4 ms·

I used to think this, but now am not as sure. The experience that Portugal and the Pacific Northwest have had has caused me to question this. I legitimately do

I used to think this, but now am not as sure. The experience that Portugal and the Pacific Northwest have had has caused me to question this. I legitimately don’t know.

hinkley 3y ago
It might work if you divert all of the funds to recovery programs. But Oregon did not do that and now they are backpedaling.
- bickfordb 3y ago
  We also didn't require you to enter recovery programs.
TaylorAlexander 3y ago
Well, legalizing drugs won't solve other social problems. That takes completely unrelated reforms. But at least people won't end up senselessly put in prison for what they choose to put in their own body.
- binary132 3y ago
  People usually don't get thrown in jail for getting high, they get thrown in jail for things that they do either in order to get high, or because they got high. Am I wrong?
cthalupa 3y ago
Blanket legalization without any supporting infrastructure seems dicey. Portugal had fairly promising results early on when they had funding for all of the assistance programs, etc., but this money ran out and the taxes raised as part of the change did not provide enough funding to support them. The PNW implementations are scattershot messes, so no surprise things are going poorly there. (Though I don't think as poorly of harm reduction practices as many do) I think there are quite a few things we could broadly legalize, like marijuana, lsd, shrooms, dmt, etc., and have little cause for concern. Opioids, amphetamines, cocaine, etc. have enough abuse potential that we do probably need real programs to help people get clean and away from the situation that led them to begin abusing in the first place before we make them broadly legal. Though, at the same time there are legitimate arguments that we would see significant benefits in some areas by legalizing, if only because we could bundle naloxone with opioids and ensure consistent dosages and purity, which would save a lot of lives.
- fasthands9 3y ago
  I agree for the most part. I used to be more pro legalization of everything. It definitely seems like if you do the cost benefit analysis for individual cases it is better to not punish people for ingesting a substance voluntarily. That said, I've lost two friends to heroin overdoses (one intentional, one not). They were both relatively successful. I find the call for better programs a bit empty - would these programs be voluntary if you are on decriminalized drugs? If so, do they have any chance of success? My friends were both financially fine so they could have opted for rehab and (as far as I know) did not. Perhaps if legal there'd be better harm reduction practices, though I'm still skeptical this would overcome the increase in ubiquity. The data also makes things hard. California and Oregon have far few overdoses than West Virginia. But Texas and North Dakota beat the west coast states by a lot.
  - cthalupa 3y ago
    I've also lost a friend to a heroin overdose, and as best we can tell it was unintentional and the result of a significant difference in purity/dose from what he was expecting. It's the sort of thing legalization and regulation would go a long way to fixing. Naloxone being readily available and using with others capable of dosing you with it to stop an OD would also be a huge deal. But yes, I imagine any rehabilitation programs would be voluntary, though I think it would be reasonable to force them in situations where people are doing other illegal things while on the drug - DWI, the sort of public abuse you see in some cities (though lots of this is tied to a larger homelessness issue), etc. Bundle it up with programs for the homeless and you probably take care of a lot of the worst situations for people. I don't think we'll ever get to perfect, but I hope everyone believes we can get to a better spot than we're at today.
  - BobaFloutist 3y ago
    If they're legalized it's possible it would be easier to track usage, and stage interventions if someone's demonstrating dangerous patterns. If it's illegal than maybe fewer people are exposed, but it can be harder to know when it's a problem.
    - 3y ago
yieldcrv 3y ago
you realize that "decriminalization" is the same as 1800s snake oil salesmen at the world's fair right? the exact reason the FDA was created these substances need to go through the FDA with per ailment clinical trials and side effects listed just like other substances reach parity with other approved drugs, alongside licensed distribution (like other drugs), treatment programs and education make options for consumers - like we're already doing at the state level with marijuana - but better options so they don't chose the black market supply
- dekhn 3y ago
  A few things to mention here. First, the government actually paid a university to grow cannabis and they gave it to glaucoma patients for decades without any interesting results (in my opinion probably because the grantees were more interested in getting repeated funding from NIDA than to publish things NIDA didn't want to see). Second, there have been a number of clinical trials on marijuana for quite some time with a wide range of results (it's a tricky drug to study for a number of reasons). For a long time, NIDA made it hard to get funding for this- and also constrained the supply- probably with the goal of preventing studies that would find efficacy. Third, I think the FDA system is really poor at evaluating a wide range of drugs (of which cannabis is an example). They have a really limiting mechanism that doesn't work well in "compassionate use" where we already have a good understanding of the risks from widespread use. Fourth, the FDA wasn't created to do this- it was created mainly to reduce consumer fear of drugs in response to absolutely horrific side effects. The drug that led to this, thalidomide, is approved by the FDA and used in the US as a highly effective medicine. I think in retrospect, it took the FDA so long to get here for political reasons, not scientific or medical ones.
  - 57FkMytWjyFu 3y ago
    The product made by that university was whole plant, ground. It might have been paid to grow it, but it wasn't any good at it. https://www.reddit.com/r/trees/comments/epeb6k/the_university_of_mississippi_remains_the_sole/ https://www.reddit.com/r/trees/comments/epeb6k/the_universit...
loeg 3y ago
The PNW isn't a monolithic legal environment. Oregon state has dabbled in legalization much more than Washington.
namlem 3y ago
Non-opiois drugs should generally be legal imo. Opioids specifically are tricky.
comte7092 3y ago
I’d caution taking too many lessons from what’s happened in Oregon so far. Measure 110 was advanced by ballot initiative, and there was little planning around how supportive services/infrastructure would be built. As a result, the rollout has gone extremely poorly. Add to that, despite what people will viciously argue to the contrary, the distribution caused to society by COVID. Across the entire US there was a significant increase in crime, followed by a subsequent reduction. Further, significant numbers of people were let out of the jail system and shelters to reduce crowding. There are realistically several currents that are leading to people’s anecdotal experiences, which are challenging to disentangle. All I would argue is that it is folly to think that just throwing the doors open without careful planning and consideration is a bad idea (shocking, I know).
ecronant 3y ago
[dead]

I used to think this, but now am not as sure. The experience that Portugal and the Pacific Northwest have had has caused me to question this. I legitimately don’t know.

hinkley 3y ago

It might work if you divert all of the funds to recovery programs. But Oregon did not do that and now they are backpedaling.

bickfordb 3y ago
We also didn't require you to enter recovery programs.

TaylorAlexander 3y ago

Well, legalizing drugs won't solve other social problems. That takes completely unrelated reforms. But at least people won't end up senselessly put in prison for what they choose to put in their own body.

binary132 3y ago
People usually don't get thrown in jail for getting high, they get thrown in jail for things that they do either in order to get high, or because they got high. Am I wrong?

cthalupa 3y ago

Blanket legalization without any supporting infrastructure seems dicey. Portugal had fairly promising results early on when they had funding for all of the assistance programs, etc., but this money ran out and the taxes raised as part of the change did not provide enough funding to support them. The PNW implementations are scattershot messes, so no surprise things are going poorly there. (Though I don't think as poorly of harm reduction practices as many do) I think there are quite a few things we could broadly legalize, like marijuana, lsd, shrooms, dmt, etc., and have little cause for concern. Opioids, amphetamines, cocaine, etc. have enough abuse potential that we do probably need real programs to help people get clean and away from the situation that led them to begin abusing in the first place before we make them broadly legal. Though, at the same time there are legitimate arguments that we would see significant benefits in some areas by legalizing, if only because we could bundle naloxone with opioids and ensure consistent dosages and purity, which would save a lot of lives.

fasthands9 3y ago
I agree for the most part. I used to be more pro legalization of everything. It definitely seems like if you do the cost benefit analysis for individual cases it is better to not punish people for ingesting a substance voluntarily. That said, I've lost two friends to heroin overdoses (one intentional, one not). They were both relatively successful. I find the call for better programs a bit empty - would these programs be voluntary if you are on decriminalized drugs? If so, do they have any chance of success? My friends were both financially fine so they could have opted for rehab and (as far as I know) did not. Perhaps if legal there'd be better harm reduction practices, though I'm still skeptical this would overcome the increase in ubiquity. The data also makes things hard. California and Oregon have far few overdoses than West Virginia. But Texas and North Dakota beat the west coast states by a lot.
- cthalupa 3y ago
  I've also lost a friend to a heroin overdose, and as best we can tell it was unintentional and the result of a significant difference in purity/dose from what he was expecting. It's the sort of thing legalization and regulation would go a long way to fixing. Naloxone being readily available and using with others capable of dosing you with it to stop an OD would also be a huge deal. But yes, I imagine any rehabilitation programs would be voluntary, though I think it would be reasonable to force them in situations where people are doing other illegal things while on the drug - DWI, the sort of public abuse you see in some cities (though lots of this is tied to a larger homelessness issue), etc. Bundle it up with programs for the homeless and you probably take care of a lot of the worst situations for people. I don't think we'll ever get to perfect, but I hope everyone believes we can get to a better spot than we're at today.
- BobaFloutist 3y ago
  If they're legalized it's possible it would be easier to track usage, and stage interventions if someone's demonstrating dangerous patterns. If it's illegal than maybe fewer people are exposed, but it can be harder to know when it's a problem.
  - 3y ago

yieldcrv 3y ago

you realize that "decriminalization" is the same as 1800s snake oil salesmen at the world's fair right? the exact reason the FDA was created these substances need to go through the FDA with per ailment clinical trials and side effects listed just like other substances reach parity with other approved drugs, alongside licensed distribution (like other drugs), treatment programs and education make options for consumers - like we're already doing at the state level with marijuana - but better options so they don't chose the black market supply

dekhn 3y ago
A few things to mention here. First, the government actually paid a university to grow cannabis and they gave it to glaucoma patients for decades without any interesting results (in my opinion probably because the grantees were more interested in getting repeated funding from NIDA than to publish things NIDA didn't want to see). Second, there have been a number of clinical trials on marijuana for quite some time with a wide range of results (it's a tricky drug to study for a number of reasons). For a long time, NIDA made it hard to get funding for this- and also constrained the supply- probably with the goal of preventing studies that would find efficacy. Third, I think the FDA system is really poor at evaluating a wide range of drugs (of which cannabis is an example). They have a really limiting mechanism that doesn't work well in "compassionate use" where we already have a good understanding of the risks from widespread use. Fourth, the FDA wasn't created to do this- it was created mainly to reduce consumer fear of drugs in response to absolutely horrific side effects. The drug that led to this, thalidomide, is approved by the FDA and used in the US as a highly effective medicine. I think in retrospect, it took the FDA so long to get here for political reasons, not scientific or medical ones.
- 57FkMytWjyFu 3y ago
  The product made by that university was whole plant, ground. It might have been paid to grow it, but it wasn't any good at it. https://www.reddit.com/r/trees/comments/epeb6k/the_university_of_mississippi_remains_the_sole/ https://www.reddit.com/r/trees/comments/epeb6k/the_universit...

loeg 3y ago

The PNW isn't a monolithic legal environment. Oregon state has dabbled in legalization much more than Washington.

namlem 3y ago

Non-opiois drugs should generally be legal imo. Opioids specifically are tricky.

comte7092 3y ago

I’d caution taking too many lessons from what’s happened in Oregon so far. Measure 110 was advanced by ballot initiative, and there was little planning around how supportive services/infrastructure would be built. As a result, the rollout has gone extremely poorly. Add to that, despite what people will viciously argue to the contrary, the distribution caused to society by COVID. Across the entire US there was a significant increase in crime, followed by a subsequent reduction. Further, significant numbers of people were let out of the jail system and shelters to reduce crowding. There are realistically several currents that are leading to people’s anecdotal experiences, which are challenging to disentangle. All I would argue is that it is folly to think that just throwing the doors open without careful planning and consideration is a bad idea (shocking, I know).

ecronant 3y ago

[dead]