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Apart from the terrible human suffering that drugs (and their criminalization create), there is another factor that is not, in my opinion, discussed enough. Dr

Apart from the terrible human suffering that drugs (and their criminalization create), there is another factor that is not, in my opinion, discussed enough. Drugs are and amazing business and making them illegal, make rich to the worst kind of people. It's giving power to the last people you would want in power. So, in the consumer countries you have addicts suffering. In the producers countries you have wars and societies totally corrupted, and the worst of the worst get rich. Amazing strategy. It looks more like a war on humanity that a war on drugs.

digi_owl 10y ago
Frankly reading up on The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs is disheartening. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Convention_on_Narcotic_Drugs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Convention_on_Narcotic_... Keep in mind that it came into being right as the Nixon years used anti-drug legislation to effectively take down blacks and hippies. On top of that you have nations that wanted to hedge around their big and growing pharma industries, and others that was negative to all drugs (except their local cultural ones) for religious and cultural reasons. In effect religion and economics trumped medical science, and the world has been dealing with the blowback ever since.
acchow 10y ago
Aren't drugs made illegal as a matter of national security? See also: the opium wars.
- emodendroket 10y ago
  That's not really what's happening in this case.
- laughinghan 10y ago
  Huh? Are you talking about the opium wars where China was invaded by the British and forced to stop trying to combat their opium epidemic? I've never heard of an interpretation of events where China made opium illegal in an attempt to forestall invasion by Western powers.
  - fragmede 10y ago
    "forced to stop trying to combat their opium epidemic" is a really euphemistic way of saying China banned opium inside their borders, so Britain invades China so Britain can sell opium to China. It was a national security concern, insofar as smugglers bringing cocaine, heroin, and marijuana into the US via Mexico are a matter of national security for the US.
    - M_Grey 10y ago
      Another lesson in the unintended consequences of prohibition.
    - laughinghan 10y ago
      What's euphemistic about it? I used the same intensity words as your description (literally the same words, like "invaded") and mention a superset of the information (I asserted that the ban was primarily intended to combat their opium epidemic, as opposed to e.g. hurting British interests). It's circular to bring up the US War on Drugs to support the argument that the opium wars were about national security, in response to a comment challenging whether the opium wars support the argument that the US War on Drugs is about national security. My whole point is that I'm skeptical of the case that either is about national security.
erikpukinskis 10y ago
It's not a war on humanity it's a war on the working class. The capital class can pay lower wages the more of the labor class are dealing with drug addicted family members. Because it makes the employee afraid. Companies make a 2x, 3x, 10x, 100x premium off of labor. The only way they can do that is with a perceived shortage of "work". The way they do that is to make enough political instability that a strong single digit percentage of people are visibly falling through the cracks of solvency. Drugs help. Many business owners are aware on some level that they could double salaries and stay solvent, but they don't think about it, they think in terms of "market rates" for labor, and they want rates to be as low as possible, so they subconsciously collude in cultural movements which make work seem scarce, and life scary and chaotic. Their brains don't drift to the "what if we all just work hard and get paid a fair share? what if every employee was on a partner track?" scenario because they would lose money. And they're the ones deciding what the partner agreement says so it doesn't change. There's no technical reason in 2017 for there to be any unemployment, for anyone to be hungry or need health care, lack access to the internet, or anyone to work more than 20 hours a week. The problem is if that happens, the working class will rest up, get educated, and demand fair compensation for their wages, and the capital class will be stuck with a piddling 20% of the global economy instead of the 80% they currently get. So they fight tooth and nail to keep a certain level of instability, in the workforce, and in far away places.
- civilian 10y ago
  The war on drugs is reducing the amount of labor available. If we follow the principles of supply and demand-- if Business Owners wants to pay employees less, then they want _more_ people to be available to work, and they also want those people to have lower cost of living. Having people in prison and having people pay for their family member's drug addiction reduces labor supply and increase cost of living. I think you have a conspiracy narrative, and you are trying to fit evidence to support it.
  - tomjakubowski 10y ago
    Prisoners in the US are available for certain kinds of work, and get peanut-scale wages for their labor.
M_Grey 10y ago
You're not the first person to observe this essential fact, but it just seems that it never percolates to policy makers and their gerrymandered voting blocs. Say no to drugs but the governments' kept it Running through our community, killing the unity The war on drugs is a war on you and me And yet, they say this is the Home of The Free But if you ask me, it's all about hypocrisy... I mean... people liked Tupac for a reason, flaws and all.

digi_owl 10y ago

Frankly reading up on The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs is disheartening. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Convention_on_Narcotic_Drugs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Convention_on_Narcotic_... Keep in mind that it came into being right as the Nixon years used anti-drug legislation to effectively take down blacks and hippies. On top of that you have nations that wanted to hedge around their big and growing pharma industries, and others that was negative to all drugs (except their local cultural ones) for religious and cultural reasons. In effect religion and economics trumped medical science, and the world has been dealing with the blowback ever since.

acchow 10y ago

Aren't drugs made illegal as a matter of national security? See also: the opium wars.

emodendroket 10y ago
That's not really what's happening in this case.
laughinghan 10y ago
Huh? Are you talking about the opium wars where China was invaded by the British and forced to stop trying to combat their opium epidemic? I've never heard of an interpretation of events where China made opium illegal in an attempt to forestall invasion by Western powers.
- fragmede 10y ago
  "forced to stop trying to combat their opium epidemic" is a really euphemistic way of saying China banned opium inside their borders, so Britain invades China so Britain can sell opium to China. It was a national security concern, insofar as smugglers bringing cocaine, heroin, and marijuana into the US via Mexico are a matter of national security for the US.
  - M_Grey 10y ago
    Another lesson in the unintended consequences of prohibition.
  - laughinghan 10y ago
    What's euphemistic about it? I used the same intensity words as your description (literally the same words, like "invaded") and mention a superset of the information (I asserted that the ban was primarily intended to combat their opium epidemic, as opposed to e.g. hurting British interests). It's circular to bring up the US War on Drugs to support the argument that the opium wars were about national security, in response to a comment challenging whether the opium wars support the argument that the US War on Drugs is about national security. My whole point is that I'm skeptical of the case that either is about national security.

erikpukinskis 10y ago

It's not a war on humanity it's a war on the working class. The capital class can pay lower wages the more of the labor class are dealing with drug addicted family members. Because it makes the employee afraid. Companies make a 2x, 3x, 10x, 100x premium off of labor. The only way they can do that is with a perceived shortage of "work". The way they do that is to make enough political instability that a strong single digit percentage of people are visibly falling through the cracks of solvency. Drugs help. Many business owners are aware on some level that they could double salaries and stay solvent, but they don't think about it, they think in terms of "market rates" for labor, and they want rates to be as low as possible, so they subconsciously collude in cultural movements which make work seem scarce, and life scary and chaotic. Their brains don't drift to the "what if we all just work hard and get paid a fair share? what if every employee was on a partner track?" scenario because they would lose money. And they're the ones deciding what the partner agreement says so it doesn't change. There's no technical reason in 2017 for there to be any unemployment, for anyone to be hungry or need health care, lack access to the internet, or anyone to work more than 20 hours a week. The problem is if that happens, the working class will rest up, get educated, and demand fair compensation for their wages, and the capital class will be stuck with a piddling 20% of the global economy instead of the 80% they currently get. So they fight tooth and nail to keep a certain level of instability, in the workforce, and in far away places.

civilian 10y ago
The war on drugs is reducing the amount of labor available. If we follow the principles of supply and demand-- if Business Owners wants to pay employees less, then they want _more_ people to be available to work, and they also want those people to have lower cost of living. Having people in prison and having people pay for their family member's drug addiction reduces labor supply and increase cost of living. I think you have a conspiracy narrative, and you are trying to fit evidence to support it.
- tomjakubowski 10y ago
  Prisoners in the US are available for certain kinds of work, and get peanut-scale wages for their labor.

M_Grey 10y ago

You're not the first person to observe this essential fact, but it just seems that it never percolates to policy makers and their gerrymandered voting blocs. Say no to drugs but the governments' kept it Running through our community, killing the unity The war on drugs is a war on you and me And yet, they say this is the Home of The Free But if you ask me, it's all about hypocrisy... I mean... people liked Tupac for a reason, flaws and all.