4 ms·

Your view is justified and valid, but have you considered what happens to those same people you care so much about now? They just get some from street, and it's

by iaml 8y ago

Your view is justified and valid, but have you considered what happens to those same people you care so much about now? They just get some from street, and it's not only impossible to reliably notify them of any danger, they risk incarceration afterwards as well. That's not mentioning questionable quality of street drugs and substance lottery. You might be tempted to say that without legislation population exposure to the drug may be lower, but I'd argue it's impossible to objectively measure it when people are afraid they get jailed if they somehow slip and let it be discovered they do it. I bet the actual percentage of people using drugs is much higher than you think.

bitL 8y ago
It's difficult to figure out proper approach, I agree. However, there also must be a strong negative reinforcement for the sake of learning - e.g. inserting one's hand into hot flowing lava should scar one both physically and mentally so that this person and anyone seeing them doesn't attempt the same. I know a guy who was fairly smart and decided to take LSD at university in his "teaching assistant" room, and make notes about his experience. Something went wrong during his trip and he ended up confronting some kind of demons. Previously purely rational person within a year switched to become a seventh-day adventist. Since then I simply couldn't trust his judgement anymore; not because he became religious, but because something really damaged his brain on his first trip. Another person I knew was a brilliant winner of math and informatics Olympiad. Decided to try heroin once. Dropped out of university the following year, spent a year working in construction, went to a lesser university, dropped out after two years. A talent gone. Some drugs ("krokodil", meth), seem to give pretty brutal feedback about their use, e.g. literal zombification of humans. There are so many horrible stories... It's really complicated as a human has to go against their own nature to override brain's pleasure complex, often also against their friends, tribe, customs etc. while the whole world keeps saying: "Just take it, it's normal, everything will be fine", and 10 years later finding themselves one step from abyss. I would rather convey a strong message: "It's not OK, don't ever do it!"
- iaml 8y ago
  I was born in a pretty rough city of a pretty rough country and it was a popular past-time for my peers to get a hold of some non-prescription meds and overdose on them hard to catch a glimmer of a trip. I'm sure a lot of them damaged their mental & physical health doing that. If those exact drugs were illegal nothing would change, except the label of the drug. I think stopping people by law is pretty pointless and highly ineffective, so maybe alternatives are better.

by iaml 8y ago

bitL 8y ago

It's difficult to figure out proper approach, I agree. However, there also must be a strong negative reinforcement for the sake of learning - e.g. inserting one's hand into hot flowing lava should scar one both physically and mentally so that this person and anyone seeing them doesn't attempt the same. I know a guy who was fairly smart and decided to take LSD at university in his "teaching assistant" room, and make notes about his experience. Something went wrong during his trip and he ended up confronting some kind of demons. Previously purely rational person within a year switched to become a seventh-day adventist. Since then I simply couldn't trust his judgement anymore; not because he became religious, but because something really damaged his brain on his first trip. Another person I knew was a brilliant winner of math and informatics Olympiad. Decided to try heroin once. Dropped out of university the following year, spent a year working in construction, went to a lesser university, dropped out after two years. A talent gone. Some drugs ("krokodil", meth), seem to give pretty brutal feedback about their use, e.g. literal zombification of humans. There are so many horrible stories... It's really complicated as a human has to go against their own nature to override brain's pleasure complex, often also against their friends, tribe, customs etc. while the whole world keeps saying: "Just take it, it's normal, everything will be fine", and 10 years later finding themselves one step from abyss. I would rather convey a strong message: "It's not OK, don't ever do it!"

iaml 8y ago
I was born in a pretty rough city of a pretty rough country and it was a popular past-time for my peers to get a hold of some non-prescription meds and overdose on them hard to catch a glimmer of a trip. I'm sure a lot of them damaged their mental & physical health doing that. If those exact drugs were illegal nothing would change, except the label of the drug. I think stopping people by law is pretty pointless and highly ineffective, so maybe alternatives are better.