Is there anything good about narcotic prohibitions?

Thanks for your reply, iano. I've had a long day and although you seem to have written that last post very straightforwardly, I'm still having trouble getting the sense of your response. If I understand you right, you are suggesting that the free availability of any potentially harmful drug can be the beginning of a slippery slope - and you cite tobacco and alcohol as two examples of a harmful legalised narcotic... am I with you?

I agree with your analysis and have been against the "war on drugs" for some time now. This is solid proof that you can teach history all you want and people will still make the exact same mistakes.That said, Jar's proposal, while interesting, is unfeasible. I suppose if it were restricted to just the hardest medically challenged cases, while trying to remove them from addiction, that would make sense. Otherwise it doesn't make sense financially.By creating a free entertainment drug system you remove normal barriers to their use, and might aid in producing problems that might not be there. Frankly if we're going to have a free drug system, there are countless other drugs which ought to be available rather than those that are for entertainment purposes. But I digress...If one starts such a system there is no stopping its growth and manipulation. Drug companies could start making new drugs for which the gov't would then have to look for a contractor (maybe them) to supply everyone who might want it. If one puts in a rule that drug companies can't invent new drugs, or market them, then we'll be right back in the drug war mode.I might also ask what limits will be taken regarding drugs to be supplied. Will that include various paints and glues and aerosols?

---

holmes
"What you need is sustained outrage...there's far too much unthinking respect given to authority." (M.Ivins)

Back when Heroin was legal in the UK there was a grand total of 48 Heroin addicts in the country. Anyone want to guess how many there are now?

I take it you suggesting there is money to be made, or that it is politically expedient to have many narcotics proscribed, or maybe that its too much effort to change the inherited opinions of the public? So how do you go about addressing these problems I wonder?I guess its not very easy!

Up and down, like consumption of any product goes, with no serious spike in either direction until after World War II.

---

"I fail to comprehend your indignation, sir. I've simply made the logical deduction that you are a liar."
-Spock

One would have to look at the reasons for tobacco uptake a litte. Typically uptake is at a young age and the effects of the first number of inhaled cigarettes is to cause the victim to suffocate, cough, go green and get sick. Yet they persist in doing something for which there are no apparent physical benefits. The reason for persisting is singular. Cigarette smoking provides the illusion of coolness, adulthood, rebellion etc. Its all about image and conforming to what the cool herd is doing.If a scenario was created whereby it was possible for a narcotic to be available and for it to be considered cool and adult and rebellious (well within the bounds of the marketing dept) then you would have the same situation as you do with cigarettes - except that one of the main reasons for not taking it up (if at all tried): it makes you feel awful - would have been removed.Tobacco is a slow killer and apart from the serious physical downsides which appear later on, there is little apparent downside along the way. Physcologically, there is litte if any downside. With narcotics you get the phsycological as well as physical downsides all along the way. The total destruction quotient would I think greatly exceed that for cigarettes.

This varies hugely depending on the narcotic, and many of the physical downsides are the product of the illicit nature of drug taking.TTFN,WK

[qs]According to Dr James Mills, a historian who has traced drug use through the 20th century, they tended to be doctors or middle-class patients who could afford to sustain a habit."In the 1930s, it was really the well-to-do crowd. The working classes might have a bit of heroin in the medicine prescribed to them [b]but it wouldn't be enough to form a dependency[b]," says Dr Mills.[/qs]Thus it would seem that making drugs cheap (or free - as Jar suggests) and increasing availability are excellent ways of making people dependent on highly addictive substances.

How does that follow from your quote? Heroin use has increased dramatically, especially in the working classes, despite the massive efforts to combat their spread.The evidence could just as easily be seen to suggest that making drugs illegal is an excellent way of making people dependent on highly addictive substances.TTFN,WK

I can think of nothing, which has dangers associated it, which if made more cheap and freely available will result in less total harm being done. Narcotics can be highly addictive (the street name for cocaine in the inner city of Dublin is 'more' - cos that is all you want).Prohibition-era data provides no useful reference for us for the reasons I suggested in my last post. We would be flying blind and can only look to existing drugs which are freely available for our guide.

I don't know about your neck of the woods but in the 70's in North Dublin, heroin went through the community like a hurricane and decimated it. Cheap introduction-to-the-drug techniques and widespread availabilty allied with many folks hopeless outlook on the future which established a spearhead, were the mechanisms for its success.Crack cocaine is doing the rounds now and in precisely the same fashion.

Certainly drugs like Marijuana should be legalized. In fact, if Marijuana was legalized I think you would see a drop in the use of more dangerous drugs like cocaine and heroin. (Just my opinion, don't have data to back me up).Prohibition in general is a poor policy. In the USA for example drug education is ridiculously over the top. You would think that smoking pot would kill you and make you insane. When you actually try drinking or pot and find out that it's not such a big deal when used responsibly it makes you pretty much disregard all the BS they fed you in Drug eduction. However, this is dangerous because drugs like cocaine and heroin really are quite dangerous. Especially herion (believe it or not, I know several people who occasionally use a bit of cocaine recreationally... like 10 or less times a year and it has no bad effects on them. Although I would be scared to snort something that is mixed with who knows what).

That is not a new thought.I have mixed feelings about this. Some of the newer drugs (such as crack), are very deadly in and of themselves, while others (such as marijuana) seem to be less harmful than alcohol and tobacco (which is why the alcohol and tobacco lobyists are so against them).Makkng many of these drugs legal would certainly be a blow to the cartels.

I started the following about 3 years ago, back just before the "Coffee House" topic numbers reached 100: Good drugs, bad drugs, legal drugs, illegal drugsMoose

Hopeful people take drugs, too.