1) Introduction
As always, hello to all steemers, steemians, steemos, ... however you want to call steem users :)
The following text deals with the prohibiton of drugs. To be more specific, it explains why prohibition didn't work, doesn't work and never will work. I hope i can convince people that the ongoing war on drugs is a treath to all of us.
I apologize for not being word-perfect in english, i am always trying to improve my english skills.
(me and my lovely wife Roberta)
Before you wonder if i know what i am talking about, let me explain why i write about it. I am not a scientist. I am not a drug counsellor. I am not a drug addict. I am just a normal guy. A normal guy who experimented with psychotropic substances a few years ago. A normal guy who has friends who consumed drugs. A normal guy who read a lot and did a lot research in regard to drugs. I have read great books like "BUZZED" , great analyses like Drug harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis from David Nutt, etc.
I really made an effort, i learned much and want to use this platform to share my knowledge with others.
2) The donut glaze case
The title of a story i found two weeks ago at www.thinkprogress.org says:
Police Arrest Florida Man, Claiming Donut Glaze Was Crystal Meth
The article explains:
Orlando police pulled over a man and arrested him for drug possession. But it turns out that drug was a Krispy Kreme doughnut.After being pulled over for failing to come to a full stop before driving out of a parking lot, 64-year-old Daniel Rushing told the Orlando Sentinel he was arrested, jailed and strip-searched — all over a few flakes of sugar in his car. Police thought the flakes were crystal methamphetamine.
“I kept telling them, ‘That’s … glaze from a doughnut,” he told the Sentinel. “They tried to say it was crack cocaine at first, then they said, ‘No, it’s meth, crystal meth.’”But two roadside drug tests came back positive for meth. Rushing, who is white, ended up spending 10 hours in jail and was released on a $2,500 bond. Prosecutors later dropped the case against him after another test determined the flakes were not an illegal drug.
This... is crazy. I use this article here to demonstrate how crazy our society has become. This guy was strip-searched. Strip-searched! What is going on in this country?! Look at what they put this poor guy trough.
I don't really care if it was just donut glaze or crystal meth, crack cocaine or whatever. As i will explain later, everybody should have the right to influence his conciousness however he or she wants. The drug tests came back positive for meth because he used cleaning materials in his car. A standart cleaning product. The war on drugs is so radical, that you have to fear the police, even if you don't have anything to do with drugs. But lets have a look at the history of the war on drugs first.3) History (till 1971)
Until 1914 Coca was used in health drinks and remedies, morphine was used for different medical purposes, heroine was used tro treat respiratory illness and smoking marijuana was as normal as drinking a beer today for some groups of people.
Then the aggressively enforced Harrison Narcotics act passed, which restricted the manufacture and sale of marijuana , cocaine, morphine and heroine.
From 1930 to 1962, leaded by Harry Anslinger, drugs were increasingly criminalized. web.stanford.edu explains:The Boggs Act of 1951 drastically increased the penalties for marijuana use. The Narcotics Control Act of 1956 created “the most punitive and repressive anti-narcotics legislation ever adopted by Congress". All discretion to suspend sentences or permit probation was eliminated. Anslinger was critical of judges for being too easy on drug dealers and called for longer minimum sentences. He established a punitive drug policy with a focus on drug law enforcement. The Federal Bureau of Narcotics also used propaganda as a preventative measure. They created myths and horror stories about drugs. Marijuana was blamed for bizarre cases of insanity, murder, and sex crimes. Anslinger said that marijuana caused some people to “fly into a delirious rage and many commit violent crimes (McWilliams, 1990, P. 70).” It is puzzling that Anslinger and the FBN fabricated such tales, while there existed less dramatic, but true horror stories connected to drug abuse. The propaganda of the 1940’s and 1950’s was often so far fetched that people simply didn’t believe the government’s warnings about drugs.In the 1960’s “hippies” made the consume of marijuana, heroine and hallucinogens like LSD popular. The demand for drugs in America skyrocketed.
In reaction the Narcotics Addict Rehabilitation Act of 1966 passed. The act specified that “narcotic addiction” was a mental illness. But drug use, however, was still considered a crime. The act did pave the road for federal expenditures on drug abuse treatment.In 1971 President Richard Nixon declared war on drugs. He proclaimed, “America’s public enemy number one in the United States is drug abuse.
(Richard Nixon)
In June 1971, Nixon addressed Congress and declared, “as long as there is a demand, there will be those willing to take the risks of meeting the demand (Sharp, 1994, p.27).” In this statement he publicly proclaimed that all efforts of interdiction and eradication are destined to fail. Unfortunately, Nixon failed to listen to his own advice. Nixon launched a massive interdiction effort in Mexico. The Drug Enforcement Agency was created in 1973. They initiated Operation Intercept, which pressured Mexico to regulate its marijuana growers. The U S government spent hundreds of millions of dollars closing up the border. Trade between Mexico and the U S came to a virtual standstill. Mass amounts of Mexican crops headed for the U S rotted, while waiting in line at the border. In the end, Nixon achieved his goal of curtailing the supply of Mexican marijuana in America. Columbia, however, was quick to replace Mexico as America’s marijuana supplier.Later one of Richard Nixon's top advisers and a key figure in the Watergate scandal said the war on drugs was created as a political tool to fight hippies and blacks.
"We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities," Ehrlichman said. "We could arrest their leaders. raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."4) Fact check - how succesful is the war on drugs?
Nixons policy in regard to drugs changed the game, because it lead to much more oppresion of consumers. This policy didn't significantly change in the last 45 years. It is time to have a look at the results.
a) Racism
As Ehrlichman said, the war against drugs should discriminate against minorities. This statistic shows that thats the case till today.
b) Prison population (1/2)
This graphic shows the effect on the prison population. It is clear to see that Nixons drug policy (policies) have lead to a gigantic increase of the prison population.
c) Prison population (2/2)
You can also see that the prison population is much higher in countries where the war on drugs is fought aggressively. USA - We are the #1 ...
d) Money
Imagine what we could do with all this money.
e) Drug consumers
This chart shows that the percentage of people using drugs (exception: alcohol, tobacco, coffeine) sharply increased from 1999 to 2008.
Other articles i read made clear that the same happened continuesly from 1971 to 2015, unfortunately i couldn't find a chart to show that. So the main goal of the war on drugs, to prevent the usage, could not be realized.
It just doesn't work!
5) WHY the war on drugs didn't work, doesn't work and never will work
The idea behind the war on drugs is, that only repression can be used to lower the amount of drug users. Most of the population thinks that if we would legalize drugs, everybody would shoot heroin and sniff cocaine. That is nonsense.
Understand: The legalization of drugs doesn't lead to an icrease of consumers, amount of use or consume rate!
One example for that is Colorado. As you know, marijuana is legal in Colorado since 2012. The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) tried to find out, which effects the lagalization of marijuana has in regard to the amount of adolescents smoking it. They created a survey with 17.000 middle and high school students, asking them if they smoked pot in the last 30 days. 2011, before weed was legal in Colorado, 25% of the students admitted that they consumed marijuana in the last 30 days. 2015, after weed has been lagalized, only 21% of students admitted that they used pot.
Dont forget that some students didn't admitt that they smoked pot in 2011 because they had fear because it was illegal. So there is a good chance that the amount of students who smoked marijuana in 2011 was significantly higher than the statistic shows. Which means that the legalization of weed lead waaaaay less pot smokers.
Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat? But how is this possible?!
Let me explain.
The most people have the vision of a horror scenario: Drug-Zombies everywhere if we legalize drugs. Well, let me give you two scenarios.
Scenario #1: Imagine a world, where you can buy any drug you want in a drugstore. The drugstores are not allowed to advertise their drugs. You have to be at least 18 years old to buy drugs. If you want to buy a drug, the apothecary advises you, tells you about the risks, how to use it and who you can call if you have problems with an addiction.
Scenario #2: The possession of the most drugs is illegal. On the streets are dealers. Everybody can buy from them. They don't care if you are 14 or 40 years old. They want to make money, so they have the goal to produce as many drug addicts as possible. Even if you never had something to do with drugs, they will convince you that you need their stuff.
Your childen live in the world that scenario #2 represents. - We have to stop this.
The reason why the most drugs are not legal, is because of companies who bribe our politicans. Weed is one of the best medicament out there. But you can't patent a plant.
Bernie Sanders is a big supporter of the legalization of weed. Unfortunately the most politicians are bought by big pharma. Corrupt politicians - The reason, why facts don't matter.
Let us fight to legalize first marijuana, and then all drugs!
Thanks for reading, if you like it please give me an upvote and follow me. Enjoy the sun :)
