4 ms·

I don't get your point. A poor person sells drug because it's the only way to make money. He doesn't make a lot of money out of it and any job would be better

I don't get your point. A poor person sells drug because it's the only way to make money. He doesn't make a lot of money out of it and any job would be better as he would get health care and pension on top of it. He would not also risk going to jail or die from a gunshot. Now there's no more "illegal drugs" to sell. What does this person do to make money? Remember there's no job for him/her and he somehow needs to eat to live. I'm not saying the war on drug is fought properly, but between putting in jail all people who sell and/or consume drugs and let everyone do as they want there's probably stuff to be done. Heroin was legal when first discovered, it was removed from the market because it's a lethal substance. The "let everyone decide" doesn't work. Food education doesn't beat the commercial from Coca-Cola & the like. You would get the same problems with drugs, except drugs are not only lethal on the short term but somehow make you unproductive. Then you're going to tell me "but we would regulate these drugs and they would have to comply to strict regulations". Boom. Crime opportunity. My point is that legalizing some drugs wouldn't change the core of the problem.

mootothemax 16y ago
Heroin was legal when first discovered, it was removed from the market because it's a lethal substance. Care to cite a couple of sources for that? I thought it was due to being highly addictive with few medicinal benefits.
roel_v 16y ago
Your argument only holds if all poor people would switch to selling drugs. You're saying there is no alternative to selling drugs, which there obviously is, as demonstrated by the hundreds of millions of people worldwide who are poor yet do not sell drugs. If drugs are not illegal, those who are now selling drugs will simple have to do like the other poos people now.
- shin_lao 16y ago
  No, I'm saying that people who currently chose a life of crime would look for other criminal activities.
  - roel_v 16y ago
    Oh OK well I addressed that point two posts earlier. In short, most people who are now in the drug are not in a position to switch to other forms of crime. So overall the number of crimes and the number of criminals must go down. I have no data to back up any estimates onto how much, but I'd guess that something in the magnitude of 75% of all current criminals who commit crimes because of drugs now will not switch to violent crimes (let alone to fraud, for which - let's be frank here - most petty criminals are too stupid).

mootothemax 16y ago

Heroin was legal when first discovered, it was removed from the market because it's a lethal substance. Care to cite a couple of sources for that? I thought it was due to being highly addictive with few medicinal benefits.

roel_v 16y ago

Your argument only holds if all poor people would switch to selling drugs. You're saying there is no alternative to selling drugs, which there obviously is, as demonstrated by the hundreds of millions of people worldwide who are poor yet do not sell drugs. If drugs are not illegal, those who are now selling drugs will simple have to do like the other poos people now.

shin_lao 16y ago
No, I'm saying that people who currently chose a life of crime would look for other criminal activities.
- roel_v 16y ago
  Oh OK well I addressed that point two posts earlier. In short, most people who are now in the drug are not in a position to switch to other forms of crime. So overall the number of crimes and the number of criminals must go down. I have no data to back up any estimates onto how much, but I'd guess that something in the magnitude of 75% of all current criminals who commit crimes because of drugs now will not switch to violent crimes (let alone to fraud, for which - let's be frank here - most petty criminals are too stupid).