Should all drugs be legal?

Those that want to get drugs do get drugs, no law has stopped that. Ask your self this, if I could get any drug as free and easy as I could get a haircut would I go nuts and take all the drugs available? Most people will say no to that question, those that do not say no simply laugh at the question as they can already get the drugs they want as easy as a haircut.

Your argument suggests that an increased availability in drugs leads to more consumers, but this is not the case, a free and large market in drugs like any free market lowers prices and raises quality due to competition. Markets cannot produce consumers.
To think that shed loads of people will suddenly become interested in using drugs due to a change in any law, is wrong. Most people in any given society will not use recreational drugs regardless of the law.

You are right to highlight the potential for some drugs to cause overdose(like alcohol). Sadly overdose deaths mainly lie with analgesic use (heroin,morphine,methadone,ect) the problem with illegal use of analgesics is that self dosing can be very difficult as the actual strength of the drug in question can vary wildly due to an unregulated market. Legalisation creates regulated markets and reduces overdose deaths, it also allows addicts to re-enter society without the massive burden of criminalisation.

Thankfully most recreational drug use does not lead to addiction or anti-social behavior.

 

drugs that are harmful (or have more bad side effects than good) should be cast

 

Yet they are not.

 

all drugs are bad!

 

I once oiled my car with a synthetic 5/30 oil(it was cold) my car did not like it so much, but that oil got the beast through the winter, and come spring I could manage it on 10/40 again.

 

well i dont understand that, one because i dont have a car and two... well i just dont understand it
well im off to bed see you guys tomorrow

 

Should all drugs be legal?
In my opinion, no. Some drugs which are illegal now, should be made legal. Some drugs that are legal now should be made illegal. Drugs which are dangerously addictive such as heroin, should be illegal as these can have an extremely negative effect on a person's ability to think for him or herself. Drugs which can cause a person to become violent should also be illegal, alcohol is a good example. Drinking too much can cause you to drink more, resulting in you doing things you might not do otherwise. Drugs which cause only harm to yourself, marijuana for example, should be legal as you should have the freedom to decide what you put in your own body, as long as you're not inhibiting anyone else's freedom whilst you're doing it.

 

Right. First post here so I figure it should be a rant.

Narcotics should not be legalised for a number of reasons.

First and foremost, addictions to legal substances is bad enough. The top 3 most used drugs in the world are, in no specific order, Caffine, Nicotine and Alcohol. Caffine addiction is nowhere near as detrimental as the other two, so we will focus on Nicotine and Alcohol.

Alcohol is quite hard to give up, even if you dont think that you have a problem. If there is anyone on here that has gone from training for the beer-lympics to no alcohol whatsoever, they'll know exactly what Im trying to say. Alcohol is hard to give up, especially because its such a social drug. If your friends are all going out for a drink, you may also feel that you should drink too. How many people do you know that have done something amazingly dumb while they were drunk? And yet alcohol is still readily available, people drive drunk for christ sake. How many people die every year in your country because of drunk drivers? And yet alcohol is legal. Alcohol destroys your insides, teenagers are already damaging their organs in their early teens becuase alcohol is so easy to get, whats going to happen if they keep drinking till they're 40 or 50? Replace alcohol with any drug in any of these examples and it still reads the same.

Nicotine, which people get from cigarettes, may not have the immediate effects that alcohol does, but in the long run its way more addictive and much worse for you. The chemicals in smokes go everywhere in your body, the smoke hits your lungs, goes into your blood which gets taken everywhere. This is why smoking causes cancers and strokes, it starts to ruin your heart, lungs, limbs. Everything. Any smoker who says that they dont know the risks is either a moron or a liar. So if we know the risks, why do we keep doing it? Because we are addicted. Simple as that.

Smokes are always very heavily taxed by the government, and in my country its set to go up again. I dont know if anyone is familiar with the term "chop chop" but here its a name we give to illegal tobacco. See? Even though cigarettes are legal and readily available, people still sell illegal stuff, and people buy it because its cheaper.

Which brings us to narcotics. If currently illegal drugs were legalised, the only real benefit that I can see is that they would be pure, no household chemicals mixed in, or no laced bactches.

They would still be just as addictive, but they would become more expensive because your government would tax them to no end. Where it might cost you $20 for a gram of weed at the moment, if it was legal and regulated, the government would want to make some money off of it. All of a sudden, a hazy afternoon with a single and some cartoons could easily cost you $100 or more. This price increase would lead to people who are junkies already getting even more desperate for some money to get a hit. Can you imagine what it would cost to chase the dragon if the government was taxing it? You could expect more armed robbery, more assaults, just so they can get a hit. Also, what would happen to the stores that were licenced to sell drugs, they would become a prime target for theives, which means more crime, which means more security, which means higher prices.

Have you ever gotten so drunk you pass out or vomit? If drugs were so easy to buy, I imagine you would see the number of ODs rising. "Nah they could just stop you from buying too much at once." I hear you say. Yeah becuse that worked really well with Pseudoephedrine.

So no, I dont think that legalising drugs is a good idea at all, and Im in no way bias or straightedge, I recently gave up alcohol, I still smoke cigarettes, and I've taken drugs in my time and I still do take drugs.

 

Alcohol is only addictive to alcoholics. These can be people born with alcoholism or it can be developed through constant heavy drinking.

I agree, nicotine is a substance which should be banned as it is both extremely poisonous and highly addictive.

I'm not sure which country you're from, but I've never heard of illegal tobacco in my country and the tax is something like €7 per 20 cigarettes.

They could also be regulated so that they are harder to get for younger people.

You seem to be lumping all drugs under one heading which is a mistake. Different drugs have different levels of addictiveness. Some are very addictive, and I agree these should not be allowed, but others aren't really addictive at all, and I can see no problems with these.

I've only gotten that drunk a handful of times, but I have to point out again, not all drugs are the same, some are hard to OD on. Also, what an individual does to their own body should be no concern of the governing body of a country. They should have the freedom to do what damage to themselves as they see fit, as long as they aren't in the grip of an overriding addiction.

I'd be interested to know which drugs you've taken, I've never smoked tobacco, I drink infrequently and haven't taken many drugs as I try to avoid anything I know to be dangerously addictive. With your point of government taxation, I think you've gone a little wild with it. Do people go on murderous rampages to buy cigarettes? No. And nicotine is one of the most addictive drugs, certainly more addictive than weed. Plus, chances are, even with taxation, prices would go down in most countries. Certainly at the moment it's much cheaper for me to buy weed in Amsterdam than where I live. Also, surely police time would be freed up as they'd have less illegal drugs to try and monitor?

 

but the thing is... some people will chose the wrong drug... a dude with a bad heart taking viagra (HEART ATTACK!!!)

 

oh, ok, i get it now.

no drug should be legal without side effects being publicly known (bigger fine print, slower side effect speech)... not all drugs are bad, but the thing is, people have to be educated about the things that they do.

 

Like they do with cigarettes?

 

ok educated and willing to make the right choices

 

people will OD on drugs which will cause havoc.....

 

and thin out the stupid population

 

yes... so all drugs should not be legal! not even advil... or tynenol.... people should need prescriptions for those

 

...and viagra... those cheaters >.<

 

and all those sleeping pills...... its just so messed up