Many things in life and in politics are not a case of “good” vs “bad” but of “bad” vs “worse”. I think it’s quite acceptable to think that legalisation might be

Many things in life and in politics are not a case of “good” vs “bad” but of “bad” vs “worse”. I think it’s quite acceptable to think that legalisation might be the least worst policy there is even for hard drugs. Yes it will have negative effects but they may be less bad on aggregate than the alternative. The same may well be true for the other examples you cite (I tend to personally believe not but it doesn’t mean it’s not a balancing act or that I’m right) - but I suspect that a lot of these things are also all likely to have quite a lot of local situational differences in determining which is worse.