fafalone

And you're not giving *any* numbers that indicate the percentage would increase if resources were dedicated to helping addicts who want to stop and increasing education about the subject.

mm hmm

They support their claims with statistics, go through all the links too.

Where might I find those surveys?

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/dea/pubs/legaliz/claim3.htm Read through that.

I'm asking you to provide evidence that decriminalization of drug use will drastically increase usage; because this simply hasn't happened in countries where use is not policed.

I don't think so.

Here we go, please provide some non-anecdotal evidence to support that claim.

and even then, IV heroin is probably the only drug with a higher death rate among its users than alcohol and tobacco (one of the leading causes of death) Do you know how hard it is to die of an overdose of cocaine? You would need 1000mg of PURE cocaine (street samples are about 50% pure) taken within ONE HOUR (the liver metabolizes it quite quickly). The death rate among users of only hallucinogens (LSD, DMT) is ZERO.

My point was that drug use causes less deaths, which is true; the deaths per users is not currently being discussed because the burden on society is measured by quanitity, not percentage.

Thread split off from the unrelated parent thread for more debate in a main-page forum. It qualifies for this forum because "Drugs and Behavoir" is a psychology course I happen to be taking next semester (starts next tuesday)

The government should be focused on HELPING addicts, not locking them up along with recreational users. 59.6% of inmates are in for non-violent drug offenses, 2.7% are in for ALL violent offenses (see the previously given breakdown of this), it's not hard to see that the cost of maintaining the exploding number of prisoners and the DEA's budget (which, by the way, is much larger than the Department of Education's budget) is clearly far more of a burden to society than dedicating resources to helping addicts and making the INEVITABLE use of drugs safer.

oh and alcohol is up at 25-30% (NIDA website)

3% of violent criminals in state prisons were under the influence of crack or powder cocaine at the time their crime was committed, and only 1% were under the influence of heroin (1999, National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University (CASA))

Benign? Do you have the good fortune of not knowing any agressive alcoholics? Addictiveness and risk: There are no deaths linked solely to marijuana, LSD, DMT, and some other drugs. All three of the previously mentioned drugs are not physically addictive, and hallucinogens are not held to be psychologically addictive. Cocaine is not physically addictive unless extremely heavy dosages are frequently taken (withdrawal is treated with trazodone, have you heard of it? not alot of people have); it is however very psychologically addictive; however risk is low as occaisonal recreational use does not create problems. Heroin is physically and psychologically addictive, but no more so than cigarettes. Irresponsible use leads to health problems.. alot like alcohol. People who want it are going to get it no matter how hard the DEA tries.

Nicotine is more addictive than heroin; it's a scientific fact. Not all people who take it get addicted, and alcohol-related violence is a millionfold more prevalent than heroin-related violence.

..and we're looking for a general solution, since specific solutions exist and are not too difficult to find.

Ok, and alcohol and tobacco should be completely legal and people doing small amounts of other drugs should have their lives ruined by a drug conviction why?

The message is the entire problem. Consenting adults should not be barred from putting certain chemicals (that, mind you, are generally far safer and linked to less long term effects than alcohol and tobacco (with the possible exception of long-term dissociative use creating holes in the brain)) into their own bodies in their own homes. The DEA's message is that if you use drugs you'll either die or turn into a violent junkie... this simply isn't true.

Anyone familiar with what measures were taking to ensure bacteria from earth didn't get onto the surface of mars from the various probes that have landed on it?

it's the Drug Enforcement Agency logo with a big red X through it. because they're an evil propaganda machine who go around ruining hundreds of thousands of lives per year of people who believe they should be free to put whatever chemicals they want into their own body, spreading misinformation and their own heavily biased interpretation of studies that actually support the opposite of current drug policy in the US. they refuse to send agents to formal structured drug debates because their own debate manual admits they lose every time.

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