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After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

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Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#31

Post by Mediterraneo10 »

The simple slogan of "defund the police" in fact leads to vociferous disagreement among individual activists and organizations about what that means, i.e. whether simply refusing the police military hardware and funding levels, or ending the existence of police outright and replacing them with an unarmed, locally organized neighborhood patrol.

"The war on drugs has been a failure and should end" seems like a similar can of worms. Should the state take the approach of decriminalizing drugs but still aiming to reduce their use by allowing addicts only recourse to medical treatment in special centers? Or should things take a libertarian path and allow citizens to put whatever they want into their own bodies whenever they want?

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#32

Post by dcolkitt »

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #20
sjwalter wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you kidding me? The "war" on drugs today is nothing like it was at all in the 90s. For the most obvious example, marijuana is legal to purchase for recreational use in dozens of states, with more coming.

What do we need to do next that would have the biggest effect, decriminalize cocaine/crack cocaine?

Legal and purity regulated heroin would have by far the biggest impact, because of the scourge of fentanyl deaths.

If I had to choose between legal cannabis and legal heroin, I’d choose the latter on utilitarian grounds. (Although obviously I support both wholeheartedly.)

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#33

Post by dragonwriter »

LordKano wrote: post #11

It's helping law enforcement maintain high budgets. The drug war fuels the violence of the drug trade and that violence requires the police be well equipped to handle it.

> It's helping law enforcement maintain high budgets.

And not just in the obvious, direct ways of pointing out drug crime and asking for funding. E.g., I recall studies of DARE’s impacts showing that it had no measurable impacts on drug use, drug abuse, or drug-related crime among students directly participating or communities, but did have a measurable positive impact on participating students attitudes toward law enforcement.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#34

Post by nuclearnice1 »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #28
bgroins wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reasoning is well established at this point. It was started by the Nixon administration to reduce the amount of left and left-leaning voters, particularly black Americans. "The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the…

Whether or not it was Nixon and friends acting like racists is secondary. Tons of individuals and institutions piled on because there was power and money in it for them.

You can say it’s secondary, but it’s a good answer to the question raised by the parent: “it would be very interesting to know the reasoning to start it.”

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#35

Post by himinlomax »

dcolkitt wrote: post #24
BitwiseFool wrote: post #9

This is one of those weird things about American Democracy where everyone I speak to thinks the Drug War was a terrible thing and should be stopped. And yet, our politicians never substantially do anything to change the status quo.

You almost certainly occupy a bubble in this. I hate the War on Drugs with every fiber in my being, but it’s broadly popular. Cannabis legalization may recently be popular. But I’d be shocked if more than 5% of Americans supported the legalization hard drugs, and if more than 20% supported by Portuguese style decriminalization. Even soft drug prohibition, like MDMA and LSD, are supported by sizable majorities of vote…

Decriminalization and legalization are different things.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#36

Post by tyingq »

pope_meat wrote: post #3

Created a lot of jobs in the industry of arresting and detaining humans. Being number 1 per capita in prison population isn't a lean operation, a lot of people's lives depend on the system continuing. I think the solution is to rent bulldozers, armor them, and just level a bunch of them. Too many prison beds, too many laws, it's all gotten very dumb.

It's pretty hard to get info on the industry as well.

Jpay, for example, is a subsidiary of a private company, and does the "fund a prisoners commissary account" as well as "send a prisoner a email" type services.

Here's their fees for money transfers for the Texas Prisoners:

$ 0.00 - 9.99 $2.45

$ 10.00 - 19.99 $3.45

$ 20.00 - 49.99 $6.45

$ 50.00 - 99.99 $8.45

$ 100.00 - 199.99 $10.45

$ 200.00 - 300.00 $12.45

They also charge it as a cash advance, which can result in additional charges from your bank.

Ouch.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#37

Post by pope_meat »

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #25
pope_meat wrote: post #3

Created a lot of jobs in the industry of arresting and detaining humans. Being number 1 per capita in prison population isn't a lean operation, a lot of people's lives depend on the system continuing. I think the solution is to rent bulldozers, armor them, and just level a bunch of them. Too many prison beds, too many laws, it's all gotten very dumb.

> Created a lot of jobs in the industry of arresting and detaining humans. What portion of those arrested + detained are the type of people we want in society/civilization?

A large portion, in my opinion. You can disagree.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#38

Post by throwaway0a5e »

the_economist wrote: post #30

Counterpoint: The war on drugs has been progressively ramped down since the late 90s. NYTimes wrote a long story about how during the feds quit using tactics such as convicted drug dealers to flip on their bosses, etc. We aren't putting as many drug dealers in jail and we aren't putting many drug users in jail. What you get is an epic rise in opioid deaths over the past 30 years and chaos on the streets of our cities…

>Given what LA/SF/Portland streets look like with this eased-back war on drugs, it is possible the war was doing a lot.

You don't need to run a war on drugs to enforce existing laws about petty property crime and laws that criminalize the most abrasive of homeless behavior.

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#39

Post by [deleted] »

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #20
sjwalter wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you kidding me? The "war" on drugs today is nothing like it was at all in the 90s. For the most obvious example, marijuana is legal to purchase for recreational use in dozens of states, with more coming.

What do we need to do next that would have the biggest effect, decriminalize cocaine/crack cocaine?

[deleted]

Re: After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us?'

#40

Post by setpatchaddress »

the_economist wrote: post #30

Counterpoint: The war on drugs has been progressively ramped down since the late 90s. NYTimes wrote a long story about how during the feds quit using tactics such as convicted drug dealers to flip on their bosses, etc. We aren't putting as many drug dealers in jail and we aren't putting many drug users in jail. What you get is an epic rise in opioid deaths over the past 30 years and chaos on the streets of our cities…

you might google Fentanyl
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