Drugs legalisation: 'when, not if'

[Jeroen Wenting]

Originally posted by Jason Menard:


I can sympathize.

hear hear!

[Gerald Davis]

Originally posted by Joe King:
[QB]
This is a bit excessive me thinks. A far better solution would be to help people through the process of giving up whatever they are addicted to. Things like support groups and counselling could help a large number of people give up their addiction. The NHS is currently advertising free support groups and counselling for people who want to give up smoking, and I'm sure there are also similar schemes for other drugs.
[QB]

The costs would be to high and would not guantee success. If these druggies decided to have children they will have inhereted the weekness towards drugs in their genes plus they would be born into a druggie culture. I say cut their gonads and cut of any future problams. The drug takers don't even want to help themselves.

So many social, health and economical problems would be solved by sterilizing the bad and the wrong.

[Jeroen Wenting]

hmm, selective breeding you mean?
Might work but there's a risk of course. Will you stop at preventing criminals from breeding or will you also force sterilisation of people who are say overweight or maybe prefer the wrong political party?

[Gerald Davis]

I figured someone would say that. But it is a risk worth taking. Look at how terrible this planet is because of the sins of man. Even my constant depression is the product of someone elses ignorence.

[Bert Bates]

You're on thin ice here Gerald...

It seems that deciding who's "bad and wrong" might be a bit tricky...

But in any case, tread very carefully here...

[Max Habibi]

The only reason I'm not closing this thread is because Bert already gave you guys a warning. But Gerald, you're on very, very thin ice here.

M

[Alan Wanwierd]

Originally posted by Gerald Davis:
...So many social, health and economical problems would be solved by sterilizing the bad and the wrong...

You dont think that perhaps the resultant outcry from the worlds population when somewhere starts doing this might cause just 1 or 2 problems? Hers a little "thought experiment":

Lets pick a country at random and say that Australia were do adopt this policy "1st offence of drug related criminal activity results in sterilisation", Its a simple and cheap suggestion. After announcing the policy government buildings, police buildings prisons would be trashed by an angry mob protesting about civil rights and making parallels with Hitlers "final solution", outcry would be massive and immediate streets woudl be filled with protesters. - Government response would either be to set army on its own people, or to give in a rescind the policy. Lets assume (for the sake of debate) that the army manage to quell the rebellion and rebuild the infrastructure damaged in the riots. With a population now controlled by military, the economic atractiveness of Australia plummets and investors pull out, tourists wont go anywhere near Australia and the resultant economic decline further fuels civil unrest within the country. Pleas to the outside world are heard and sooner or later the people of Australia beg the international community for assistance in overthrowing their government, but pleas fall on deaf ears since UN is extremely reluctant to get involved in regime change. [-We wont go into _that_ here!-]

Social, health and economic problems solved?... I doubt it!

[peter wooster]

Originally posted by Gerald Davis:

The costs would be to high and would not guantee success. If these druggies decided to have children they will have inhereted the weekness towards drugs in their genes plus they would be born into a druggie culture. I say cut their gonads and cut of any future problams. The drug takers don't even want to help themselves.

So many social, health and economical problems would be solved by sterilizing the bad and the wrong.

Most appropriate, today being the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

I just hope you are joking, as Tom Lehrer said, " I know there are people in the world that do not love their fellow human beings and I hate people like that.".

[Warren Dew]

Gerald Davis:

Even my constant depression is the product of someone elses ignorence.

Are you sure it's someone else? Some people have a genetic predisposition to depression, you know.

[Gerald Davis]

Originally posted by Warren Dew:
Gerald Davis:

Even my constant depression is the product of someone elses ignorence.

Are you sure it's someone else? Some people have a genetic predisposition to depression, you know.

It is the fault of someone else ,my ancestors. They have some sort of sick idea about dating cousins. I don't know what the hell they was thinking, was they trying to create a new ethnic super race or something.

[peter wooster]

Originally posted by Gerald Davis:
It is the fault of someone else ,my ancestors. They have some sort of sick idea about dating cousins. I don't know what the hell they was thinking, was they trying to create a new ethnic super race or something.

If you weren't so against drugs, you could use some of the wonders of modern medicine to fix that. A woman I know (who's bipolar I) swears by Paxil.

[Gerald Davis]

Originally posted by peter wooster:


If you weren't so against drugs, you could use some of the wonders of modern medicine to fix that. A woman I know (who's bipolar I) swears by Paxil.

Thinks I will try it, I am currently on Sertaline.

[Bert Bates]

It seems that "altered consciousness" scares people, and the government... I can think of a few "drugs", MDMA and ketamine for example, that have legitimate uses, but were outlawed when it was discovered that they could ALSO alter one's consciousness...

[Jeroen Wenting]

the problem with that altered consciousness is that it often leaves people with no boundaries.
They'll happily and with a smile on their face slice your throat and not even remember it afterwards.

Now under the laws of at least this country they couldn't then be prosecuted for the act because they didn't know they were doing it (yes, our laws are extremely weird like that).

So if such drugs were legal anyone could commit pretty much any crime and then claim they didn't know they did it because they were under influence of drugs.

[Bert Bates]

If we make finer distinctions it seems a little more complicated than that...

Many prescription drugs alter emotions, and change perceptions... While I think that all of the safety arguments are reasonable, I can't help thinking that there's more to it...

There's a concept called the "pharmaceutical ratio". This number is the ratio between the "active" dose of a drug, and the "lethal" dose. So, if the active dose of aspirin is 2 tablets, and the lethal dose is 100 tablets, then aspirin would have a pharmaceutical ratio of 50. It follows that the lower a drug's pharnaceutical ratio, the more dangerous it is... Ecstasy for instance has a very low ratio, maybe in the range of 10 - 30. Using this metric aspirin is almost as dangerous... LSD's ratio is not really known, but people have survived taking 100,000 times the active dose... so using this metric LSD would be very safe. Cannabis's ratio is also very high... it's virtually impossible to OD on weed...

Speed and barbituates tend to have very low ratios, making them dangerous, yet millions of people use these prescription drugs... Alcohol's ratio is also on the low side, maybe 30 or 40.

So, there's more to it than safety, although there are at least two different ways to look at safety, the safety of the user, and the safety of those around him... It would be hard to argue that Cannabis users pose much of a threat to themselves OR their fellows... Speed users on the other hand pose a great threat to themselves AND their fellows... yet the penalties for use or distribution of these two compunds are similar... why is that?

[Warren Dew]

Jeroen Wenting:

the problem with that altered consciousness is that it often leaves people with no boundaries. They'll happily and with a smile on their face slice your throat and not even remember it afterwards.

Now under the laws of at least this country they couldn't then be prosecuted for the act because they didn't know they were doing it (yes, our laws are extremely weird like that).

So if such drugs were legal anyone could commit pretty much any crime and then claim they didn't know they did it because they were under influence of drugs.

Sounds to me like an argument for holding all people responsible for all their actions, whether or not they remember it later.

[Jeroen Wenting]

Originally posted by Warren Dew:

Sounds to me like an argument for holding all people responsible for all their actions, whether or not they remember it later.

yup, that's a good idea
Let's do the same with politicians...

[Bert Bates]

and journalists

[Jeroen Wenting]

Originally posted by Bert Bates:
and journalists

no, they're hopeless. Rather shoot those from the start as an example

[Warren Dew]

And here I was thinking that "all people" included politicians and journalists ... silly me!

[Jason Menard]

Originally posted by Warren Dew:
And here I was thinking that "all people" included politicians and journalists ... silly me!

Journalists are people too?