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Drugs - Time to legalise - The Economist


Rob W
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No, mainly because I know people from teenage years who developed serious issues with it very quickly.

 

my honest opinion is it's no worse than booze. it's a massive hypocrisy for one to be legal and the other not.

 

legalising it would safeguard people from buying shite cut with who knows what while giving the exchequer a massive boost.

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Because teenagers are out of control and embrace chaos and escape. I think if you're curious, trying drugs in middle age is safer than riding a bike.

I need an invite to CT's next bbq then. :D

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Because teenagers are out of control and embrace chaos and escape. I think if you're curious, trying drugs in middle age is safer than riding a bike.

What a load of shit. You want to see the states of some people I've worked with who are frazzled from drugs. Many of whom end up killing themselves.

 

Some people have a very low tolerance, and there's no way of knowing prior to trying things.

 

I get that people do drugs, that's their choice, but pretending its a perfectly harmless pastime is a lie

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my honest opinion is it's no worse than booze. it's a massive hypocrisy for one to be legal and the other not.

 

legalising it would safeguard people from buying shite cut with who knows what while giving the exchequer a massive boost.

Booze is only legal because it's taxed to the hilt. We spend more than that on NHS services to clean up the fallout from booze though so it's a false economy.

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:lol: You fucking idiot. I was drawing an ironic comparison between the risk / harm perspectives in two active threads.

I know you didn't mean literally safer than riding a bike ffs, it's the assertion that it's not particularly dangerous which is a load of shit

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my honest opinion is it's no worse than booze. it's a massive hypocrisy for one to be legal and the other not.

 

legalising it would safeguard people from buying shite cut with who knows what while giving the exchequer a massive boost.

Not really hypocritical considering the cultural history of alcohol use in western Europe. Sure you can handle coke fine and not find addictive. That's not true of all people though and the cardiologists I know say it is very damaging.

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Booze is only legal because it's taxed to the hilt. We spend more than that on NHS services to clean up the fallout from booze though so it's a false economy.

 

yes, but people still take all the stuff that is illegal. legalising other drugs would allow you to tax the shit out of them too instead of financing the black market.

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Not really hypocritical considering the cultural history of alcohol use in western Europe. Sure you can handle coke fine and not find addictive. That's not true of all people though and the cardiologists I know say it is very damaging.

 

people die from drinking too you know. i know way more alcoholics than i do people with serious drug habits.

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people die from drinking too you know. i know way more alcoholics than i do people with serious drug habits.

 

Partly because alcohol is legal so it's a lot easier to get hold of.

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yes, but people still take all the stuff that is illegal. legalising other drugs would allow you to tax the shit out of them too instead of financing the black market.

Yeah, I would argue making alcohol illegal is the more logical alternative giving the number of deaths it contributes to annually

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I do wonder what the incidence of serious injury and fatality is amongst cyclists and the incidence of fatality amongst traditional drug users.

 

The reason why i say this is that the incidence of harm is used as the argument against drugs, if the incidence of harm was found to be similar to e.g. riding a bicycle in London, would that make the case for prohibiting it?

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Partly because alcohol is legal so it's a lot easier to get hold of.

 

exactly my point. all drugs are bad for you. alcohol is a drug too so why should one be ok and the others not just because your government tells you that's the case?

 

i think it was bill hicks that made the striking observation about the the types of drugs that a capitalist system endorses - caffeine to get you through the working week, alcohol to numb the pain at the weekend.

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Yeah, I would argue making alcohol illegal is the more logical alternative giving the number of deaths it contributes to annually

 

pointless. people will still drink and take drugs regardless of their legality. may as well regulate and tax the market if you ask me.

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exactly my point. all drugs are bad for you.

 

Your point was that the drug that's legal, regulated and easiest to get hold of is the one that damages the fuck out of the most people. The leap from that to "let's legalise and regulate other drugs too" is a curious one.

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:lol:

how do you get to near 50 and still don't know what a bong is fucking hell

I'm 40 and have never heard the word 'bong' used as a name for a drug. Thought it must be Mackem and /or new charva slang.
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Booze is only legal because it's taxed to the hilt. We spend more than that on NHS services to clean up the fallout from booze though so it's a false economy.

 

Absolute rubbish. The duty and tax on alcohol far outweighs the cost to the NHS of alcohol related illness.

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Your point was that the drug that's legal, regulated and easiest to get hold of is the one that damages the fuck out of the most people. The leap from that to "let's legalise and regulate other drugs too" is a curious one.

 

my point was it's hypocritical for one to be legal and the others not. all drugs are damaging. anyone that thinks alcohol isn't as bad as the rest just because it's legal has their head in the sand.

 

people will always take drugs so i find it pointless that they're illegal.

 

would legalising all drugs increase the number of addicts? quite possibly, but some of the tax revenues from doing so could be used to inform and educate the public. plus the dangers of taking drugs would be reduced because of regulation.

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my point was it's hypocritical for one to be legal and the others not. all drugs are damaging. anyone that thinks alcohol isn't as bad as the rest just because it's legal has their head in the sand.

 

people will always take drugs so i find it pointless that they're illegal.

 

would legalising all drugs increase the number of addicts? quite possibly, but some of the tax revenues from doing so could be used to inform and educate the public. plus the dangers of taking drugs would be reduced because of regulation.

 

Completely agree. The moral and legal basis for drugs being prohibited is harm, for the law to be coherent (an absolute must for any moral code) then equivalent harm needs to be treated equivalently.

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There would be a massive increase in drug use due to the normalisation and increase in ease of access to them. Do we really need/want more drug use in society? I certainly don't. For every person like you who can take the odd line and wake up the next morning without a craving there are plenty more who would get hooked. If alcohol were brought onto the market today for the first time it would be instantly banned. However, as it has been around for thousands of years it would now be near impossible to ban, look at the USA's dabble with prohibition and how well that worked out.

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I agree consistency would be desirable. Social and societal mores dictate otherwise, though.

 

Its not desirable, its usually non-negotiable.

 

e.g. "Thou shalt not bugger under-age boys unless you are a Tory politician, in which case its fine" is unacceptable. Treating equivalent situations equivalently is the fundamental principle of the law.

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