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> So your line is "Marijuana aesthetically displeases me and we're no longer jailing people for it, therefore drug war is good"? Nowhere did I mention aestheti

by bitlax 2y ago

> So your line is "Marijuana aesthetically displeases me and we're no longer jailing people for it, therefore drug war is good"? Nowhere did I mention aesthetics. > Or is it "Fentanyl deaths exploding has happened despite it still not being legal to purchase, therefore somehow we need more drug war despite it having not prevented this outcome in any way"? Enforcement procedures have changed at all levels, regardless of classification. > Somehow no matter what actually happens, it supports doing drug war harder. This doesn't sound like a very principled argument to me Yes, I'm positing that drug enforcement has benefits and my statements are consistent. > Some drugs are probably not a great idea for most people. No drug is for everyone. Agreed. > Also, the state arresting people for what drugs they take adds a ton of problems without solving any, not the least of which being a fairly draconian police state that harms people who aren't even doing drugs, and we have decades of evidence that this is the case This is a false choice, filled with cliches.

advael 2y ago
> Nowhere did I mention aesthetics. You mentioned, without further commentary, that you could smell marijuana various places, in the context of harms of the very limited relaxations in drug enforcement that have happened in some states in the US. Not only is it unclear to me that this is a direct consequence of that (Where I live, you could smell weed a lot of these places well before the state legalized recreational use), but the harm this causes is left unstated, which is why I call it an aesthetic objection > Enforcement procedures have changed at all levels, regardless of classification. Vague and also nonsense. Throughout the era of drug prohibition we've had a constant stream of these "crises" where a drug becomes popular for some reason, people die because they're using it unsafely, and the news squawks about it for months. Every version of drug policy has failed to prevent this problem, and yet people keep trying to pretend if we just throw more cops at the problem it will magically start working. It won't > Yes, I'm positing that drug enforcement has benefits and my statements are consistent. They're not. In one case, you name the fact that you notice a drug that's increasingly being legalized in various places as evidence that relaxing enforcement is a problem. In the other, you name a drug that's still actively quite illegal, that the DEA busts labs for making, doctors for overprescribing, and individuals for possessing, and say that the fact that it's the subject of the current well-known drug crisis is evidence that enforcement is too lax. What level of enforcement do you think will solve the problem? It really seems like whatever outcome we see from what policies, as long as someone, somewhere still uses a drug you think they shouldn't, your conclusion will be that this is evidence of inadequate cop involvement > This is a false choice, filled with cliches. This is the reality we currently occupy. Police stop and search people, break into their homes, confiscate their belongings, on the assumption that they might have drugs, or have made money selling drugs. They shoot people on the assumption that they can't be reasoned with because they might be on drugs. We ruin millions of people's lives by throwing them in jail for merely posessing drugs, which if anything exacerbates those individuals' propensity to buy black market drugs. This is all a direct downstream consequence of drug policy
- bitlax 2y ago
  > ...which is why I call it an aesthetic objection Ah, so you made it up. Words have meaning. > ...the problem it will magically start working. It won't You're changing your argument here. > ...evidence of inadequate cop involvement You've forgotten what you're trying to prove and you've misunderstood in what sense I'm saying that my statements are consistent. > ...This is all a direct downstream consequence of drug policy You're restating the same false choice. It's been real. I'm gonna leave it here. Consider that a win.
  - advael 2y ago
    > Ah, so you made it up. Words have meaning. Actually, I used the meaning of the word to arrive at the conclusion I did, whereas your objection seems to be to the fact that you didn't use that specific word > You're changing your argument here. Nope, same argument the whole time: Drug prohibition doesn't work, and it also causes harm. Perhaps it's confusing when I take time to respond to what you're saying specifically? > You've forgotten what you're trying to prove and you've misunderstood in what sense I'm saying that my statements are consistent. What a lovely little gotcha this would be if it referred to anything that actually happened. > You're restating the same false choice. Nope, I'm describing reality under the status quo of drug enforcement. I'm not talking in hypotheticals, I'm talking about what happened and continues to happen > It's been real. I'm gonna leave it here. Consider that a win. I know it's a trite idiom but nothing about this is "real." You, like many on this website, seem to think debate consists of acting smug and trying to find little "gotchas" while making no case whatsoever for your own beliefs. I understand that trying to define, let alone justify, exactly what it is what you believe is pretty hard. Perhaps that's why you'd like state actors to be empowered to make more decisions for people. Maybe people would have better discussions if they didn't think about it in terms of "winning"

by bitlax 2y ago

advael 2y ago

> Nowhere did I mention aesthetics. You mentioned, without further commentary, that you could smell marijuana various places, in the context of harms of the very limited relaxations in drug enforcement that have happened in some states in the US. Not only is it unclear to me that this is a direct consequence of that (Where I live, you could smell weed a lot of these places well before the state legalized recreational use), but the harm this causes is left unstated, which is why I call it an aesthetic objection > Enforcement procedures have changed at all levels, regardless of classification. Vague and also nonsense. Throughout the era of drug prohibition we've had a constant stream of these "crises" where a drug becomes popular for some reason, people die because they're using it unsafely, and the news squawks about it for months. Every version of drug policy has failed to prevent this problem, and yet people keep trying to pretend if we just throw more cops at the problem it will magically start working. It won't > Yes, I'm positing that drug enforcement has benefits and my statements are consistent. They're not. In one case, you name the fact that you notice a drug that's increasingly being legalized in various places as evidence that relaxing enforcement is a problem. In the other, you name a drug that's still actively quite illegal, that the DEA busts labs for making, doctors for overprescribing, and individuals for possessing, and say that the fact that it's the subject of the current well-known drug crisis is evidence that enforcement is too lax. What level of enforcement do you think will solve the problem? It really seems like whatever outcome we see from what policies, as long as someone, somewhere still uses a drug you think they shouldn't, your conclusion will be that this is evidence of inadequate cop involvement > This is a false choice, filled with cliches. This is the reality we currently occupy. Police stop and search people, break into their homes, confiscate their belongings, on the assumption that they might have drugs, or have made money selling drugs. They shoot people on the assumption that they can't be reasoned with because they might be on drugs. We ruin millions of people's lives by throwing them in jail for merely posessing drugs, which if anything exacerbates those individuals' propensity to buy black market drugs. This is all a direct downstream consequence of drug policy

bitlax 2y ago
> ...which is why I call it an aesthetic objection Ah, so you made it up. Words have meaning. > ...the problem it will magically start working. It won't You're changing your argument here. > ...evidence of inadequate cop involvement You've forgotten what you're trying to prove and you've misunderstood in what sense I'm saying that my statements are consistent. > ...This is all a direct downstream consequence of drug policy You're restating the same false choice. It's been real. I'm gonna leave it here. Consider that a win.
- advael 2y ago
  > Ah, so you made it up. Words have meaning. Actually, I used the meaning of the word to arrive at the conclusion I did, whereas your objection seems to be to the fact that you didn't use that specific word > You're changing your argument here. Nope, same argument the whole time: Drug prohibition doesn't work, and it also causes harm. Perhaps it's confusing when I take time to respond to what you're saying specifically? > You've forgotten what you're trying to prove and you've misunderstood in what sense I'm saying that my statements are consistent. What a lovely little gotcha this would be if it referred to anything that actually happened. > You're restating the same false choice. Nope, I'm describing reality under the status quo of drug enforcement. I'm not talking in hypotheticals, I'm talking about what happened and continues to happen > It's been real. I'm gonna leave it here. Consider that a win. I know it's a trite idiom but nothing about this is "real." You, like many on this website, seem to think debate consists of acting smug and trying to find little "gotchas" while making no case whatsoever for your own beliefs. I understand that trying to define, let alone justify, exactly what it is what you believe is pretty hard. Perhaps that's why you'd like state actors to be empowered to make more decisions for people. Maybe people would have better discussions if they didn't think about it in terms of "winning"