This makes me happy.

[NAOS]

You're a tard.

I was joking with you, you tardface skinhead

 

[PearlWatson]

I mean you'd have to be an idiot to think that drugs don't screw people up.

But should the government have the right to protect people from themselves???

Well you expect the government to rehab them afterwards.

 

[Scat]

that's racist

You're a tard.

I was joking with you, you tardface skinhead

I know you were joking, as was I with you, you liberal weenie.

 

[NAOS]

just off camera, printed on the t-shirt, it says: MARCUS LOVES CAULK

(another joke, you conservative douchewanger)

 

[Gameface]

Actually you would be surprised the number of drug addicts that come from more or less stable home lives. This is where my knowledge of the prison system comes into play.

My brother (who is 9 years older than me) was a hard-core drug addict for over 30 years (cocaine, crack, heroin, meth in the end). He was a smart, quiet, shy kid and got picked on at school by a few boys that were pretty rough. He got down over not having friends and turned to the one group that would befriend him, who also happened to be stoners. He found out he had a decided affinity for marijuana and it became the stereotypical gateway drug for him. When a friend offered him some cocaine he stole from his brother, my brother was hooked within a few uses. He told me he tried heroin the first time when he was 16, and was hooked almost immediately. He started stealing from everyone to feed his addictions. Finally, with no other recourse, he was given an ultimatum: get off the drugs or leave. He left.

Many people with no real underlying mental issues, per se, have a strong proclivity to addiction. My brother WAS an intelligent, caring, nice kid. Drugs messed that all up. We grew up in the standard suburban life in the upper-middle-class, so to speak. My dad owned his own business. We went to good schools. We went to church. There were no terrible things, traumas or what have you, in my brother's childhood that might push someone in that direction. He told me himself it all started one day because he was bored and worried about not fitting in, so he tried his first joint. It just cascaded from there.

I actually was called to testify against my brother after he violently attacked someone over drugs. I was going go find him since he had called and told us he was in town. I was 23, newly married, with a new baby boy, and my parents were worried he might get into trouble. He told me where he would be, at a park in downtown Ogden (a crappy place if ever there was one, especially at the time). As I drove up I watched him pull a knife on a guy and jump on him. He stabbed the guy 3 or 4 times, almost killing him. It was because the guy hadn't brought the drugs he had promised and tried to take my brother's money without giving him the goods. They had been arguing and yelling at each other pretty loudly apparently because someone had called the police. Literally right on my heels the police showed up. The intercepted me as I was running toward my brother and the other guy. I watched him get arrested and then nearly had to testify about it in court. He has been clean now for 3 years. He is 50.

We learned in helping him many many times with his problems that his case is more the norm than the exception. Many drug addicts start out that way. Someone bored or a little bit down turning to drugs to alleviate the boredom or depression or just to try something new or to impress someone. For some of them, it turns out like this. He spent 30 years in and out of prison and jail, drifting around the country. Occasionally coming home. Breaking my mom's heart. In fact when I was 17 I fought him and more or less beat him up to keep him out of the house when he wanted to steal things while my parents were away.

The prison system never did anything really to help him get clean. Really though, we were happy when he was in prison because we knew he was relatively safe. But we never imagined he would come out of it a better person. I wish we could change it in ways Joker and others have proposed. I wish he had had chance like that. It took a pretty horrific scenario to get him to give up drugs, and in the process he in effect lost his whole life. And I lost my chance to have a big brother.

Was his life made better or worse by having to face legal consequences on top of the consequences of drug use? Now of course, when he attacked someone over drugs he has to face legal consequences for that, as we all would no matter why we did it, but I'm sure there were times when he had court ordered drug tests, or got caught for simple possession, and it resulted in fines, jail time, or even prison. Was that a positive thing for him? Was it a positive thing for you or the rest of your family? Did it benefit society?

I'm not trying to single you out, but having had a close personal experience with someone who suffered greatly due to drug use, was prohibition helpful? I think we look at the horrors of hard drugs and say to ourselves that we must do something. I just question if criminalizing possession is a worthwhile part of the solution.

 

[LogGrad98]

Was his life made better or worse by having to face legal consequences on top of the consequences of drug use? Now of course, when he attacked someone over drugs he has to face legal consequences for that, as we all would no matter why we did it, but I'm sure there were times when he had court ordered drug tests, or got caught for simple possession, and it resulted in fines, jail time, or even prison. Was that a positive thing for him? Was it a positive thing for you or the rest of your family? Did it benefit society?

I'm not trying to single you out, but having had a close personal experience with someone who suffered greatly due to drug use, was prohibition helpful? I think we look at the horrors of hard drugs and say to ourselves that we must do something. I just question if criminalizing possession is a worthwhile part of the solution.

The big problem as I see it is that, drugs being legal or not, he couldn't hold down a job because he would be out of it for a week at a time and just not show up. So he stole, mostly petty theft, although there is this great story about him holding up a 7-11 with a replica pirate pistol. I think with some of the harder drugs this would become a big issue for many people, regardless of their legality.

To answer your comment more directly, I think criminalizing possession is not very helpful for the individual, especially how weak our laws are about it now. Yeah my brother did some time for possession, most of his hard time was for dealing in one way or another, and he did a 9-month stint when he blew up a meth-lab he was trying to start. He told me once that he sometimes welcomed time served for possession because it was "soft time" and gave him a chance to get things together again, then he went right back to it.

I think we need to follow more the example of Amsterdam. Possession and use is fine. Selling is highly regulated, and only "soft drugs" are legal. Keep the really hard stuff illegal (heroin, cocaine, crack, meth, etc.).

Imo, if we really want to stop the flow of drugs we need to dry up the demand (getting back to possession). We have already shown that going after the supply is a losing battle. Take one dealer off the street and the demand remains, so the other dealers raise prices and it isn't long before a couple more get the idea to fill the gap and you get 2 or 3 in place of that one. There was a good analysis of this in one of the Freakonomics books (I think the 2nd one). To me it makes sense. If you criminalize the possession and use of the hard drugs in a big way, not just some slap on the wrist or fine like it is now (my brother was caught with over a kilo of meth, but since they had no evidence he was trying to distribute it, he went into jail for 9 months for possession only), but minimum sentences, something truly deterrent, "hard time", I think you would see a shift of those people to the softer drugs (which should be made legal at the same time, otherwise we are still fighting a losing battle), and the hard drug problem would eventually whither away to a fraction of what it once was. Then you really would only have issues with crack heads and people who are truly messed up, instead of legions of people like my brother that let a bad decision wreck his life.

My brother told me this while he was drying out. He said he wished he had received stiffer penalties rather than a year or 2 here and there. He said a year in jail was just enough time to make new contacts, get past the initial symptoms of withdrawal, and for the "need" to get really deep. So he came out wanting it more and better prepared to get it.

Even better would have been some mandatory rehab and then relocation or job placement or something like that to keep them off it. Get them out of the situation.

 

[The-Joker]

The big problem as I see it is that, drugs being legal or not, he couldn't hold down a job because he would be out of it for a week at a time and just not show up. So he stole, mostly petty theft, although there is this great story about him holding up a 7-11 with a replica pirate pistol. I think with some of the harder drugs this would become a big issue for many people, regardless of their legality.

To answer your comment more directly, I think criminalizing possession is not very helpful for the individual, especially how weak our laws are about it now. Yeah my brother did some time for possession, most of his hard time was for dealing in one way or another, and he did a 9-month stint when he blew up a meth-lab he was trying to start. He told me once that he sometimes welcomed time served for possession because it was "soft time" and gave him a chance to get things together again, then he went right back to it.

I think we need to follow more the example of Amsterdam. Possession and use is fine. Selling is highly regulated, and only "soft drugs" are legal. Keep the really hard stuff illegal (heroin, cocaine, crack, meth, etc.).

Imo, if we really want to stop the flow of drugs we need to dry up the demand (getting back to possession). We have already shown that going after the supply is a losing battle. Take one dealer off the street and the demand remains, so the other dealers raise prices and it isn't long before a couple more get the idea to fill the gap and you get 2 or 3 in place of that one. There was a good analysis of this in one of the Freakonomics books (I think the 2nd one). To me it makes sense. If you criminalize the possession and use of the hard drugs in a big way, not just some slap on the wrist or fine like it is now (my brother was caught with over a kilo of meth, but since they had no evidence he was trying to distribute it, he went into jail for 9 months for possession only), but minimum sentences, something truly deterrent, "hard time", I think you would see a shift of those people to the softer drugs (which should be made legal at the same time, otherwise we are still fighting a losing battle), and the hard drug problem would eventually whither away to a fraction of what it once was. Then you really would only have issues with crack heads and people who are truly messed up, instead of legions of people like my brother that let a bad decision wreck his life.

My brother told me this while he was drying out. He said he wished he had received stiffer penalties rather than a year or 2 here and there. He said a year in jail was just enough time to make new contacts, get past the initial symptoms of withdrawal, and for the "need" to get really deep. So he came out wanting it more and better prepared to get it.

Even better would have been some mandatory rehab and then relocation or job placement or something like that to keep them off it. Get them out of the situation.

For real??? That's a damn Breaking Bad amount of meth... yo

He's lucky he didn't get the book thrown at him for that.

 

[LogGrad98]

For real??? That's a damn Breaking Bad amount of meth... yo

He's lucky he didn't get the book thrown at him for that.

He got lucky on 2 counts. One, it was before the real meth boom, so it was viewed somewhat differently. And two, his sentence got reduced due to, ready for this? Overcrowding. Even still I think his original sentence was 3 years or something like that, it got reduced to a year and he was out on probation in 9 months. Gotta love it.

 

[Boondocksaint27]

Imo, if we really want to stop the flow of drugs we need to dry up the demand (getting back to possession). We have already shown that going after the supply is a losing battle. Take one dealer off the street and the demand remains, so the other dealers raise prices and it isn't long before a couple more get the idea to fill the gap and you get 2 or 3 in place of that one.

The problem is that by taking dealers off the street here, it's not really going after the supply. That's more going after the middle men. Truly going after the supply would mean taking some type of military action against the cartels.

 

[Gameface]

The problem is that by taking dealers off the street here, it's not really going after the supply. That's more going after the middle men. Truly going after the supply would mean taking some type of military action against the cartels.

I would say the best way to control the supply is to legalize it and regulate it. Only allow domestically produced products that are produced according to our regulations. Get the criminal element out of the picture completely. We no longer consider the liquor industry to be run by criminals and thugs. It's a better situation, imho, to have business people controlling an industry that sells these types of products than cartels and thug gangs.

 

[Nate505]

Is going after the supply a winning battle? I'd say it isn't. All the bases from every drug (except meth I think) come from plants. Plants are nearly impossible to eradicate. The south can't get rid of the Kudzu plant that was introduced from Japan in the early 20th century, and this is a plant that people are trying to eradicate that doesn't have a demand and that isn't being grown clandestinely and guarded by men with automatic weapons. Hell, my parents have been battling crabgrass for an eternity it seems in their yard.

Now from certain areas you can eliminate or greatly reduce the supply of something. Turkey was a prime growing area for illicit opium in the 70s but isn't anymore (interestingly enough, they are a prime area for licit opium used for, heh, "medication"). But opium production didn't just go away, it just got moved to Afghanistan. Then the Tailban put a "stop" to that in 2000, but they also had a ton of reserves in place so they were able to control and limit the supply and increase their profits (much like if someone hoarded Tickle Me Elmo dolls 10 years ago before Christmas would have made a killing on ebay). Eventually another country would have replaced that supply but the Taliban was booted out a year later and the Afghans just continued.

I know I'm not an economic genius, but I do know one thing. If there is a large enough demand for something and that product is not super duper rare (like enriched uranium) and easy to produce, there will be a demand for it. Reducing demand is the only way for it to stop, much like how cigarette sales have declined in this country despite them being totally legal.

 

[Scat]

All the bases from every drug (except meth I think) come from plants. Plants are nearly impossible to eradicate.

Meth was originally made from the plant Chinese Ephedra, Ephedra sinica. IMO, this was the real reason that ephedra was made illegal, not because it was a danger to people but rather to curb meth production. They just used public safety as the reason to criminalize it. That being said, synthetic ephedra in the form of psudoepherdrine (Sudafed) is now the primary source of meth I believe. This is why you can only buy so much at a time and you have to provide ID when you buy it.

It wouldn't surprise me if people are now growing the Ephedra plant for drug making reasons.

Interestingly enough, there is a form of Ephedra that grows wild here in Utah, Ephedra nevadensis AKA the Mormon Tea Plant. It doesn't have the alkaloids to make meth but supposedly it gives you an energy boost akin to coffee. It also cures venereal disease.