Opinions of the War on Drugs

manpaint

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The issue in the US is that the "War on Drugs" actually had nothing to do with removing dangerous or illicit goods from the people.
See, in the 60's, the CIA began trading arms for cocaine with South America, and those bricks of cocaine were shipped straight to the US. A variant, known as crack (crack cocaine), was then peddled throughout poor and black communities. It was sold to people as a "cool, "fun" drug and a way for poor people to make quick money selling it on the street. Then, shortly after, Ronald Regan began the "War on Drugs" because of the rise in "dangerous drug interest".

In reality, this just gave law enforcement excuses to abuse black communities. If police officers "suspected" a young black man of possessing any amount of any illicit drugs (crack, marijuana, etc), they were thusly legally backed to beat, arrest, and steal any property the black man had on them. Police were protected by the law, thanks to the initiatives put in place by the "War on Drugs". This is part of the vitriol behind it in the US. Something like possession of marijuana is considered a 'victimless crime', because it does not require you impeding on someone else's rights. Yet, people who were caught in possession of things like Marijuana and Crack were receiving larger prison sentences than people who had committed crimes such as burglary and homicide. To top this off, in the US, you are legally allowed to exploit prisoners as slave labor, and since prisons were privatized, it incentivized putting away as many people for as long as possible.

So, the "War on Drugs" is a misnomer and a term purposefully used to obfuscate the real issue behind the matter.
I see. From a canadian point of view, the USA seems truly dystopian at times.
 

Taleisin

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I see. From a canadian point of view, the USA seems truly dystopian at times.
I imagine many of the issues in Canada stem directly from following the USA's example, including this one
 
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manpaint

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I imagine many of the issues in Canada stem directly from following the USA's example, including this one
While it is true that we indeed follow the USA on a lot of things, it is my impression that we often get better versions of things conceptualized in the USA as they were trialed first and any misteps is seen. That being said I am no canadian politics expert, so perphaps I just don't have enough information.
 

dimensionalist

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The war on drugs = trash and based on trash attitudes. You can't punish people more than the deserve to be punished. Three strikes laws are trash also. The Mexican drug war, Duterte getting people to shoot anyone who does drugs in the Philippines, its all wrong. To some extent you have to just let the drugs do the harm they will.
 
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punishedgnome

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I think that cracking down on trafficking for some drugs that cause obvious societal harm like opiates is OK, but no one should ever be arrested for simple possession.

Stuff like weed and most psychedelics? Fuck off it's my body.
 
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