Author Topic: War on Drugs  (Read 105626 times)

Offline barneystuta

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #160 on: January 27, 2012, 10:56:26 am »
They were discussing the Drugs (and Branson's comments) on Question Time last night. No surprise Melanie Phillips was talking shite, but anyway.

Drug use is a very complex issue. Someone I know used to smoke Cannabis (as a "kid" in his late teens). He got involved in the wrong crowd, and soon enough, was hooked on things much worse (Heroin). He came from a good family, a very good family, and it was such a surprise when this all came out. He was one of the "lucky" ones though, as he got help. All the rest of the crowd are now in prison (for crimes that they committed because of the need/addiction to drugs), or dead.

He got help, and got out of the cycle. It broke him for the short term, it was horrible. But now, he is happily married, has a beautiful daughter, and got a good job (and career). This all happened 20 years ago now, but he got the help he needed. He was "lucky" because a few times, when a house was raided, or police came around, he never had anything on him. So he "got away" with it.

But, had he been in possession (a significant amount), and been caught on more than one occasion, he could have ended up in prison. The spiral from there, from prison to out, to getting hooked again, to getting caught, etc. The same route his "friends" went down at the time. And like I said, they are either in prison, or now dead. It would probably have meant no wife, no daughter, and no "help".

What Branson is talking about is worth having a conversation around. I think it needs to be looked at. I am not saying an all out "make it legal" but if it is illegal to sell drugs, why do I know where I can get them from? Why do I know exactly who to speak to, if I wanted to (I don't), know where to go to get drugs? And if I know, why don't the police know? And if they do, why do they not do anything about it? It is all well and good going for the "big cheese" but that isn't really working either. At the end of the day, the end user, the kids who get involved in this, don't get it from the "big cheese" they get it from a local dealer or middle man.


Offline Corkboy

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #161 on: January 28, 2012, 12:01:40 am »
This is from 1998. That's quite a while ago.

Ever tried cannabis? Prince asks MS sufferer

    Amelia Gentleman
    The Guardian, Thursday 24 December 1998 17.43 GMT

Anti-establishment forces campaigning to legalise cannabis could be joined by an altogether more orthodox figure - the Prince of Wales has hinted that he approves of its use as an alternative method of pain relief.

During a visit to a day care centre this week he suggested to a multiple sclerosis sufferer that cannabis might ease her crippling pain. Karen Drake, confined to a wheelchair by her illness, met Prince Charles at the Sue Ryder Home in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, when he made the informal visit on Sunday.

After asking about her health, the Prince inquired whether she had experimented with alternative remedies. "He asked me if I had tried taking cannabis, saying he understood that, under strict medical supervision, it was one of the best things for it," she said yesterday.

Ms Drake, aged 36, admitted she was was somewhat taken aback; she told him she had never tried the drug and pointed out that it was illegal. But she had felt touched by his concern. "I was surprised that he asked me, but it was nice of him to be so considerate. It showed that he had thought about the condition, and knew what was helpful.

"I've never tried it in the past because it is not legal. But I'd give anything a chance if it worked."

Yesterday a spokeswoman for Prince Charles declined to comment on remarks which she said had been made during a private visit. But she said: "Prince Charles is aware of the issue of the use of cannabis for MS sufferers. Health is one of his major portfolios, and I think people would be surprised if he wasn't aware of the debate on the treatment of MS sufferers."

Prince Charles, who as an adolescent experimented with nothing stronger than cherry brandy, did not suggest the drug be decriminalised. Nevertheless, campaigners for legalisation seized on his comments. Paul Flynn, Labour MP for Newport West, said: "It is splendid advice from a most unexpected source. The Government is in a tiny minority on this issue, but I am encouraged to learn that the high level of popular support for the use of cannabis for medicinal purposes has reached Buckingham Palace."

Rob Christopher, founder of the Free Medical Marijuana Foundation, which supplies free cannabis by post to MS sufferers, added: "Cannabis is a very effective way of controlling muscle spasms, improving bladder control, and as a relief from the pain - which can be crippling for MS sufferers. It is excellent to hear that someone in such a high position in society is thinking about its advantages and is willing to speak openly about it."

The Multiple Sclerosis Society reacted more cautiously. Peter Cardy, the charity's chief executive, said: "The Prince is right to say some sufferers who take cannabis find relief from the unpleasant symptoms. I would be inclined to think it a doctor's place, as opposed to that of Prince Charles, to make recommendations about trying cannabis."

The society is not opposed in principle to cannabis, but recommends it should be subjected to thorough clinical trials like any other drug before becoming freely available to sufferers.

Prince Charles is not the first member of the royal family to support use of cannabis as medicine. Queen Victoria is said to have used it to ease period pains.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/1998/dec/24/monarchy.ameliagentleman

Offline hassinator

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #162 on: January 29, 2012, 11:59:49 am »
When oh when will we make stairs illegal, its gone too far. Mind bending retardation journalism.

ha ha.  an excellent response.  or bay leaves which kill more people every year from an allergic reaction than mdma.

a more pertinent example might be banning booze but 'drunk boy falls down stairs' just isn't going to get the fail hard.

meanwhile demi moore suffers a reaction to smoking 'incense' - is that a euphemism for dmt?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16769647

Offline pantbash

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #163 on: February 8, 2012, 10:04:35 am »
Good to know there are some intelligent and thoughtful people looking into the failures of the current world situation regards drugs.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/feb/06/magic-mushrooms-law-war-drugs

Quote
It's been a busy fortnight. First the publication of two major peer-reviewed research papers about magic mushrooms that attracted worldwide publicity. Then off to Prague for an international drugs policy symposium. And just last week, news of a large grant for our next collaborative study with Imperial College. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I established the Beckley Foundation some 14 years ago as a think tank on drugs policy. It was apparent even then that the "war on drugs" had failed. A 1997 report by the United Nations Drugs Control Programme put the value of the global trade in illicit drugs at around $400bn. Recent UN figures show that global production of opium (used mostly to make heroin) rose by almost 80% between 1998 and 2009. The market in illicit drugs is the third largest market in the world, after food and oil.

The health statistics are equally grim. In some countries – including some within the EU – more than three-quarters of intravenous drug users are infected with hepatitis C. Worldwide, there are several million non-fatal drug overdoses each year. Drug wars themselves also claim a dreadful toll: more than 47,000 deaths in the past five years for Mexico alone, according to the latest estimates.

However, while it is clear that existing policies are crying out for reform, what is less clear is how to foster the required political will.

The Beckley Foundation is the only organisation to combine rigorous scientific research with detailed policy analysis in an attempt to address that question. Our premise is simple: drugs policies should focus on health, harm reduction and cost-effectiveness, and should be based on the best available scientific evidence. That means trying out and evaluating a variety of policy ideas, as well as researching the physical effects of drugs.

Drugs policies around the world are based on three UN conventions, dating from 1961, 1971 and 1988. The conventions allow limited production and possession of drugs, but only for scientific and therapeutic use. In particular, parties to the 1988 Convention (which include the vast majority of UN member states) are obliged to criminalise the production, distribution, sale, purchase and possession of listed drugs other than for approved scientific and medical purposes. The result is the criminalisation of millions of people guilty of nothing other than personal drug use.

It is important to realise that an illegal market is a completely unregulated market. The evidence indicates that decriminalising personal possession and use saves valuable police time and criminal justice resources, and does not increase the prevalence of drug use. Moreover, because users are no longer regarded as criminals, their access to education and treatment is improved and the harm caused by problem drug use is reduced. That is why, together with the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Drug Policy Reform, we organised a meeting of government leaders, policy makers and experts at the House of Lords in November at which we launched a Global Initiative for Drug Policy Reform.

At that meeting, we presented a report commissioned by the Beckley Foundation into how the UN conventions could be amended to allow countries more freedom to create national policies based on their individual needs. We heard fascinating evidence from the Czech Republic, Portugal and elsewhere about their experiences of moving – within the "wiggle room" permitted by the UN conventions – towards policies based on public health, education and harm reduction rather than criminal enforcement.

At the symposium in Prague last week, a group of international experts again discussed possible reform mechanisms: partial decriminalisation under the existing conventions, and explicit decriminalisation or strict government regulation under amended conventions. We also considered problems caused by the current legal regime, such as the difficulty Bolivia faces in trying to get an exemption to permit the millennia-old indigenous tradition of chewing coca leaves.

The Beckley Foundation's focus on health-oriented policies demands a research programme to gather relevant evidence. That evidence also affords profound insights into how the brain works and potential therapeutic uses of psychoactive drugs.

Which brings me back to those recent scientific papers, products of a collaboration between the Beckley Foundation and Professor David Nutt's department at Imperial College London. Using the latest functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) techniques, the team looked at the brains of subjects as they received an intravenous dose of psilocybin, a psychedelic drug found in magic mushrooms. The papers were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and the British Journal of Psychiatry.

Many users of psychedelics report the experience as a consciousness-expanding one, and conventional wisdom suggests that such drugs should increase brain activity and blood flow to the brain.

Instead, the research in PNAS showed that psilocybin decreased blood flow to specific regions of the brain that act as "connector hubs", where information converges and from where it is disseminated. In the paper, we suggest that these hubs normally facilitate efficient communication between brain regions by filtering out the majority of input in order to avoid over-stimulation and confusion. But the hubs also constrain brain activity by forcing traffic to use a limited number of well-worn routes. Psilocybin appears to lift some of these constraints, allowing a freer and more fluid state of consciousness.

In the second study, subjects were given cues to recall positive events in their lives. With psilocybin, their memories were extremely vivid, almost as if they were reliving the events rather than just imagining them.

The findings suggest potential uses for psilocybin in the treatment of depression, a condition characterised by rigidly pessimistic thinking patterns. These fixated patterns are associated with overactivity in the medial prefrontal cortex – one of the same connector hubs deactivated by psilocybin. Psilocybin may also be a useful adjunct to psychotherapy, helping patients who are stuck in negative thought patterns to access distant memories and work through them.

The newly published results are exciting enough to have generated funding for a major study into psilocybin and depression, which will begin shortly. Watch this space.

Amanda Feilding is director of the Beckley Foundation, a think tank working for health-oriented drug policies based on scientific research
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Offline Mello

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #164 on: February 8, 2012, 01:09:56 pm »
They were discussing the Drugs (and Branson's comments) on Question Time last night. No surprise Melanie Phillips was talking shite, but anyway.

Drug use is a very complex issue. Someone I know used to smoke Cannabis (as a "kid" in his late teens). He got involved in the wrong crowd, and soon enough, was hooked on things much worse (Heroin). He came from a good family, a very good family, and it was such a surprise when this all came out. He was one of the "lucky" ones though, as he got help. All the rest of the crowd are now in prison (for crimes that they committed because of the need/addiction to drugs), or dead.

He got help, and got out of the cycle. It broke him for the short term, it was horrible. But now, he is happily married, has a beautiful daughter, and got a good job (and career). This all happened 20 years ago now, but he got the help he needed. He was "lucky" because a few times, when a house was raided, or police came around, he never had anything on him. So he "got away" with it.

But, had he been in possession (a significant amount), and been caught on more than one occasion, he could have ended up in prison. The spiral from there, from prison to out, to getting hooked again, to getting caught, etc. The same route his "friends" went down at the time. And like I said, they are either in prison, or now dead. It would probably have meant no wife, no daughter, and no "help".

What Branson is talking about is worth having a conversation around. I think it needs to be looked at. I am not saying an all out "make it legal" but if it is illegal to sell drugs, why do I know where I can get them from? Why do I know exactly who to speak to, if I wanted to (I don't), know where to go to get drugs? And if I know, why don't the police know? And if they do, why do they not do anything about it? It is all well and good going for the "big cheese" but that isn't really working either. At the end of the day, the end user, the kids who get involved in this, don't get it from the "big cheese" they get it from a local dealer or middle man.



I think a lot of the reason why some people end up in the wrong crowd and try harder drugs is because of its illegal nature.  There's a certain threshold of being willing to break the law, and another to sell something illegal that is going to make getting involved with the wrong people more likely.

Offline Endoe

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #165 on: February 8, 2012, 02:57:56 pm »
That sort of garbage really isn't worth posting on here.

Agree mate, but this is the sort of thinking that prevents us as a species moving forward on the issue, so needs to be posted to be fair on both sides, hopefully illustrating how stupid and ridiculous this "war" has become. I believe it's the biggest issue we in the west face.I hope that It's inevitable we'll see decriminalisation of some drugs, hopefully soon, which ironically would save lives which are unfortunatel;y being lost, in large part to the criminalisation of these substances.
"David Norkett, 16, died from brain injuries six days after he staggered backwards and plunged down seven steps at a multi-storey car park used as a frequent haunt for drug taking, a coroner was told."
See it's actually the illegality of the drug that killed him, if it were legal he wouldnt have been there, in danger in the first place. It's an issue that really irks me, but what can we really do about it? What's needed.

Offline trembles97

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #166 on: February 8, 2012, 06:10:51 pm »
Weed will be legalized at some point over here. Decriminalization is only the first domino...

Offline Mumm-Ra

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #167 on: February 9, 2012, 09:55:04 pm »
It's funny to see the shock stories about skunk popping up these days. How much rocky/soap bar is still around in the UK? That was all you could get (or 90% of it) in the 90s in Liverpool. I shudder to think of what was in it. No-one from any other country would touch it with a bargepole. In fact I'd be very interested to see a scientific breakdown of the ingredients

Offline SamAteTheRedAcid

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #168 on: February 9, 2012, 10:20:23 pm »
It's funny to see the shock stories about skunk popping up these days. How much rocky/soap bar is still around in the UK? That was all you could get (or 90% of it) in the 90s in Liverpool. I shudder to think of what was in it. No-one from any other country would touch it with a bargepole. In fact I'd be very interested to see a scientific breakdown of the ingredients

My god some of the shit I've smoked over the years. Minty rocky with plastic bits in it. 30% cowshit. 30% rabbit shit. 30% tea and 9% tree sap, the other 1% actually weed.
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #169 on: February 14, 2012, 11:24:44 am »
Ten Years After Decriminalization, Drug Abuse Down by Half in Portugal

Drug warriors often contend that drug use would skyrocket if we were to legalize or decriminalize drugs in the United States. Fortunately, we have a real-world example of the actual effects of ending the violent, expensive War on Drugs and replacing it with a system of treatment for problem users and addicts.

Ten years ago, Portugal decriminalized all drugs. One decade after this unprecedented experiment, drug abuse is down by half:

    “There is no doubt that the phenomenon of addiction is in decline in Portugal,” said Joao Goulao, President of the Institute of Drugs and Drugs Addiction, a press conference to mark the 10th anniversary of the law.

The number of addicts considered “problematic” — those who repeatedly use “hard” drugs and intravenous users — had fallen by half since the early 1990s, when the figure was estimated at around 100,000 people, Goulao said.

Other factors had also played their part however, Goulao, a medical doctor added.

    “This development can not only be attributed to decriminalisation but to a confluence of treatment and risk reduction policies.”

Many of these innovative treatment procedures would not have emerged if addicts had continued to be arrested and locked up rather than treated by medical experts and psychologists. Currently 40,000 people in Portugal are being treated for drug abuse. This is a far cheaper, far more humane way to tackle the problem. Rather than locking up 100,000 criminals, the Portuguese are working to cure 40,000 patients and fine-tuning a whole new canon of drug treatment knowledge at the same time.

None of this is possible when waging a war.

source

Offline pantbash

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #170 on: February 14, 2012, 04:48:06 pm »
Not the best proposal for legalisation I have heard, but interesting non the less.




Following the death of Whitney Houston, Tony Bennett has called for the legalisation of hard drugs. Houston would not have died, Bennett said, if drug users were not forced "to hide".

Bennett made his comments just hours after Houston's body was found in her hotel room. The 85-year-old singer was speaking at Clive Davis's annual pre-Grammys party, which had been abruptly re-dedicated to Houston's life. "I'd like to have every gentleman and lady in this room commit themselves to get our government to legalise drugs," he told the star-studded crowd. "So they have to get it from a doctor, not just some gangsters that just sell it under the table."

According to Bennett, drug laws were responsible not just for Houston's death but for the premature ends of Michael Jackson and Amy Winehouse. This is a bizarre claim: Winehouse died of alcohol poisoning, while Jackson was killed by the effects of a legal drug, administered by a doctor. Houston's death has yet to be explained.

Despite criticism from certain quarters, Bennett said on Monday that the reaction to his comments has been "mostly positive". "[Legalisation would] get rid of all the gangsters that make people hide," he told Rolling Stone magazine. "Once it's legal and everybody can do it, there is no longer the desire to do something that nobody else can do … You're always afraid you're going to get arrested. You have to hide. Why do that?"

Bennett won two Grammys on Sunday, including a prize for Body and Soul, his duet with Amy Winehouse; this brings his career total to 17. "Winning just feels great," Bennett said.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/feb/14/tony-bennett-whitney-houston
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Offline scatman

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #171 on: February 14, 2012, 04:55:11 pm »
he's got some points, but sort of fucks it up by relating it to winehouse and wacko
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Offline WhoHe

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #172 on: February 14, 2012, 04:57:59 pm »
Can't see legalisation working in the UK as we are a bunch of immature, desperate, depressed, guilt-ridden, nasty, uptight knobs - 24 hour drinking has really, really worked well hasn't it ?  Cafe culture my arse.
Everyone spouts the Portuguese model as the way to go but I seem to remember that others have tried legalisation with dire consquences (was it Switzerland ?).

Wouldn't be that arsed one way or the other really but I cannot see any of the mainstream parties having this in their manifesto anytime soon. Lets face it, in all major towns/cities in the UK its basically legal anyway such is the ease with which you can get hold of drugs.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #173 on: February 14, 2012, 10:26:43 pm »
Can't see legalisation working in the UK as we are a bunch of immature, desperate, depressed, guilt-ridden, nasty, uptight knobs - 24 hour drinking has really, really worked well hasn't it ?  Cafe culture my arse.
Everyone spouts the Portuguese model as the way to go but I seem to remember that others have tried legalisation with dire consquences (was it Switzerland ?).

Portugal didn't legalise. They decriminalised, which means that for possession amounts, you're dealt with by health authorities not courts and jails. It's all still illegal.

Offline scatman

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #174 on: February 15, 2012, 08:23:32 am »
Can't see legalisation working in the UK as we are a bunch of immature, desperate, depressed, guilt-ridden, nasty, uptight knobs - 24 hour drinking has really, really worked well hasn't it ?  Cafe culture my arse.
Everyone spouts the Portuguese model as the way to go but I seem to remember that others have tried legalisation with dire consquences (was it Switzerland ?).

Wouldn't be that arsed one way or the other really but I cannot see any of the mainstream parties having this in their manifesto anytime soon. Lets face it, in all major towns/cities in the UK its basically legal anyway such is the ease with which you can get hold of drugs.
you don't seem to understand the fundamental differences between you saying it's easy to get and it's basically legal, with it actually not being legal and being decriminalised.

For example, say I am a 16 year old weed smoker, I would have to ring up a drug dealer and once I have acquired the goods I would have to find some area (as i wouldnt want to get caught by parents) to smoke my purchase in. Now said area could be full of other people with drug problems who might be doing harder drugs, I may get pushed into doing these or may not. But I'd still be putting myself at risk with the people around me and with the law. So one day the police raid this 'area' and despite me having a small amount of weed on me, I am arrested and possibly jailed. I still have my weed addiction, jail is not going to help me stop, so when I come out it's highly likely I'll continue on the same path.

Decriminalisation would mean I was less likely to go to this area that I consider safe from the authorities to smoke my drugs and if I am caught by the law then instead of putting me in jail they would ideally help me overcome my addiction to this drug.

Of course not all people have to go somewhere to smoke drugs, a lot can do it in the comfort of their home but the one's who are more likely to commit the crimes that the 'experts' associate with drugs are those that go 'elsewhere'. Knowing that I can't be arrested for possession of this drug I am more likely not to try to find these 'safe havens' and more likely to stay away.

Of course half of my post is opinion so don't take it all as fact!
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Offline Mumm-Ra

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #175 on: February 15, 2012, 05:00:03 pm »
you don't seem to understand the fundamental differences between you saying it's easy to get and it's basically legal, with it actually not being legal and being decriminalised.

For example, say I am a 16 year old weed smoker, I would have to ring up a drug dealer and once I have acquired the goods I would have to find some area (as i wouldnt want to get caught by parents) to smoke my purchase in. Now said area could be full of other people with drug problems who might be doing harder drugs, I may get pushed into doing these or may not. But I'd still be putting myself at risk with the people around me and with the law. So one day the police raid this 'area' and despite me having a small amount of weed on me, I am arrested and possibly jailed. I still have my weed addiction, jail is not going to help me stop, so when I come out it's highly likely I'll continue on the same path.

Decriminalisation would mean I was less likely to go to this area that I consider safe from the authorities to smoke my drugs and if I am caught by the law then instead of putting me in jail they would ideally help me overcome my addiction to this drug.

Of course not all people have to go somewhere to smoke drugs, a lot can do it in the comfort of their home but the one's who are more likely to commit the crimes that the 'experts' associate with drugs are those that go 'elsewhere'. Knowing that I can't be arrested for possession of this drug I am more likely not to try to find these 'safe havens' and more likely to stay away.

Of course half of my post is opinion so don't take it all as fact!

I don't think your example is a good one. Alcohol is fully legal but most parents don't let their 16 yr old kids have booze-ups with their mates in the house, so they go down to the park, where other young people are consuming other things they're not allowed to at home.

As far as I can see, all decriminalisation means is that drug users don't have to be too paranoid about being in possession of a personal amount. They could still get fined but they wouldn't be locked up, and given a criminal record, and the stigma and future employment problems that come with it.

It seems a bit daft to me, because the criminals are still out there making money. The govt saves some cash from not having to jail drug users but all the other criminal problems, and dangers are still there. All that illicit untaxed drug money is still out there. All that lucrative drug turf still exists, ergo so does the gang violence. The 'gateway' problem you mention is still there because unless the sale of pot is decrimmed, people still have to go to a criminal to buy it. And that criminal could be selling other things as well.

Decrim is a good start, it solves the first problem of making users criminals, but the only way to solve the other problems is legalisation.

Offline scatman

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #176 on: February 16, 2012, 05:14:00 pm »
I don't think your example is a good one. Alcohol is fully legal but most parents don't let their 16 yr old kids have booze-ups with their mates in the house, so they go down to the park, where other young people are consuming other things they're not allowed to at home.

As far as I can see, all decriminalisation means is that drug users don't have to be too paranoid about being in possession of a personal amount. They could still get fined but they wouldn't be locked up, and given a criminal record, and the stigma and future employment problems that come with it.

It seems a bit daft to me, because the criminals are still out there making money. The govt saves some cash from not having to jail drug users but all the other criminal problems, and dangers are still there. All that illicit untaxed drug money is still out there. All that lucrative drug turf still exists, ergo so does the gang violence. The 'gateway' problem you mention is still there because unless the sale of pot is decrimmed, people still have to go to a criminal to buy it. And that criminal could be selling other things as well.

Decrim is a good start, it solves the first problem of making users criminals, but the only way to solve the other problems is legalisation.
oh I'm all for legalisation, I believe it's the way forward even if it is a government monopoly. My example was a bit pants, it was early :D
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Offline Bootleorbust

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #177 on: February 16, 2012, 07:57:56 pm »
I've got M.E. and live with an extreme pain problem. I'd like to try cannabis, but I don't fancy negotiating with the kinds of guys who have it. The thing is the NHS will give me as much morphine as I want, and I've probably already developed a habit. It seems ludicrous to me, that I can get access medically to something which is more habit forming but can't get hold of something which is less habit forming and from what I can gather is more effective

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #178 on: February 16, 2012, 09:51:40 pm »
Young, Undercover Cops Flirted With Students to Trick Them Into Selling Pot

 Working at the Drug Policy Alliance for the last twelve years I have read and heard countless stories of people having their lives ruined because of our country's cruel war on drugs. Last weekend, the nationally syndicated show This American Life highlighted a story that is so insane, you don't know whether to laugh or puke.

Last year in three high schools in Florida, several undercover police officers posed as students. The undercover cops went to classes, became Facebook friends and flirted with the other students. One 18-year-old honor student named Justin fell in love with an attractive 25-year-old undercover cop after spending weeks sharing stories about their lives, texting and flirting with each other.

One day she asked Justin if he smoked pot. Even though he didn't smoke marijuana, the love-struck teen promised to help find some for her. Every couple of days she would text him asking if he had the marijuana. Finally, Justin was able to get it to her. She tried to give him $25 for the marijuana and he said he didn't want the money -- he got it for her as a present.

A short while later, the police did a big sweep and arrest 31 students -- including Justin. Almost all were charged with selling a small amount of marijuana to the undercover cops. Now Justin has a felony hanging over his head.

This story is not unique to Florida and it reminds me of an 18-year-old Mitchell Lawrence, a young man from Great Barrington, Mass., who served two years in jail for selling a joint to an undercover cop. The officer befriended Lawrence and his friends and would hang out with them. One day the cop asked if Lawrence had any weed. Lawrence gave the cop a joint. The cop handed him $20. Lawrence hesitated, but the cop insisted on giving him the money. "Selling" the joint, because they were hanging out less than a 1000 feet from a school, and thus was considered a "drug free school zone," carried a mandatory minimum two-year sentence.

The drug war is sick. How much money was wasted by our law enforcement to get these few bags of marijuana "off the streets"? How do these cops look themselves in the mirror? Seducing 18-year-olds to fall in love or pretending to be friends and then tricking them into procuring small amounts of marijuana so they can charge them with felonies is beyond slimy and diametrically opposed to the officers' charge to "serve and protect."

We often hear that we need to fight the drug war to protect the kids. As these despicable examples show, more often the drug war is ruining young people's lives and doing more harm than good.

By Tony Newman | Sourced from AlterNet

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #179 on: February 16, 2012, 10:24:06 pm »
*open mouthed*
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #180 on: February 16, 2012, 10:38:47 pm »
I've got M.E. and live with an extreme pain problem. I'd like to try cannabis, but I don't fancy negotiating with the kinds of guys who have it. The thing is the NHS will give me as much morphine as I want, and I've probably already developed a habit. It seems ludicrous to me, that I can get access medically to something which is more habit forming but can't get hold of something which is less habit forming and from what I can gather is more effective

I was where you are about 2 years ago. Instead of a oxycontin/diazepam/tramadol cocktail, I switched it for some nice bud. 

Now I don't have ME, I have AS, but I found myself dependant on some pretty addictive prescription drugs.

I started smoking weed and I started sleeping, getting my apetite back, stopped being on edge because of the painkillers and had some much needed relief.

Weed can be abused but no more than morphine and other opiates can.
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #181 on: February 17, 2012, 04:54:21 pm »
This is a bit long so I've cropped the original but do check out the entire article which has sources and all that. Basically, the Welfare State in the US has expanded almost lockstep with the War on Drugs.

An American Nightmare

Everyone from Bill Cosby to Ronald Reagan seems fond of placing the blame for our black community’s fate squarely on the shoulders of African-Americans, largely excusing the rest of America from any blame for their plight and refusing to consider that - just maybe - other factors might have come into play at some point during our shared history.

Until now, the emergence of the modern Welfare State in particular has been singled-out as the single most detrimental force on our African-American community, since it supposedly allowed “welfare queens” with “80 names, 30 addresses, and 12 Social security cards” to pull in over $150,000 of tax-free income a year.  As the argument goes, the Public Welfare Amendments of 1962 created a system that disincentived marriage by rewarding single mothers with loads of free cash.

All they had to do was remain out of wedlock, and the checks would just keep on rolling in.

This view was popularized by a Nobel Prize winning physicist, William Shockley, who argued that these programs “tended to encourage childbirth, especially among less productive members of society (particularly blacks, whom he considered to be genetically inferior to whites), causing a reverse evolution.”  Shockley popularized this hypothesis, bringing it to both Congress and the public, and even put forth a proposal offering financial rewards to minorities if they were voluntary sterilized.

So assuming that the Welfare State was created by black mothers who had no intent to ever marry, and willfully popped out babies to get paid, we’d expect to see a steady even rise in American government expenditures on the welfare funding sent to families and children starting in 1962 and then into the next few decades.  That’s the year the Public Welfare Amendments were passed, which specifically increased aid to dependent children.

And yet that’s not what happened at all:



Seems a bit odd, there’s a distinct spike – but it starts in the early ’70s not the early ’60s.  Neither population growth nor total welfare spending explain this spike, both grew at a relatively flat linear rate during this time period.  Did it just take a full decade for black women to finally realize that all they had to do was pop out a baby or seven, marriage be damned, and they could start rolling in the dough?  Or maybe something else happened that created a dearth of African-American men who were available to actually marry?

In 1971 President Nixon officially began the War on Drugs, which fully hit its stride in ’73 with the passage of the draconian Rockefeller Drugs Laws, and very quickly a distinct trend in the American prison population emerged:



If the War on Drugs didn’t directly precipitate the Welfare State and the destruction of  the American black family, why did welfare aid to families spike in lockstep with our  prison population right as that War started?  Well, if you’re familiar American drug laws, it shouldn’t surprise you that some 90% of those arrested under the Rockefeller Drug Laws in the years after its passage were minorities.

Sure, correlation doesn’t prove causation – but when you stop a moment and consider that marriage requires an eligible male, it’s not that hard to figure out why the modern Welfare State emerged in tandem with our War on Drugs, as it’s a little bit difficult to marry someone behind bars:

A black male born in 1974 had a 13.4% chance of going to prison at some point in his life, while a white male had just a 2.2% chance.  And it’s not like this trend got any better, by 1991 the odds a black male would spend time in prison had ballooned to 29%, while the odds a white male would end up in the clink had only increased to 4.4%

And it’s not at all difficult to see how the reduction in marriageable males affected the rate of black marriages in America. In the decade prior to the start of the War on Drugs, the first decade of the Public Welfare Amendments, the percentage of married African-American women roughly followed the national trend and declined proportionally by less than 6% – but then in the ’70s as the War on Drugs raged, that proportional decline tripled to nearly 18%:



We’ve certainly come a long way as a nation since Abolition, but the horrible reality is that a black child who was born during slavery was more likely to be raised by both parents than a black child born during the twenty-first century.  As Fredrick Douglass explained, during slavery it was common practice to separate children born into slavery from their birth-mothers before their first birthday. Which makes perfect sense when you consider that under slavery blacks were human chattel, and separating newborns calves from their mothers is just what you do with livestock.


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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #182 on: February 17, 2012, 05:24:05 pm »
I've got M.E. and live with an extreme pain problem. I'd like to try cannabis, but I don't fancy negotiating with the kinds of guys who have it. The thing is the NHS will give me as much morphine as I want, and I've probably already developed a habit. It seems ludicrous to me, that I can get access medically to something which is more habit forming but can't get hold of something which is less habit forming and from what I can gather is more effective

If I were you, I'd just do it. If you were to buy some weed from someone, the person you actually handed the money to and gave it to you wouldn't be some hardened criminal, it's more likely to be a student or someone like that.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #183 on: March 1, 2012, 01:40:53 pm »
Atheism (from Greek, "athos" meaning 'hell', "eios" meaning 'demon' or 'Satan', and "ismos" meaning Liberal, literally "Satan's Liberal Helldemon")

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #184 on: March 1, 2012, 02:14:02 pm »
ah if only...we'll just carry on wasting money policing
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #185 on: March 1, 2012, 03:38:14 pm »
I've got M.E. and live with an extreme pain problem. I'd like to try cannabis, but I don't fancy negotiating with the kinds of guys who have it. The thing is the NHS will give me as much morphine as I want, and I've probably already developed a habit. It seems ludicrous to me, that I can get access medically to something which is more habit forming but can't get hold of something which is less habit forming and from what I can gather is more effective

The usual Weed dealers around my way aren't the type that 'would break your legs if you looked at them wrong' my dealers (some who i've become friends with through getting weed off them) are very laid back, when they drop off some weed to the house, they would call in for a smoke or 2 (my main one is a liverpool supporter so we have plenty to talk about) and the majority of the one off dealers i would get it off you wouldn't be able to pick them out in the street, as said before they are usually students or just your regular guy. the worst thats happened to me was i was ripped off getting a £50 bag.. round my way its £10 = 1gram.. i got 3.8g for 50 quid which i was raging about, but at the end of the day i didnt really care as it was good stuff.

i know a guy who used to get that morphine from the NHS for a reoccuring back injury which means he cant work, as he's in agony pretty much 24hours of the day but he said to me that he would choose the weed over morphine any day, the morphines great but he became very reliant on it, and now instead has a joint or 2 to ease the pain and he says it works perfectly.. and to him its alot more effective than the morphine and not as addictive..
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #186 on: March 15, 2012, 07:17:23 am »
The results are out from that survey I posted a while back.
There is some interesting reading in the articles under this URL, which ever side of the debate you stand on.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/guardian-mixmag-drug-survey


The facts/figures of the survey are in this short vid (4min) if some people don;t want to dig around on the Guardian website.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/datablog/video/2012/mar/15/drugs-use-animation-20-facts
« Last Edit: March 15, 2012, 07:27:49 am by pantbash »
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #187 on: March 15, 2012, 11:54:38 am »
thanks, theres so much to read!
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #188 on: March 16, 2012, 10:24:36 am »
9 March 2012 Last updated at 02:44

LSD 'helps alcoholics to give up drinking'
LSD Could LSD be used to treat alcoholism?
Quote
One dose of the hallucinogenic drug LSD could help alcoholics give up drinking, according to an analysis of studies performed in the 1960s.

A study, presented in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, looked at data from six trials and more than 500 patients.

It said there was a "significant beneficial effect" on alcohol abuse, which lasted several months after the drug was taken.

An expert said this was "as good as anything we've got".

LSD is a class A drug in the UK and is one of the most powerful hallucinogens ever identified. It appears to work by blocking a chemical in the brain, serotonin, which controls functions including perception, behaviour, hunger and mood.
Benefit

Researchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology analysed earlier studies on the drug between 1966 and 1970.

Patients were all taking part in alcohol treatment programmes, but some were given a single dose of LSD of between 210 and 800 micrograms.

For the group of patients taking LSD, 59% showed reduced levels of alcohol misuse compared with 38% in the other group.

This effect was maintained six months after taking the hallucinogen, but it disappeared after a year. Those taking LSD also reported higher levels of abstinence.

The report's authors, Teri Krebs and Pal-Orjan Johansen, said: "A single dose of LSD has a significant beneficial effect on alcohol misuse."

They suggested that more regular doses might lead to a sustained benefit.

"Given the evidence for a beneficial effect of LSD on alcoholism, it is puzzling why this treatment approach has been largely overlooked," they added.

Prof David Nutt, who was sacked as the UK government's drugs adviser, has previously called for the laws around illegal drugs to be relaxed to enable more research.

He said: "Curing alcohol dependency requires huge changes in the way you see yourself. That's what LSD does.

"Overall there is a big effect, show me another treatment with results as good; we've missed a trick here.

"This is probably as good as anything we've got [for treating alcoholism]."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17297714
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #189 on: March 16, 2012, 10:25:44 am »
"The greatest argument against democracy is to have a five minute conversation  with the average voter. "

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #190 on: March 16, 2012, 10:28:58 am »


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11660210

quite surprised cannabis is that high up the chart above LSD.. and ecstacy.. other than second hand smoke how else is cannabis harmful to others?
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Offline Hudson66

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #191 on: March 16, 2012, 01:08:27 pm »
You dont have to smoke cannabis either for it to be effective. Butane lower aswell?

Wonder how many deaths there has been from sniffing gas compared to 0 cannabis Deaths? Doen't seem proportionate at all that chart.


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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #192 on: March 16, 2012, 01:38:54 pm »
You'll never win a war on drugs.

It is no longer a war on drugs anyway, Obama is trying to remove the term that is associated with America which came from Nixon in the 70s. America is struggling in Afghanistan to contain the problem but they have seen the amount of Heroin decrease since 2007.

I just wrote a paper on this.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #193 on: March 16, 2012, 01:49:47 pm »
You'll never win a war on drugs.

It is no longer a war on drugs anyway, Obama is trying to remove the term that is associated with America which came from Nixon in the 70s. America is struggling in Afghanistan to contain the problem but they have seen the amount of Heroin decrease since 2007.

I just wrote a paper on this.

also if you actually get into heroin and take heroin then you're a fucking douche... I've seen many a people ruin their lives through that stupid fucking drug.
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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #194 on: March 16, 2012, 01:56:11 pm »
also if you actually get into heroin and take heroin then you're a fucking douche... I've seen many a people ruin their lives through that stupid fucking drug.

Totally agree, I've taken a drugs module at University this year and it's shocking what it does. It's weird though that Heroin was once legal and was only made illegal for the widespread society in 1921/22 after following America in banning it. They did it under the Harrison act of 1914.

America thought it wise to treat Opium addiction with Heroin...guess how that worked out in 1908? They banned it in 1914 and only made it available for Medicine.

In England in the 1950s a man in London broke into a hospital and started selling the drug in a black market and this guy is blamed for the problem in England. Weird right.

The funniest, well not funny but weirdest thing was that Opium was giving to children if you couldn't

- stop the child crying
- teething problems
- couldn't sleep

In the late 1890s.

Fascinating story the rise of Heroin/Opium but Germany created Heroin but were also the mass producers of Cocaine in the early 20th century.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #195 on: March 16, 2012, 02:06:12 pm »
You dont have to smoke cannabis either for it to be effective. Butane lower aswell?

Wonder how many deaths there has been from sniffing gas compared to 0 cannabis Deaths? Doen't seem proportionate at all that chart.

It is not a straight death chart. It is a chart of the impact on society where they used various 16 different metrics. Cannabis for a small proportion of users can trigger a latent tendency to psychosis. Also in terms of the wider impact to society, some users drop out and cease to be productive members of society. As a drug it is relatively benign, but nothing in life is risk free.

Also cannabis smoke is carcinogenic - and as it is usually smoked unfiltered is nastier than cigarette smoke. Normally, the quantities involved are much lower than cigarette smoke - but it is still a risk. There will be lung cancer cases caused by smoking joints.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #196 on: March 16, 2012, 02:08:17 pm »
Totally agree, I've taken a drugs module at University this year and it's shocking what it does. It's weird though that Heroin was once legal and was only made illegal for the widespread society in 1921/22 after following America in banning it. They did it under the Harrison act of 1914.

America thought it wise to treat Opium addiction with Heroin...guess how that worked out in 1908? They banned it in 1914 and only made it available for Medicine.

In England in the 1950s a man in London broke into a hospital and started selling the drug in a black market and this guy is blamed for the problem in England. Weird right.

The funniest, well not funny but weirdest thing was that Opium was giving to children if you couldn't

- stop the child crying
- teething problems
- couldn't sleep

In the late 1890s.

Fascinating story the rise of Heroin/Opium but Germany created Heroin but were also the mass producers of Cocaine in the early 20th century.

Most of the problems with Heroin are not caused by the drug, they are caused by the criminalisation of the drug.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #197 on: March 16, 2012, 02:09:18 pm »
Most of the problems with Heroin are not caused by the drug, they are caused by the criminalisation of the drug.

That is true, very true.

Funding the drug is the problem.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #198 on: March 17, 2012, 09:49:58 pm »
quite surprised cannabis is that high up the chart above LSD.. and ecstacy.. other than second hand smoke how else is cannabis harmful to others?

From what I've read the scoring system in that study seems to be biased towards more popular drugs such as alcohol and cannabis.
The study involved 16 criteria, including a drug's affects on users' physical and mental health, social harms including crime, "family adversities" and environmental damage, economic costs and "international damage".
So cannabis will have a huge effect on the mental health side of the user.

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Re: War on Drugs
« Reply #199 on: March 17, 2012, 10:51:22 pm »
So cannabis will have a huge effect on the mental health side of the user.

Based on what though?