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I’m very much for legalizing and regulating (almost) all drugs, but watch out with the confirmation bias of “everyone in my social circle who used recreationall
by jorvi 2y ago
I’m very much for legalizing and regulating (almost) all drugs, but watch out with the confirmation bias of “everyone in my social circle who used recreationally turned out fine.”
I can’t find it right now but I read a great comment on legalization that pointed out that a kid experimenting with weed and cocaine in college is doing so for a radically different reason than a kid doing it escape the daily misery of his ghetto neighborhood.
This is also why you’ll often see staunch opposition to legalization in the lower socio-economic classes, with them having seen people close to them destroyed by drug use.
And yes, legalization and regulation would of course also allow harm reduction. But it is good to be able to take the opposition’s perspective :)
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- tremon 2y ago> with them having seen people close to them destroyed by drug use. But isn't this a false correlation, then? Were they destroyed by drug use, or by the daily misery of their ghetto neighborhood?
- westerno 2y agoThe combination, which is the point of the comment above. Legalization may be fine in places where people have other support factors that make them less likely to destroy their lives with drugs and alcohol, but in areas without those protective forces, it's good that there are some controls (or at least many of the people who live there think so).
- jacksnipe 2y agoAt that point it becomes important to ask (1) how much damage does the illegalization itself do; (2) how much harm does the limited access actually prevent; and (3) how much damage alcohol does, and what the tradeoff is. If you’re going to make a harm reduction argument, you need to do your best to fully account for all the harms in play.
- beedeebeedee 2y agoSpot on- so many social problems get attributed to everything but the economy and inequality. If we could make our system more equitable, then we would not have such desperation.
- WalterBright 2y agoWhat happened with the tremendous social spending by the government?
- beedeebeedee 2y agoGovernment spending is not a panacea for structural economic issues
- WalterBright 2y agoThat money is handed to the poor.
- chaps 2y agoImagine hearing someone's loved one dying to drug use and asking them, "But isn't this a false correlation?". What a deeply and unsettlingly cold question that lacks any potential for empathy.
- HelloMcFly 2y agoOkay, but the person wasn't asking this of the family of a dying loved one, they were asking it in this space where ideas are discussed and examined. Yes, it would be disturbingly unempathetic to ask that question in such a circumstance, but asking it in this circumstance is neither cold, inappropriate, or a demonstration that the asker lacks empathy.
- beedeebeedee 2y ago> "But isn't this a false correlation?". What a deeply and unsettlingly cold question that lacks any potential for empathy. That's an absurd mental picture you've imagined. Using that to undermine the discussion of the reality that people use drugs to temporarily escape from desperate conditions is unsettling and lacks empathy and judgment.
- chaps 2y agoYou've deeply misunderstood my comment.
- beedeebeedee 2y agoYou've deeply misunderstood your own comment
- knome 2y agoI disagree entirely, and I have personally witnessed people lose themselves to drug use. Anyone with a relative dying of addiction has no doubt been long exhausted in watching them circle the pit of their addiction. They are going to be under no illusions regarding the chances there were to escape it, and the choices made to remain there. Asking if they were escaping from a miserable reality vs chasing a high isn't offensive. It's just dealing with the reality of the situation as it is. The only person I see being offended is someone in denial, blaming the drugs alone rather than allowing any blame to the person using them, trying to imagine them an innocent victim without agency in the matter. The question is a good one. It actually looks for what caused everything to go wrong, rather than just being pointlessly offended on behalf of the imagined umbrage you think others might feel.
- herval 2y agoI think poor people in the US are against legalization mostly due to the decades of “war on drugs” propaganda or other forms of conservatism (eg religion), not because they’ve seen people close to them being destroyed by drug use
- bluejekyll 2y agoThe primary reason to legalize isn’t to make it easier to do drugs, it’s to not use the justice and court system for dealing with addiction problems. Our goal should be to legalize use and then take the money saved from police enforcement and funnel that into programs that get people off drugs. In the US an issue is that the latter part is part of the healthcare system, and we all know that has a lot of issues in serving people who fall into the under-employed category.
- kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 2y agoSeveral states have tried that. Some have already repealed the laws because they were a disaster.
- remixff2400 2y agoNot my area of expertise per se, but the counterargument that I've seen is that the states (e.g. Oregon) that tried it never got the backstops in place to help soften and support the transition (i.e. rehab centers, support programs, social programs). Instead, it was just a hard switch that went expectedly bad. There's at least a theory that people believe will work that hasn't been correctly implemented yet, but whether or not it's feasible to implement at all, I'm not holding my breath.
- righthand 2y agoWhen this happens the reason 90% of the time is usually not because the program wasn’t working but the opposition to the program has made sure to either gut the funding or put in measures that makes those programs not work (only hiring 2 people to handle all the work or excessive operating requirements. Cops will fight tooth and nail against social programs because it reduces their budget when problems are solved. Look up these programs and you will see centrists claiming the progressive program was bad, but never indicate reasons as to why.
- directevolve 2y agoIn Portland, decriminalization was poorly planned, new treatment options were implemented badly, and the alternative penalties for possession were not meaningfully enforced. It was a failure of execution. I don’t think it tells us much about how well an ideally functioning decriminalization or legalization effort would work. It does update us in understanding that it’s difficult to accomplish this transition successfully.
- Der_Einzige 2y agoCitation needed on claims of poor people opposing drug legalization. I can show you stats from Oregon showing that poor people overwhelmingly support, and still support, the bulk of our legalization efforts (I.e legal shrooms and legal weed)