Drug Legalization - Expensive and Deadly Lie

Washington Witness ^ | by Eric Lobsinger

[FF578]

Drugs. What a concept. Drugs carry an aura of excitement, rebellion, and just plain coolness. On a campus such as Washington University, drugs like marijuana can even seem innocent, soft, and harmless. Little wonder then the drug legalization movement claims many adherents from university ranks.

The real world, though, is very different from the safe haven of college life. Drugs in the real world cause real problems. Far from being substances that liberate the mind and body, drugs shackle humans to very inhumane conditions and circumstances. Worst of all, drugs infect all of society. No one is completely sheltered from the violence, destruction, and costs that arise as a result of drugs.

Those who wish the legalization of drugs are often fond of claiming that drugs only affect the individual using them. To penalize someone for using drugs is to convict them of a "victimless crime." Unfortunately, nothing is further from the truth than that belief. The sad reality is that drugs do cost society. In fact, in every case in which drug laws have been softened or not enforced, the rate of crime has increased. The famous city of Amsterdam has had to greatly expand its police presence ever since drugs became tolerated. This is not surprising, considering 80 percent of the 7,000 regular drug addicts commit all the property crime in the city.

Great Britain experiemented with softening its heroin laws from 1959 to 1968. The result was that Scotland Yard had to double its narcotics squad just to keep up with the ever increasing drug related crimes. Switzerland's experimental "legalization zones" in Zurich started in the late 1980's and only lasted until 1995 because the rude upshot of violence within the "legalized zones" became too much for the Swiss police to deal with. The crime waves that rippled through China in the early twentieth century and Egypt in the 1920's after the legalization of opium and cocaine are all too well known.

Despite the argument made by legalization advocates that decriminalizing drugs will make drugs more available so people will no longer have to resort to unsavory means to acquire and pay for the substances, the real issue at hand are the consequences from drug use. Committing crime to acquire or pay for drugs actually contributes very little to the sum of drug related crimes. Department of Justice statistics reveal that only 12 percent of violent offenses and 24 percent of property crimes are drug money related. This is in contrast with the 78 percent of men and 84 percent of women in prison who commited crime under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

Moreover, researchers have found a correlation between increase drug use and the increase likelihood of committing domestic abuse. In Philadephia, the city of brotherly love, 80 percent of parents who beat their children to death were under the unfluence of drugs or alcohol. The mental imbalance drugs induce on users, which leads to rash decisions and often violent behavior, is something that affects more than just the individual users. Drugs are a societal problem.

Perhaps some may interpret these last few points as attacks against alcohol too. Tobacco and alcohol, however, cannot be grouped together with drugs for one simple reason: the dangers behind tobacco and alcohol are far less severe than drugs. Although alcohol is a factor in half of all murders, sexual assaults, robberies, and violent crimes, this is actually rather benign compared to drugs. Even though 400,000 babies are born every year to some sort of disability because of irresponsible, drunken mothers, drugs are still worse. For example, mothers who smoke marijuana give their babies a 500 percent greater chance of developing disabilites and eleven times greater chance of getting leukemia over mothers who drink alcohol while pregnant. Cocaine is addictive to 75 percent of first-time users. Compare this to alcohol, which is addictive to 10 percent of first-time users. Although tobacco contributes to roughly 400,000 deaths per year, marijuana is much more carcinogenic than tobacco, which means it supresses the human immune system in a more fatally powerful way. Therefore, while it is true that alcohol and tobacco are unkind products, to argue that drugs ought to be legalized because alcohol and tobacco are legal completely ignores the vast differences in harm between the legal and illegal.

Furthermore, the drug legalization camp misses some of the finer points in their proposed decriminalization policies. For example, should "designer drugs" also be legalized? What about LSD and PCP? These drugs, after all, have some nasty side effects on users and those nearby the users. Would not some of these "hard drugs" still need to be kept out of public hands? If not, what about age restrictions for drugs? If candy cigarettes are no longer considered acceptable for children, how can one justify giving an eight-year old a joint to smoke? Thus, the legalization of drugs would still require government restrictions, which goes against the claim that legalization would strip the government of costs tied to drug enforcement. Even with the potential taxes the government could harness from the legal sale of drugs, the costs associated with drug maintenance would not justify legalization. Alcohol, for example, generates $13 billion in taxes a year for government. Society, however, pays $100 billion a year for the numerous alcohol related social costs, i.e. health care, treatment, property destruction, etc.

Drugs would not be any different. In fact, by their more dangerous nature, drugs would likely be a lot more expensive on society than alcohol. Also, with the increasing potency of marijuana and other drugs over the last thiry years, the social costs for the use of such drugs rise as well. In the end, the public pays for these social costs. Expanded health care, easier access to rehabilitation centers, and new education initiatives would be only some of the added costs to legalizing drugs. The auto insurance companies have already hinted at higher premiums with the legalization of drugs. Therefore, whether it is through government programs or the private sector, all people would have to pay for the social costs of legalized drugs.

Drugs are not just "feel good" substances that have no effect outside of the user. Quite the contrary, the legalization of drugs would harm everyone financially and socially. Increased violent crime, domestic abuse, and disabilities for children, as witnessed in countries that have legalized drugs, are severe social costs. The inevitable spending increases for health care, social programs, and insurance from legalized drugs would furthermore cost all people in a direct manner. Once one unpacks all the issues hidden behind drugs, one realizes that drugs are not simply chemical toys to amuse oneself with; drugs are expensive poisons that waste the resources of all of us.

[fod]

nah, she has a real problem folks messing with her perconcieved notions

[bassmaner]

Many drug users are weak-minded, impressionable, or immature, and it just seems to me that legalizing drugs is equivalent to putting society's stamp of approval on them.

We must have had many "weak-minded" people for the first 138 years of the republic's existence -- ALL drugs were legal in America until 1914.

Even today, there are many "weak-minded" people that eat too much junk food, drink too much beer, smoke too many cigarettes, have too many pets, watch too much television, etc. The difference is that these "weak-minded" people, regardless of the harm they bring upon themselves through their behavior, do not risk GOING TO JAIL for them. Anyway, traditionally it's not "society's" (read: government's) duty to put a "stamp of approval" on any personal behavior, as long as the person harms no one else in the process. That duty was given to government early in the 20th century, starting with the enactment of the personal income tax that greatly increased government revenues and grew government to the Leviathan we deal with today.

The real "weak-minded" people are those who defer personal decisions to government bureaucrats by supporting such follies as the WOD.

[KC_Conspirator]

Legalizing drugs will produce a nation of zombies who are impossible to live with individually and who will impose their stunted mentalities politically.

I agree with that. Drugs would be one thing if it only affected the user. But the crime and home abuse that occurs with it affects society and eventually tax payers who have to pay to clean it all up. I am not for subsidizing a whole new slew of state rehab programs because someone thought legalzing hard drugs was a good idea.

[FreeTally]

You could say the same thing about politicians

...or women who get pregnant and have abortions....

[fod]

did I happen to mention you come off as a real idiot, fred?

[Hemingway's Ghost]

Dane is a she?

-> S H U D D E R <-

[FreeTally]

Post #159 applies to you and your logic.

[AUgrad]

I am not for subsidizing a whole new slew of state rehab programs because someone thought legalzing hard drugs was a good idea.

Let me guess ,smart consumers like you know that your tax money is best spent subsidizing the prison-industrial complex.

[fod]

dunno for sure, but she has never denied it...

[AUgrad]

#163 also aptly applies

[Fred25]

CAPTION TO PHOTO.........

”Look, man, all I know is that I was in my VW microbus, headed toward Berkeley, when this flying saucer landed right in the middle of Interstate 80. These three little grays got out and they told me they would take me right to the Berkeley Medical Marijuana Health and Happiness Clinic on Bancroft Way. Then I got in their saucer, and the next thing I knew I was here in this place with a bunch of other hippies just like me, right in the middle of the damndest raid I’ve ever seen and a bunch of damned A-rabs yelling at me, and damned CIA guys all over the place! Just give me my stash and I’ll get outta here. Hey, what year is this? Is it 1998 yet? Where are all the chicks, man? Hey, is this Oakland?”

[KC_Conspirator]

So, since we want to avoid running down the socialist path to more subsidized rehab programs (because that is what will happen) then we are are totalitarians? That is childish and a leap of logic. Please go back to your freshmen dorm and study for bit.

[Liberal Classic]

LOL!

[AUgrad]

Now your humor has become juvenile. What's the problem? No more cognizant arguments to make? At least do like most of your WOD bretheren and resort to platitudes.

[KC_Conspirator]

And drug legalization will solve the social problem of broken families, child abuse, and spousal abuse that is caused by drug abuse? That is the most absurd thing I have seen on this thread today. In fact, something like 90% of these cases are substance related.

[Un-PC]

What could be more expensive than the billions of dollars we've already wasted trying to win a fruitless "war on drugs," whose sequel is now the equally futile "war on terrorism." Neither is winnable a war (terrorism against America won't end until we revise our foreign policy in the Middle East).

By the way, for those Freepers who think it's their solemn duty to pry into the private habits of their fellow citizens, I say to hell with you. You're no friend of freedom, and you certainly have no respect for the privacy of others.

If somebody wants to screw up his life with drugs, that's his business. It's a medical concern, not a crimnal concern. It's because of the incessant meddling of self-anointed moralists that we are no longer safe in our homes against Kevlar-vested stormtroopers armed with machine guns.

[bassmaner]

But the crime and home abuse that occurs with it affects society and eventually tax payers who have to pay to clean it all up.

Oh, you're so right -- that doesn't exist in our "drug-free America" today. Let's keep up the good work -- all those dopers and druggies are behind bars where they belong and none of those evil South Americans are bringing in their horrible poisons anymore. (/sarcasm off)

Why don't you get it? The "collateral damage" from drug war policies is far more damaging to society than the pharmacological effects of any psychotropic drug. The inner cities have been turned into war zones, prisons are packed to the rafters with non-violent people while violent criminals not subject to mandatory minimum sentences get turned loose, innocent people are getting killed in their beds because drug stormtroopers got the wrong address, a new Vietnam is brewing in Columbia, etc. etc. etc.

But it's all worth it, because we're creating that wonderful "Drug-Free America"! We're "doin' it for the chilrun", right?

[Dane]

LOL! You two are disproving the stereotype that females are the ones that gossip. Maybe Libertarian males are the worst offenders.(could be all the drugs)

Oh well that doesn't really matter, I am getting great entertainment watching you two cackle.

Oh BTW, I am a male.

[AUgrad]

You make a convincing argument. You almost have me convinced.

But I still have reservations about legalizing drugs

A gentleman and a scholar if I ever met one. Your approach to the argument speaks well of you. I applaud you for your willingness to listen to an opposing viewpoint.Anytime you are interested in serious debate (without abuse) , ping me.