Posted on 08/20/2014 10:40:32 AM PDT by ConservingFreedom
Not to mention that people's poor diets and sleep habits are also paid for in healthcare - do these 'conservatives' want government monitoring our fridges and setting our bedtimes?
Conservative and freedom, says it all. I get to pick and choose what should be legal for everyone else in the masses. Typical liberalism.
Double blind trials are the gold standard - but it's not the case that no other kind of evidence has any weight.
And what percentage of drinkers become alcoholics?
The question of drug legalization turns not on whether drugs are bad for their users — they are — but whether the harms to society created by having the government not treat psychoactive substances as a criminal matter (basically an uptick in the number of people ruining their lives, and indirectly the lives of those around them by using drugs) are greater or less than the harms created by treating use of and trade in psychoactive substances as a matter of criminal law (erosion of civil liberties through increasingly drastic enforcement measures like no-knock raids and asset forfeiture laws, creating a cash-flow for ruthless and often terrorist-linked criminal enterprises, lack of quality control of the the product leading to dangers to users besides those inherent in the use of psychoactive drugs, black-market premium pricing of drugs leading to property crime to support habits, defining users to be criminals thereby preventing them from seeking medical help for their habit,...)
Psychoactive recreational drugs are bad. Keeping them illegal makes them worse, not just for the users, but for society as a whole.
That’s the serious argument — not “pro-dope” just anti-drug-war — not turning at all on the notion that one’s body is one’s own and one can ingest or inhale what one want (that’ a “pro-dope” argument), just that making them illegal rather than treating them the way we treat alcohol and tobacco, creates worse problems than it solves.
Honestly the only bright line I can find between the psychoactive drugs we’ve chosen to keep legal (alcohol, nicotine and caffeine) and those we’ve outlawed is that the former were popular in Europe at the time of the American Founding. None of the dire things drug warriors predict would happen under legalization were true in the 19th century when the government didn’t prevent trade in or use of marijuana, peyote, cocaine or opiates, includ laudanum (tincture of opium) which was suprisingly popular.
It actually surprises me the degree to which conservatives now champion what was originally a left-wing progressive cause: drug prohibition, like the income tax, direct election of Senators, moralizing foreign policy devoid of connection to American national interests and the Federal Reserve is one of the baleful legacies of Woodrow Wilson’s administration.
The legality of pot would impose no requirements on anyone - anybody who doesn't want to smoke it could continue to not smoke it.
About anywhere else it is a disaster. You should see the zombies coming out of the pot and vaping shop, so sad and so young.
Here in CA most all violent criminals jailed love their pot and often mixed it with other stuff during the crimes that put them in prison.
Pot is for losers and will make losers out of future generations.
Have a major health issue, then I can see its private use.
All I know is that almost all of the people I have ever known who are long-term pot smokers are: poor, lazy, apathetic, slackers. Not all, but nearly all.
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That’s interesting.
did you know any of these folks before they became long term pot smokers?
Of the folks I know from before pot usage (admittedly only 2 or 3 people) and then seeing them today, the two that were lazy, apathetic, moody ones before they took up the habit are still lazy, apathetic and moody.
So then the drugs I mentioned in an earlier post are next for "decriminalization"? Afterall, they cause enrichment as well.
Honestly the only bright line I can find between the psychoactive drugs we’ve chosen to keep legal (alcohol, nicotine and caffeine) and those we’ve outlawed is that the former were popular in Europe at the time of the American Founding. None of the dire things drug warriors predict would happen under legalization were true in the 19th century when the government didn’t prevent trade in or use of marijuana, peyote, cocaine or opiates, includ laudanum (tincture of opium) which was suprisingly popular.
It actually surprises me the degree to which conservatives now champion what was originally a left-wing progressive cause
Excellent post! My only caveat is that ownership of one's own body is neither unserious nor "pro-dope" - though I will agree that if criminalization was applied only to the nastiest drugs (e.g., meth) and was successful, I'd be roughly as concerned about that violation of bodily ownership as I am about public ownership of sidewalks.
In my area, the local “organic health solutions” shop is patronized by mainly young folks...I don’t recall seeing any elderly cancer patients going in or coming out.
I love it when pro-pot folks “defend” it by comparing it to alcohol and tobacco. For years, this same group has ranted endlessly about the horrors of smoking and the social costs of booze. They demand that they be regulated, taxed, and virtually outlawed.
Then they extoll the virtues of weed “because it’s no worse than alcohol and tobacco.”
Do we really need yet another substance to be abused? And why stop there? Why not make all drugs legal?
Anti-biotics, meth, cocaine, and everything else should be ‘take as you want’ unless they are hypocrites. They want only their drug legalized, for now. The rest would come with time.
This whole medical pot thing has really been a wise use of the left to get it more mainstream. They did it with homos and all the rest of their agenda, a little normalization at a time.
Comparing marijuana to liquor is a non sequitur. I won’t even discuss that.
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Exactly. Alcohol is much worse.
In 2011, nearly 10,000 were killed in alcohol related car crashes.
How many people died from pot in 2011?
I concur too. For a pro liberty website, FR seems to have many anti-liberty opinions. I don’t see how Conservatives who are against government regulating everything, would approve of laws that criminalize ADULTS in the privacy of their homes from using marijuana.
I am not changing my mind to your way of thinking.
I have no sympathies for those to push a view on millions of others when I know it would hurt society more than ever helping them, so count me out for the marches.
People like you are a liberal because you think you know what is best for all of society, when you don’t.
In my view, you all are using this as excuse to keep from being penalized (to heck with the damage to the population, like I expressed). Time for me to leave the pot thread. Ceya. Remember, you said I couldn’t read pass the title.
Young people report that they can get pot (which is illegal for all, except in a few states) more easily than beer or cigarettes (which are legal for adults). It appears that the most effective way to reduce access to marijuana by young people is harnessing the power of the market by legalizing for adults, so sellers have the potential loss of their legal adult market to discourage them from selling to minors.
Here in CA most all violent criminals jailed love their pot
Alcohol is even more popular among criminals - should we ban that drug too?
Exactly, f-ing the future of our young people and saying “Its going to happen anyway” as an excuss.
The older crowd into that are mostly in prison or dead I would guess.
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Your logic is flawed.. honesty is suspect.. and point is mute..
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