I'm generally in favor of some form of legalization, but I feel like this conversation has a tendency to become very hand-wavy and legalization can be overly ev

I'm generally in favor of some form of legalization, but I feel like this conversation has a tendency to become very hand-wavy and legalization can be overly evangelized as a panacea for systemic problems related to addiction. Firstly, what does legalization mean? Legal to prescribe? Legal to purchase over the counter after a certain age? Full, unrestricted legality? In weaker forms of these I think there's a case to be made that a black market doesn't disappear, but perhaps changes its business model. There's still benefits to be gained, in terms of more safety to addicts from impurities, but it seems difficult to claim that you can really control an addicts dosage when a black market can arise to meet their wants for higher dosages. I don't think we should criminalize addiction directly, but I think that's really only part of the picture. Part of the troubles of being an addict stem from stigmatization. We need to evolve from seeing addicts as degenerates and liars and instead as people suffering. We need a social climate that encourages addicts to seek help without social or criminal penalties. We need more addiction treatment programs, and we need treatment programs that don't impose their own judgements about getting clean through substitute drugs. We probably need to have lesser penalties for crimes that may be related to addiction (i.e. petty theft to pay for an addiction) or else we're simply criminalizing the addict in another way.