Cops Like Me Say Legalize All Drugs. Here’s Why.

I wish we could have everyone get on board with this. It won't fix much in the grand scheme of how fucked up the US is, but it's a compassionate start.

 

What about religions Pmose should they go as well?

you throw this kid so much bait it's crazy, nsa. If i were trying to get him to rant, that's about as good as i coulda done (heh, your handle's initials are NSA... narc? jk )

 

Drugs do not solve your social problems. They create worse ones for everybody else.

Time and time again, you seem awfully concerned about other people's problems. And personally, I'd be very flattered, but not if I wasn't asking for your input.

Have you used street drugs pmoseman? If so, which ones, and for how long?

Have you ever been addicted to street drugs pmoseman? If so, which ones, and for how long?

If you answered no to the above two questions, then what exactly is it that you base your opinions on? Outdated, biased literature? You like to watch others? Pastor Larry told ya so?

I am comforted by the fact that my drug habits are a burden on a hypocritical mainstream society, in which 1 person dies every 8 seconds due to smoking, and 1 person dies every 10 seconds due to alcohol.

Maybe it'll eventually teach them not to oppress a minority in the manner that they have for so long, and then try to live their lives as if they're saints compared to us.

Examples:

Chinese who came to the US to help finish building a train track through treacherous terrain, and for their hard work, were met with a bunch of racist bureaucrats who promptly banned their preference for opium in order to somehow cripple their work performance.

African-Americans who - in an effort to feel more comfortable while out in a racist public - resorted to the use of cocaine in order to help them break the ice with single and attractive Caucasian women, only to have sensationalist media reports published about "Negro Cocaine Fiends", and cocaine use promptly banned.

Mexicans whose preference for marijuana caught the attention of your reliable-racist Caucasians, causing films such as "Reefer Madness" to become referenced as a reason for the very low risk plant to become banned.

Though I sure as hell don't speak for the racist portion of booze loving Caucasians whose preference for racism, control, and jealously has culminated in a very bitter, greedy, confused, and plain angry America. A pissed off melting pot nation on the brink of imploding.

Edit - Tell ya what, drugs may not solve social problems - not permanently, but your opinions sure as hell aren't doing a better job, as is evident from the number of people who haven't benefited from them. So try to keep that in mind before you spit out another pearl of wisdom.

 

congrats. nxt step is to delete post #83, and edit the quote from #69 into your #76. Just fuckin do it, don't tell us. Posts here are already tedious enough for most to wade through, no need to make it murkier unless you're intentionally trying to fuck up the dialogue.#

 

you throw this kid so much bait it's crazy, nsa. If i were trying to get him to rant, that's about as good as i coulda done (heh, your handle's initials are NSA... narc? jk )

There would be requirements to meet this goal.. original thought and the ability to contemplate.. the requirements may not be available me think?

 

lol i've no idea what your post means, could be cuz i'm half in the bag or maybe you weren't concise enough.. but yeah it was in good fun i know damn-well who/what you are, and what he is, and that post was in jest

 

Blimey! i thought i was bad for straying off topic!lol

Yes, pmoseman isnt ever going get an invite to a thinktank but this thread had some really solid discussion going but it seems to be rapidly heading off on a tangent.

 

America's war on drugs includes doing things like aerial fumigation in places like Colombia, generally with the help of the fascist regimes we install. Even this level of absurdity has not really affected drug use - it has had drastic side effects for indigent farmers in latin america.

Tobacco kills MILLIONS of people each year - an order (several orders) of magnitude more than people killed by cocaine/heroin overdoses. Yet the very thought of foreign countries coming over here and bombing american tobacco farms is RIDICULOUS - but its the same thing.

The war on drugs is totally bunk. The FDA is a good thing and getting rid of quacks and croakers is a good thing but making it ILLEGAL to purchase a substance I want to consume is not a good thing.

I have a profound disrespect for police officers in general in the USA mainly because of the ridiculous drug laws they enforce. What kind of ego does it take to make you think you have the right to handcuff me and imprison me for imbibing a substance you don't like?

I suppose LEAP is a good thing, I wasn't familiar with it. The marijuana legalization trend sweeping the US is great, but its nowhere near enough. End the war on drugs - stop destroying lives and incarcerating people for no good reason. I hope (if humanity lasts that long) that in 20-30 years we will look back on the war on drugs as a debacle far grander in scope than alcohol prohibition.

 

^
dont hate the players mate, hate the game.lol
Im sure the majority of police offs dont give a shit about your drug use. Their just doing what their paid to do.

yeah, a small % might think their doing it for moral or ethical rwasons but considering that cops see the worst drug-fuelled situations, on the daily.
Can you really blame them for their dim view on drugs?

 

Tobacco kills MILLIONS of people each year - an order (several orders) of magnitude more than people killed by cocaine/heroin overdoses. Yet the very thought of foreign countries coming over here and bombing american tobacco farms is RIDICULOUS - but its the same thing.

I know right?

In other words, every eight seconds, someone dies from tobacco use.

Not that I would care, and, nothing personal towards tobacco users, as I smoked for about 16 years IIRC before finally managing to quit for good for reasons other than my concern for my health. But as part of the street drug-using minority who is also attempting to help best I can in order to usher in a radical reform of our disgraceful and draconian drug laws, I simply cannot ignore the staggering costs to human life and the immense burden on healthcare, when it's associated with the habitual consumption of tobacco products. Besides, it's not like the media seems to care too much about it, especially when compared to as little as one occasional death due to the use of ecstasy (which may have been a dirty pill).

What a bunch of nutty-brown, corn-sprinkled caca, this war on (the people who use street) drugs is.

The war on drugs is totally bunk. The FDA is a good thing and getting rid of quacks and croakers is a good thing but making it ILLEGAL to purchase a substance I want to consume is not a good thing.

For shizzle, dear sir.

I have a profound disrespect for police officers in general in the USA mainly because of the ridiculous drug laws they enforce. What kind of ego does it take to make you think you have the right to handcuff me and imprison me for imbibing a substance you don't like?

They only care about meeting their monthly arrest quotas, so that the money they do end up stealing seizing from their victims "the bad guys" can be put to "better" use - like buying that iPhone 5S they all wanted so badly.

I suppose LEAP is a good thing, I wasn't familiar with it. The marijuana legalization trend sweeping the US is great, but its nowhere near enough. End the war on drugs - stop destroying lives and incarcerating people for no good reason. I hope (if humanity lasts that long) that in 20-30 years we will look back on the war on drugs as a debacle far grander in scope than alcohol prohibition.

"A holocaust in slow motion." - The House I Live In

I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist, but it's beginning to dawn on me that it's clearly in their best financial interest to maintain the status quo with regards to "tough on crime" policies for street drug users and dealers. The private prison industry demands it - and they've threatened to sue the government if a certain percentage of their beds aren't filled with inmates. Capitalism at it's worst.

Unfortunately, their propaganda machine is still running quite effectively - although the advent of the so-called Information Age, and the ability to share countless stories of drug war injustice with almost every nation on earth via the web has clearly resulted in an undermining effect - slowly but surely, it appears. No wonder the government now wants to introduce new laws regarding internet privacy, or lack thereof.

That said, I also believe there will come a time when mainstream society will look back on this era in humanity with profound bemusement at the persecution of countless non-violent men and women who were otherwise law-abiding citizens. We will one day regret the incarceration of the aforementioned individuals for the simple fact that they happened to have in their possession something as benign as parts of a plant.

Es un mundo loco yo

 

^It'll be in the 2200 edition of "People's History of the United States." Since you know this genocide is going to be swept under the rug as soon as possible.

Though as a history nerd it really starts me thinking of how the War on Drugs will be portrayed in our history books in centuries to come (if humans make it that long). I mean, it's a LONG event, as US history goes, 100 years and counting since the Harrison Act. It also affects SO many different areas of American life, unlike even the "Indian problem" which was often confined to certain areas or parts of life, allowing most to ignore it (kind of like wars today). But the War on Drugs affects popular culture (how portrayals of, for example, cannabis have changed), medicine (how we use opioids or cannabis), spirituality (psychedelics), economics (huge black market becoming legal), political (law and order interest groups), etc etc.

Will this period of time be labeled some huge mistake? Will we be able to acknowledge it for the genocide and hidden civil war that it was? A fight against the weakest and most vulnerable in a society, punishing them with draconian methods and punishments. Or will it be re-branded as a social experiment? Dying Puritan America's last fight against multi-culturalism and tolerance? The new Jim Crow?

And I love LEAP, wonderful organization. I've met a few of the officers who work for the organization and I can say they're some of the coolest and most realistic activists I've ever met.

 

Having spent my fair share of time in the court system, what I came away with was the futility of the war on drugs. While I'm eternally grateful for the second lease on life I've received, it wasn't the courts that helped me to change, it was my community. I was "supervised" as long as is legally allowed in Oklahoma. Fear of punishment is one thing, but all addicts know craving trumps all of those fears. Speaking from an individual point of view and not a sociological one, it's the love I received from my community that finally overcame the love I thought I felt from drugs. The federal and local governments need to either quit lying and/or wake up to see that fighting an innately neutral substance is a practice in futility. Legalize it, spend the money on diversion and treatment. Teenagers know when they're being lied to. Teenagers are also self-willed and invincible in their minds. Speak the truth, and they will listen. Lie to them and they will continue to resist. When addiction skips a generation in a single family, that's a win. Sorry for being all over the place. It's an issue dear to me, and emotion takes over knowledge of essay format! Haha!

 

Johnnyyokie, I can relate. My opinions about the destructiveness of the War on Drugs turned to a passion once I had to see it in action. I wasn't the one in court but my late son was and we got to know lots of the other people coming to drug court every week. What a dismal and insane circus. Take people when they are about as far down as they can get, mentally and physically, and throw a bunch of felonies at them to really rub it in that they are a drain on their communities. Make sure that you keep the stigma stoked with lots of horror stories in the news so that no one will hire any of those felons and then charge the penniless, jobless people that are struggling just to stay alive thousands of dollars for participating against their will in the court system. Oh, and if by some miracle they do get hired? Make sure that you require them to attend so many AA meetings that they will get fired anyway. And if AA and NA don't suit you? Too bad because those are the only meetings recognized by the courts.

 

I live in the UK where things aren't quite so mad, I have been arrested for drug related crimes and still only got probation after I voluntarily went on a methadone script. Even so this makes for depressing reading.


I have thought a lot about the legalisation of drugs particularly opiates and I think it could be done, just carefully. The thing to do is to isolate the drug use, not the user. When drugs are used out in the world the habit can spread from person to person just like with anything else. If heroin was prescribed (supervised consumption at first like methadone, then unsupervised) there would be no way for an illegal market to operate (unless it catered specifically to new users). Then, the existing drug use could not spread as it would be isolated and *most* of the negative side effects of the drug (malnourishment, citric acid destroying veins, hepatitis as well as the financial drain on users/communities) could be removed.

I've been on a meth script for several years now and I have managed to stay "clean" by buying an extra couple of bottles at the weekend (just so I've got something to look forward to). The thing is, I am actually on a higher dose of opiates than I ever was before, but because society now deems me as a 'recovering' addict and I'm not constantly out of pocket or damaging my body, I am able to live a semi-normal life I'm even doing (and nearly finished) a degree in IT.

 

Johnnyyokie, I can relate. My opinions about the destructiveness of the War on Drugs turned to a passion once I had to see it in action. I wasn't the one in court but my late son was and we got to know lots of the other people coming to drug court every week. What a dismal and insane circus. Take people when they are about as far down as they can get, mentally and physically, and throw a bunch of felonies at them to really rub it in that they are a drain on their communities. Make sure that you keep the stigma stoked with lots of horror stories in the news so that no one will hire any of those felons and then charge the penniless, jobless people that are struggling just to stay alive thousands of dollars for participating against their will in the court system. Oh, and if by some miracle they do get hired? Make sure that you require them to attend so many AA meetings that they will get fired anyway. And if AA and NA don't suit you? Too bad because those are the only meetings recognized by the courts.

well said all around. I wasn't the one in court either, but a very close person was, and it was exactly the circus you describe here (they call it 'drug court' here, and it's like a meat factory they just process mostly young adults like an assembly line and an overwhelming majority are mere possession, and these ppl are having their lives wrecked worse than drug problems typically do)

 

well said all around. I wasn't the one in court either, but a very close person was, and it was exactly the circus you describe here (they call it 'drug court' here, and it's like a meat factory they just process mostly young adults like an assembly line and an overwhelming majority are mere possession, and these ppl are having their lives wrecked worse than drug problems typically do)

What penalty wrecked your friend's life?

 

It's often the illegality that makes drugs more dangerous than they are. If we legalize most of the drugs(most of them are safer than alcohol anyway), then we'll have good purity product sold in professional settings and maybe pharmacies. Treatment for addiction to the more harmful drugs without fear of criminal prosecution sounds like another step foward. Furthermore, 2C-x series are nootropics at low doses, DMAA can be legalized so it replaces speed, and MDMA and the MDxx series could also be legalized as they aren't very addictive. Nootropics could also be legalized for that cognitive edge. We should strive for an educated society that uses safer drugs, and uses psychedelics responsibly, and also nootropics and the safe stimulant DMAA. A society that helps each other and help those hooked on the nastier drugs instead of incarcerating them. A society that is responsible and well educated can make reasonable choices and buy and use safe drugs and other drugs responsibly and it'll be sold like a pharmaceutical and at special shops. A fear based society don't know which drugs are harmful or how to use them responsibly. A fear based society don't know about drugs and ALL of their effects and possible side effects and abuse potential. Thus, there would be a lot of people hooked on bad drugs or don't educate themselves or use them responsibly. Then they're too afraid of seeking help because one small relapse and they're jailed. Then they won't be able to get jobs or go to college. The users (even smart, responsible educated ones) get jailed while the gangs and the REAL criminals roam free. The war on drugs is flawed. Education and responsibility are the keys, not fear and criminalization.
Responsibility matters!
Stay cool! %)
I'm more than cool, I'm ....
supercool! (┌●_&#9679

 

Why is alcohol not safe?

 

why do you think it is?

 

why do you think it is?

Since you are asking a question in response to a question which was directed at sky blue Molly I will not answer you.

 

Typical pmose.. couldn't be because there isn't even close to a good answer.

Please keep any disruption to within legal bounds.. AKA.. no putting a sunset on a thread before its sun has set