#drug legalization

[lifewithchronicpain]

Should heroin and cocaine be legally available to people who need and want them? If we are serious about stopping the crisis of drug overdose deaths, that is exactly the kind of profound change we need. Yes, extensive regulations would be necessary. In fact, the whole point of regulating drug production and sales is that we can better control what is being sold and to whom.

After British Columbia’s Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry testified to the all-party health committee in Ottawa in May that regulating these controlled drugs would minimize harms, B.C. Premier David Eby said he disagreed. He is quoted saying “in a reality-based, real-world level, (it) doesn’t make any sense.” But does our current approach of drug prohibition “make sense?”

Since the overdose crisis was declared in 2016, illicit drug toxicity deaths have become the leading cause of unnatural death in B.C. and the leading cause of death from all causes for those aged 10 to 59. More than 44,000 people have died from drug poisoning in Canada since 2016, and more than one-third of those were in B.C. An average of 22 people are dying every day in Canada because the illicit supply of drugs is toxic.

What it comes down to is whether people care more about saving lives or taking away drugs from people. They truly are not the same thing. Safe injection sites also offer a measure of safety for addicts should they OD and access to services if they decide they want to quit.

I know legalizing these drugs seems bad in a knee jerk way. However if we regulate them we make them safer. Of course we would heavily do so and OUI’s would still be illegal. We have to stop trying to restrict our way out of this problem, it’s clearly making it worse for both addicts and pain patients.

[culturevulturette]

Once again, my state is a cautionary tale.

[onecornerface]

Some proposed forms of drug legalization aim to make drugs only available to "responsible" users-- not people who are addicted, or who use drugs chaotically. But then these forms of legalization will not provide legally manufactured drugs, of consistent and known composition, to the people who are *most* vulnerable to overdose and other health hazards. These people will continue to rely on the illicit drug supply of ever-changing mystery powder sourced from organized crime.

"Responsible use" legalization will only benefit the best-off drug users, and leave out the worst-off drug users. We must advocate a drug legalization that will make safer drugs accessible to the people who are currently getting screwed over the most.

[jamesgierach]

DEA 2024 NATIONAL DRUG THREAT ASSESSMENT MISSES THE BOAT

by James E. Gierach

The recently released National Drug Threat Assessment misses the boat. The report says:

“DEA’s top priority is reducing the supply of deadly drugs in our country and defeating the two cartels responsible for the vast majority of drug trafficking in the United States. The drug poisoning crisis remains a public safety, public health, and national security issue, which requires a new approach.

“The shift from plant-based drugs, like heroin and cocaine, to synthetic, chemical-based drugs, like fentanyl and methamphetamine, has resulted in the most dangerous and deadly drug crisis the United States has ever faced,” said DEA Administrator Anne Milgram. “At the heart of the synthetic drug crisis are the Sinaloa and Jalisco cartels and their associates, who DEA is tracking world-wide. The suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, and money launderers all play a role in the web of deliberate and calculated treachery orchestrated by these cartels. DEA will continue to use all available resources to target these networks and save American lives.”

DEA “TOP PRIORITY”: Reduce drug supply?

Has the DEA and its leadership learned nothing over the 63 years of America’s War on Drugs? Has it not learned that whatever the drug (cannabis, heroin, crack cocaine, LSD, PCP, ecstasy, meth or fentanyl) DRUG PROHIBITION IS A BOON TO DRUG PRODUCTION, INVENTION, TRAFFICKING, ADDICTION, OVERDOSE, DEATH, ORGANIZED CRIME and VIOLENCE.

The supply-side tactics of interdiction, surveillance, crop-spraying, border-policing, undercover detective work and confidential-informant buying DO NOT REDUCE SUPPLY.

Drug prohibition is like Rumpelstiltskin Magic that guarantees more drugs, uncontrolled and unregulated, everywhere. See “The Silver Bullet Solution: Is it time to end the War on Drugs?” (Guadium, 2023) by James E. Gierach.

The DEA is right about one thing: more drugs (more drugs appearing based upon its insistence on the prohibition of drugs) increases the risk to “public safety, public health, and national security.”

Unfortunately, and equally obviously, the DEA does not know what to do about it. Drug poisoning from drug prohibition requires a “new approach.” How about legalized drugs, regulated markets, government inspection, dealer licensing, fixed places of business, regulated hours and health warnings. Recall how poisoning and crime from unregulated alcohol was stopped with legalized alcohol markets, not more unwanted, unworkable Prohibition.

Today, a century later: Same societal prohibition sickness; same societal fix. LEGALIZE DRUGS.

Second “DEA OVERSIGHT”: More of the same (continued prohibition) from the DEA will not help.

The DEA thrives on its drug-prohibition mandate. It plays Drug War, Monopoly Money and Cops and Robbers with the Sinaloa and Jalisco drug cartels. The result is more new synthetic drugs that DEA agents ever dreamed when plant-drugs were the prohibited enemy.

The 2018 Shadow Report (Marie Nougier, “A Taking Stock: a Decade of Drug Policy, a Civil Society Shadow Report,” International Drug Policy Consortium, 2018, p. 27, http://fileserver.idpc.net/library/Shadow_Report_FINAL_ENGLISH.pdf) is a study basically asking, “What has the World War on Drugs done for us lately?” The report was prepared by the well-respected International Drug Policy Consortium using United Nations drug use and drug-invention statistics.

The Shadow Report noted that during the preceding ten-year period analyzed, drug cartels had invented 803 new synthetic drugs. It’s fair to say, drug prohibition policy never before ever produced more new mind-altering, synthetic drugs in any previous ten-year historical period of human life. Again, “The Silver Bullet Solution:…”supra, explains how and why drug prohibition, New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller’s mandatory-minimum, drug-sentencing laws and constitutional ex post facto laws converged to create an unexpected and unintended deluge of new synthetic drugs.

It’s 2024. Time to end the lost War on Drugs. Half-measures (legalized beer, legalized marijuana, or Oregon-styled drug decriminalization) will only further delay what society needs: full-dose, LEGALIZED, REGULATED and CONTROLLED DRUGS.

Let the DEA pack up and go home. Let DEA agents, and other federal and state law enforcement agents and officers, keep their drug-war winnings and drug-policing pensions, a significant part of America’s trillion-dollar drug-war spending. But let society out from under the worst public in the history of mankind—DRUG PROHIBITION, common denominator to a dozen crises and problems: “Violence, Gangs, Guns, Drugs, Policing, Mass Incarceration, Racism, Immigration, Human Rights, Healthcare, AIDS, and Corruption.” (“The Silver Bullet Solution:…,” supra.)

Palos Park, Illinois

May 9, 2024

[trendynewsnow]

Voter Sentiment on Drug Legalization Shifts in the U.S.

Voter Sentiment on Drug Legalization Shifts On Tuesday, voters across the United States expressed their apprehension regarding the easing of drug legislation, as significant efforts to legalize recreational marijuana in Florida and the therapeutic use of specific psychedelics in Massachusetts did not achieve success. In addition, residents in both North Dakota and South Dakota chose to reject…

[gkmmediatv]

ਫਰੀਦਕੋਟ ਪੁਲਿਸ 05 ਪਿਸਟਲ ਬਰਾਮਦ ਮਾਮਲੇ ਵਿੱਚ ਸ਼ਾਮਿਲ 03 ਦੋਸ਼ੀਆਂ ਨੂੰ ਕੀਤਾ ਗਿਆ ਕਾਬੂ, ਪਹਿਲਾ ਵੀ ਦਰਜ ਸਨ ਕਤਲ, ਅਸਲਾ, ਜੇਲ੍ਹ ਅਤੇ ਨਸ਼ੇ ਨਾਲ ਜੜੇ ਕਈ ਮਕੱਦਮੇ

Continue reading ਫਰੀਦਕੋਟ ਪੁਲਿਸ 05 ਪਿਸਟਲ ਬਰਾਮਦ ਮਾਮਲੇ ਵਿੱਚ ਸ਼ਾਮਿਲ 03 ਦੋਸ਼ੀਆਂ ਨੂੰ ਕੀਤਾ ਗਿਆ ਕਾਬੂ, ਪਹਿਲਾ ਵੀ ਦਰਜ ਸਨ ਕਤਲ, ਅਸਲਾ, ਜੇਲ੍ਹ ਅਤੇ ਨਸ਼ੇ ਨਾਲ ਜੜੇ ਕਈ ਮਕੱਦਮੇ

[antiprohibit]

Is Drug Prohibition Compatible with American Ideals?

The American Flag is a symbol of the efforts of the people to form a more perfect union with their government. Drug prohibition, the legislative effort to outlaw the production, distribution, possession, and consumption of certain substances, stands in stark contrast to many core Western and American ideals. As the West prides itself on values such as personal freedom, limited government…

[blogquantumreality]

I've long since believed in legalizing all drugs, but I know that doesn't fly well in political discourse so I often settle for advocating removing penalties on marijuana purchase/sale, possession, and usage.

But in the end, drug use is something a competent adult does to oneself, and if legal, provided it's not used to excess, the majority - if not all of it - of harm is being done by someone to oneself and not other people.

Now, if it starts disrupting one's life and responsibilities, that is now a medical issue that needs treatment. And that's how it should be viewed in society rather than as a criminal matter requiring locking people up.

Curious about something you mentioned in your post last week, you said that in your opinion all drugs should be legal and I’m curious about how that would be a positive at all? Like I get weed bc it’s pretty harmless but when I think of drugs I think of cocaine and heroin, which have destroyed so many lives. If it was widely available wouldn’t that end up hurting more people than helping? That’s just my opinion but I’m curious on the other side

I do think all drugs should be legal. This is said knowing that addiction runs in my family and that the only reason my older sister is my *sister* is due to drug use and addiction. Otherwise she'd be my cousin.

Making drugs illegal does not stop people from getting high. It does not stop drug related crime. And it certainly does not stop drugs from tearing families apart.

Addiction is a symptom of a larger problem. Solve the problem and the addict problem goes away. Solve the addict problem and drugs stop ruining lives and destroying families and creating massive amounts of drug related violence. Places that have roled out decriminalization strategies effectively have seen an overall reduction in crime rates across the board, a reduction in recreational drug use, and a reduction in bloodborne illness like HIV. Creating safe needle exchanges as well as safe places to get high with medical staff onhand has also created a locale where very few people die from overdose.

Most people hear "decriminalize all drugs" and think I mean a free-for-all. I don't. I think the drug market should be regulated. I don't think you should be able to get ketamine or heroin over the counter at a walmart like you can get asprin. But I think it's time to stop putting people in jail for getting high.

My aunt tore her life and her family and her health apart for years while she was addicted to heroin. My sister, her daughter, needed to be removed from her care due to the amazingly bad choices she made as a mother due to her addiction and her prioritizing drugs over the health and safety of her daughter. My aunt has had multiple heart attacks from the damage the constant drug use did to her body.

My aunt is more than a decade sober and do you know why? It's not because she got a wakeup call when her daughter was taken away, because at the time she willingly and freely signed her over to my parents because that got her "out of [her] hair". It's not because she had a heart attack, because she went right back to it the moment she was out of the hospital. It's not even because she spent time in rehab and prison, because the moment she was out she was using again.

No, my aunt got sober because her life changed. She was put on a better pain management plan. She got out of her shitty marriage to her shitty husband. She completed some education to make her more hireable so she didn't have to rely on less than safe means of paying her bills. She reconnected with my sister and reforged their relationship once she was 18. She bought her own house. She found love with someone who didn't give a shit about her past and brought out the best in her.

My aunt was a deeply unhappy person. Heroin made life more tolerable for her. Until she couldn't tolerate life without it. Until she'd do anything, anything, to get her next high.

A lot of addicts are addicts because they are self-medicating for something else and their drug of choice has chemical properties that makes their brains crave it more. If you fix the "deeply unhappy" part, you create a healthier environment for that addict to take control over their life again. Without it, they are far more likely to continue to relapse.

Knowing this, why would I then want to add the threat of prison and jailtime- life-ruining things themselves- to an addict's list of concerns?

Look up rat park sometime. In the rat paradise, drugged water was freely offered, and occasional a rat here or there would take a hit or two, but rarely enough to even get high and almost never habitually. Addiction literally didn't exist even though the rats were taking addictive substances. But the rats in cages, seperated from each other, with no enrichment, crammed into small spaces and stressed to hell? Those rats took hit after hit after hit until they overdosed and died. The addict rats were deeply unhappy. The drugs were their only escape. The paradise rats had to be lured in with sweetened drugs to even consider and even then they rejected them. The caged rats did not need sweetner, even though the drugs made the water bitter.

If we can see such a stark difference in rats having their needs met vs rats experiencing isolation and stress, what would happen if we showed human addicts the same consideration?

I think a lot better results than continuing to jail deeply unhappy and desperate people for doing the only thing they can think of to cope.

[esaari]

just Creed things

[hollowboobtheory]

while I'm soapboxing, you need to quit thinking of addicts as a "them" situation. do you get irritable, groggy, and headachey without your daily coffee? congratulations! you're an addict. addiction can happen to anybody. it can happen to you. there's a decent chance it already has happened to you, just in a more socially accepted way that leads you to not think of it as an addiction.

[crazygnomenclature]

Ran this one originally when Minnesota was legalizing cannabis last year. And yes, those contracts are legally binding. The smiley face seals it.

[foldingfittedsheets]

I’ve never had a particularly strong desire to get high. Altered mind states have always been somewhat unappealing to me. The only drug I’ve ever enjoyed taking was a prescription strength muscle relaxant that loosened all my knots at once and sent me into the boneless slumber of jello. Top marks.

But I have dabbled with pot. As I’m wildly sensitive to smoke my only recourse was to try edibles and anyone could’ve predicted this was a recipe for disaster. So here’s the story of the first time I got high.

Brendan was a major stoner. He was a high energy guy who loved hiking, had his shit together, and absolutely loved getting high and relaxing. One day he decided to make pot brownies. Brendan was an amazing cook in his own right but he came into my life at a time when I was eating mayonnaise sandwiches and started giving me real food so I viewed him as a paragon of cookery. He made amazing desserts. And he didn’t make a batch of no pot brownies.

I’d never had one of Brendan’s brownies, before, but dear god I wanted one when they came out of the oven in a waft of rich chocolatey smells. They were fudgey and perfect and all that I wanted in the world was to eat one. I watched him take a bite, burning with envy and desire.

Being high seemed like a small price to pay if only I could sink my teeth into the warm splendor of brownie. I came up to where he was sitting on the couch, slightly behind his left shoulder. “Hey. I want to try a bite,” I told him.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes!” I was sure as fuck that I wanted that brownie in my mouth.

Brendan was sat facing the tv and held up his hand without looking so I could take a bite. I am not a creature of modest bites. And I wanted that brownie. I took a huge bite, carving into the interior of the brownie, leaving Brendan with a only a rim.

He pulled his hand back and saw the brownie crime I had committed and gave a resigned chuckle. “Well this is going to be fun.”

On one other occasion in my life I’ve tried an edible and there was a brief relaxed period before things went horribly wrong that made me think, this is probably where most people stop and enjoy themselves.

But on this occasion, the massive bite of brownie didn’t drift me slowly up through layers of being high. It skyrocketed me into high space with great prejudice. I have no memory of a middle point, I wasn’t high and then I was suddenly so high I couldn’t function.

I’ve heard people talk about paranoia. I didn’t have that. Some people mention nervousness, no, none of that for me. My mind was simply gone. A thought would blip to life on one side of my brain and fail to travel through the fog to find its conclusion. I couldn’t think. I wasn’t really experiencing sensation. I was nothing in the void.

When Brendan realized I’d been staring wall eyed at nothing for too long he said, “How are you doing?”

It took a long time to process the words and even longer to slur out, “I can see everything.”

I don’t remember him getting up and leaving, or waiting, or anything really. Thoughts flickered and died in my mindscape, meaningless and alone.

Then Brendan put headphones on me.

I was unable to conceive of anything as wonderful as music surrounding me, and thus began the only nice part of the trip. I might have experienced ego death but at least I had the ethereal sounds of Pure Reason Revolution to wrap myself in.

I’m not sure how long the nice phase lasted. But eventually something started going wrong in my mouth. My throat became uncomfortable enough to pierce the haze I was in. It was almost numb, and impossibly dry. I drank water to no avail. Finally I conceived of the solution. “Ice cream!” I demanded of Brendan.

He went to grab some and I was dismayed that when I took a bite the sensation in my throat intensified. “It made it worse,” I complained.

“Made what worse?” Brendan asked, because of course I hadn’t actually told him why I’d wanted ice cream.

When I told him what was happening he said, “Oh, of course ice cream is going to make cotton mouth worse.”

“Well then why did you give it to me!” I complained. He smiled fondly at my irrational grumping and got me more water.

Finally I’d had enough. Music couldn’t erase my discomfort, I was getting frustrated I couldn’t think but I was still high as balls and I wanted the night to be over. Brendan suggested I go to bed so I climbed up into my bed and lay there, uncomfortably high.

I couldn’t sleep. My throat was so cottony, a side effect I hadn’t known existed and I thoroughly loathed.

Then I thought: I could masturbate! Brendan had talked about enjoying that while high. I’d give it a shot. My body however was wiser than my head and was having none of this plan. It refused to respond, stubbornly insisting that now was not the time.

I doubled down, refusing to give up on this horrible idea and in a bitter struggle, and against my body’s own wishes, I produced an orgasm that rated a 0 on the pleasure scale. Something happened but it was like a resentful flex of muscles that stopped immediately.

Furious with the overall experience of being high I buried my head in pillows and finally slept. I told Brendan the next day about my attempt and he facepalmed so hard. “Why didn’t you just go to sleep! You were way too high to enjoy that.”

I grumbled and agreed that it was very stupid. I tried to weigh the single bite of brownie I had with the absolutely wretched hours of discomfort and while it didn’t quite balance it was still pretty close. It was a really good brownie.

[onecornerface]

Adam Zivo, a Canadian journalist (likely the most prolific anti-safe-supply fanatic), claims it is "homophobic" to compare gay sex to hard drug use. However, Zivo is a moron, and the comparison is correct.

More precisely, bigotry and violence against people who engage in gay sex are (in many ways) similar to bigotry and violence against people who use “hard drugs.” Bigotry and violence against trans people are also similar. They are all authoritarian, puritanical, and hostile to the basic values of a diverse free society.

The history of queer resistance is also similar to, and interlinked with, the history of resistance to anti-drug-user and ableist oppression: ACT UP, harm reduction, needle provision, patients' self-advocacy for the biased medical system to change their priorities, etc.

[jamesgierach]

YES! It’s time to end the War on Drugs.

Read why.

Book Release November 14th.

[somecunttookmyurl]

currently trying to patiently explain to my GP surgery that whilst they "may not ordinarily" issue a certificate signed by a doctor for prescribed medications there is no law against it but there is a law against me trying to take lisdexamfetamine -a very controlled substance- into Japan without one so that should probably take precedence