I do not advocate the use of drugs such as marijuana , amphetamines , cocaine , heroin and the number of other drugs, due to only a personaly choice . But I think these drugs should be legalized in the United States for the same reason alcohol, and cigarettes are legalized in the united states. For the same reason pharmeceutical drugs are legal in the United States. It isn't the government choice to tell the American People it is wrong bad to use these drugs. If a person does marijuana everynight, its the person fault and the person should take full responsibility for the consequenses of their actions. Obviously programs such as DARE do not have a profound impact on our children's choice of whether to smoke marijuana or not. Their were people who use marijuana daily and could still perform all daily functions. I think the legalization would reduce illicit drug trade in the United States. Alcohol reduces mental impairment. But no policy maker is advocated the reduction of alcohol impairment . The point that Iam trying to make is the people before hand no the consequences of their actions before taking these drugs. People take drugs for pleasure . So What!?!?! People consume fatty foods because it taste good every day and may become obese !!! Its their choice!

10/9/2005 11:43:33 AM

kthx

10/9/2005 11:48:50 AM

It is their choice to take drugs, and I think there is one reason the government does outlaw drugs like cocaine, narcotics, and speed, their addiction potential (pot is not on the list). These drugs heavily expliot a flaw in the human mind, causing it to physically become addicted to a drug after only limited abuse. Its easy to sit here and say "drugs shouldn't be illegal, the government shouldn't tell me what to do", but can you imagine little kids in rehab, and thousands and thousands of people in rehab, and many more on the streets and dying from overdoses? We see how bad alcohol and gambling can effect people's lives, those are kiddie addictions compared to herion.

10/9/2005 12:01:11 PM

^ yep

its a national security issue for drugs like heroin

10/9/2005 12:05:18 PM

anyone who thinks narcotics should be legal has either never tried them before or is stupid/liberitarian

10/9/2005 12:09:50 PM

Again, Alcohol can exploit a flaw in the human mind. People know the symptons of the drugs before they used them . If one takes a sleeping pill constantly , a person will gradually fall out of their sleep cycle , causing them to be delayed for important factors in their lives such as missing work. It would be illegal for little kids to use drugs anyway , just as it is illegal for little kids to smoke and use alcohol. I don't think legalizing pot will not change much for kids. Whether one legalizing pot or not, it would be against the law for a minor to use pot simply because they do not have any rights . Kids today go to rehab for their addiction to heroin and cocaine, along with their usage of alcohol. People are in rehab now for their addiction. Drugs are still illegal Kris and thousands of kids die now on the streets because of their stupid choices. Look at what happened to River Phoenix throwing a great future away because of his stupid addiction. But I am not going to sit down and say 'Oh, Drugs forced River into oblvion' . No! River forced himself into oblivion. He knew the effects of what HEroin would do to his mind. I think legalizing drugs would reduced the number of minors using drugs because The government would keep track of the distributors distributing these illegal drugs because their would be policies that would state prevent drug dealers from distributing these drugs to minors , just like with alcohol beverages and cigarette companies. People die because of Alcohol poisioning and lung cancer everyday ; dosen't that qualify as a potential danger to people. Illegal drugs are compared to the Prohibition era of the 1920's. Whether drugs are legalized are not , people are still going to use drugs anyway, just like people in the 1920's were going to use alcohol

10/9/2005 12:23:41 PM

We have created our own country where we can do Supercool all day.

10/9/2005 12:38:21 PM

Quote :

"Again, Alcohol can exploit a flaw in the human mind."

Not nearly to the degree of cocaine or the like. I've never felt the addiction of alcohol, and I've had way more of it than I have narcs, yet I felt the addiction to narcs.

Quote :

"It would be illegal for little kids to use drugs anyway , just as it is illegal for little kids to smoke and use alcohol."

But just like alcohol, kids will have a much easier time getting it if it's legal and their parents have it.

Quote :

"I don't think legalizing pot will not change much for kids."

I specifically left pot out of this.

Quote :

"Drugs are still illegal Kris and thousands of kids die now on the streets because of their stupid choices."

Machine guns and handgrendaes are illegal, yet people have still died from them. Does that justify them being legal?

Quote :

"I think legalizing drugs would reduced the number of minors using drugs because The government would keep track of the distributors distributing these illegal drugs because their would be policies that would state prevent drug dealers from distributing these drugs to minors , just like with alcohol beverages and cigarette companies."

Do you have any kind of data to back this up? It's quite a statement to say that more kids would be using alcohol and tobacco if it wasn't legal.

10/9/2005 12:50:07 PM

i think that this area of law enforcement should be left to the states

the schedule system is fucking stupid

10/9/2005 1:10:01 PM

Coke is satan incarnate. So many countries have lawless regions controlled by dictators, gangs, warlords, terrorists, etc who are entirely funded by drug money. Its all of whats wrong with central and south america and its fucking over plenty of villages across africa and asia. And of course it's fucking up individuals all over the world. I think its the worst thing to happen to humanity since cancer.

Pot should be legal.

10/9/2005 3:27:13 PM

Imagine you're a farmer in Peru. Every once in a while, a bunch of guys with guns come and tell you to grow coca. And, every once in a while, a bunch of guys with guns come and tell you to not grow coca.

Oh, and you've never heard the word "cocaine" in your life.

10/9/2005 3:39:09 PM

Just speaking from experience with Peru, everyone down there has fucking heard "cocaine" before. It's not exactly Bumfucknowhereilliteracyland or anything.

My way of dealing with the, "People should have the right to make their own decisions about it," line has always been the thinking, "Well, you use the drugs, you get addicted to the drugs, the addiction runs your life and you don't get to make a decision about anything." Meaning that, at the end of the day, your "right to make your own decisions" could very well be better served by being denied one choice by the government instead of a thousand choices by the drug.

10/9/2005 4:11:15 PM

Quote :

"Coke is satan incarnate. So many countries have lawless regions controlled by dictators, gangs, warlords, terrorists, etc who are entirely funded by drug money. "

Right and if it were legal here do you believe those lawless dictators would recieve the artificially inflated prices for the drugs? Cocaine is expensive because it is legal. If it were legal in the US alone prices would drop dramatically and the warlords would need another income source.

ECON 101

Quote :

""Well, you use the drugs, you get addicted to the drugs, the addiction runs your life and you don't get to make a decision about anything." "

I'm really addicted to caffeine. In fact I'm about to go have a triple espresso right now. In no way is addiction a certain life ruining thing--especially if the substance abused it cheap enough. There are some people that addiction can ruin just by sake of being addicted, but they are the minority.

10/9/2005 5:17:34 PM

Drug is my favorite drug and i think we should legalize it

10/9/2005 5:25:55 PM

Quote :

"I'm really addicted to caffeine."

Don't be a twat. I've never heard about anyone sucking dick for java. Nor have I ever heard of someone shooting someone over a coffee sale gone bad.

10/9/2005 5:27:25 PM

caffeine is more addictive then the hallucinogens and psychotics

10/9/2005 5:34:52 PM

Thats because halluciengens have an extremely low addiction potential.

Quote :

"I'm really addicted to caffeine. In fact I'm about to go have a triple espresso right now. In no way is addiction a certain life ruining thing--especially if the substance abused it cheap enough."

An addiction to caffine isn't a life ruining thing, because ITS GODDAMN CAFFINE. You can go to work without having to constantly think about caffine. Caffine use doesn't put you into a state you can't even function properly in. You don't have to spend every dime you have on caffine. Your body doesn't physically depend on caffine in order to function right. Don't compare your taste for coffee with a REAL addiction like heroin.

Anyone who can belittle a narcotic addiction has obviously never abused narcotics. So I encourage you, take some percocet, just do it regularly for a few months, then I would ask you to report if drug addictions aren't life crippling, but you would either be to doped out to type anything, or too busy trying to score some dope to bother to type.

10/9/2005 7:27:03 PM

Quote :

"Thats because halluciengens have an extremely low addiction potential."

that was pretty much what my obvious point was



[Edited on October 9, 2005 at 7:29 PM. Reason : but yeah narcotics are fucking easy to get in trouble with]

10/9/2005 7:27:57 PM

sorry, I missed that

[Edited on October 9, 2005 at 7:30 PM. Reason : ^not percs or other perscription narcotics (sans morphine)]

10/9/2005 7:30:05 PM

Quote :

"Don't be a twat. I've never heard about anyone sucking dick for java. "

But they only do that because the price is artificially high. If the price were say, $5 for a 3 gram bag you would always have enough money to stay high at all times.

I still believe in self control over narcotic addiction.

10/9/2005 7:30:24 PM

what the fuck

if you had an endless supply of percocets i promise you that you would slowly blow off more and more things to take a few pills and sit in your room

[Edited on October 9, 2005 at 7:32 PM. Reason : or some fucking morphine, god damn i miss that stuff]

10/9/2005 7:31:47 PM

Quote :

" If the price were say, $5 for a 3 gram bag you would always have enough money to stay high at all times."

No you wouldn't, you'd start using more and more, it would eat up more and more of your money, and pretty soon you'd stop going to work because you're always high, etc.

It would mirror the cases of addiction today, they would simply be even more widespread and even more crippling.

10/9/2005 7:33:46 PM

i skipped work for narcotics

10/9/2005 7:34:29 PM

^^^

Sorry but I think there is more to life than being fucked up. Most people are like this and have some higher purpose than drugs. I don't think most people are addicts, like I said its the few bad apples you have to worry about, and fuck them anyway

10/9/2005 8:18:39 PM

if you start taking narcotics
thinking you can control it
you will get addicted
even if there are "more important things"
thats kinda the whole point of what addiction is

10/9/2005 8:22:25 PM

You've obviously never been addicted to something. You may think there's more to life than drugs, but if you had ever used them, you'd realize that when you are addicted to a drug, that's all life is, that drug.

10/9/2005 8:26:59 PM

I watched a cool series of show on Illegal Drugs on the History Channel last night. All drugs were at one time legal, and gradually they were banned. I can't remember exactly, but I think by the 50's pot, heroin, and cocaine were illegal.

Then in the 60's the government became concerned that the LSD-using youth were being too disruptive. Since free speech and assembly for protest were constitutionally guaranteed rights, they decided to make LSD illegal. Then, protestors were arrested by the thousands on drug possession charges, and after awhile the protests ended. Unlike the previously banned drugs, LSD is not physically addictive.

Another drug that is not physically additive is MDMA (X, ecstasy). It acts by causing a massive release of serotonin in the brain, and the mental health community thought it was useful in therapy sessions and marriage counseling. The judge hearing the case to make it a controlled substance ruled that it should not be banned, but he was later over turned by the Federal Government. It's now a Class I substance, meaning it can't be prescribed or even researched.

Heroin is also Class I, though studies have shown it to be a more much effective pain killer than opium. I have read medical studies (conducted in other countries, of course) that also prove that heroin for surgery or injury pain management is actually less physically additive than opium, which is what is primarily used during hopitalization in the US.

And then there is Roofies, that drug that makes people unconscious and seems to be so popular for rape and robbery.

Finally, there are plenty of prescription drugs that are perfectly legal and potentially deadly. The advantage of having them legalized lies in quality control and dosage control. You can OD and die on any of the above drugs, of course.

Should any or all of these be completely illegal? Well, they are, which means they can't even be researched for potentially useful applications. People seem to have no problems finding them for purchase anyway.

[Edited on October 9, 2005 at 8:44 PM. Reason : ..]

[Edited on October 9, 2005 at 8:56 PM. Reason : ..]

10/9/2005 8:40:05 PM

crystal meth is not MDMA and is HIGHLY addictive
schedule not class
i cant uinderstand why you would ONLY ban roofies given your criteria and benzos are often abused for rape and they make you unconscious and unable to remember what happened so should those be banned too?

10/9/2005 8:46:14 PM

^You're right, sorry, mental hiccup. I shouldn't have stayed up so late watching TV last night.

I'm going to edit it now.

10/9/2005 8:56:05 PM

Public Service Announcement:

Legal != Freely available to your community's children.

How weak does a Soap Box argument have to be when this hyperbolic appeal to "think of the children" is made...

10/9/2005 9:02:20 PM

I fell asleep with that show on last night, 24carat, and I don't recall them saying that the gov't was concerned about the disruptiveness. If anything, the gov't was concerned about the health aspect of LSD, particularly the state of mind of the person after the trip, much less the concerns over bad trips.

10/9/2005 9:06:45 PM

Actually, correct me if i'm wrong, but something can be perfectly legal and also require a prescription. That puts it in "children protected" status I suppose.

The Netherlands has some of our "Schedule I" drugs legalized, and they have a lower drug addiction rate than we do (to the extent that these things can be tracked.)

I can also say that morphine made me truly not care what was happening to me. I had a huge gash in my abdomen and everything was cool as far as I was concerned. And morphine is legal for medicinal purposes. It's obviously addictive.

10/9/2005 9:11:27 PM

i didnt see the show but he is absoultely right
LSD was controlling the counter-culture
hoover sent a memo saying "hey you cant arrest them for protesting but you can arrest them for drugs"
it really didnt have anything to do with health

^not all schedule 1 drugs are addictive

[Edited on October 9, 2005 at 9:13 PM. Reason : .]

10/9/2005 9:11:44 PM

Quote :

"legalization of Drug"

idiot...

10/9/2005 9:13:00 PM

Actually, it was all Leary's fault.

10/9/2005 9:14:59 PM

Quote :

"I fell asleep with that show on last night"

The govt conspiracy theory to get the hippies was on near the end of the show. Well after the funny video of the guy on the trip pretending to be a chicken. Whoever made that particular video is really dim, because it just made me want to try LSD. Chicken dude looked pretty happy to me.

10/9/2005 9:15:35 PM

Quote :

"You've obviously never been addicted to something. You may think there's more to life than drugs, but if you had ever used them, you'd realize that when you are addicted to a drug, that's all life is, that drug."

I realize there are weak people in the world, and some of them can't resist the temptation of all manner of things. Caveat emptor though--you even learn in health class that drugs can be a Pandora's box. I've had friends lose everything they have to cocaine, friends that been been killed and paralyzed skydiving, and my mom lost her life to a perscription drug OD. Life's fucking dangerous and if you can't take responsibility for what your actions then fuck ya.

If you want to do narcotics you can just milk doctors like the more creative ones do. Illegal or no people will do as they please.

10/10/2005 12:06:53 AM

Quote :

" Right and if it were legal here do you believe those lawless dictators would recieve the artificially inflated prices for the drugs? Cocaine is expensive because it is legal. If it were legal in the US alone prices would drop dramatically and the warlords would need another income source. ECON 101"

Dont you mean its expensive because its illegal?

For one, The USA only accounts for a fraction of cocaine sales. Also, you cant really predict what would happen to the druglords if it were legalized. It might cut their profits, but it could also legitimize their business.

10/10/2005 1:08:57 AM

Marijuana is for losers.

But it makes sense to decriminalize it.

10/10/2005 3:26:56 AM

legalization makes sense. then, american farmers could grow it, undercutting foreign production. also, states could tax the drugs (relatively) heavily and fund rehab programs for the people who can't handle it. your freedom to use drugs would come with the caveat that it is your responsibility to bail out others who aren't responsible with their use.

i understand that once drugs have a strong enough lobby, this safety net won't fly any longer, but by then the use of these substances will have "matured", if you know what i mean.

10/10/2005 7:33:04 AM

Quote :

"I realize there are weak people in the world, and some of them can't resist the temptation of all manner of things."

But what you don't understand is that you, I, or anyone else in the world is that weak, if we tried those drugs we would be just as addicted, our lives would be just as in shambles. Now I'm sure you'll say "WELL YOU SHOULDNT HAVE TRIED THEM!". And I'd say, what a monster you are. You want to punish someone for the rest of their life for one mistake? You want to punish someone the rest of their life with a drug addiction because of one mistake they probably made when they were young?

Quote :

"Illegal or no people will do as they please."

Like I said before, that's not proper justification to legalize something. Murder is illegal, people still do it, hell we should just legalize murder, the government isn't stopping anyone from doing it.

10/10/2005 12:39:45 PM

Why was murder made illegal?

Are there victims involved in the crime?

10/10/2005 1:31:51 PM

You guys are arguing the wrong issue. We've moved past weed and its now time to illegalize porn.

10/10/2005 1:33:24 PM

Never thought I'd see the day when I'd have to refrain from making an argument because Kris already made it.

Quote :

"i understand that once drugs have a strong enough lobby, this safety net won't fly any longer, but by then the use of these substances will have "matured", if you know what i mean."

So you mean to tell me that you can look at the tobacco lobby in this country and tell me that a huge drug lobby wouldn't be bad? And wtf does "matured" mean? Calmed down? Yeah, because people hardly ever get shitfaced trashed anymore.

Quote :

"Are there victims involved in the crime?"

Arguably not in drug use, but in drug sales? Oh hell yes.

10/10/2005 1:54:10 PM

Explain your answer.

10/10/2005 2:03:56 PM

I tend to think that an individual's drug use very rarely limits its negative impact to the user, but I can understand that, because of the indirect nature of that effect, one might at least try to claim otherwise.

One who sells drugs, though, is knowingly and energetically distributing a substance that not only causes serious physical deterioration and powerful addiction -- both of which could, I suppose, be said for tobacco -- but also one's inability to function in society and for his own benefit.

Drug dealers steal money, life, and freedom from people who as often as not (if not more so) are not in any state of mind to be "taking responsibility."

10/10/2005 2:13:40 PM

"steal?"

10/10/2005 2:30:05 PM

Quote :

"Why was murder made illegal? Are there victims involved in the crime?"

That's kind of irrelevant, he said "Illegal or no people will do as they please.". Therefore I could pick anything illegal and use it as an example to prove the point that just because people do something that's illegal doesn't mean making it illegal does nothing. Now had he have said "Victimless crimes, illegal or no, people will do as they please", then your arguement would be relevant.

10/10/2005 2:35:05 PM

arguing that drugs should be illegal b.c drug users might resort to crime to get more drugs is like saying we should ban alcohol b.c people may get drunk and resort to driving back drunk or that all knives might be mad b.c someone may get angry and stab someone

10/10/2005 3:10:40 PM

Quote :

""steal?""

The goal of a drug dealer is to get you addicted to the drug so that you have no choice but to give him money, right? That's just good for business, and it's also just as good as if he was holding a gun to your head.

Quote :

"arguing that drugs should be illegal b.c drug users might resort to crime to get more drugs is like saying we should ban alcohol b.c people may get drunk and resort to driving back drunk"

In some respects it is, and I have occasionally toyed with the idea of going Prohibitionist for that very reason. At the end of the day, though, alcohol has proven itself more consistently mild in its impact on society than many illegal drugs, and, perhaps more importantly, it is far more intrinsically bound to the culture and thus harder to remove.

Quote :

"or that all knives might be mad b.c someone may get angry and stab someone"

Wrong. There is nothing inherent in a knife that motivates you to use it or to do bad things, whereas there certainly is something in drugs that motivates you to do whatever is necessary to get more drugs. Maybe what's necessary is that you cut back on your mountain climbing budget, but more likely, it's that you steal something or start selling drugs on your own.

10/10/2005 3:16:53 PM