

Toastedandy wrote:

Melissia wrote:And for those anecdotal evidences, I have plenty of friends who haven't done anything "harder" than marijuana. Meh? Better proof would be research.

I dont understand
Research from me? or you?
and proof for what?

No, no, and proof of marijuana being a gateway drug.

You do realize that there have been studies on this issue, right?

Probably is, Im speaking from personal experience. Aswell as the experience of about a dozen mates.

(by gateway I was meant it opened the glorious world of drug use to us)

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halonachos wrote:
Not necessarily a gateway drug unless the marijuana given was laced with something else by the dealer. Sometimes a dealer will lace marijuana with bits of cocaine to get the marijuana user hooked on cocaine and then start selling the higher profit cocaine.

Hahahaha seriously? You really believe this?

ShumaGorath wrote:

Not necessarily a gateway drug unless the marijuana given was laced with something else by the dealer. Sometimes a dealer will lace marijuana with bits of cocaine to get the marijuana user hooked on cocaine and then start selling the higher profit cocaine.

Gateway drugs are low impact low value drugs like marijuana that increase your likelihood of encountering harder drugs. The theory is not based on codependant addictions developed because of nefarious drug dealers, it's a sociological idea that states that once you've started taking one drug you have an increased likelihood to take others due to the insular and mixed nature of drug scenes and the common human behavior of curiosity. It is a well researched and thoroughly vetted concept with parallels in many other fields (advertising uses similar concepts constantly).

I can't believe people still have this conversation with eachother. It's even worse then videogame violence link denial or global warmin denial.

Lacing marijuana with cocaine does actually happen on occasion, but it is a total waste of cocaine because it's just not going to provide the same high as crack cocaine or even snorting a line of coke. I've worked with hundreds of coke addicts over the years and none of them ever said that smoking marijuana with cocaine resulted in their addiction to coke, and if anything was said on the topic of coke laced pot it's that doing so is a complete waste of perfectly good cocaine. I have however known a lot of people who have been given pot laced with PCP which is just plain rude. PCP is probably one of the most misunderstood drugs out there. It's pretty much just like LSD with less technocolor in the hallucinations, but with a powerful anesthetic quality because it was after all a failed experiment by big pharma and the military to develop an alternative to morphine. Don't know anybody who got addicted to PCP through laced pot because as I said earlier running into once of those laced joints is more of a rude surprise than a life changing experience.

Back on the gateway drug theory. The flaw with it is that the theory assumes healthy people we be driven to use harder and harder drugs by any drug experimentation, and it completely ignores the big reasons why normal healthy people who experiment with marijuana don't choose to escalate to a harder drugs. It only separates those who never smoke pot and those who do smoke pot into 2 groups of people, and it assumes all people who smoke pot are the same. It ignores the mental health flaws in future addicts that makes their future addiction a predictable tragedy before they even touch pot, and assumes all pot users are as mentally ill as future hard drug addicts. If you look deeper into pot users and find those with any of the following 3 traits there is a good chance the person in question is going to experiment with hard drugs, but if you don't find any of the traits the person probably isn't going to experiment with hard drugs.

Lack of self preservation: The user just doesn't care if the live or die, or becomes an addict. The person could be depressed, or on a downswing of BiPolar. Maybe the person hates them self, thinks they deserve the worse in life, and/or passive aggressively wants there parents to feel like a failure by self destructing in front of their parents. Really depressed people make illogical decisions like suicide attempts or experimenting with hard drugs.

Lack of common sense: I have noticed a lack of common drag more addicts down than anything else, it's the top reason in my book. The drug user just doesn't connect cause with effect. The connection between a cause and effect in an event is just not there, and they just don't have the basic level of insight to see dropout of high school=unemployed or smoke crack=become a crack addict. You really do see a lot of this with BiPolars, conduct disorder, and cluster B personality disorders. It's so bad it's almost like the poor bastards never stood a chance in life.

Unfounded belief of invulnerability: This is almost never seen with out a lack of common sense, but when you combine the 2 a person doesn't really stand a chance in life. I'm not just talking about the crappy sense of invulnerability that you see in almost all teenagers where the world revolves around them, they are the protagonist in life's story, and thus crappy events like a car crash or getting killed in war happens to other people and not them. I'm talking about that crappy sense of invulnerability on steroids with some cluster B sprinkles on top. Charlie Sheen is the new poster child for explaining this sense of invulnerability. Being addicted to hard drugs is for loosers, and almost nothing with convince a narcissistic donkey-cave that they have a drug problem. If someone is thinking like that before they touch drugs what chance does society have of preventing them from experimenting with hard drugs?

Anyhow if you separate pot users with those traits from those without you will for the most part separate the future hard drug addicts from the pot users. When you only look at the future drug addicts and not every pot user you'll start to see a pattern where the future hard drug users are just going to continue to escalate their drug abuse no matter what. If pot wasn't around they would end up jumping straight from alcohol to hard drugs, if hard drugs did not exist they would just become alcoholics, and the only reason that we didn't have as many hard drug users in the past is technology. Technology has improved man's ability to manufacture and distribute drugs, and once that genie is out of the bottle you can't put it back in. Just look at how badly alcohol prohibition failed, and can anybody tell me that drug prohibition has not failed on the same epic scale as alcohol prohibition has failed?

Back on the gateway drug theory. The flaw with it is that the theory assumes healthy people we be driven to use harder and harder drugs by any drug experimentation, and it completely ignores the big reasons why normal healthy people who experiment with marijuana don't choose to escalate to a harder drugs. It only separates those who never smoke pot and those who do smoke pot into 2 groups of people, and it assumes all people who smoke pot are the same. It ignores the mental health flaws in future addicts that makes their future addiction a predictable tragedy before they even touch pot, and assumes all pot users are as mentally ill as future hard drug addicts.

No, thats the strawman construct gateway drug theory that pro legalization advocates pull out to beat with sticks. Not the actual one. The actual one isn't that deep or conspiracy ridden. It's just a statistical analysis of contact rates. Anything beyond that is something someone with an agenda added.

If you look deeper into pot users and find those with any of the following 3 traits there is a good chance the person in question is going to experiment with hard drugs, but if you don't find any of the traits the person probably isn't going to experiment with hard drugs.

Yes. There are a lot of variables. Far more then anyone could ever write about. Gateway isn't about prediction, it's just a visible trend.

Just look at how badly alcohol prohibition failed, and can anybody tell me that drug prohibition has not failed on the same epic scale as alcohol prohibition has failed?

Anyone who has looked into drug use rates in the 19th century and cocaine use pre banning can. Or hey, anyone who just looked at the rates in depressed regions of the globe where enforcement is lax or non existent. Those people are the educated ones you should listen to, not the ones that spew whatever gak they heard on the subway or from their high roomate while be was playing a bass.

I hate this conversation specifically because all of the information is readily available and logically simple. People just don't like what they hear so they ignore it and make up wild conspiracies and bs psychology so that they get to pretend that people are somehow mature enough to handle legalized drugs, despite the fact that historically that has never been the case in any region of the world. Thats not going to change now.

ShumaGorath wrote:No, thats the strawman construct gateway drug theory that pro legalization advocates pull out to beat with sticks. Not the actual one. The actual one isn't that deep or conspiracy ridden. It's just a statistical analysis of contact rates. Anything beyond that is something someone with an agenda added.

Statistical analysis? You mean "people who have drug hookups are infinitely more likely to use drugs of any sort than people who don't, in that they are able to in the first place"? That's like saying that people who have access to a car are infinitely more likely to drive one than people who don't.

Anyone who has looked into drug use rates in the 19th century and cocaine use pre banning can. Or hey, anyone who just looked at the rates in depressed regions of the globe where enforcement is lax or non existent. Those people are the educated ones you should listen to, not the ones that spew whatever gak they heard on the subway or from their high roomate while be was playing a bass.

I hate this conversation specifically because all of the information is readily available and logically simple. People just don't like what they hear so they ignore it and make up wild conspiracies and bs psychology so that they get to pretend that people are somehow mature enough to handle legalized drugs, despite the fact that historically that has never been the case in any region of the world. Thats not going to change now.

So your theory is that it's not that "depressed regions" are impoverished, corrupt cesspools that are behind anything you see there, but that drug enforcement in particular is lax is responsible? And you don't recognize how backwards that is? The fact that law enforcement is toothless or corrupt enough that organized criminals can run the show has infinitely more to do with anything than the fact that drugs are readily available. Criminalization only provides an extremely lucrative revenue source for organized crime.

I have pondered the thought that with decriminalization, the prices would tumble and the major cartels would see their revenue stream slow to a trickle in the face of more institutionalized narcotic production. They would panic and try their best (by causing massive amounts of chaos on the border unseen since the early 1900's) to make people cry out for the drugs to be re-criminalized and boost their profits back up.

Just a thought.

Statistical analysis? You mean "people who have drug hookups are infinitely more likely to use drugs of any sort than people who don't, in that they are able to in the first place"? That's like saying that people who have access to a car are infinitely more likely to drive one than people who don't.

Yes. I know. Statistics aren't usually hard to understand. Thats exactly why it fething floors me that people don't understand or do and can somehow still argue against the gateway drug theory.

Statistical analysis? You mean "people who have drug hookups are infinitely more likely to use drugs of any sort than people who don't, in that they are able to in the first place"? That's like saying that people who have access to a car are infinitely more likely to drive one than people who don't.

They are inextricably linked, impoverished areas do not have the funds for enforcement and the economically depressed are significantly more likely to turn to drugs. I would hardly consider cocaine crazy america pre banning to be an impoverished cesspit however. But then now I know your color. It's the color of ideologue troll.

And you don't recognize how backwards that is?

I'm not sure you're able to look at such situations objectively if you're coming to such conclusions based on what I said.

The fact that law enforcement is toothless or corrupt enough that organized criminals can run the show has infinitely more to do with anything than the fact that drugs are readily available.

Oh looky, "law enforcement is toothless and corrupt". Wonderful. This is the gak I was avoiding by not posting on this forum. Care to site an example? Which law enforcement agency? What region? What law are they enforcing? Or is this just hyperbolic bs because you have no knowledge concerning the conversation at hand but you have a very strong opinion regardless? Which is it?

Criminalization only provides an extremely lucrative revenue source for organized crime.

Yes, and legalization results in use rates orders of magnitude higher then exist under banning when enforcement is effective. I know you're probably just going to slap your face on the keyboard with"itsn ot effcv (face typings hard)" but without giving specific situations wherein it is or is not effective we are only left with historical reality and logical conclusions.

Historically (opium laden china, 19th century coked up america, modern day mideast) population centers with legal and easy access to effective drugs use them. A lot. Logically enforcing legal banning of such items reduce their prevalence among populations (post war china, 20th century america, modern day japan).

It follows that when you are punished for holding or using a substance that you are less likely to use it, and moreso when not. Pretending otherwise is asinine. Stating that banning something creates crime relating to the banning is absolutely insane. Of course it does. You know what happens when you make murder illegal? You get illegal murder. Drugs illegal? Illegal drugs. Insider trading illegal? Well howdy do, now theres an underground system of insider trading that circumvents the law. It's as if thats what happens to every single that that becomes illegal because once its illegal its no longer legal.





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Stormrider wrote:I have pondered the thought that with decriminalization, the prices would tumble and the major cartels would see their revenue stream slow to a trickle in the face of more institutionalized narcotic production. They would panic and try their best (by causing massive amounts of chaos on the border unseen since the early 1900's) to make people cry out for the drugs to be re-criminalized and boost their profits back up.

Just a thought.

No. They would probably just sell to africa or china instead. We're not the worlds biggest drug market and I have no idea how the hell a Columbian drug lord is going to cruise through zeta territory to harass our borders.

ShumaGorath wrote:Yes. I know. Statistics aren't usually hard to understand. Thats exactly why it fething floors me that people don't understand or do and can somehow still argue against the gateway drug theory.

The fact that having access to a drug hookup is a requirement to be able to acquire any in the first place does exactly nothing to vindicate the gateway theory. You may as well try to correlate not starving to death as a child with drug use later in life.

They are inextricably linked, impoverished areas do not have the funds for enforcement and the economically depressed are significantly more likely to turn to drugs.

They are only linked in that their general state causes their drug problems, most of which are made possible or at the least greatly exacerbated by criminalization elsewhere, as it means organized crime is established as a black market supplier and smuggler, and so can easily move its business in.

I would hardly consider cocaine crazy america pre banning to be an impoverished cesspit however. But then now I know your color. It's the color of ideologue troll.

First, you're imagining that there was indeed a tangible problem where there was only a moral panic fueled by racism and yellow journalism, and second you're talking about an era before the FDA or the New Deal, "impoverished", "corrupt", and "cesspit" describe it perfectly.

I'm not sure you're able to look at such situations objectively if you're coming to such conclusions based on what I said.

It is literally backwards, in that you describing the effect as the cause and the cause as the effect.

Criminalization only provides an extremely lucrative revenue source for organized crime.

Yes, and legalization results in use rates orders of magnitude higher then exist under banning when enforcement is effective. I know you're probably just going to slap your face on the keyboard with"itsn ot effcv (face typings hard)" but without giving specific situations wherein it is or is not effective we are only left with historical reality and logical conclusions.

Historically (opium laden china, 19th century coked up america, modern day mideast) population centers with legal and easy access to effective drugs use them. A lot. Logically enforcing legal banning of such items reduce their prevalence among populations (post war china, 20th century america, modern day japan).

It follows that when you are punished for holding or using a substance that you are less likely to use it, and moreso when not. Pretending otherwise is asinine. Stating that banning something creates crime relating to the banning is absolutely insane. Of course it does. You know what happens when you make murder illegal? You get illegal murder. Drugs illegal? Illegal drugs. Insider trading illegal? Well howdy do, now theres an underground system of insider trading that circumvents the law. It's as if thats what happens to every single that that becomes illegal because once its illegal its no longer legal.

This is specifically an issue wherein every problem is only exacerbated by criminalization. By blacklisting substances completely you remove them from the purview of regulation and oversight, and inextricably link them to criminals already dealing in smuggling and black market goods, who produce dangerous, low quality product, which is sold for exorbitant prices, and whose business interests are protected via illegal, violent means. Due to the lack of quality controls, the product is far more damaging to the user; due to the prices, the user is driven to crime if addicted and impoverished; and due to the criminal nature of the dealer the user is shielded from exposure to rehabilitation programs.

The fact that having access to a drug hookup is a requirement to be able to acquire any in the first place does exactly nothing to vindicate the gateway theory. You may as well try to correlate not starving to death as a child with drug use later in life.

Very good! That is a direct correlation. Congratulations, you're starting to understand very basic logic. Someday we might be able to have this conversation without it hurting me inside.

They are only linked in that their general state causes their drug problems, most of which are made possible or at the least greatly exacerbated by criminalization elsewhere, as it means organized crime is established as a black market supplier and smuggler, and so can easily move its business in.

Why exactly does the illegality make it easier for them to obtain drugs? That doesn't make any fething sense. If it's legal then they will have legal access to the same commodity. Legality doesn't make something hard to get. It's not like legality makes things illegal.

First, you're imagining that there was indeed a tangible problem where there was only a moral panic fueled by racism and yellow journalism,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_Wars#Growth_of_opium_trade

and second you're talking about an era before the FDA or the New Deal, "impoverished", "corrupt", and "cesspit" describe it perfectly.

Cocaine wasn't a controlled substance in America until 1970. You don't know what you're talking about and it's painful to read.

It is literally backwards, in that you describing the effect as the cause and the cause as the effect.

Do they do drugs because they're poor? Are they poor because they're doing drugs? Is the enforcement lax because it's corrupt or is it corrupt because it's lax? This gak isn't causative, causation does not equal correlation unless you can observe that it does. Drug use hits poor communities hard because they both can not be legalistically protected effectively and because they are economically depressed. They can not be legalistically protected because they are economically depressed and they can not rise economically because of severe drug issues. This is chicken and egg bs, don't tell me that one causes the other.

This is specifically an issue wherein every problem is only exacerbated by criminalization.

This is mind blowingly wrong to the point that you're not worth talking too. It's bad enough that you don't know the history, but you're unable to interface with simple logic.

By blacklisting substances completely you remove them from the purview of regulation and oversight, and inextricably link them to criminals already dealing in smuggling and black market goods, who produce dangerous, low quality product, which is sold for exorbitant prices, and whose business interests are protected via illegal, violent means.

Yes, because the alternative is legality. If a substance or act is detrimental to a person or society enough to be labeled illegal then it follows that legalizing it would be bad. The creation of black markets is one of many run on effects of a functioning legal system. Welcome to ethics 101.

Due to the lack of quality controls, the product is far more damaging to the user; due to the prices, the user is driven to crime if addicted and impoverished; and due to the criminal nature of the dealer the user is shielded from exposure to rehabilitation programs.

You're right about the first part. it's as if we DON'T WANT PEOPLE USING. You're right about the second part though to a much lesser degree since individual crimes due to poverty and addiction don't really get negated with lowered prices. People shoot each other for playstation games and those are legal. Massively increasing usage rates will fundamentally increase the pool of users who could be impoverished and will thus logically increase the chances of overall drug related crime rising. People stab eachother for booze money every day. This is all ignoring the runon effects of an increased user pool on drugs with severe psychological effects like heroin or cocaine. You're last bit is just plainly wrong. Look at european drug treatment programs, specifically around germany. Thats a legal thing and differs by country.

You're painful to talk to and you have no idea what you're talking about. I'm done responding to you.

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:
The fact that having access to a drug hookup is a requirement to be able to acquire any in the first place does exactly nothing to vindicate the gateway theory. You may as well try to correlate not starving to death as a child with drug use later in life.

Actually, those are correlates. Very few dead people use drugs.

I honestly do not trust people with any cannibis.
Not to mention cannabis can be a gateway drug
Other addictive substances can be mixed with cannabis. If I was a drug dealer, I would make the highest demand product (cannabis)
addictive by adding traces of more expensive drugs, to get a amount of reliable costumers, then take the addictive stuff (possibly crack cocaine) out of the cannabis. This would eventaly lead them to diffrent types of harder drugs. Whilst cannabis is not addictive in it's self, I am not trusting a drug dealer word, thats just me.

I think that decrimilizing cannabis and made it heavily tracked and resricted by the goverment would be a good idea (along with tougher regulations on booze and tabaco). Maybe track it all be fingerprints, which can be added to police databases. And if the goverment having your fingerprints on standby scares you... well, no pot for you.

In short, I do not believe in totaly banning it (saying you can't do something makes you want to do things even more). But legalizing it and having it lose doesn't work. Thier needs to be a middle ground.

About alchohol, Their needs to be actual punishment, or a metric buttload of community service on underage drinkers, and raise the price of alchohol. Impose a sin tax, like they do in Canada, and put that tax money to raise awareness.

The individual is smart, the mass is stupid. I do not trust the mass, and i actually trust my government (even if it is a Conservitive majority)
Stiff regulations is the awnser.

ShumaGorath wrote:

First, you're imagining that there was indeed a tangible problem where there was only a moral panic fueled by racism and yellow journalism,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_Wars#Growth_of_opium_trade

1) I was referring to the late nineteenth century US, not China.
2) That says exactly nothing to establish that opium was indeed a problem in China, and not merely something their government didn't like because of its connections to English Imperialism.

Cocaine wasn't a controlled substance in America until 1970. You don't know what you're talking about and it's painful to read.

Its use dried up around/just after the full swing of the Temperance movement, and didn't start again until the 1980s, fueled by the fact that its illegality made it a profitable black market venture.

Do they do drugs because they're poor? Are they poor because they're doing drugs? Is the enforcement lax because it's corrupt or is it corrupt because it's lax? This gak isn't causative, causation does not equal correlation unless you can observe that it does. Drug use hits poor communities hard because they both can not be legalistically protected effectively and because they are economically depressed. They can not be legalistically protected because they are economically depressed and they can not rise economically because of severe drug issues. This is chicken and egg bs, don't tell me that one causes the other.

It is the criminal structure associated with their black market trade which hits poor areas hard, not the existence of the drugs themselves; even more hazardous, addictive substances are more widely used in semi-affluent communities, with none of the related problems aside from individual health, which would be just as impacted by alcoholism, and less impacted by pot.

Yes, because the alternative is legality. If a substance or act is detrimental to a person or society enough to be labeled illegal then it follows that legalizing it would be bad. The creation of black markets is one of many run on effects of a functioning legal system. Welcome to ethics 101.

You're right about the first part. it's as if we DON'T WANT PEOPLE USING. You're right about the second part though to a much lesser degree since individual crimes due to poverty and addiction don't really get negated with lowered prices. People shoot each other for playstation games and those are legal. Massively increasing usage rates will fundamentally increase the pool of users who could be impoverished and will thus logically increase the chances of overall drug related crime rising. People stab eachother for booze money every day. This is all ignoring the runon effects of an increased user pool on drugs with severe psychological effects like heroin or cocaine. You're last bit is just plainly wrong. Look at european drug treatment programs, specifically around germany. Thats a legal thing and differs by country.

You're painful to talk to and you have no idea what you're talking about. I'm done responding to you.

You're pretending that there was in fact a valid reason behind the bans in the first place, which in the cases of the most proscribed substances we can see there was not, while the more detrimental, hazardous chemicals are used available with a prescription. The most "reasonable" prohibitionist movements were fueled by "it's most frequently used by people we don't like, let's ban it so we have an excuse to arrest them!", while the rest were fueled by even more unhinged puritanical sentiments opposing any psychoactive chemical, regardless of what it actually does (which can be seen firsthand today in the banning of synthetic cannabinoids and salvia).

dogma wrote:

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:
The fact that having access to a drug hookup is a requirement to be able to acquire any in the first place does exactly nothing to vindicate the gateway theory. You may as well try to correlate not starving to death as a child with drug use later in life.

Actually, those are correlates. Very few dead people use drugs.

Very good! That is a direct correlation. Congratulations, you're starting to understand very basic logic. Someday we might be able to have this conversation without it hurting me inside.

The point was that it was a meaningless correlation.