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Your quote nails my sentiment on the matter of drug legalisation. The conversation shown here within HN is fascinating, from an outliers perspective. The bene

Your quote nails my sentiment on the matter of drug legalisation. The conversation shown here within HN is fascinating, from an outliers perspective. The benefits and effects of the legalisation of Marijuana I would assume, have been well documented by now though the quantity of these reports, I would assume to be small in number. Surely it's a benefit if the number of these reports and articles were increased. Surely the reports from Canberra (Australia, where plant ownership is legalised) and Amsterdam are quite numerous? And they would back the sentiment shown in this article? The argument about the 'divorce between rhetoric and reality' around drug policy has enough merit to renew the conversation on drug legalisation by it's self. Once that conversation begins, the number of reports and articles such as this will increase and potential arguments about a single report being either biased or anecdotal will be minimised as the scientific method is leveraged. The conversation should steered towards why drug policy is inaccurate and what we need to do to have laws and systems changed, socially and politically, to cater for more evidence based studies on drug use. Edit: A TED talk on the topic that I found interesting. https://www.ted.com/talks/ethan_nadelmann_why_we_need_to_end_the_war_on_drugs?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/ethan_nadelmann_why_we_need_to_end... Disclaimer: occasionally I like to smoke weed. So by the sentiment of everyone here, I'm probably biased and my arguments should be subjected to criticism and be entirely disregarded as lacking merit. (see what I did there? ;-D)

gcb0 10y ago
you failed to read the one paragraph conclusion. both pro and cons arguments were wrong. absolutely nothing relevant has changed. crime didnt go up nor down. neither did taxes. etc. nada. also, ted is only relevant to rich pot heads ;)
- timv 10y ago
  Actually, though the article's summary claimed to find no noticeable change, the section on taxes says: One area where legal marijuana has reaped unexpectedly large benefits is state tax revenue.
  - AstralStorm 10y ago
    Which means more money to invest in the country fixing issues, hopefully, instead of being wasted on mansions for corrupt politicians or spent recklessly. For example, issues that cause crime. Wouldn't that be nice? Or at least advancement of science and engineering. Someone gets to fund the space program.
    - Beltiras 10y ago
      Get high so someone else can go high?
    - random_upvoter 10y ago
      OTOH once marijuana is legal it is just another crop and I would expect to price to drop to near zero. Combined with the fact that you hardly need kilograms of it, I wouldn't get too excited about future tax revenue.
      - aianus 10y ago
        I would argue otherwise. Alcohol (especially wine) is very easy and cheap to make at home but the Liquor Control Board of Ontario still managed to pull in $1.8 billion last year taxing it.
        pliftkl 10y ago
        I don't think it's the home brewing equivalent that is the risk. It's more about the relative profits of corn vs marijuana in the midwest. If we were to fully legalize, I would expect that marijuana would have to get at least as cheap as alternative crops.
      - TheBeardKing 10y ago
        Don't ignore the cost of all the regulations marijuana has in addition to regular crops - for growers, transporters, and sellers.
      - Grishnakh 10y ago
- toyg 10y ago
  "No change" alone is worth legalizing though: because it means you can scale down the militarization of police lead by the war on drugs. It won't happen overnight, it might not bring savings and it will be resisted, but it can result in a significant cultural change that will help in other areas ("black lives matter" and so on).
  - Beltiras 10y ago
    Except that in the meantime the state collects revenue.
- betenoire 10y ago
  I think that the fact that nothing changed is literally proof that it is bad law. If prohibiting something doesn't help anything, even if it doesn't hurt anything, then we shouldn't prohibit it. I would like to hear an counter example, I can't think of one.
  - icc97 10y ago
    I agree, the law just makes things worse by increasing the number of people we call criminals. However as a counter example, even if the murder rate didn't change by de-criminalizing murder, I'd still argue that there should be a law against it.
    - urza 10y ago
      You just demonstrated the bias that the guy against legalisation is affected. If the murder rate didn't change by de-criminalizing murder at all, then it would be more rational to spend the resources on other ways that could help lower the rate or help deal with the facts that they are happening.
      - sqeaky 10y ago
        You make it sound as though passing a law against has huge resources involved. Since we all agree murder is bad, there isn't any argument or lobbying and a ban on murder and the law is simply passed. Even the investigation techniques can largely come from other similar crimes, fingerprints, DNA, asking questions are all reusable from other crimes. Some are unique, but not a huge cost compared to drugs. Then there is the huge investment in thing that only catch people with drugs. Drug sniffing dogs, housing for literally millions of non-violent offenders, training on finding drugs. In addition to the victim which others have commented on this is an extremely poor analogy.
    - crdb 10y ago
      This is a false equivalence. Pot smoking is victimless (at most, your landlord will need to get rid of the smell for the next non-smoking tenant). Murder has, by definition, serious consequences for someone else. In a legal system whose premise is that one should be free to do anything so long as it does not infringe upon the rights of others, it it consistent to legalise pot and keep murder illegal.
- redwood 10y ago
  That's partially because it has not been legalized in a non-nearly-exclusively-caucasian state yet. Meaning it hasn't been legalized in a state where there are many marijuana arrests. I'm not exageratting... I've never met a caucasian person who's been arrested for marijuana posession. Never. And yet here in NYC alone, on the order of 50,000 people (almost exclusively of color) are arrested every year for marijuana possession. This gives them a record. This means they can't get jobs or take financial aid. This Cato report, quite frankly, is a painfully long bore that ignores the dynamics at play that make Colorado, Washington, Oregon and Alaska uniquely atypical test-beds.
  - coldtea 10y ago
    >That's partially because it has not been legalized in a non-nearly-exclusively-caucasian state yet. Wish that was also true for TED.
  - soundwave106 10y ago
    The Cato report unfortunately did not go into arrests. It may seem like stating the obvious, but from what I see, that's one area where there legalization has been significant impact. Even in states like Colorado which are less racially diverse than some, arrests have decreased a lot and court filings have plummeted. (See: http://cdpsdocs.state.co.us/ors/docs/reports/2016-SB13-283-Rpt.pdf http://cdpsdocs.state.co.us/ors/docs/reports/2016-SB13-283-R...) A policy which has no significant impact, except to stop law enforcement from wasting time on trivialities, is fine by me.
  - Prefinem 10y ago
    > I've never met a caucasian person who's been arrested for marijuana posession. I happen to know someone (Caucasian) who was just arrested and let me say that skin color isn't always an issue. I think your point would stand more firmly on a basis of states that are more or less likely to criminalize the drug. Edit: To early to speak correctly
  - M_Grey 10y ago
    In my twenties my friends and I were into it, and without exception all of us who were white, or just light-skinned, were never so much as asked a question about anything related to pot, by a police officer. I was pulled over once and my friend had just smoked in the car, and it stank... cop didn't even blink. Now at the time two of my friends were black, and one was Sikh, and they stopped smoking first out of all of us, because if they so much as smelled vaguely of pot, they'd get hassled. When we all get together now over dinner or drinks, we still go back to the old joke my Sikh friend came up with, "Being white is like a superpower in this country." It's not that simple of course, and the factors which determine whether the police will bother you are also based on socioeconomic status, and if you have a criminal record or not. In terms of actually catching the eye of the police though, my white friends and I just never did, while any of my friends who couldn't have passed the infamous "paper bag test" always seemed to have to explain themselves a lot more. Note: NorthEast US, I cannot speak for the rest of it. Sidenote: My Sikh friend normally has a decent time of it, but after 9/11? He and his family who had moved to Georgia, ended up moving back East.
ajdlinux 10y ago
Canberran here - not to detract from your point, but possession of cannabis plants here isn't legal, it's merely "decriminalised", which in this case means for small quantities that are for personal use, police have the power to issue a "Simple Cannabis Offence Notice" which can be discharged by payment of a fine similar to a traffic ticket. The plants will still be confiscated.
- FuckOffNeemo 10y ago
  Thank you for the correction :)
- ptaipale 10y ago
  Same goes with Amsterdam (or Netherlands overall). Cannabis isn't "legal", the policy is just non-enforcement. Possession with 5 grams is not prosecuted. Possession of 5 plants is usually not prosecuted if renounced by cultivator. With "hard" drugs, things are different. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_the_Netherlands https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_the_Netherlands
- gtvwill 10y ago
  Aye I havE heard the confiscation is at the discretion of the officers involved. Have known some old hats that grew in their backyard in Canberra. If the cops came knocking they usually got a fine and asked to keep things discrete for the neighbors sake. Weird as hell, have even on the rarest of occasions heard of this happening in nsw, I guess some cops don't fully back the laws they are supposed to enforce for the better occasionally.

gcb0 10y ago

you failed to read the one paragraph conclusion. both pro and cons arguments were wrong. absolutely nothing relevant has changed. crime didnt go up nor down. neither did taxes. etc. nada. also, ted is only relevant to rich pot heads ;)

timv 10y ago
Actually, though the article's summary claimed to find no noticeable change, the section on taxes says: One area where legal marijuana has reaped unexpectedly large benefits is state tax revenue.
- AstralStorm 10y ago
  Which means more money to invest in the country fixing issues, hopefully, instead of being wasted on mansions for corrupt politicians or spent recklessly. For example, issues that cause crime. Wouldn't that be nice? Or at least advancement of science and engineering. Someone gets to fund the space program.
  - Beltiras 10y ago
    Get high so someone else can go high?
  - random_upvoter 10y ago
    OTOH once marijuana is legal it is just another crop and I would expect to price to drop to near zero. Combined with the fact that you hardly need kilograms of it, I wouldn't get too excited about future tax revenue.
    - aianus 10y ago
      I would argue otherwise. Alcohol (especially wine) is very easy and cheap to make at home but the Liquor Control Board of Ontario still managed to pull in $1.8 billion last year taxing it.
      - pliftkl 10y ago
        I don't think it's the home brewing equivalent that is the risk. It's more about the relative profits of corn vs marijuana in the midwest. If we were to fully legalize, I would expect that marijuana would have to get at least as cheap as alternative crops.
    - TheBeardKing 10y ago
      Don't ignore the cost of all the regulations marijuana has in addition to regular crops - for growers, transporters, and sellers.
    - Grishnakh 10y ago
toyg 10y ago
"No change" alone is worth legalizing though: because it means you can scale down the militarization of police lead by the war on drugs. It won't happen overnight, it might not bring savings and it will be resisted, but it can result in a significant cultural change that will help in other areas ("black lives matter" and so on).
- Beltiras 10y ago
  Except that in the meantime the state collects revenue.
betenoire 10y ago
I think that the fact that nothing changed is literally proof that it is bad law. If prohibiting something doesn't help anything, even if it doesn't hurt anything, then we shouldn't prohibit it. I would like to hear an counter example, I can't think of one.
- icc97 10y ago
  I agree, the law just makes things worse by increasing the number of people we call criminals. However as a counter example, even if the murder rate didn't change by de-criminalizing murder, I'd still argue that there should be a law against it.
  - urza 10y ago
    You just demonstrated the bias that the guy against legalisation is affected. If the murder rate didn't change by de-criminalizing murder at all, then it would be more rational to spend the resources on other ways that could help lower the rate or help deal with the facts that they are happening.
    - sqeaky 10y ago
      You make it sound as though passing a law against has huge resources involved. Since we all agree murder is bad, there isn't any argument or lobbying and a ban on murder and the law is simply passed. Even the investigation techniques can largely come from other similar crimes, fingerprints, DNA, asking questions are all reusable from other crimes. Some are unique, but not a huge cost compared to drugs. Then there is the huge investment in thing that only catch people with drugs. Drug sniffing dogs, housing for literally millions of non-violent offenders, training on finding drugs. In addition to the victim which others have commented on this is an extremely poor analogy.
  - crdb 10y ago
    This is a false equivalence. Pot smoking is victimless (at most, your landlord will need to get rid of the smell for the next non-smoking tenant). Murder has, by definition, serious consequences for someone else. In a legal system whose premise is that one should be free to do anything so long as it does not infringe upon the rights of others, it it consistent to legalise pot and keep murder illegal.
redwood 10y ago
That's partially because it has not been legalized in a non-nearly-exclusively-caucasian state yet. Meaning it hasn't been legalized in a state where there are many marijuana arrests. I'm not exageratting... I've never met a caucasian person who's been arrested for marijuana posession. Never. And yet here in NYC alone, on the order of 50,000 people (almost exclusively of color) are arrested every year for marijuana possession. This gives them a record. This means they can't get jobs or take financial aid. This Cato report, quite frankly, is a painfully long bore that ignores the dynamics at play that make Colorado, Washington, Oregon and Alaska uniquely atypical test-beds.
- coldtea 10y ago
  >That's partially because it has not been legalized in a non-nearly-exclusively-caucasian state yet. Wish that was also true for TED.
- soundwave106 10y ago
  The Cato report unfortunately did not go into arrests. It may seem like stating the obvious, but from what I see, that's one area where there legalization has been significant impact. Even in states like Colorado which are less racially diverse than some, arrests have decreased a lot and court filings have plummeted. (See: http://cdpsdocs.state.co.us/ors/docs/reports/2016-SB13-283-Rpt.pdf http://cdpsdocs.state.co.us/ors/docs/reports/2016-SB13-283-R...) A policy which has no significant impact, except to stop law enforcement from wasting time on trivialities, is fine by me.
- Prefinem 10y ago
  > I've never met a caucasian person who's been arrested for marijuana posession. I happen to know someone (Caucasian) who was just arrested and let me say that skin color isn't always an issue. I think your point would stand more firmly on a basis of states that are more or less likely to criminalize the drug. Edit: To early to speak correctly
- M_Grey 10y ago
  In my twenties my friends and I were into it, and without exception all of us who were white, or just light-skinned, were never so much as asked a question about anything related to pot, by a police officer. I was pulled over once and my friend had just smoked in the car, and it stank... cop didn't even blink. Now at the time two of my friends were black, and one was Sikh, and they stopped smoking first out of all of us, because if they so much as smelled vaguely of pot, they'd get hassled. When we all get together now over dinner or drinks, we still go back to the old joke my Sikh friend came up with, "Being white is like a superpower in this country." It's not that simple of course, and the factors which determine whether the police will bother you are also based on socioeconomic status, and if you have a criminal record or not. In terms of actually catching the eye of the police though, my white friends and I just never did, while any of my friends who couldn't have passed the infamous "paper bag test" always seemed to have to explain themselves a lot more. Note: NorthEast US, I cannot speak for the rest of it. Sidenote: My Sikh friend normally has a decent time of it, but after 9/11? He and his family who had moved to Georgia, ended up moving back East.

ajdlinux 10y ago

Canberran here - not to detract from your point, but possession of cannabis plants here isn't legal, it's merely "decriminalised", which in this case means for small quantities that are for personal use, police have the power to issue a "Simple Cannabis Offence Notice" which can be discharged by payment of a fine similar to a traffic ticket. The plants will still be confiscated.

FuckOffNeemo 10y ago
Thank you for the correction :)
ptaipale 10y ago
Same goes with Amsterdam (or Netherlands overall). Cannabis isn't "legal", the policy is just non-enforcement. Possession with 5 grams is not prosecuted. Possession of 5 plants is usually not prosecuted if renounced by cultivator. With "hard" drugs, things are different. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_the_Netherlands https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_the_Netherlands
gtvwill 10y ago
Aye I havE heard the confiscation is at the discretion of the officers involved. Have known some old hats that grew in their backyard in Canberra. If the cops came knocking they usually got a fine and asked to keep things discrete for the neighbors sake. Weird as hell, have even on the rarest of occasions heard of this happening in nsw, I guess some cops don't fully back the laws they are supposed to enforce for the better occasionally.