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Drugs
I think in the UK, we have a very childish attitude to drugs. I am for the legalisation of SOME drugs but not all.
The three kinds of drugs I would legalise would be: Cannabis, Magic Mushrooms and Ecstacy. There is the problem though that these three drugs right now, when bought illegally can be dangerous.
Instead what I believe should happen is that the government should take control of the industry, making sure all drugs made are pure and are of good quality. Not only that, they can be taxed.
To ensure people don't buy too much, you should apply for a card of some sort that vendors can swipe and see if you're eligible to buy more drugs, if not, you can be denied sale. To be able to own a card, you should be working, this is to ensure people don't buy drugs with their benefits and so that if they're currently unemployed, that money isn't wasted on luxuries. They mush also have a clean criminal record.
This would obliterate the underground market for those drugs and its likely that most people would stick to those 3 than go further into Crystal Meth or Heroin. By having those 3 legal, it suggests that the rest really are dangerous and shouldn't be taken.
We even have government ministers admitting they smoked weed at college/uni. They all know what it involves, its not playing with your life. We have a huge alcohol problem in this country but nobody has ever beaten anyone up or got aggressive after smoking weed.
Magic Mushrooms were legal in the UK up till very recently and I enjoyed heading up to Camden to buy them. There are different kinds of mushrooms, some that give you and intense high, others a more mellow one. The government should sell a variety from mellow to medium-intense. People could apply for the intense if they could prove they'd handled the others OK (even though bad trips are somewhat random).
So maybe, thinking about it more, people should have insurance before buying drugs too to pay for any medical or psychiatric costs involved.
Ecstacy is nowhere near as dangerous as its perceived to be and nobody has ever died from taking an E. Rather, its been for intoxication from drinking too much water. So, people know what to do when taking E's just some are dumb enough to overcompensate and do themselves in - in the same way some people drink so much alcohol they end up injured or dead in some way or another.
None of the above drugs are addictive. I think their open existence would really take off the allure of drugs to youngsters, and adults too.
Its wrong that now, people can go to jail for smoking a joint and I'm certain that most police officers don't really want to make an arrest, there are more important things to do than arrest a harmless 30 year old smoking a joint in his living room.
The legal age to buy cannabis or mushrooms should be 16, for ecstacy, 18.
It should be a serious criminal offence to take any of these drugs in the presence of children - especially if you are the only one looking after them.
Parents should also be careful not to smoke too much cannabis in the same room as their children as they can get high from the smoke. If a child is found to be high, their parents should be prosecuted.
Even though the legal age for mushrooms and cannabis should be 16, there would be a slight grey area between the ages of 14-16, this would be to ensure that when a child turns 16, they don't dive headfirst into drugs and put themselves in danger. Parents would be allowed every 3 months from when the child turns 14, to apply for a small amount of cannabis or mushrooms for the child. It would be a criminal offence for the child to leave the house for 6 hours after consumption.
Obviously, there are gaping 'what ifs' when it comes to what I'm proposing and there is probably a better way of stopping people from getting their hands on too much drugs or giving too much to their children. If those hurdles were overcome, I think our attitude to drugs would be more measured, we wouldn't have so much alcohol related violence, the government would have a new way of generating income as well as the personal positive aspects of taking mind-altering drugs.
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Posts: 2
You cannot make this argument strong because I can take every reason you have given for a particular government regulation and use that to argue for the abolition of drugs (and no, the fact that we use them already does not help your case. That would be like saying murder should be legalized because a lot of people kill others). For example, you said the parents who smoke or do drugs around children should be prosecuted. While I am sure you say this without this in mind, can I not say that the mere possibility that this could happen is a sufficient reason for the banning of drugs? Another example is when you stated outright that there should be age limits on drug usage. Well don't you think that the mere possibility of drug usage in children is enough to warrant banning them? How about the argument that the mere possibility that someone may get tainted drugs is reason enough to ban all drugs? You cannot advocate for a restricted freedom without acknowledging the strength of the opponent's argument. In this case, all the opponent needs to win is for you to acknowledge his or her argument in order to win. From the moment you grant them the premise of danger with respect to drugs (which admittedly is unavoidable) and the premise for the right of the government to regulate you have given them victory as well.
You also seem to think that you can remove the underworld of drugs and yet simultaneously regulate the usage of drugs from how they are produced, the strength made available to consumers and the age at which they become legal to consume. Doesn't it seem obvious that the underworld could simply provide these illicit drugs to consumers? Perhaps a certain potency of mushroom is not permitted without some sort of license to consume (on a side point it seems to me that this could be used to restrict the use of drugs to virtually no one). So what does the underground do? It sells these drugs with out checking. Someone who is thirteen wants to try X. The Underground will sell it. The simple fact that you have these regulations at all Guarantee the existence of and underground economy. How about the existence of coke? The fact that you outlawed coke does not make coke disappear. That will also be sold in the underground.
The best solution to the problem of drugs is to legalize and deregulate everything. Yes this will allow children to use it, Yes this includes all forms of drugs, even the really dangerous ones, and the reason why is that it is wrong to illegalize them. Any other argument will play into the statists hands.