Kofi Annan on Why It's Time to Legalize Drugs • Hacker News Board

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

#361

Post by Noos » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 6:34 AM UTC

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.…

No more than gambling usage has dropped because it's no longer rebellious to gamble.

Gambling legalization is very close to drug legalization in my opinion, and that has shown that usage will increase, and the behavior will be destigmatized.

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

#362

Post by _yosefk » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 6:53 AM UTC

gedy wrote: post #255

_yosefk wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite conspiracy theory regarding drug legalization is, "the rich" will want to legalize drugs to get rid of "the poor" on the theory that people who've been put out of work by machines are an unnecessary burden, and that widespread use of drugs among such people is a good way to reduce their numbers. (I don't quite "believe" this theory in the sense of imagining a bunch of rich people sitting in a room, conspi…

Interesting theory, but for pacification, not elimination.

I've known a few drug addicts who died young and left no children.

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

#363

Post by mjw_byrne » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 8:52 AM UTC

There's a strong parallel between drug policy and sex education policy. If you acknowledge that sex is a thing people are simply going to do and you give them the information they need to do it safely and throw in a free condom or two, STDs and unwanted pregnancies are kept under good control. If your policy is "you don't need education and condoms if you just don't do it!" then STDs and unwanted pregnancies soar.

In the case of drugs, it is clear that people will use them regardless. So the question for policymakers can't be "how do we stop people using drugs?", it has to be "given that people will use drugs, how do we minimise the harm caused?"

The other interesting parallel is ashtrays in aeroplane toilets. Supposedly they're there because sometimes, despite the warnings and no-smoking signs, people light up in the loo anyway. It's better for them to have an ashtray to put the cigarette out in than to try to improvise and possibly start a fire. In a situation where a planeload of passenger's lives could be at stake, there's no room for moral grandstanding - they've done the pragmatic thing and realised that when total prohibition cannot be enforced, you simply do what you can to minimise the damage.

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

#364

Post by conceit » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 1:15 PM UTC

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,…

Or maybe they don't see Drugs as a problem. I don't think e.g. Victorian aristocrats saw poverty as a problem or that the slave traders saw exhaustion or torture and other forms of violence as a problem, far from it. I believe slaves would rather be given coffee instead of food coffee.

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

#365

Post by conceit » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 1:18 PM UTC

mjw_byrne wrote: post #363

There's a strong parallel between drug policy and sex education policy. If you acknowledge that sex is a thing people are simply going to do and you give them the information they need to do it safely and throw in a free condom or two, STDs and unwanted pregnancies are kept under good control. If your policy is "you don't need education and condoms if you just don't do it!" then STDs and unwanted pregnancies soar. In…

> how do we minimise the harm caused?"

I know one: we advertise drugs in movies and on billboards and put a liquor store on every other street corner, Oughta show'em.

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

#366

Post by patcon » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 7:11 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #158

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,…

The government persists with the drug war because Americans have a moral opposition to drug use: http://www.jhsph.edu/news/news-releases/2014/study-public-fe... . When I was a kid in the 1990's, 70-80% of polled adults wanted to make even marijuana illegal. For drugs aside from marijuana, that's still the case. Your alternate theories about money and control directly contradict the history of prohibition. Did you kno…

> Did you know that at the time alcohol prohibition was instituted, fully 1/3 of the federal budget came from liquor taxes?

It's not about general funding (for which the government has many sources, including straight-up printing), but about untraced monies. Money is not all equal, and for certain purposes, taxed money is much, much less valuable than untraceable drug money.

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

#367

Post by koide » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 8:13 PM UTC

gozur88 wrote: post #355

zeveb wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if drugs are harmful and addictive, why can't society ban people from selling them, like it does for all sorts of other harmful products? That begs the question: should society ban the sale of harmful products? I can buy: a sword; a gun; a packet of cigarettes; arsenic; cyanide; Doritos; Dianetics; Season 1 of Survivor and so forth. All of these things may be argued by some to be harmful (and by others not to be).…

The reason is people take it as given if you mess yourself up the rest of us will have to pay for your treatment. If I have to pay for your mistakes, then I want some say in what you're doing. Personally, I'd rather live in a more libertarian society, where you could do whatever you want (to yourself) and accept the consequences. But that's not the society we live in.

But alcohol and tobacco are just as harmful in the sense of having to pay for the treatments and the damage to others as the rest of the drugs. Why ignore them?

It really makes no sense...

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

#368

Post by gozur88 » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 8:52 PM UTC

koide wrote: post #367

gozur88 wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason is people take it as given if you mess yourself up the rest of us will have to pay for your treatment. If I have to pay for your mistakes, then I want some say in what you're doing. Personally, I'd rather live in a more libertarian society, where you could do whatever you want (to yourself) and accept the consequences. But that's not the society we live in.

But alcohol and tobacco are just as harmful in the sense of having to pay for the treatments and the damage to others as the rest of the drugs. Why ignore them? It really makes no sense...

There are all sorts of restrictions on alcohol and tobacco. In the US alcohol would be illegal if the government hadn't tried and failed to make it illegel.

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

#369

Post by pc2g4d » Thu, Mar 03, 2016, 10:36 PM UTC

cubano wrote: post #87

I've always thought that, in the US, that States could provide a perfect market testing platform for various social ideas. You don't want abortion? Make Kansas, say, a no abortion state. Legalized drugs? Head your head to Colorado. Socialism? Sure New Hampshire is almost there already anyway. Well, you get the point. It's been proven that actual markets almost always work as well if not better than diktat, so these "…

I love this idea, and it has a long history. The states are known as the "laboratories of democracy". From Wikipedia[1]:

"Laboratories of democracy is a phrase popularized by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis in New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann to describe how a 'state may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.' Brandeis was an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States from 1916 to 1939.

"This concept explains how within the federal framework, there exists a system of state autonomy where state and local governments act as social 'laboratories,' where laws and policies are created and tested at the state level of the democratic system, in a manner similar (in theory, at least) to the scientific method."

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratories_of_democracy

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

#370

Post by koide » Fri, Mar 04, 2016, 7:39 AM UTC

gozur88 wrote: post #368

koide wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But alcohol and tobacco are just as harmful in the sense of having to pay for the treatments and the damage to others as the rest of the drugs. Why ignore them? It really makes no sense...

There are all sorts of restrictions on alcohol and tobacco. In the US alcohol would be illegal if the government hadn't tried and failed to make it illegel.

All sorts, except the sort that applies to all the rest of the drugs. It still makes no sense.