Fester “I cannot understand Col's belief that a greater availability would lead to a surge in the number of addicts,”

The increase in the number of drug addicts will either remain in line of increase (due to taking more, cheaper hits) in relation to the increasign number of users. The number of user will increase as observed by what actually happened when the state government of Victoria made casino gambling and poker machines “legal”.

Legalization is to effectively condone and accept a practice which is presently considered illegal and criminal.

(It is like this, if rape and burglary were to be made legal, would the number of rapes and burglaries increase of decrease?)

“Nor can I make much of Cols claim that organised crime would still make similar money from a legal system”

If we look at tobacco and alcohol, the price of the delivered product is significantly effected by government taxes and duties.

Regardless, the end-production / wholesale price, the delivered price of any legal product, after tax, will, like tobacco and alcohol be significantly increased.

And against this increased price the criminal elements will find their margin, just like chop-chop tobacco.

Government will supply legalized duty-free (presently illegal) drugs at some time after it decides to remove the duty and taxes from tobacco and alcohol.

And the value lost on unit sales will be compensated for by the increase in the number of users per the observation of gambling in Victoria.

Col

Your assumption is that it is the substance which causes the addiction. My assumption is that addiction is a potential quality of the person, and that only a small percentage of the population has this quality.

"It is like this, if rape and burglary were to be made legal, would the number of rapes and burglaries increase of decrease?"

More to the point, would people be committing such acts because they were legal, or because their character allowed them to commit such acts? Perhaps there is a point at which external stresses might bend one's character and make it fit for such acts. An example might be the compulsion of an addict to satisfy an addiction. So supplying drugs to an addict could reduce crime, and this is what has been observed. Comparing drug taking with rape and burglary also seems unreasonable to me. Perhaps you could expand on how taking heroin is so much like rape?

"And against this increased price the criminal elements will find their margin, just like chop-chop tobacco."

The money made from chop-chop is minuscule compared to the legal trade. And you wont find many willing truckies to transport it either, as to get caught is to lose your rig. Do you know of anyone smoking chop-chop? Is it in the media of late? The tax office was worried a while back, but the police crackdown was quick and very effective. How effective would it have been were the price ten fold or 100 fold?

What I would like to see is the careful trial of ideas. This will give an idea of what works and what doesn't. It will also indicate whether your beliefs are well founded. As far as I can make out, your ideas seem more based in personal experience and trauma than an uninterested evaluation of evidence.

Fester I acknowledge some people have a greater genetic propensity to addiction than others, just as if you have a Celtic heritage, you have a greater propensity to have ginger hair and freckles and intolerance to a lot of sunlight, if you are negro, you have a higher risk of sickle cell anemia or if your parents have heart problems, you are more likely to have heart problems and if your parents have a history of substance abuse, you are likely to have a greater propensity than other folk to substance abuse.

If your mum or dad was an alcoholic or drug addict, avoid taking drugs and over-imbibing.

As for all these “qualities”, I fail to see anyone acquiring “quality” from being a “junkie”. You can only be the most you can be, taking drugs and excessive alcohol reduces who you are and substitutes a temporary caricature of something else, the negatives far exceed any temporary “positives” of the caricature.

I disagree with your assertion that legalization of presently illegal substances will not cause a seriously increase in their use based on reasons previously stated and illustrated.

“Do you know of anyone smoking chop-chop?” yes

My use of the chop-chop illustration is valid
The “scale” is irrelevant.

Every month a road roller is used to destroy bootleg CDs seized. They are cheaper than the real thing (because the distributor steals from the copyright and royalty holder). The same will apply to the excise free drugs which would compete if a legal version were available.

Africa is awash with fake medication because the profit to be made from bootleg pharmaceuticals, which do not contain real medicines and are not manufactured in a properly maintained environment.

What happens is the illegal product will always find its way into the market if a price opportunity exists.

as we know with tobacco excise, the price opportunity exists, just as it will with drugs of dependency.

An illegal market, based on marginal pricing, exists for every product (legality regardless) and you arguing / pretending it does not only shows a high degree of naivety

fester “As far as I can make out, your ideas seem more based in personal experience and trauma than an uninterested evaluation of evidence.”

I have previously stated my support for the “medicinal supply” of cannabis.

I suppose you are suggesting I should ignore the evidence presented before my own eyes in favour of some theory being bandied around by social reformers who erroneously believe the world will be a safer place when we let drug dealers sell likely-polluted but price-competitive substances to the weaker minded (you have to be if you take drugs) at prices below a legal supply and to school children ?

Because the scum, who I would see executed but who you think is worth whatever, work on school children now and they will in the future, regardless of creating a legal supply.

Legal alternatives will not reduce the attraction or opportunity of the illegal supply, regardless of the your theories, as my previous post details.

“increase in street violence since licensed drinking times were extended.”
Good point. Isn’t it terrible that some pubs have to serve alcohol in plastic cups instead of glasses because of violence? Last week on the news they announced that 80% of hospital admissions during weekends are alcohol related. Alcohol induced violence and accidents are most occurring on Saturday nights.
Something needs to happen to reduce these incidences. For a starter, no more alcohol should be served to people who obviously had too much to drink already.

However, I wouldn’t like to see alcohol decriminalised because that would punish all light to moderate drinkers.

“say opium was criminalized in China and usage dropped.”
But Col, there is a large range of drugs that are criminalised all over the world including China. Has usage stopped anywhere despite draconian measures?
Before prohibition, when people could buy drugs from their pharmacy, there were no pushers. Prices were average, and in line with other drugs or remedies sold over the counter.
“Images from the preprohibition era when many psychotropic substances were legally available in America and Europe.”
http://wings.buffalo.edu/aru/preprohibition.htm

"If we were to legalise the use of presently illegal drugs their usage would sky rocket."
Well that’s your speculation.
Mine is that drugs would be strictly regulated and the black market would shrink.
Some of the links I provided showed that when drugs are tolerated in combination with a harm reduction program, usage remains in balance and definitely does not increase.
That’s not surprising because whether drugs are illegal or legal, people have access to drugs all over the world.

While drugs have always been there, casinos have not; they’re quite recent.
If gamblers had had as much access to illegal casino’s as drug users have to illegal drugs, then we wouldn’t have seen an increase in gambling- it would just have been out in the open.

Since you agree with medical cannabis and morphine I wonder if you agree with prescribing heroin as an alternative to, or in combination with methadone as part of rehab programs?

Continued...

"The problem is, you might be happy with more out of control idiots roaming and driving the streets but I am not."
What makes you think I’d be happy about that?
I’ve been advocating harm reduction consistently. You just assume, without evidence, that drug abuse will increase when it is legalised. You refuse to consider that when drugs are legalised there can be more control over it than there is now, and regulation too.
I reiterate that taking drugs persé shouldn’t be a crime- it’s government interference in people’s private life and choices- but driving under influence should be treated like a crime, just like drink-driving is punishable.

“Tobacco… Not physically addictive nor particularly emotionally addictive”
Now I’ve heard it all!
While I agree that most illicit drugs can be addictive, and some more than others, they don’t have to be addictive for everyone. As Fester pointed out, it can depend on the personality. There can be many aspects involved in drug addiction, and medical scientists are still not done with investigating addiction.
Some people are even addicted to a placebo!
Not sure why you say that Fractelle is dumb- I think she has made a great argument that tobacco is addictive, where as you just claimed that tobacco is not addictive without a source of that information.

"So then what, reduce the tax on drugs, feed it to school kids rather than leave it to illegal dealers to feed them."
Not sure what you mean. How many licensed alcohol sellers feed alcohol to school kids? They can lose their license and be fined. Why would that be different in the case of licensed drug sellers?

”I would like us to try executing drug users as well as dealers…”
Perhaps build a number of orphanages first.
Glad to see you deviate from Libertarian philosophy and now wanna be like communist China was.

“…assumes legalisation of drugs will reduce drug related crime. I seriously doubt it will. ..“.
Well, I gave you an example about the managing of the heroin addicts in Utrecht where harm reduction works to reduce crime.

Continued