Law-Forums.org

[coinleain]

Please don't say it's against the law etc. I was answering a question "When was the last time you've heard of someone who didn't smoke pot but supported legalization?"

I replied :-

Me, I do

The reason. It's quite simple. If a small minority of people want to self destruct (weed being the gateway to harder drugs) then why should we stop them ?

I have 6 kids and would try very very hard to dissuade them of course.

It costs a huge amount to police such laws which are in essence the same as the prohibition .

Also in most Western countries the vast amount of crimes people really care about such as burglary, muggings etc are caused by junkies looking for a fix.

It would also reduce the income stream for the criminal cartels

So for the majority of non pot smokers I would say it would be a very good thing.

But it made me wonder why these drugs and not booze etc

[barend31]

Marjiuana is known to cause brain cancer, schizophrenia and depression.... ill personally pass on that

[gofraidh34]

Making drugs illegal does not stop people from using drugs HOWEVER it does hand over a multi-billion dollar market to very evil people. This creates gangs, and since they can't settle disputes through the courts they resort to violence. Many gangs require members to kill/rape innoent people to be initiated. Because what they're doing is illegal it acts as a gateway to other illegal activities that are actually violent and hurt innocent people such as robbery and rape. Legalize drugs and all these gangs go out of business over night.

It costs the US goverment literally trillions to enforce these laws and yet millions of Americans still use drugs. This money could instead be spent on honest education about the effects of drugs and for treating drug use as a health problem. This would actually reduce drug use unlike the current system which treats drug users as violent criminals.

It's actually easier for kids in high school to get marijuana because drug dealers don't care about age or ask for ID unlike business.

[winwood]

You are basically saying this -

If a small amount of people wanted to buy a assault rifle and eventually shoot up the school, then why should i stop them?

Also, before replying with, that's not the same thing at all. Think about it like this, Suppose someone that your kid hangs out with started smoking marijuana. Eventually this person wanted to try more "hardcore" drugs for kicks. The next day your kid decides to go hand out with the user, and guess what? Home boy is on PCP and decides it's a good idea to set your kid on fire and make him a human barbecue because he's hungry. Thus resulting in two lives ruined instead of one. They are not illegal because they only harm one selves they are illegal because they harm other people as well; emotionally and physically.

As far as booze goes it was illegal, during the prohibition. At first, Americans strongly supported National Prohibition and most expected it to improve health and safety, reduce crime, improve the economy, and raise public morality. They were to be disappointed.

Legitimate tax-paying producers and retailers of alcoholic beverages were forced out of business overnight. To fill unmet consumer demand, illegal bootlegging and speakeasies quickly sprang up. With them came organized crime and violence. They also brought corruption as law enforcers and elected officials were bought off with bribes and payoffs.Public morality declined and respect for law and societal institutions plummeted. Breaking the law, even flaunting it, became fashionable, especially among young people.

Tax revenues from alcohol ended but law enforcement expenditures rose. Courts and jails were over-crowded as formerly legal activities became crimes.

Another consequence of Prohibition was that illegally-produced alcohol was sometimes tainted with toxins from lead, creosote and even embalming fluid. Some consumers suffered paralysis, blindness and painful death. This led many drinkers in the state to switch to opium, cocaine, hair tonic, sterno or "liquid heat," and other dangerous substances that they would have been unlikely to consume in the absence of Prohibition.

[bean]

Just about 100 years ago, you could walk into any drugstore and buy opium, morphine, cocaine, etc. There were Civil War vets who had been addicted ever since the war!

This was a time when patent medicines became very popular and were advertised nationwide. Patent medicines were allowed to keep their ingredients secret, as a 'trade secret'. So a lot of patent medicines had narcotics in them. You could buy 'soothing syrup' for a fussy baby and wow, it really worked well! One teaspoon knocked the kid right out!

Well, under Teddy Roosevelt we had a 'Progressive Era', and part of that was to control narcotics. (Even so, my mom fed me over-the-counter cough syrup in the 50s that had codeine in it. I wish it still did! The stuff worked pretty well!

So the govt. began controlling narcotics, and then, you know how it is, anything worth doing is worth overdoing. The next thing was Prohibition, banning alcohol. But we learned that this only fed organized crime, in fact people drank more during Prohibition than before or after.

Then came marijuana. Firstly, it was a drug used almost exclusively by blacks and Mexicans. Secondly, Wm. Randolph Hearst, the richest and most powerful man in the world, owned tracts of forest to make paper for his chain of newspapers, and he didn't want competition from hemp, which can grow about 8 times as much fiber for paper per acre as trees. He began running lurid stories about 'pot addicts' who would go wild and burn and rape and pillage. It was all baloney. There were even movies that are funny today like Reefer Madness and Marijuana, Weed with Roots in Hell.

The best reason for legalizing marijuana, and the only one needed, really, is that the laws against marijuana do a lot more damage than marijuana itself.

[adin55]

Nobody ever died from second-hand booze, and most people can have one drink and not get permanently addicted. Heroine is a completely different story.

And on that note, cigarettes were so widespread at the time that trying to outlaw them would have enraged 85% of the population. Instead, there has been a sluggish movement to gradually make it impossible to smoke in public areas, and discouraging people from getting into it in the first place.

Most drugs have never been commonplace in the US.

It actually probably wouldn't reduce the income levels for the sellers at all. If (marijuana) was legalized, then the same people that were illegally growing it end up getting the contracts to supply it, and they're going to maintain the same personal profit margins regardless. And it still wouldn't stop people from illegally selling it anyway. There are still lots of bootleggers even though prohibition has been absent for nearly a decade now. All it would really do is allow the government to tax it, and earn some money out of it.

[drystan]

Nobody ever died from second-hand booze, and most people can have one drink and not get permanently addicted. Heroine is a completely different story.

And on that note, cigarettes were so widespread at the time that trying to outlaw them would have enraged 85% of the population. Instead, there has been a sluggish movement to gradually make it impossible to smoke in public areas, and discouraging people from getting into it in the first place.

Most drugs have never been commonplace in the US.

It actually probably wouldn't reduce the income levels for the sellers at all. If (marijuana) was legalized, then the same people that were illegally growing it end up getting the contracts to supply it, and they're going to maintain the same personal profit margins regardless. And it still wouldn't stop people from illegally selling it anyway. There are still lots of bootleggers even though prohibition has been absent for nearly a decade now. All it would really do is allow the government to tax it, and earn some money out of it.

two reasons...

1. people are stupid
2. people are greedy

[vipponah]

This is because it causes health problems for people.