Rising GOP support for the U.S. taking unilateral military action in Mexico against drug cartels is increasingly rattling people on both sides of the border who worry talk of an attack is getting normalized.
Wednesday’s Republican presidential primary debate featured high-stakes policy disagreements on a range of issues from abortion to the environment — but found near-unanimous consensus on the idea of using American military force to fight drug smuggling and migration.
You don’t need guns to kill the Cartels. You need to legalize drigs and regulate them. The war on drugs is what made the cartels what they are today.
That’s a naive view. Do you think cartels will dismiss themselves at that point? Or that mobs will somehow become lawful citizens?
Also, do you think there is a positive scenario of consuming cocaine or opiates? Those drugs induce heavy addiction and take a great toll from your mind and body.
You are exactly correct. We can legalize and sell marijuana (and certain other drugs, probably psychadelics. That’s for experts to decide.) like is already being done, but you simply cannot have recreational use of drugs like narcotics and cocaine.
They are simply too irresistible. It would lead to a massive public health crisis with phenomenal social consequences and so, so much death.
Now, I think drug abuse needs to be treated not criminally, but as the health issue that it is.
However, there will still be demand, and that will have to be fulfilled illicitly.
The idea that Cocaine is simpy too irresistible is not convincing to me. As a matter of fact availability is not really an issue, yet most people are not cocaine addicts. Also of regular users the majority is not addicted in the sense of needing it daily. Further it is much easier to develop problematic drug use patterns, like with any addictive things, when it is socially taboo, so people cannot talk about it with people outside of their circle of users and hide it from friends and family.
Addiction always is a social and psychological issue, whether it is cocaine, gambling or video games. Getting it out of the taboo is an important step to lower addiction.
Cocaine isn’t really as available as you, it seems, trying to show. Weed was / is.
If cocaine will become drug of choice instead of weed, consequences will be dire.
You will find a cocaine dealer in every mid sized town. It is not difficult to get hooked up with any drug in most places, be it weed, cocaine or opiates. Availability is not the limitinf factor to consumption or addiction in the same way it isnt for weed.
So you’re in favor of banning alcohol and sugar, right?
Alcohol - yes. Though it seems there are ways of consuming it without getting addiction. And that’s not the case with cocaine and opiates.
Sugar - not so much. Addiction and physical harm is real, but not on the same level. Also it’s very hard to effectively forbid sugar. I think it’s unreal.
you falsely assume all users of cocaine and opiates to be addicted. If that would be the case, then medical use wouldnt be possible.
These substances are very addictive and need to be treated with great respect and caution. Something that is not possible in the environment created by their criminalization.
These substances are very addictive and need to be treated with great respect and caution.
Exactly. They are dangerous to the level I don’t trust ordinary people to use them, only medical professionals
criminalization fails to prevent use by “ordinary people”.
It is the same like with sex ed. People who teach their teenagers about the risks and how to minimize them have much better success at preventing teen pregnancy or stds for their children than those that go the “wait till marriage or go to hell!” way.
In the same way countries that have introduced programs for harm reduction like drug checking, consume rooms, needle exchanges etc. suffer much less drug related deaths, or problems like HIV and Hep C.
But you cannot do harm reduction, social care and addiction prevention in an environment where the only people that drug users can talk about drugs with are other users and dealers.
