5 ms·

that's your opinion and it's okay to have that opinion. My opinion is that the government should not tell me what I'm allowed to do with my body (or even worst

that's your opinion and it's okay to have that opinion. My opinion is that the government should not tell me what I'm allowed to do with my body (or even worst arrest me for doing stuff to my body). If I literally want to kill myself it should be my choice - How ridiculous would it be if we arrested people that attempted suicide? It's at least as ridiculos trying to end up in prison for an addiction. Also, completely tangential. But poverty is the thing that really kills people (including driving them to seeking the thrills of hard drugs). I can almost guarantee that there is a correlation between income level/standard of living and meth zones.

stjohnswarts 5y ago
That's fine but that's not what the majority of us believe (that hard/extremely addictive and life destroying drugs should be banned) and you will just have to deal with that or find a libertarian paradise in some far off country. Pot isn't one of those drugs though, it's pretty harmless or at least no more destructive than alcohol.
- rantwasp 5y ago
  we're getting philosophical here. but I believe that your freedom should be YOUR freedom. Does that mean you should do stupid things and ruin your life? Probably not. But this is not about doing stupid things. It's about having the option and the option not being constrained by arbitrary things (ie who gets to decide that A is good and B is bad, A is okay, B is life destroying) also, one thing to consider: It's mostly non-controversial that pot is harmless nowadays. The more you go back in time, the more pot was painted as wrecking your life, a gateway drug, etc. So a lot of what the effect of a drug are can (and is) hearsay + fear-mongering.
  - foxes 5y ago
    How is it not controversial? Most studies seem to suggest the effect is not known. [0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/ [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4827335/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4827335/ Definitely seems to suggest there are potentially harmful side effects.
    - rantwasp 5y ago
      look at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/table/T1/?report=objectonly https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/table/T... those studies are basically jokes. ever take tylenol? the pain killer that is available OTC virtually everywhere? do you know what happens if you take double the max recommended dosage? liver failure. for something that's OTC. for all intents and purposes weed is harmless. In WA, most people that I know have tried weed and some of them are actually doing it on a regular basis. I have yet to hear of any [mental] health issues. If you do something all day everyday you are dealing with something else and the drug is a way of escapism.
      - foxes 5y ago
        Again, the argument that because bad x exists and is allowed freely does not mean y should be allowed. You can not use transitive arguments for this. I would think that pain killer should also be restricted. Anecdotal small sample sizes are also not convincing either way, I do not think we should be so cavalier with allowing or disallowing.
        rantwasp 5y ago
        my point is that everything should be allowed and the decision should be at a personal level. that’s freedom! literally the definition of freedom. you can do whatever you want as long as you don’t restrict others freedom
        foxes 5y ago
        I respectfully disagree, society does not function like that. We need constraints. It might not restrict others freedoms entirely, but there are still consequences for actions, things do not happen in a vacuum.
        enchiridion 5y ago
        Things indeed do not happen in a vacuum. Each situation is heavily influenced by the complicated and nuanced circumstances surrounding it. Do you think a few hundred people in the central government should decide how to handle those situations, or the people most intimately familiar with the details?
- foxes 5y ago
  I believe alcohol is already pretty destructive. It’s been shown no level is really safe, it causes brain damage, although as to how much it’s not clear. I think weed is fairly similar. Tobacco gives you lung cancer. I don’t think we should just let people destroy themselves. We want a caring society.
  - rantwasp 5y ago
    we should educate/inform people and let them make their own choices. we want a caring society but not at the cost of restricting personal freedoms
  - throwawayboise 5y ago
    > Tobacco gives you lung cancer. And smoking weed doesnt? They are both plants.
    - samatman 5y ago
      Unclear actually. The content of cannabis smoke is quite different from tobacco smoke, and in particular it contains a lot of terpenes, and the cannabinoids themselves, which are potent antioxidants. Last I checked, cannabis smoke was implicated in COPD, but doesn't appear to contribute to lung cancer. That was at least a decade ago, however.
  - pmoriarty 5y ago
    "I don't think we should just let people destroy themselves. We want a caring society." The problem is that, like the old "we had to destroy the village to save it" cliche from Vietnam, the War on Drugs destroys the very lives it purports to protect. The illegality of drugs means that the drugs people buy are either not what they're sold as or are of an unknown purity, which leads to overdoses. Such unintentional overdoses from mistakes in gauging substance or purity would virtually disappear if drugs were legal. The organized crime that runs the drug trade kills many people and has a corrosive effect on our justice system and government and that of many other nations. That too will be greatly reduced with legalization. Arrests of users, killing of them and their families by police during raids, imprisonment, separating families and ruining lives by all of the above and on top of that criminal records for possession are yet another horrific consequence of the War on Drugs. Rights are thrown away, police power and surveillance of the population is ratcheted up to ever greater levels in the name of fighting the WOD. Billions of dollars are wasted and billions more given to organized crime instead of paid as taxes to governments. And on top of it all the WOD is not even effective. People continue to use drugs anyway, if they want to. So what is the point?

stjohnswarts 5y ago

That's fine but that's not what the majority of us believe (that hard/extremely addictive and life destroying drugs should be banned) and you will just have to deal with that or find a libertarian paradise in some far off country. Pot isn't one of those drugs though, it's pretty harmless or at least no more destructive than alcohol.

rantwasp 5y ago
we're getting philosophical here. but I believe that your freedom should be YOUR freedom. Does that mean you should do stupid things and ruin your life? Probably not. But this is not about doing stupid things. It's about having the option and the option not being constrained by arbitrary things (ie who gets to decide that A is good and B is bad, A is okay, B is life destroying) also, one thing to consider: It's mostly non-controversial that pot is harmless nowadays. The more you go back in time, the more pot was painted as wrecking your life, a gateway drug, etc. So a lot of what the effect of a drug are can (and is) hearsay + fear-mongering.
- foxes 5y ago
  How is it not controversial? Most studies seem to suggest the effect is not known. [0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/ [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4827335/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4827335/ Definitely seems to suggest there are potentially harmful side effects.
  - rantwasp 5y ago
    look at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/table/T1/?report=objectonly https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4337025/table/T... those studies are basically jokes. ever take tylenol? the pain killer that is available OTC virtually everywhere? do you know what happens if you take double the max recommended dosage? liver failure. for something that's OTC. for all intents and purposes weed is harmless. In WA, most people that I know have tried weed and some of them are actually doing it on a regular basis. I have yet to hear of any [mental] health issues. If you do something all day everyday you are dealing with something else and the drug is a way of escapism.
    - foxes 5y ago
      Again, the argument that because bad x exists and is allowed freely does not mean y should be allowed. You can not use transitive arguments for this. I would think that pain killer should also be restricted. Anecdotal small sample sizes are also not convincing either way, I do not think we should be so cavalier with allowing or disallowing.
      - rantwasp 5y ago
        my point is that everything should be allowed and the decision should be at a personal level. that’s freedom! literally the definition of freedom. you can do whatever you want as long as you don’t restrict others freedom
        foxes 5y ago
        I respectfully disagree, society does not function like that. We need constraints. It might not restrict others freedoms entirely, but there are still consequences for actions, things do not happen in a vacuum.
        enchiridion 5y ago
        Things indeed do not happen in a vacuum. Each situation is heavily influenced by the complicated and nuanced circumstances surrounding it. Do you think a few hundred people in the central government should decide how to handle those situations, or the people most intimately familiar with the details?
foxes 5y ago
I believe alcohol is already pretty destructive. It’s been shown no level is really safe, it causes brain damage, although as to how much it’s not clear. I think weed is fairly similar. Tobacco gives you lung cancer. I don’t think we should just let people destroy themselves. We want a caring society.
- rantwasp 5y ago
  we should educate/inform people and let them make their own choices. we want a caring society but not at the cost of restricting personal freedoms
- throwawayboise 5y ago
  > Tobacco gives you lung cancer. And smoking weed doesnt? They are both plants.
  - samatman 5y ago
    Unclear actually. The content of cannabis smoke is quite different from tobacco smoke, and in particular it contains a lot of terpenes, and the cannabinoids themselves, which are potent antioxidants. Last I checked, cannabis smoke was implicated in COPD, but doesn't appear to contribute to lung cancer. That was at least a decade ago, however.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  "I don't think we should just let people destroy themselves. We want a caring society." The problem is that, like the old "we had to destroy the village to save it" cliche from Vietnam, the War on Drugs destroys the very lives it purports to protect. The illegality of drugs means that the drugs people buy are either not what they're sold as or are of an unknown purity, which leads to overdoses. Such unintentional overdoses from mistakes in gauging substance or purity would virtually disappear if drugs were legal. The organized crime that runs the drug trade kills many people and has a corrosive effect on our justice system and government and that of many other nations. That too will be greatly reduced with legalization. Arrests of users, killing of them and their families by police during raids, imprisonment, separating families and ruining lives by all of the above and on top of that criminal records for possession are yet another horrific consequence of the War on Drugs. Rights are thrown away, police power and surveillance of the population is ratcheted up to ever greater levels in the name of fighting the WOD. Billions of dollars are wasted and billions more given to organized crime instead of paid as taxes to governments. And on top of it all the WOD is not even effective. People continue to use drugs anyway, if they want to. So what is the point?