Another Useless War - The War On Drugs
Just a quick sketch today about drugs and society. This is one of my major interests and I would welcome input from anyone who can help me develop more information on this topic in the future. I hope to post more detailed analysis on the details of the failure of the war on drugs and the fight to legalize drugs.
The war on drugs has been a complete social, medical and financial failure and we must legalize all drugs now. Yeah, I just thought I'd start out slowly and ease you into the subject... and then I thought no, I think I'll use the sledgehammer approach!!!
Listen, we are spending about 40 billion dollars a year in the war on drugs in Canada.... and we are losing. We are losing because about the same percentage of people are addicted to drugs now that have always been addicted to drugs. We are losing because our police, courts and jails are full of drug offenders and cannot handle the things that really concern us as a society. We are losing because 20% of hospital days are related to drug abuse and other people can't access adequate medical care. We are losing because 40 billion dollars a year are being flushed down the toilet.
Look, it's really simple, if addicts didn't need to steal to get drugs, our homes and our streets would be safer. As a side effect the police would be free to protect us from other non drug related crime. Also it would eliminate drug houses, shooting galleries and drug labs in residential areas. And for those who don't like seeing homeless people, it would greatly decrease homelessness because addicts would not be spending their rent money on drugs.
Even if you have no compassion for the person who contracts HIV or Hepatitis C, think about the amount of money that our already broke health care system spends annually on these diseases. Make no mistake about it; our criminalizing of drug addiction in the last 100 years is responsible in large measure for the spread of these diseases in North America.
Finally, I'd like to end this brief introduction to "the war on drugs" by saying that I and many others who are more knowledgeable than I believe that drug addiction is not a criminal problem. First of all it is a medical problem. To state it in a slightly more complex way, it is a Biological-Psychological-Social-Spiritual disease and if there is a cure it is certainly not going to be found in jail!!! If there is a cure, we could come closer to achieving it if we took those 40 billion dollars a year and spent a portion of it on exploring and providing treatment options.
PLEASE WATCH THIS VIDEO FROM LAW ENFORCEMENT AGAINST PROHIBITION.
The war on drugs has been a complete social, medical and financial failure and we must legalize all drugs now. Yeah, I just thought I'd start out slowly and ease you into the subject... and then I thought no, I think I'll use the sledgehammer approach!!!
Listen, we are spending about 40 billion dollars a year in the war on drugs in Canada.... and we are losing. We are losing because about the same percentage of people are addicted to drugs now that have always been addicted to drugs. We are losing because our police, courts and jails are full of drug offenders and cannot handle the things that really concern us as a society. We are losing because 20% of hospital days are related to drug abuse and other people can't access adequate medical care. We are losing because 40 billion dollars a year are being flushed down the toilet.
Look, it's really simple, if addicts didn't need to steal to get drugs, our homes and our streets would be safer. As a side effect the police would be free to protect us from other non drug related crime. Also it would eliminate drug houses, shooting galleries and drug labs in residential areas. And for those who don't like seeing homeless people, it would greatly decrease homelessness because addicts would not be spending their rent money on drugs.
Even if you have no compassion for the person who contracts HIV or Hepatitis C, think about the amount of money that our already broke health care system spends annually on these diseases. Make no mistake about it; our criminalizing of drug addiction in the last 100 years is responsible in large measure for the spread of these diseases in North America.
Finally, I'd like to end this brief introduction to "the war on drugs" by saying that I and many others who are more knowledgeable than I believe that drug addiction is not a criminal problem. First of all it is a medical problem. To state it in a slightly more complex way, it is a Biological-Psychological-Social-Spiritual disease and if there is a cure it is certainly not going to be found in jail!!! If there is a cure, we could come closer to achieving it if we took those 40 billion dollars a year and spent a portion of it on exploring and providing treatment options.
PLEASE WATCH THIS VIDEO FROM LAW ENFORCEMENT AGAINST PROHIBITION.
posted by cameronga at 2:40 PM
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