Drug Legalization
by Jack Tourette
© 1995
Forget taxes, forget medical and industrial uses. The fundamental issue
of the drug legalization debate is the individual's right to absolute
sovereignty over the self. Drug use is a personal choice and merits the
same Constitutional protection as freedom of speech and religion.
Stephen Chapman wrote in his 10 November op-ed that the Dutch have made the
use of cannabis "a matter of personal choice." He notes that "the percentage
of people in the Netherlands who use cannabis in a given month has been stable
since 1987," and that "pot smoking is about half as common among Dutch teen-agers
as it is among American kids." The Dutch have had similar success controlling
the use of harder drugs, without an increase in crime.
The Dutch approach contrasts sharply with the disastrous attempts at drug
eradication in the United States. Drug laws have created a lucrative economy
of more compact (easier to smuggle), more dangerous forms of drugs (more bang
for the buck). Misinformation has exacerbated the problem by breeding ignorance
and disrespect for authority. What was a minor public health problem (isolated
drug abuse) is now a major social problem: robbery, burglary, gang warfare,
over-burdened courts, property forfeiture, unfair prison sentences, prison
crowding, police corruption, and inner-city deterioration.
Despite the drug war-spawned problems, many people use drugs responsibly -
some recreationally, others medically or as part of spiritual practices.
Prudent drug use can improve one's mental health and enrich one's spiritual
life. Government sophistry to the contrary, drug dangers are easily minimized.
Drugs have always been a part of human culture. The key to control is not
prohibition but incorporation into the mainstream. Legalization is only the
first step in incorporation, and must take place gradually. Emphasis on
education and personal responsibility is required; until then, responsible
users will remain in the minority.
Some common arguments against drug legalization are refuted as follows:
Drugs effects are not real
Many drug effects are indistinguishable from states attained spontaneously or
through religious practice or meditation; other drug effects are fun. If a
certain activity makes one happy, that emotion is no less meaningful because
it came from a drug. This reasoning also applies to other pastimes: how real
is a movie or a novel compared to 'real life'? Why not let the individual
decide?
Drugs are a crutch
While non-medical forms of drugs are not essential to the sustenance of life,
neither is religion, entertainment, privacy, etc. Life would be pretty bleak
without any of those 'non-essentials'. Let the individual decide what is
necessary.
Drugs are dangerous
Some are dangerous, other are not. In a free society, accurate information
about safe drugs and methods of use would be freely available. In such a
society, people would make informed decisions about drugs the same as they
do today for such risky activities as car travel or hazardous sports.
Drugs are addictive
Drugs have been used for millenia; only recently has the use of highly
purified, highly concentrated forms become common.
Drug users harm others
Laws currently in place already address driving under the influence and public
intoxication. Workplace impairment is easily detected using simple tests of
dexterity or reaction time; tests that detect metabolites of drugs ingested
weeks or months in the past do not. The issue is public safety, not publicly
acceptable lifestyle.
Drug benefits:
The content and nature of the experiences that [psychedelics] induce
are thus not artificial products of their pharmacological intervention
with the brain ("toxic psychoses"), but authentic expressions of the
psyche revealing its functioning on levels ordinarily not available
for observation and study.
[...]
For this reason, it does not seem to be an exaggeration to say that
psychedelics, used responsibly and with proper caution, would be for
psychiatry what the microscope is for biology and medicine or the
telescope is for astronomy.
Dr. Stanislav Grof (b.1931)
LSD Psychotherapy, 1980
The Declaration of Independence holds as self-evident truth the unalienable
rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Drug prohibition
violates these rights. Control of one's mind and body is a private matter,
outside the mandate of government. Until drug prohibition ends, individual
freedoms will diminish and social problems will worsen.
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