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Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

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Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#101

Post by parenthephobia »

jfmfhhdkdkd wrote: post #96
jdietrich wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Portugal decriminalised personal possession of drugs 15 years ago, which has given us some useful evidence. HIV infection rates and drug-related deaths have reduced significantly, and the prison population has reduced by over 50%. The proportion of people who have ever used drugs has increased slightly, but there has been a reduction in the number of regular drug users. We don't really know what would happen in a lai…

But Japan and Hong Kong and many others still have far lower drug use and crime rates despite their very tough laws on drug use, when compared to Portugal.

The rational conclusion seems to be that whether drugs are legal, or decriminalized, are, at best, only part of what determines levels of drug use and drug-related crime.

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#102

Post by analog31 »

puranjay wrote: post #66
Synaesthesia wrote: post #41

The drug problem was studied years ago by the RAND corporation and the US Military - a pure cost-benefit analysis. They found that treatment and education are the most cost effective way to deal with the drug problem, and that prohibition was the most costly and ineffective means of dealing with it. Therefore the government understands that the war on drugs is likely to be unsuccessful, and we have to ask ourselves,…

I always wonder what would happen to drug use if it was widely and easily available. Would usage drop because it wouldn't be "rebellious" to get drugs? That was at least the motivation for a lot of younger drug users I know. In my country (India), there is a region in the Himalayas - Kasaul - where marijuana grows in the wild. It is so easily accessible that you can literally pluck some on a walk through the forest.…

In the US culture, I think a lot would depend on marketing and advertising. Consider the marketing of high fructose corn syrup, which is cheap, legal, hardly "rebellious," possibly a sort of low-grade high, and consumed in toxic quantities.

I'm not arguing against legalization. But I had a similar conversation with my kids about legalizing pot. I told them that whatever the health aspects of pot use are, the pot industry would use all of the tactics of the tobacco industry, to market pot as "cool" and perfectly safe.

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#103

Post by ZeroGravitas »

purpled_haze wrote: post #100
Synaesthesia wrote: post #41

The drug problem was studied years ago by the RAND corporation and the US Military - a pure cost-benefit analysis. They found that treatment and education are the most cost effective way to deal with the drug problem, and that prohibition was the most costly and ineffective means of dealing with it. Therefore the government understands that the war on drugs is likely to be unsuccessful, and we have to ask ourselves,…

> Tobacco and Alcohol companies would likely suffer as a result of drug legalisation, like cannabis. To state this in another way- think of all of the Budweiser/Bud Light sponsorships and commercials and replace that Bud with the other kind of bud. That's about the scale and usage to expect, at the very least, if cannabis were to be completely legal everywhere alcohol is. And all of the abuse, drunk driving, etc? Inc…

Did the abuse of alcohol and it's impacts go up or down after prohibition? Probably depends on whether you count making gangsters rich and famous, and people dying from drinking bathtub gin as abuse or not, but even if you exclude all that, it's not a slam dunk that there would be a big shift in either direction for users, or that it wouldn't simply displace other drugs, legal or illegal, which you'd need to measure to get a true picture.

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#104

Post by emiliobumachar »

tim333 wrote: post #62
Synaesthesia wrote: post #41

The drug problem was studied years ago by the RAND corporation and the US Military - a pure cost-benefit analysis. They found that treatment and education are the most cost effective way to deal with the drug problem, and that prohibition was the most costly and ineffective means of dealing with it. Therefore the government understands that the war on drugs is likely to be unsuccessful, and we have to ask ourselves,…

Nearly all countries have some ban so I doubt full legalization is the answer. I think if you approach it to minimise harm you'd probably have varying policies depending on the drug and the situation. For example cannabis, maybe legalize and tax like cigarettes. Stuff like Heroin and Meth don't legalize private sales but let drug counsellors hand it out to addicts to kill the illegal market, prevent them being harmed…

"Nearly all countries have some ban so I doubt full legalization is the answer. "

Most countries went with the flow of international pressure, rather than banning as a sovereign decision. It came to a point in which any country that becomes sufficiently soft on hard drugs is labeled a "narco state", and that's widely considered reasonable grounds for a military invasion! What we're seeing today is the chilling effects of that.

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#105

Post by jdietrich »

jfmfhhdkdkd wrote: post #90
jfmfhhdkdkd wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet, there are plenty of Asian countries (Singapore, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, etc) where drug laws are much stricter than the US's, there are very few drug addicts, and there is very little crime.

I really find it absurd that stating facts is downvoted here on HN because it doesn't fit the hivemind. Singapore and Indonesia execute drug offenders and despite what I am told should happen in this thread, there is very little crime despite their crazier "War on Drugs". When compared to a country like Portugal, Singapore and Indonesia have far lower crime and drug use.

Execution is a very drastic drug-related harm. If we killed everyone at age 50 then cancer rates would fall drastically, but it would be completely unreasonable to suggest that we had effectively solved the cancer problem.

It is worth noting that Indonesia have changed their drug policies in recent years and are moving towards a medicalised rather than criminalised approach to drug use, largely as a response to rising rates of HIV infection amongst injecting drug users.

https://www.unodc.org/indonesia/en/issues/hiv-and-drugs.html

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#106

Post by pbhjpbhj »

akie wrote: post #5
smegel wrote: post #2

It really is a difficult problem. Sweden legalized heroin in the 60s and it was a disaster. On the other hand, enforcement only has a moderate impact, but comes at a huge financial and social cost. And while I don't support it, the only country with a measure of success seems to be Singapore, where you just hang anyone who has more than single dose in their possession. Maybe the grim reality is hanging a few hundred…

The US incarcerated very significant percentages of its black male population under the guise of the "war on drugs" and I'm not sure if it made much of a difference. Drug use in the US is certainly not lower than in comparable countries, so I'm not sure if you could conclude that removing people from society in order to address the "drug problem" is necessarily an idea backed by solid data.

>US incarcerated very significant percentages of its black male population under the guise of the "war on drugs" //

You think it was a government backed conspiracy against black males?

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#107

Post by cr1895 »

puranjay wrote: post #66
Synaesthesia wrote: post #41

The drug problem was studied years ago by the RAND corporation and the US Military - a pure cost-benefit analysis. They found that treatment and education are the most cost effective way to deal with the drug problem, and that prohibition was the most costly and ineffective means of dealing with it. Therefore the government understands that the war on drugs is likely to be unsuccessful, and we have to ask ourselves,…

I always wonder what would happen to drug use if it was widely and easily available. Would usage drop because it wouldn't be "rebellious" to get drugs? That was at least the motivation for a lot of younger drug users I know. In my country (India), there is a region in the Himalayas - Kasaul - where marijuana grows in the wild. It is so easily accessible that you can literally pluck some on a walk through the forest.…

>In my country (India), there is a region in the Himalayas - Kasaul - where marijuana grows in the wild. It is so easily accessible that you can literally pluck some on a walk through the forest.

e.g. Hindu Kush. Interestingly, cannabis has been used in India since 2000BCE.

Aren't there some tolerated/accepted uses of cannabis in India? I suppose what I'm really asking is it actually tourists or aren't there some significant traditional uses such as bhang? I can certainly understand that some users would just be tourists, but most I'm not sure of.

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#108

Post by Pxtl »

Synaesthesia wrote: post #41

The drug problem was studied years ago by the RAND corporation and the US Military - a pure cost-benefit analysis. They found that treatment and education are the most cost effective way to deal with the drug problem, and that prohibition was the most costly and ineffective means of dealing with it. Therefore the government understands that the war on drugs is likely to be unsuccessful, and we have to ask ourselves,…

My understanding wasnt that the CIA was directly involved in the drug trade, but that their normal activities create infrastructure for their partners that are shady international organizations that operate outside local laws naturally creates drug smuggling networks.

They work with local organized crime to create covert hideouts and border crossings for CIA use, and give them funding and weapons in exchange, and things like the drug trade come out of that almost automatically.

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#109

Post by ZeroGravitas »

jfmfhhdkdkd wrote: post #96
jdietrich wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Portugal decriminalised personal possession of drugs 15 years ago, which has given us some useful evidence. HIV infection rates and drug-related deaths have reduced significantly, and the prison population has reduced by over 50%. The proportion of people who have ever used drugs has increased slightly, but there has been a reduction in the number of regular drug users. We don't really know what would happen in a lai…

But Japan and Hong Kong and many others still have far lower drug use and crime rates despite their very tough laws on drug use, when compared to Portugal.

The article states that research shows no correlation between severe drug penalties and usage levels.

There's a few people offering anecdotes to counter that, but obviously actual research wins, the difference between Portugal and Japan are therefore likely to be cultural differences outside of strict drug laws.

Re: Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs

#110

Post by parenthephobia »

jfmfhhdkdkd wrote: post #90
jfmfhhdkdkd wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet, there are plenty of Asian countries (Singapore, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, etc) where drug laws are much stricter than the US's, there are very few drug addicts, and there is very little crime.

I really find it absurd that stating facts is downvoted here on HN because it doesn't fit the hivemind. Singapore and Indonesia execute drug offenders and despite what I am told should happen in this thread, there is very little crime despite their crazier "War on Drugs". When compared to a country like Portugal, Singapore and Indonesia have far lower crime and drug use.

I think that what gets down-voted is more the implication that making drugs offences capital crimes is the chief reason Singapore and Indonesia have lower drug usage rates.

I believe that more significant influencing factors are that drug usage is socially unacceptable Singapore and Indonesia, that citizens are more willing to accept government control over their private activities, that drugs are harder to acquire.

It seems more likely that those countries are able to have capital punishment for (what the West would consider to be) minor drugs offences precisely _because_ drug use is already low and drug users are more consistently vilified by society.

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