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Hi - this is a personal comment rather than a PBU perspective! Whilst I don't disagree with anything you said, I think it's slightly blind to some of the other issues - namely that of growing and exporting drugs and the abuse and terror people in places like Colombia and Afghanistan face because of drugs. Yes, legalisation could help to regulate that, but given their remoteness and histories that would be a tall order. Plus you have to consider the druglords in charge of such an operation - they're not likely to suddenly want to give up their profits and pay taxes - and how's that enforced? And wouldn't it cost as much enforcing that as enforcing the criminalisation of drugs? There's a whole lot more to this than just the legalisation/criminalisation issue. And the same arguments have been applied to the legalisation of prostitution - which is a whole other (and often connected) issue. Plus, I think there's a difference between recreational drugs and drug addiction and there are some drugs you definitely do want people to stay away from! On another point, I don't believe for a minute that MPs only take legal drugs - it's just we don't know about it (yet).
"War on drugs" has failed shock !
"War on drugs" has failed shock !
Thursday, 02 June, 2011
According to the authoritative Global Commission on Drug Policy, the "war on drugs" has failed. Just as the war on alcohol failed in the 20th century.
Two things struck me about this: 1) This is absolutely obvious to anyone with half a brain cell; and 2) Nothing (in the short term at least) will change as a result.
Hypocrisy
There are few things more nauseatingly hypocritical than mainstream politicians pontificating to young people about the dangers of drugs - usually just before they go off to indulge their own (legal) drugs by having a drink and/or a cigarette ! No wonder young people treat older people's lectures on drugs with such contempt.
Facts
Lets's look at some facts:
TOBACCO kills between 5 and 6 MILLION people a year worldwide: around 100,000 in the UK. TOBACCO is LEGAL.
ALCOHOL kills between 500,000 and 1 MILLION people a year worldwide: around 15,000 in the UK. ALCOHOL is LEGAL.
ILLEGAL DRUGS kill no more than 1,500 people a year in the UK - there are no reliable figures for the world as a whole.
Using the famous principle of the alien landing on the earth from Mars, you would struggle to explain to her/him/it why Tobacco & Alcohol were legal but drugs such as cannabis, heroin and cocaine were not.
Illegality is the biggest problem
A significant proportion of deaths from illegal drugs is attributable to the fact that they are illegal - either deaths caused by drug wars or by the unregulated strength and purity/impurity of the drugs themselves. The cost to society of the crime associated with addicts needing to feed their illegal drug habit is well documented.
The solution ?
The obvious solution is to make all these drugs legal and to regulate and tax them. This would save vast sums of money on law enforcement and from crime. And potentially could actually raise significant sums of money for the Treasury to fund the education and support campaigns that would be needed to accompany legalisation.
The corruption of mainstream politics
How revealing it is about politicians from the main parties that only a handful of them support such an approach. It is left to exasperated police chiefs and ex-politicians to point to the obvious solution. Meanwhile the "war on drugs" goes on - costing a fortune, ruining the lives of millions, and convincing no one - not even the politicians who support it in public.
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Reminds me of when I was a vegan. Lots of meat eaters (and vegetarians) said it was unfeasible - what about all the cows who need to milked, and all the animals that will have to be killed because we've stop farming them.
Duh - any change like this is not going to happen overnight.
We have had some variety of the war on drugs for years (at least since the Chinese tried to stop us selling Burmese opium, upon which much of the profits of empire were based? - Or the british first banned cannabis in South africa because the local population seemed happier smoking than working in the gold mines)
so the reaction to a more liberal approach will also take years. Probably the only likely solution will happen when its a Europe wide policy.
Of course we'll first have to wean our politicians off their dependancy on the Daily Mail or News International first. Strange how the most neo-liberal press is also the most repressive ones
Thanks for these thoughtful responses.
I think we would have to learn from the experience of decriminalisation of alcohol for how to deal with the criminal gangs currently controlling the drugs trade. And yes, this would be a tougher challenge in some countries than others. But the alternative of the status quo seems to me clearly worse.
The Daily Mail ("Hurrah for the Blackshirts" front page in the 1930s) has little to teach us about liberalism. The press has a marginally less appalling record than MPs for thinking outside the box on these issues - the famous (short-lived) Independent campaign for legalising cannabis comes to mind for example. The fact that you have someone like Kenneth Clarke (I am not sure if he is still a handsomely paid director of BAT or has relinquished the post since becoming Home Secretary) can be Home Secretary when he has personally profited from the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people a year worldwide from tobacco tells you all you need to know about the morals of mainstream politicians.
