Russell Brand Tells UN That Drugs Ban Leads Only To 'Death, Suffering, Crime' - Polidicks

[QUOTE=MightyLOLZOR;44296812]I don't know, the effects of various drugs differ from person to person, so I think it's too much of a gray subject for the government to legalize all drugs, and I don't know if I would be comfortable in a world where drugs are legal because some random guy could go berzerk and kill me and/or others. I know shit like that happens even now, but with all drugs legal, the world would be a crazy place.[/QUOTE] portugal's pretty much decriminalised all drugs and it's been pretty alright

[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;44295166]I've had family members who have been addicted to drugs, and still gone to work after blowing their mind. Come home, play and chat with family about their days, goto bed and goto work the next morning. If you can do that, I cannot see any reason to why you shouldn't be allowed to find some enjoyment with drugs. You are a functional addict, a functional addict that is still keeping their family healthy and happy, and doing things that benefit your country.[/QUOTE] Yeah if you can maintain your addiction with readily available product of consistent quality and strength without dangerous contaminates in the right dosages and with clean paraphenalia you can function comparably with someone addicted to something considered far more benign i.e. coffee or cigarettes Prohibition doesn't help people maintain their addictions or use responsibly - it just stigmatises them and makes them more likely to suffer terrible consequences if they do develop a what is considered an actual problem due to lack of regulation, unbiased education, and support. [QUOTE=Lachz0r;44295979]everything on earth will fuck you up if you abuse it/misuse it/use too much[/QUOTE] Exactly. And the current prohibition framework does nothing to help people use substances safely. In fact, it does the opposite - it pushes them to obtain drugs from an unregulated black market from people only interested in profits where strength is mostly unknown and contamination is rife. Overdosing would happen a lot less if people knew the strength of their shit, could get clean paraphernalia, use in a safe place, and had unbiased educational material and support available without any stigmatisation. [QUOTE=Doom64hunter;44298264]Even if selling and consuming drugs were legalized, it wouldn't make all problems magically go away[/QUOTE] I don't think anybody thinks that would be the case. It could certainly, if done in a sensible waym, minimise many of them i.e. if properly regulated there would be less issue with variable strength product causing accidental overdoses and contamination in the harder substances. It's not some magical switch - it needs to be done properly and ongoing support and effort needs to be continually delivered in order to counter the problems that remain to minimise their detrimental effects on individuals and on society as a whole. I reckon the way drugs education is in most places is kinda like abstinence only sex education - it's unrealistic and counter-productive. It causes stigmatisation and breeds ignorance. What's needed is unbiased education covering how to obtain, check/test, and use substances safely and the positives and negatives of each substance.

[QUOTE=ScoobyV2;44297051]To be honest. Legalizing recreational drugs would be awesome. And cigarettes should be banned, it's an awful habit.[/QUOTE] How does that make any sense whatsoever. Both are drugs. Both are harmful albeit to a different degree. Just because you don't like cigarettes doesn't mean they should be banned. The last time the government tried to ban something millions of people indulged in for decades a lot of bad shit happened.

Cigarette use has declined a lot in recent years and this could be attributed to the rise in educational material available on the subject and it's harms, etc. Banning them wouldn't really help - it would just create a black market. It goes to show really that if the education is the reason for the decline (which it very likely is) then people CAN think for themselves and make their own decisions based on the information that is made available to them. They aren't brainless sheep. If you keep people well informed then it tends to be fine to trust them to decide what they want to do for themselves. Garbage in - Garbage out and all that...

[QUOTE=Doom64hunter;44298264]Even if selling and consuming drugs were legalized, it wouldn't make all problems magically go away[/QUOTE] Why would you want to go and see a dealer and deal with all that shit, when you could go to a chemist/pharmacy and just buy a few grams of weed or whatever and then just deal with it like any other material we buy.

Russell Brand is Jack Sparrow in real life.

[QUOTE=Lachz0r;44295979]everything on earth will fuck you up if you abuse it/misuse it/use too much[/QUOTE] Still there are drugs that are relatively benign and drugs that are completely horrible. Would you allow people to take as much meth or heroin as they want? No because both are aweful drugs that destroy a person, other drugs like mushrooms and pot are fine as long as the person takes it in a safe way.

[QUOTE=Sableye;44298805]Still there are drugs that are relatively benign and drugs that are completely horrible. Would you allow people to take as much meth or heroin as they want? No because both are aweful drugs that destroy a person, other drugs like mushrooms and pot are fine as long as the person takes it in a safe way.[/QUOTE] It's possible to use harder drugs responsibly too. Prohibition doesn't help people do that, though. If people knew the strength of the product they were getting and that it wasn't contaminated, they used clean paraphernalia, etc. they would have a much better shot of using them safely. Even if they got addicted - without prohibition it would be more possible to effectively maintain an addiction and continue to function normally. Addiction is used as some demon word when actually when properly maintained many of the negatives that are associated with addiction disappear or become less of an issue. People don't overdose deliberately - that's more caused by variable strength and quality of product and poor dosing - caused by black market, lack of education, and stigmatisation. There are a lot of people who use heroin and other hard drugs occasionally without becoming addicted but you tend to hear more about the addicted ones because they're the ones that end up in scare campaigns and D.A.R.E. bullshit because addiction is used as a trigger word.