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> 'Cause free labor's the cornerstone of US economics it isn't > 'Cause slavery was abolished, unless you are in prison; you think I am bullshittin', then rea

> 'Cause free labor's the cornerstone of US economics it isn't > 'Cause slavery was abolished, unless you are in prison; you think I am bullshittin', then read the 13th Amendment This is true, they didn't listen when Kanye said it awkwardly, but it's been true the whole time. > That's why they givin' drug offenders time in double digits Maaaaybe sometimes, but if you come at it from that perspective you aren't going to convince enough people to change their minds. The way it's been sold to the public is not from the perspective of benefitting prisons; so you need to address the argument that the public is given: that illicit drugs are so dangerous that the enforcement is worth it. There are lots of countries without "reaganomics" or any private prisons, which are extremely strict and punitive when it comes to illicit drugs. It looks like the law is going in the right direction though, the recent sentencing reform has been great, decriminalization (or at least, sentencing/institutions that do more good than harm) should be the next step, but it's not at the top of anyone's platform as far as I can tell. Added: another story on Hacker News today, related to prison labour in a country which isn't the U.S. (I see absolutely nobody crying foul): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20427122 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20427122

deleted 7y ago
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4ntonius8lock 7y ago
> so you need to address the argument that the public is given: that illicit drugs are so dangerous that the enforcement is worth it Some people see the problem in the fact that Americans are and have historically been very comfortable benefiting from injustice and from things that are enforced 'on other people'. Middle class young hippies were shocked when the system showed its teeth and banned a substance so that the movement could be targeted by the repression systems put in place... while that was the norm done toward people in bad neighborhoods. Some people think the the answer is to get people to be more self aware of their position, especially hypocritical positions based on emotion that hurt others, and hopefully be more empathetic.
- microcolonel 7y ago
  > Some people see the problem in the fact that Americans are and have historically been very comfortable benefiting from injustice and from things that are enforced 'on other people'. The vast majority of people do not have trouble generally abiding by the provisions of the Controlled Substances Act; and while that doesn't mean it's just, but it does mean it's not crazy for ordinary people to think that others could abide by it as well. Very few people are even familiar with the concept of the prison industrial complex, let alone explicitly motivated to vote by it. > Middle class young hippies were shocked when the system showed its teeth and banned a substance so that the movement could be targeted by the repression systems put in place... while that was the norm done toward people in bad neighborhoods. Just as gun control is no longer typically motivated by racism, the war on drugs is not today typically motivated (to the ordinary person) by a prejudice against hippies or hispanics. If you argue against a point nobody is defending, you'll change nothing.
  - 4ntonius8lock 7y ago
    The people who designed the war on drugs, did so with a target. It is to this day blatantly targeting certain communities, for example, sentencing guidelines between crack and cocaine. Your logic is faulty: If you follow your line of thinking making the Kippah illegal would be fine since the 'vast majority of us' wouldn't have any trouble abiding by the new law. Oh, you did put in a condition: as long as enforcement is 'perceived by the ordinary person' to be non-prejudice. I'm not sure why you put that condition into the logic, or how that changes the reality of the injustice... but ok.
    - microcolonel 7y ago
      As I said, I'm not saying the law is just, I'm saying that most people don't support because they intend to perpetrate your perceived injustice. The vast majority of people are not moustache-twirling villains who think that drug laws should be enforced in the way they are, for the particular purpose of punishing the downtrodden or profiting prisons at any cost; so when your argument revolves around that, the people who know they don't support it for that reason are not going to be convinced. You're arguing against the cynical, bigoted schemers who influenced the law, not the people who've accepted it for the public messaging (which has been, beyond a certain point, not recognizable as racist); and those ordinary people are the voters who decide elections. This is not the world of John Lennon's Imagine; where bad things only happen because people choose to be evil, and everything can be solved by choosing not to be evil. Ordinary people do the wrong thing because they've been convinced by faulty or incomplete arguments, or they've ignored the arguments altogether. Ordinary people do the wrong thing because they are wrong.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

4ntonius8lock 7y ago

> so you need to address the argument that the public is given: that illicit drugs are so dangerous that the enforcement is worth it Some people see the problem in the fact that Americans are and have historically been very comfortable benefiting from injustice and from things that are enforced 'on other people'. Middle class young hippies were shocked when the system showed its teeth and banned a substance so that the movement could be targeted by the repression systems put in place... while that was the norm done toward people in bad neighborhoods. Some people think the the answer is to get people to be more self aware of their position, especially hypocritical positions based on emotion that hurt others, and hopefully be more empathetic.

microcolonel 7y ago
> Some people see the problem in the fact that Americans are and have historically been very comfortable benefiting from injustice and from things that are enforced 'on other people'. The vast majority of people do not have trouble generally abiding by the provisions of the Controlled Substances Act; and while that doesn't mean it's just, but it does mean it's not crazy for ordinary people to think that others could abide by it as well. Very few people are even familiar with the concept of the prison industrial complex, let alone explicitly motivated to vote by it. > Middle class young hippies were shocked when the system showed its teeth and banned a substance so that the movement could be targeted by the repression systems put in place... while that was the norm done toward people in bad neighborhoods. Just as gun control is no longer typically motivated by racism, the war on drugs is not today typically motivated (to the ordinary person) by a prejudice against hippies or hispanics. If you argue against a point nobody is defending, you'll change nothing.
- 4ntonius8lock 7y ago
  The people who designed the war on drugs, did so with a target. It is to this day blatantly targeting certain communities, for example, sentencing guidelines between crack and cocaine. Your logic is faulty: If you follow your line of thinking making the Kippah illegal would be fine since the 'vast majority of us' wouldn't have any trouble abiding by the new law. Oh, you did put in a condition: as long as enforcement is 'perceived by the ordinary person' to be non-prejudice. I'm not sure why you put that condition into the logic, or how that changes the reality of the injustice... but ok.
  - microcolonel 7y ago
    As I said, I'm not saying the law is just, I'm saying that most people don't support because they intend to perpetrate your perceived injustice. The vast majority of people are not moustache-twirling villains who think that drug laws should be enforced in the way they are, for the particular purpose of punishing the downtrodden or profiting prisons at any cost; so when your argument revolves around that, the people who know they don't support it for that reason are not going to be convinced. You're arguing against the cynical, bigoted schemers who influenced the law, not the people who've accepted it for the public messaging (which has been, beyond a certain point, not recognizable as racist); and those ordinary people are the voters who decide elections. This is not the world of John Lennon's Imagine; where bad things only happen because people choose to be evil, and everything can be solved by choosing not to be evil. Ordinary people do the wrong thing because they've been convinced by faulty or incomplete arguments, or they've ignored the arguments altogether. Ordinary people do the wrong thing because they are wrong.