8 ms·

Americans are starting to legalize more and more. When prohibition 2.0 ends in failure maybe some will learn that it doesn’t work.

lolAtTheSquares 7y ago
But the biggest laugh is the idea that people using drugs in public is a good idea. Today, I went to get lunch, and these two dudes standing on line in front of me were so fucking stoned that I might have laughed at anything that happened to them. Beaten, robbed, arrested, stabbed, shot, whatever. They were stumbling around, acting like everything belonged to them, not a care in the world, but clearly old enough to know better. Balding, gray hair, maybe fifty years old? They could barely order a sandwich, and they needed to go home and come down off their high in the privacy of their own home. If this is the new normal, some people are going to find out the hard way that it has nothing to do with what’s legal and what’s prohibited. It has to do with whether it’s a good idea to be anything other than completely sober in front of total strangers.
Ronnie_Dipple 7y ago
As a non native living in Mexico I'm not surprised by this but on the same hand I would say its actually not as bad as people think here, you see the cartels don't want tourists to stop coming as the locals wouldn't like it and it would effect the cartels bottom line, as long as you stay out their way the cartels will usually leave you alone, just as gangs in Chicago will most of the time. Mexico is a beautiful place of warm people, brave journalists and contradictions.
- turk73 7y ago
  I don't believe for a single second that violent assholes wouldn't give me a hard time if they felt like it. They don't live by some kind thieves' code. It's not a Dickens novel. They're dangerous as shit and anyone who accidentally crosses paths with them might get killed for the hell of it. You ever read Borderlands Beat? That's real news coming out of Mejico. That country is bullshit and it can't keep its act together and never has. But, oh, my quaint villas and excellent tacos. Yeah, right. Drink the water and get back to me. As far Chicago, that city is a mess, too. I was there just last year. It sucks there for all kinds of reasons. You know what Chicago and Mexico have in common? Failed liberal policies.
  - Ronnie_Dipple 7y ago
    > I don't believe for a single second that violent assholes wouldn't give me a hard time if they felt like it. They don't live by some kind thieves' code. It's not a Dickens novel. I never said they wouldn't, there are crazy cartel members just as there are crazy gang members. > They're dangerous as shit and anyone who accidentally crosses paths with them might get killed for the hell of it. You ever read Borderlands Beat? That's real news coming out of Mejico. That country is bullshit and it can't keep its act together and never has. But, oh, my quaint villas and excellent tacos. Yeah, right. Drink the water and get back to me. Im literally living in Mexico, not in a resort but in a border town. > As far Chicago, that city is a mess, too. I was there just last year. It sucks there for all kinds of reasons. Agreed but there are nice places as well. > You know what Chicago and Mexico have in common? Failed liberal policies. I agree and corruption. There's a ton of propaganda in mainstream media claiming that Mexico and America are both heaven and hell depending on what you watch but as an outsider (I'm neither Mexican or American) I can honestly tell you it's somewhere in between.
    - hombre_fatal 7y ago
      You know, as someone else living in Mexico, these topics always bait me. The kind of people these topics attract that weirdly brag about how radicalized they are by news always blow my mind. But in the end it's not so bad. It keeps Mexico interesting and unadulterated by tourists. Some of these commenters you'd think walk around with a helmet on because they might trip and they won't risk that possibility. I'd love to see someone like that look where I've lived for five years in a beach city and tell me how bad I must have it and how much I must fear for my life in this war zone. Some people need the air conditioned sense of suburban safety that bores me to fucking tears. Other people like a little bit of ruggedness and adventure and maybe even adversity in life. Or something in between. To each their own.
      - nso 7y ago
        Non-gringo and non-Mexican chiming in from Puerto Escondido. Your comment hits all the marks, as far as I'm concerned.
- pier25 7y ago
  Same here. I’m from Spain and I’ve lived in Mexico for a decade. I’ve never seen violence or crime in front of me. Many people think Mexico is a war zone which isn’t true at all.
  - abrichr 7y ago
    Wikipedia calls it the Mexican Drug War: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Drug_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Drug_War > Casualties are often measured indirectly by estimated total deaths from organized crime in Mexico.[253] This amounts to about 115,000 people in the years 2007 - 2018.
rayiner 7y ago
When the drug war ends and murder rates in the Americas don’t go down to European levels, maybe some will realize it was never the drugs to begin with: https://mexfiles.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/murder-rate.jpg https://mexfiles.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/murder-rate.jpg (murder rate in Mexico is far below what it was before the drug war started, and has trended down as the drug war ramped up after 1980).
- leetcrew 7y ago
  idk what it's like where you live, but in my city the overwhelming majority of murders are linked to the illicit narcotics trade. maybe they would think of some other illegal shit to kill each other over if drugs were legalized, but I find it hard to believe that the violence wouldn't subside a bit if their main revenue stream were cut off. also, it seems questionable to extrapolate the outcome of legalization in the US based on data from mexico.
  - rayiner 7y ago
    > maybe they would think of some other illegal shit to kill each other over if drugs were legalized, but I find it hard to believe that the violence wouldn't subside a bit if their main revenue stream were cut off. You might think that but the data doesn’t really support it: http://polyticks.com/polyticks/beararms/liars/uscentury.gif http://polyticks.com/polyticks/beararms/liars/uscentury.gif. Homicide rates were spiking in the US long before prohibition. Likewise, after going down post WWII, homicide rates started spiking before the drug war. They had almost doubled from the previous low point by the time Nixon was elected. Nixon coined the phrase drug war, but didn’t really fund it aggressively. That was Reagan. But homicide were near the peak by the time he was even elected. > also, it seems questionable to extrapolate the outcome of legalization in the US based on data from mexico. Not really—the cartels supply demand for drugs in the US. And OP was blaming the US drug war for violence in Mexico.
    - dredmorbius 7y ago
      What does that chart show exactly? Timepoints are labled, data are not.
refurb 7y ago
Apparently Canada is looking to start a program where addicts are provided pharmaceutical grade opioids. That’s progress!

lolAtTheSquares 7y ago

But the biggest laugh is the idea that people using drugs in public is a good idea. Today, I went to get lunch, and these two dudes standing on line in front of me were so fucking stoned that I might have laughed at anything that happened to them. Beaten, robbed, arrested, stabbed, shot, whatever. They were stumbling around, acting like everything belonged to them, not a care in the world, but clearly old enough to know better. Balding, gray hair, maybe fifty years old? They could barely order a sandwich, and they needed to go home and come down off their high in the privacy of their own home. If this is the new normal, some people are going to find out the hard way that it has nothing to do with what’s legal and what’s prohibited. It has to do with whether it’s a good idea to be anything other than completely sober in front of total strangers.

Ronnie_Dipple 7y ago

As a non native living in Mexico I'm not surprised by this but on the same hand I would say its actually not as bad as people think here, you see the cartels don't want tourists to stop coming as the locals wouldn't like it and it would effect the cartels bottom line, as long as you stay out their way the cartels will usually leave you alone, just as gangs in Chicago will most of the time. Mexico is a beautiful place of warm people, brave journalists and contradictions.

turk73 7y ago
I don't believe for a single second that violent assholes wouldn't give me a hard time if they felt like it. They don't live by some kind thieves' code. It's not a Dickens novel. They're dangerous as shit and anyone who accidentally crosses paths with them might get killed for the hell of it. You ever read Borderlands Beat? That's real news coming out of Mejico. That country is bullshit and it can't keep its act together and never has. But, oh, my quaint villas and excellent tacos. Yeah, right. Drink the water and get back to me. As far Chicago, that city is a mess, too. I was there just last year. It sucks there for all kinds of reasons. You know what Chicago and Mexico have in common? Failed liberal policies.
- Ronnie_Dipple 7y ago
  > I don't believe for a single second that violent assholes wouldn't give me a hard time if they felt like it. They don't live by some kind thieves' code. It's not a Dickens novel. I never said they wouldn't, there are crazy cartel members just as there are crazy gang members. > They're dangerous as shit and anyone who accidentally crosses paths with them might get killed for the hell of it. You ever read Borderlands Beat? That's real news coming out of Mejico. That country is bullshit and it can't keep its act together and never has. But, oh, my quaint villas and excellent tacos. Yeah, right. Drink the water and get back to me. Im literally living in Mexico, not in a resort but in a border town. > As far Chicago, that city is a mess, too. I was there just last year. It sucks there for all kinds of reasons. Agreed but there are nice places as well. > You know what Chicago and Mexico have in common? Failed liberal policies. I agree and corruption. There's a ton of propaganda in mainstream media claiming that Mexico and America are both heaven and hell depending on what you watch but as an outsider (I'm neither Mexican or American) I can honestly tell you it's somewhere in between.
  - hombre_fatal 7y ago
    You know, as someone else living in Mexico, these topics always bait me. The kind of people these topics attract that weirdly brag about how radicalized they are by news always blow my mind. But in the end it's not so bad. It keeps Mexico interesting and unadulterated by tourists. Some of these commenters you'd think walk around with a helmet on because they might trip and they won't risk that possibility. I'd love to see someone like that look where I've lived for five years in a beach city and tell me how bad I must have it and how much I must fear for my life in this war zone. Some people need the air conditioned sense of suburban safety that bores me to fucking tears. Other people like a little bit of ruggedness and adventure and maybe even adversity in life. Or something in between. To each their own.
    - nso 7y ago
      Non-gringo and non-Mexican chiming in from Puerto Escondido. Your comment hits all the marks, as far as I'm concerned.
pier25 7y ago
Same here. I’m from Spain and I’ve lived in Mexico for a decade. I’ve never seen violence or crime in front of me. Many people think Mexico is a war zone which isn’t true at all.
- abrichr 7y ago
  Wikipedia calls it the Mexican Drug War: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Drug_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Drug_War > Casualties are often measured indirectly by estimated total deaths from organized crime in Mexico.[253] This amounts to about 115,000 people in the years 2007 - 2018.

rayiner 7y ago

When the drug war ends and murder rates in the Americas don’t go down to European levels, maybe some will realize it was never the drugs to begin with: https://mexfiles.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/murder-rate.jpg https://mexfiles.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/murder-rate.jpg (murder rate in Mexico is far below what it was before the drug war started, and has trended down as the drug war ramped up after 1980).

leetcrew 7y ago
idk what it's like where you live, but in my city the overwhelming majority of murders are linked to the illicit narcotics trade. maybe they would think of some other illegal shit to kill each other over if drugs were legalized, but I find it hard to believe that the violence wouldn't subside a bit if their main revenue stream were cut off. also, it seems questionable to extrapolate the outcome of legalization in the US based on data from mexico.
- rayiner 7y ago
  > maybe they would think of some other illegal shit to kill each other over if drugs were legalized, but I find it hard to believe that the violence wouldn't subside a bit if their main revenue stream were cut off. You might think that but the data doesn’t really support it: http://polyticks.com/polyticks/beararms/liars/uscentury.gif http://polyticks.com/polyticks/beararms/liars/uscentury.gif. Homicide rates were spiking in the US long before prohibition. Likewise, after going down post WWII, homicide rates started spiking before the drug war. They had almost doubled from the previous low point by the time Nixon was elected. Nixon coined the phrase drug war, but didn’t really fund it aggressively. That was Reagan. But homicide were near the peak by the time he was even elected. > also, it seems questionable to extrapolate the outcome of legalization in the US based on data from mexico. Not really—the cartels supply demand for drugs in the US. And OP was blaming the US drug war for violence in Mexico.
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    What does that chart show exactly? Timepoints are labled, data are not.

refurb 7y ago

Apparently Canada is looking to start a program where addicts are provided pharmaceutical grade opioids. That’s progress!