Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

time.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 126 posts

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#111

Post by jawngee »

nandemo wrote: post #106
jawngee wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Citation on marijuana's toxicity? I guess everything is toxic to a certain degree, even water is toxic if you swallow enough of it.

I'd have guessed this was "common sense", but here you are: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marijuana#Long-term_effects Anyway, my point is that the argument that "marijuana isn't toxic so it should be legal" isn't valid. First, because it is toxic. Also, because it isn't that relevant: there is similarly toxic stuff that is legal. > I guess everything is toxic to a certain degree, even water is toxic if you swallow eno…

I didn't see anything in the what you linked to that stated that marijuana was toxic. A lot of "might be" linked "to certain things" but nothing substantive.

More people die each year from OTC painkillers (aspirin, tylenol, advil) than they do in deaths caused by marijuana (0).

http://drugwarfacts.org/cms/?q=node/30

Mikuriya, T.H. "Historical Aspects of Cannabis Sativa in Western Medicine," New Physician, 1969, p. 905.

Grinspoon, Lester. Marihuana Reconsidered. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971.

Nadelmann, Ethan A. "Drug Prohibition in the United States: Costs, Consequences, and Alternatives," Science, Vol 245: 943, 1 September 1989

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#112

Post by puredemo »

njharman wrote: post #36

Is anyone else perplexed that the success metric for decriminalization is reduced drug use? I'd think reduced crime (esp organized), reduced prison populations, savings in prosecuting housing drug non-criminals, job increases from local production/distribution, and/or tax revenue increases would all be more interesting / relevant metrics. It sounds like Portugal took the path of "it's still illegal and bad, we're jus…

Agreed. It presumes that usage is inherently bad, which is questionable.

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#113

Post by RevRal »

Vivtek wrote: post #107
Symmetry wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the critical difference is that as things currently stand none of the people involved in the drug trade have any reason to cooperate with the authorities. And really, once alcohol was legalized look at how quickly the mob violence around it disappeared.

Right. Prohibition created the Mafia - before Prohibition they were a bunch of petty Italian thugs, but America's real desire for alcohol made them rich and powerful. Prohibition never works. You'd think a bunch of free marketeers like American conservatives would get that.

For another take on the how prohibitions don't solve anything, take a look at alcoholism in Native American reservations with an alcohol prohibition.

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#114

Post by w00pla »

jamesbressi wrote: post #5

Does the findings in this article surprise anyone? No? Good. I'm not a hippy, but let's get over this b.s. "War on Drugs" and begin to use our common sense when dealing with social issues and impeding on natural rights.

> when dealing with social issues and impeding on natural rights.

Maybe. I am a firm believer that your rights stop only where my rights start.

I would not be against drug use by other individuals (even if I personally think it is a stupid idea). Unfortunately, drug addicts do their best to make their problems your problems (i.e. they externalise the consequences of their actions).

This is manifested in such things as free health care and constant welfare and unemployment benefits. So, yeah, if you want complete individual freedom, it should be coupled with individual consequences.

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#115

Post by netcan »

roc wrote: post #78
jrockway wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surely locking someone in a cage for possessing a non-toxic plant goes against "common sense".

The proper argument is the American ideal of personal liberty. Our rights are only supposed to be curtailed in situations where the expression of one's rights negative impacts another. The plant being non-toxic, this does not happen. An appeal to an undefined "common sense" is unnecessary.

Ethics, the kind deferred to in politics, usually boils down to some vague, undefined but shared (common) something.

The American liberty is also essentially a common American sensibility. Very few of those who defer to it could articulate one of the (usually pretty technical) liberal arguments.

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#116

Post by Devilboy »

w00pla wrote: post #114
jamesbressi wrote: post #5

Does the findings in this article surprise anyone? No? Good. I'm not a hippy, but let's get over this b.s. "War on Drugs" and begin to use our common sense when dealing with social issues and impeding on natural rights.

> when dealing with social issues and impeding on natural rights. Maybe. I am a firm believer that your rights stop only where my rights start. I would not be against drug use by other individuals (even if I personally think it is a stupid idea). Unfortunately, drug addicts do their best to make their problems your problems (i.e. they externalise the consequences of their actions). This is manifested in such things a…

So what's your stance on alcohol and nicotine?

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#117

Post by metamemetics »

unavailable wrote: post #96
Rod wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am also from Portugal. After reading your post, I was wondering whether we lived in the same country. I suspect I am from a generation younger than yours, which may explain a lot. According to your rationale, oppressive regimes lead to increased drug abuse. Well, Spain also had a dictatorship for decades. The entire "Eastern Europe" lived under Soviet oppression for decades, too. The USSR didn't have a sexual revol…

USSR et al have never needed drugs other than alcohol, which is still abused today in incredible volumes - please look for numbers yourself. Still, plenty of poppy crops were destroyed after 1985. Hemp was and still is popular in the southern parts of the Soviet bloc.

Russia is the largest consumer of heroin in the world.

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#119

Post by wrinklz »

goatforce5 wrote: post #57
mey wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of things people ingest are toxic, the trick I feel is making that well known and public knowledge, not necessarily illegal. For example, the surgeon generals warning on the pack of a cigarette, or the chemical warnings on a bottle of bleach, I feel are a better way to approach the problem. Part of my attitude comes from growing up in New Hampshire. For example, if you are a consenting adult, and you are only h…

If someone is in a traffic accident and ends up with severe physical or mental disabilities because they didn't take basic safety precautions (wearing a helmet or seatbelt), costs are incurred by the rest of society.

Then create a cost for not wearing a helmet. Raise the insurance rates to account for the extra costs. Or give appropriate insurance discounts for wearing a helmet. If you are caught without a helmet and don't have the "helmet-free" insurance, then you get fined, your insurer can drop your policy, and/or your insurance skyrockets.

Re: Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work?

#120

Post by wrinklz »

anigbrowl wrote: post #16
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

2009 - old story is old. Flagged. Edit: it's not that I don't like the story, which I do. It's that we already discussed it here when it came out in 2009.

FYI, exactly 1 year ago: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=580060 Same time.com story, 220 days ago: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=828538 Original article, 407 days ago: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=516678 It is an interesting issue, and an interesting policy result, and one we should consider adopting here. I am wholeheartedly in favor of reducing government interference in people's personal lives, an…

Perhaps HN should have a freshness date on all news.
Post reply on HN