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A relevant quote from law professor Amanda Frost: Attitudes towards nationwide injunctions also turn on one’s view of the courts…
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With regards to the courts, I think we’re about to see the Supremes tell lower courts that their rulings will…
the people he picks to work in his administration are supposed to support that effort as long as they don’t…
@Ron: What do you think Trump did in his first term that was unique or made a positive impact on…
During his first term Trump walked into the White House with no experience in government, so he selected a lot…
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Be careful about what’s sometimes done in the name of treatment–there’s a book called _Help at Any Cost_ about teen rehab which is considerably worse than prison.
nice one, Amp.
Does anyone else think that Amp’s cartoons tend to pander to the dominant decimal paradigm?
Not to hijack the thread too much, but then there’s the associated question of why we would jail drug users who are not addicts? Why put someone in jail for buying marijuana, for example? Or even fine them (presuming their state of mind is not an issue while they are committing an actual crime)?
Why put someone in jail for buying marijuana, for example? Or even fine them (presuming their state of mind is not an issue while they are committing an actual crime)?
No idea. Alcohol and tobacco are far more dangerous drugs than marijuana–and more likely to be gateway drugs. Not to hijack the thread even further, but another whole issue is the question of whether punishment works at all. In the absence of effective treatment, we have to jail criminals to prevent them from hurting others, but the recidivism (sp?) rates suggest that imprisoning people isn’t a particularly good method of changing their behavior. Drug rehab can be somewhat more effective than punitive measures. Does that suggest that we should be looking for a treatment for stealing, violence, etc as well?
As a prisoner of the drug war, i’d like to state i don’t think i’m a “drug addict” just because i smoke pot. i don’t want prison OR treatment. why can’t I be treated the same as all those addicted to nicotine?? i never hurt anyone (or commited any other crime), yet i have to pay the court 100s of dollars, pick trash up off the street, and spent 16 hours in jail. the drug war is so dumb – who the hell declares a war on your own country?!?!
Everyone here probably already knows this, but a friend was showing me some stats last night that America has five percent of the world’s population and a quarter of the world’s prisoners.
Sounds about right, Mandolin. We incarcerate something like one percent of our population.
There’s a case to be made that we have more prisoners because we have the resources to lock up everybody who ought to be locked up. Places with fewer prisoners aren’t “nicer”; they just don’t have the money to incarcerate less-serious offenders, who are instead left free to terrorize the population.
On this post, I’d suggest a #11: Because lots of drug addicts don’t want to stop using, a large fraction of that group commits crimes to support their habit, and for that subpopulation, drug rehab is an expensive waste of time and resources. The presence of those folks in rehab would also be highly destructive to the aspirations of the people who are there who do want to stop using, as well.
And just for fun: Admissions to drug treatment programs in 2003: 1.7 million
Number of people convicted and locked up for drug crimes each year (as of 1998): 100,000
That’s some cartooning power you’ve got there, Amp! You made the desired outcome come true retrospectively.
Robert,
I’m sure having the money to build prisons is a factor. I wouldn’t support it being the only one.
Robert: it seems like you’re quoting the statistics very selectively there. The first paragraph of the second page you link to reads (emphasis mine):
You can quote statistics out of context to try to make whatever point you’d like, but I believe that this is what Amp is getting at with the cartoon.
In terms of the US incarcerating more people because we have better or more numerous facilities: you might want to examine the reasons why we have those facilities. The prison-industrial complex is a booming business these days; there’s a lot of money to be made building and administering prisons, and someone’s got to fill those prisons in order for the profits to keep flowing.
Because lots of drug addicts don’t want to stop using,
So? Lots of smokers don’t want to stop using either. Should we arrest them as well? Smoking is decidedly dangerous to the user and can be dangerous to those around him or her as well (second hand smoke, fire risk, etc)
a large fraction of that group commits crimes to support their habit,
Put them in prison for the crimes they commit to support their habit. Or, better yet, start a registered addicts program like in some European countries that allows addicts to get their drug in controlled doses with clean needles from the state so that they don’t need to commit any crimes to support their habit. And if they want to stop using, easy referral to a drug treatment program.
Dianne: Not to hijack the thread too much, but then there’s the associated question of why we would jail drug users who are not addicts?
For that matter, why should the government jail drug users who are addicts?
If it’s in the interest of protecting other people from crimes committed by addicts, there are (as you mention above to Robert) already laws against those crimes, without adding drug prohibition on top of it. If it’s in the interest of helping the addicts stop hurting themselves, troubled people stop hurting themselves, then restraining them and locking them in a cage with a bunch of violent criminals seems like a strange way of looking out for their welfare.
Amp,
You’re right about the foolishness of imprisoning drug users. But government-forced “treatment” (which is, in the last resort, always backed up with the threat of prison) is not much better. The whole system of drug prohibition, as such, whether enforced through coercive psychotherapy or through simple imprisonment, is institutionalized sadism against innocent people, being passed off as “for their own good.”
I generally agree that drug use ought not be illegal.
But since it is, then the justice system needs to treat it like other things that are crimes.
Dianne, the point of my statement was that we lock up some drug addicts because they don’t want treatment and their continued freedom impinges on the rights of other people in the community. Locking them up for the individual petty or not-so-petty crimes they commit to support their habit isn’t really practical; those crimes are the symptom, not the problem.
You may feel that a European model of permanently supporting a drug underclass is beneficial; most Americans disagree. (For one thing, why get off the drugs if you get to have a decent life regardless of your irresponsibility? Responsibility and work are hard. There are a lot of people who will take the softer option if it’s made available.)
All drug use, Robert? Pot is way less detrimental than alcohol or cigarettes. All you want to do is chill and eat Twinkies. Mary Jane should be legalized and taxed the shit out of to pay for “real” addicts’ rehab in our jails. You can’t force anyone to change, but while confined a person gets time to reevaluate their direction in life and remember just what their aspirations were before they got addicted. Hey, it worked for me!
Robert:
Why?
There is no virtue in rigorously enforcing laws admittedly unreasonable or unjust. Hypocrisy may be a vice, but that doesn’t mean that consistency in evil is a virtue. It is merely relentlessness.
Robert:
Drugs don’t rob people. Robbers rob people.
If the existing laws against robbery are not strong enough to stop the robbers, then the thing to do is try to strengthen the laws against robbery, not to enforce a blanket prohibition against any use of addictive drugs. Some drug addicts steal to support their habit, and others don’t; if someone isn’t stealing to support her habit then the government has absolutely no business restraining and imprisoning her for the unrelated crimes committed by other drug users. That’s nothing more than collective punishment being inflicted on peaceful people who have done nothing to deserve it.
Dr. O’Skonsky:
It is not appropriate to imprison people as a means of career counseling. Those addicts who see that they have a problem have every right to seek treatment for themselves, and I hope it does them a lot of good. But if they are not interested in seeking help right now, the government has no legitimate right to force them participate in it against their will, or to lock them in a cage in order to try to reform their souls.
Why? There is no virtue in rigorously enforcing laws admittedly unreasonable or unjust.
Certainly there is: to maintain the validity of our system of government.
If democratically-elected legislatures pass laws, and those laws are not odious to the constitution under which they operate, then the laws should be enforced regardless of whether they are reasonable or just. To do otherwise is to imbue some unelected body with the power to override the decisions of the legislature on matters specifically entrusted to the legislature.
Our drug laws are mostly dumb, but they aren’t odious to the constitution(s) involved. If the people want dumb laws, then dumb laws the people shall have. I’m not comfortable overriding the expressed will of the populace simply because I consider myself smarter and more informed than they are.
Put it another way: I consider myself smarter and more informed than you. What decisions do you make for yourself, that I should get to override and change in your life, on the basis that I think your decisions are unreasonable?
the government has absolutely no business restraining and imprisoning her for the unrelated crimes committed by other drug users
Yes, I quite agree.
The point is that among the population of drug users who are also criminals (other than the “crimes” they commit in the ordinary process of getting and having their drugs), there is a big chunk who don’t want to stop using. For this group, sending them to rehabilitation (the point of this thread) is worse than useless – not only do they not want to be there, not only are they going to interfere with the progress of the people who do want to be there, but they are going to go out and commit more crimes while they’re in/around the non-lockup rehab process. For this group, locking them up is the only interventionist approach that makes any sense. The reason we need to lock them up rather than rehab them is that if we put them in rehab, they will continue hurting people outside the system.
Robert,
A system of government is not more important than millions of innocent people’s lives and livelihoods. If maintaining the “validity” of the former requires destroying the latter, then the system of government deserves to be ignored, altered or abolished.
Why?
Enforcing an unjust law means using violence against innocent people in order to secure an aim that is unworthy of securing. Neither electoral majorities nor Constitutions have total authority over the people subject to them, and if they have legitimate authority it is only because of the justice of the policies they endorse. Laws or constitutions that endorse unjust violence against innocent people have stepped outside of the boundaries of their legitimate authority, and are no more legitimately binding than criminal compacts or pirates’ codes.
It’s not a matter of an “unelected body” having some kind of special authority to veto the acts of the legislature. It’s a matter of the legislature not having any special authority to commit injustice against the innocent. Everybody — not as a “body,” but as free individuals — has the right to ignore or defy so-called laws that the legislature has no legitimate authority to enact: an “unjust law” is no law at all, and the idea that anyone is obliged to carry out an admitted injustice against innocent people is an affront to conscience.
Is this some kind of joke?
You have things exactly backward. Drug prohibition is founded on the premise that one group of people, who consider themselves smarter and more informed (the government, and perhaps the electoral majority behind them) are entitled to override the decisions of another group of people (drug users), on the grounds that the drug users’ decisions are unreasonable. Not only do they claim to be entitled to override drug users’ decisions about their own lives; they claim to be entitled to force drug users to comply with their judgments.
Demanding that “the people,” or the government, stop imposing their will on nonviolent drug users, does not involve overriding the decisions that they have made for themselves. It involves overriding the decisions that they have forced on innocent third parties, but those are “decisions” that neither “the people” nor the government had any right to make.
Robert:
Yes, Robert, but that’s a reason to lock them up for theft, or robbery or whatever crimes against person or property that they have been committing. It has nothing at all to do with the proper punishment (if any) for drug use.
But it’s punishments inflicted for drug use that Amp was addressing in his cartoon. I can’t find any plausible reading of the cartoon on which it would be suggesting that you shouldn’t imprison thieves or robbers who also happen to be drug addicts.
if they have legitimate authority it is only because of the justice of the policies they endorse
Nonsense. They have legitimate authority through the assent of the governed, not because of some intangible (and empirically unprovable) characteristic of their policies.
Everybody — not as a “body,” but as free individuals — has the right to ignore or defy so-called laws that the legislature has no legitimate authority to enact
True. But our legislatures have legitimate authority to enact laws concerning commerce, concerning substances, concerning personal behavior in many spheres. Our Constitution and legal tradition set limits on this power; those limits have not been exceeded by our drug laws.
Not only do they claim to be entitled to override drug users’ decisions about their own lives; they claim to be entitled to force drug users to comply with their judgments.
And they are so entitled, by their possession of a democratically-legitimized set of authorities.
The people, through their representatives, have decreed that certain acts and possessions are in violation of the law; I (and you, I assume) disagree that these laws are a good idea – but we lost the match. The fact that we lost the fight doesn’t mean that the sport is no longer valid.
Demanding that “the people,” or the government, stop imposing their will on nonviolent drug users, does not involve overriding the decisions that they have made for themselves.
But it does. They decided to elect a certain set of representatives, and those representatives made certain laws, and the judges in the society ruled that the laws fell within the legitimate exercise of state power, and so forth. For an individual or minority group which disagrees with those laws to demand that they not be enforced is for that group to de-legitimize the state.
And hey, de-legitimizing the state is a fun activity for the weekend. But it’s not what most of us want. And so saying drug laws are invalid because we find them unjust – when the populace disagrees – is an attempt to override the legitimate choices of other people. The legislature can point to a big chunk of people who affirmatively chose to give them power; you can’t.
Part of the problem is use of the term “drugs”, as if all drugs have the same effects on the body and mind, take the same amount of time to leave the body, are all addictive, etc.
There isn’t any good reason why marijuana shouldn’t be legal; sure, it can make you lazy and dumb, but so can television. Potheads don’t tend to have anger-management problems. Meth addicts do. Handing meth out at government-approved dispensaries is not going to cut down on the street crime committed by meth users.
I’m all for treatment instead of prisons. But every time I hear the drug-laws-are-infringing-on-civil-liberties arguments, I think of a couple of things: first, “yeah! get the violence off the streets, and back in the home, where it belongs!” and second, “yeah! make drug use cost-free for middle-class suburbanites, and keep all the negatives for those other neighborhoods to deal with—that’s their problem!”
Because even if the addict isn’t getting caught committing street crime, it doesn’t mean they aren’t committing any street crimes. It’s easy to say “oh, just arrest them when they’re committing crime” when you live in a neighborhood that isn’t awash with street crime, and where if you call the police, they will treat you with respect, and actually investigate the crime. (Not saying this is necessarily true of you personally, rad geek, just that I’ve only heard this argument IRL from folks who have a certain modicum of privilege, such as being able to call the police without being assumed to be a criminal themselves). In my neighborhood, break-ins (and for the most part, muggings) are not investigated. A report will be taken, but no fingerprints are taken, no neighbors or other potential witnesses are questioned, there are no added police patrols in the area after repeated occurrences—nada. Street crime is seen to be part-and-parcel of living here; it’s our “due.”
Rad geek, the argument you present privileges wealthier drug users. Because let’s face it, most heroin addicts are not going to be capable of holding down an average, everyday job. Rock star and supermodel? Maybe—for awhile, until the heroin gets the best of ’em. But auto mechanic? So, the poor slob that gets addicted and doesn’t have the good fortune of getting a spot in the Betty Ford Clinic gets to resort to smashing in my back window and running off to the pawn shop with my TV for his fix, while the rich slob (or the slob with rich relatives) gets to keep on getting high. What about the children of addicts? I was one. My father was addicted to the favorite legal drug in the U.S.—alcohol. And because it is “legal” society didn’t really view his addiction as a problem. And why should “society” have viewed his alcoholism as a problem? His alcohol-fueled violent rages weren’t a problem to society because they happened behind closed doors.
That’s where I’m coming from—-the idea that keeping addictions “quiet” and away from the “public” eye (the public that counts, y’know) is going to solve any problems. Prison clearly isn’t solving them either. I don’t know if mandatory in-house drug-treatment programs, away from the general prison population is going to work all that well—but it would probably work better than what we have right now. There are addicts who feel a need for an in-house program, but there are long waiting lists for spots. Addicts who don’t have access to an insurance-paid program are SOL.
Oh, and can we get rid of the idea that buying and using drugs is a “victimless” crime? Ok, if you grew your own pot to smoke, yes. But snorting cocaine in the privacy of your own home? Uh-uh. That cocaine has blood on it. People were killed in order for that cocaine to end up in your nose. Children were shot so you could have that “high”. Just because you don’t know, and haven’t seen the victims, doesn’t mean there aren’t any. Folks are choosing to ignore those victims, because it isn’t convenient.
Frankly, I wonder how much of our drug problem in the U.S. is caused by an attempt to self-medicate—not having access to better mental health strategies. Maybe drug treatment programs would help take the stigma away from addicts, while providing them with treatment that most of them currently have no access to.
La Lubu: Rad geek, the argument you present privileges wealthier drug users. Because let’s face it, most heroin addicts are not going to be capable of holding down an average, everyday job.
La Lubu, I’m not suggesting that heroin addiction is a good idea, or that it’s not a problem. I’m denying that heroin addicts should not be thrown in prison for using heroin. If people claim to be concerned about the welfare of addicts then they should not suggest restraining them and locking them in a cage with a population of violent criminals. If people claim to be concerned about the welfare of people other than the addicts (e.g. victims of street crime, or victims of violence or neglect in the home, or whatever), then the issue for the legal system to address is theft, battery, neglect, etc., not the drug use.
It’s certainly true that many people cannot afford rehab on their own. That’s a damn shame, but it is not a justification for forcing rehab on them against their will. It’s a good reason to try to make it available to poor people (through financial aid, sliding-scale programs, etc.). It’s not a good reason to (a) lock them in prison or (b) threaten to lock them in prison unless they participate.
Your suggestion that I’m unfamiliar with the violence involved in drug trafficking, or with the the way that people are victimized by drug users in their family, is unfounded, and it’s frankly shitty of you to presume otherwise without any knowledge of me or my family. I’m well aware of the former, and my own family has far too much personal experience with neglect, abandonment, and physical abuse that was tied to alcoholism and other drug addictions. I’ve nowhere claimed that irresponsible drug use isn’t a problem; what I’ve claimed is that the massive government violence involved in drug prohibition isn’t a reasonable response to those problem.
Robert:
The “assent” of an electoral majority is certainly not sufficient for legitimacy. Even if the majority of the electorate approved of, say, the Nuremberg Laws, or the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, that would be absolutely no argument for the legitimacy of the Nuremberg Laws or the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. And it would be no argument for enforcing either of them. Unless you are willing to accept a totalitarian theory of political authority, then you are, I’m afraid, stuck with recognizing that there are in principle some limits on what a government can enact, even if that government is backed by a majority of the electorate. (It does not matter whether the authority consists of 535 legislators, or of 50%+1 of the voting public; the point is that there are things that nobody at all has the right to do to other people.)
Now, you could claim, if you wanted, that some policies are more monstrously unjust than others, and only the really really monstrous ones should be refused on the grounds of their injustice. But then you’ll have to give some argument for why the massive violence involved in drug prohibition (including the violence of arrest and incarceration, and also the violence that results from driving the market underground) is only on “merely unjust” rather than “monstrously unjust” side of the ledger. Or you could claim, if you wanted, that any atrocity that’s backed up by an electoral majority under a democratic constitution really is legitimate, no matter how unjust it is. But if you want to argue that, then you’ll have to explain where you think that electoral majorities get the right to treat dissenters that way.
Me:
Robert:
You’ve missed the point. You’ve also seriously misunderstood, or misrepresented, my position.
Your rhetoric about overriding the decisions of others is plausible only insofar as you’re referring to the decisions that people make concerning themselves. It would be, for example, presumptuous of me to try to override your decisions about what sort of education you should get, or where you should work, or what size of a family you should have, or how you should decorate your living room. I have no business making you change your plans about these things against your will, even if you would end up with a better education, or a better job, or a more rewarding family life, or a more attractive living room, as a result. But I have every right to “override” decisions that you are trying to make for me: if you are trying to force me to go to the college that you prefer for me, or take the job that you prefer for me, or decorate my living room the way you want me to decorate it, then I have every bloody right to “override” that decision, because you have no right to make the decision for me.
You cannot sensibly posture as wanting to let people alone to make their own decisions here while also endorsing the enforcement of drug prohibition. Drug prohibition just means interfering, by the use or threat of physical force, with people’s decisions about how to spend their own time and what to put into their own bodies. When I suggest that drug laws should not be enforced, the only decisions I am “overriding” are the decisions that the governing majority wants to impose on peaceful third parties against their will. And I don’t give a damn about whether or not the governing majority is left alone to push innocent third parties around. That’s not something they have the right to expect.
Further, I’d like to note that I did not claim that any law is void because “we” find it unjust. The claim is that laws are void if they are actually unjust, whether or not anyone finds them so. If I thikn the laws against slavery are unjust, and so defy them by enslaving my neighbors, that does not mean that the laws are void, and does not making enforcing them illegitimate. It just makes me monstrously wrong about the moral status of the laws in question. The issue has to do with how a law actually treats the people subjected to it, not how third parties look on happen to react to that treatment.
Robert:
What my argument “de-legitimizes” is the government inflicting injustice upon innocent third parties, even if it should scribble down a permission slip for itself to commit the injustice, and call it a “Law.” If the state can carry out its policies without doing injustice to innocent third parties, then more power to it. If the state cannot do its business without invading the rights of innocent people, however, then its business had jolly well better be left undone. This has nothing to do with whether a faction of one or more people “disagree” with the law; it has to do with whether or not the law violates innocent people’s rights (that is, whether or not it involves pushing around people who aren’t doing any violence themselves).
Robert:
I don’t give a damn. Might does not make right, whether from the force of arms or from the force of numbers. The rights of drug users to be let alone to make their own decisions does not depend on permission from the powerful, or from the majority.
Or you could claim, if you wanted, that any atrocity that’s backed up by an electoral majority under a democratic constitution really is legitimate, no matter how unjust it is. But if you want to argue that, then you’ll have to explain where you think that electoral majorities get the right to treat dissenters that way.
Out of the barrel of a gun. Same place all states derive power. The only difference in a democratic state is democratic assent to state force.
What do you mean by “legitimate”? Morally legitimate? Theologically legitimate?
By legitimate in this context, I mean (a) acceded to by the people, or their representatives and (b) valid under the Constitutional order in place. A legitimate act of the state can be immoral – cf. the Fugitive Slave Act. You can resist it, and have moral or theological legitimacy for your actions; if you believe that laws against killer bud are wrong and want to grow some in your basement, go nuts. But the law itself is legitimate. The state doesn’t cease to be a reifiable and empirically extant entity because some subgroup disapproves of some policy. If you wish to fight it, that’s your prerogative; if you wish to change it through legislative power, that’s also a valid course of action.
But I have every right to “override” decisions that you are trying to make for me: if you are trying to force me to go to the college that you prefer for me, or take the job that you prefer for me, or decorate my living room the way you want me to decorate it, then I have every bloody right to “override” that decision, because you have no right to make the decision for me.
Quite true. But drug laws are not forcing you to go to a certain school, or work in a certain way. They are barring you from possessing a particular substance – which is an entirely valid exercise of state power. Our Constitution gives the state this ability; our judges agree that the power is not alien to our national values; our populace gives its assent. You’re attempting to your right to make your own decisions with your right to order the world as you wish. But your right to carry your decisions out is limited. You don’t get to go to Harvard if Harvard doesn’t want you; you don’t get work at IBM if they don’t want to hire you; you don’t get to decorate your living room with spotted owl feathers.
You cannot sensibly posture as wanting to let people alone to make their own decisions here while also endorsing the enforcement of drug prohibition.
Watch me.
I want people left alone to make their own decisions. I also accept that I live in a society, where other people have different ideas. On some topics, my ideas will not hold sway. I will not be privileged to order society exactly as I wish it ordered. I believe things would be better if my idea of what is right were shared by everyone and duly constituted into law – but I am one person in a society of 300 million. They get a vote, too, and their vote happens to outweigh mine.
Your claim that “laws are void if they are actually unjust, whether or not anyone finds them so” is laughable. Just according to what? Do you have some empirical computer standing icily aloof from all human connections, which computes the Justice Utility of each legal thought and shares its wisdom with us? No, you don’t. You can’t define justice in any way which is not massively subjective; philosophers have tried for 4000 years and have achieved precisely dick. Justice is a subjective and human interpretation, and there’s no way around it.
There are a LOT of laws that I think are unjust. Why CAN’T I carpet my house with spotted owl feathers? Why SHOULDN’T Amp toil around the clock as my unpaid slave? Why CAN’T I grow twenty thousand prime sativa plants in the backyard?
The answer is that I am a member of a society, not an autonomous monad. The people I have to live with have decided – in a format that is quite respectful of alternative points of view and which gives us lots of chances to argue out and see how we ought to decide things – that slavery is wrong, spotted owls deserve protection, and the sweet kind bud is off limits. I happen to agree with two out of three of these. But fooling myself that one of the three laws is “unjust” according to some bullshit magical objectivism doesn’t privilege me to overturn it on my own. I can fight the power (and face the consequences), or I can use the democratic process to attempt to get to a more just social order.
The alternative is not fuzzy anarchy, where everyone lives in peace and happiness; the alternative is bloody tyranny by the most vicious and ruthless of us (me, as it happens).
First off,
Your suggestion that I’m unfamiliar with the violence involved in drug trafficking, or with the the way that people are victimized by drug users in their family, is unfounded, and it’s frankly shitty of you to presume otherwise without any knowledge of me or my family.
I didn’t. I specifically wrote: Not saying this is necessarily true of you personally, rad geek.
I agree that locking addicts up with violent criminals is not only not a good idea, but makes a bad situation worse. But why isn’t forcible detention in a treatment center a good idea? True, the addict may not cooperate, and not get the benefit of the treatment. But other people will benefit—the ones who weren’t mugged, stolen from, or battered by the addict. Your argument that no crime is committed if no damage has yet been proven could easily be extended to drunk driving—if someone drives drunk, but doesn’t run over anyone or into anything, then there was “no damage done”. My point is, it’s only a short matter of time before the damage is done, and quite frankly, a lot of damage probably already has been done, but because of prexisting “isms” like racism, sexism, and classism, either the victims of that damage have not reported the crime, or they have and the reaction of the police was “so what” (or, “you’re lying”).
I’m just saying, you can’t separate the preexisting conditions from the legality or illegality of substance abuse. Right now, I’m having a hard time believing that addicts will just walk merrily over to the dispensary for their free fix, and loll around blissfully until the next one. Right now, I’m thinking mandatory incarceration at drug treatment centers is a good idea. Addicts do engage in destructive behavior, and until that destructive behavior is visited upon people who “count”, nobody gives a damn. Yes, I think pot should be decriminalized. If you grow and smoke your own, it should be no one else’s business (providing you’re not operating a vehicle or heavy machinery, or otherwise putting other folks at risk). Get stoned on the couch? Have at ‘er. But no, decriminalizing meth, cocaine, or heroin is going to make a bad situation worse. Yes, the “drug war” is stupid (and racist, and classist). Decriminalization of some other drugs would be, too.
How is mandatory treatment stupid? Do you feel that the mandatory DUI counseling and classes should be abolished?
This is really a criminal theory debate disguised as a drug debate, of course. It has something to do I think with who you consider as a stakeholder, and what metrics you look at. In theory, you decide on an appropriate fate (which in this context I am using to include both treatment and punishment–everything) based on a theory of ‘most benefit’.
The question is what metric you use for benefit.
I am torn on this.
Having worked in a U.S. Attorney’s office, I’m familiar with the sentences for federal druig offenses. Tney seem to me to be extreme. They are often, also, unrealistic insofar as the “dealer presumption” catches a lot of heavy users, aka addicts–which exposes them to extraordinarily harsh penalties at both federal and state levels. And of course there’s the “proportion” penalty inherent in the guidelines. (don’t know how wacky they are? Here’s a test: If the guidelines suggest a specific sentence for 10 kilograms of cocaine, can you guess what amount (in kilograms) is required for that same guideline sentence if the substance had been pot, or if it were crack? i’ll post the answer later)
On the other hand, I also strongly believe we have an obligation to enforce our laws and do our best to see that they are obeyed. So UNLESS WE ARE GOING TO CHANGE THE LAWS I have some trouble with the argument that we should selectively “unenforce” them to save money. In my view, selective enforcement is pretty easily abused. (and, in fact, it IS abused. Rush Limbaugh, anyone?)
The problem, of course, is that the solution is so large and requires such a sea change and action by so many fairly disparate agencies that is it very difficult to point to a single issue and say “that’s the problem, let’s solve it.”
For one thing, why get off the drugs if you get to have a decent life regardless of your irresponsibility?
Really? The only thing that keeps you from going off and becoming a cokehead or a heroin addict or whatever is the illegality and/or expense of it? Not ambition or a desire to live a decent life or love of your family or anything else? Would you really trade places with a drug addict who may be living on the streets or in substandard housing, unable to do much but get his or her next high if said druggie was getting his or her drugs safely from the state?
I think programs to provide drugs to addicts are useful because they decrease the risk of spreading HIV and other viruses, decrease the risk of dying from overdoses, and decrease the amount of petty crime related to drugs. But I agree that they aren’t the best solution. An effective cure would be the best solution, but, as you point out, some people aren’t ready to admit that they have a problem or are, in fact, content to live from high to high. Isn’t it better to keep these people as healthy as possible and prevent them from harming others as much as possible until they can get to a place where they are ready to accept treatment?
In my view, selective enforcement is pretty easily abused.
That’s a mild way of putting it. How about, “Selective enforcement is most often used to support institutionalized racism in the US?”
It’s easy to say “oh, just arrest them when they’re committing crime” when you live in a neighborhood that isn’t awash with street crime, and where if you call the police, they will treat you with respect, and actually investigate the crime. …In my neighborhood, break-ins (and for the most part, muggings) are not investigated.
Every crime ought to be investigated. The police should treat everyone, including, as far as possible, suspects, with respect and courtesy. Domestic violence should be treated as seriously as stranger violence, if not moreso–violence between strangers is not a betrayal of trust in the same way domestic violence is. But I see the current drug laws as an obstacle to those goals, not a step towards fulfilling them. In New York, thanks to the Rockefeller drug laws, drug convictions can earn sentences far greater than those imposed for violent crimes. This has at least two negative effects that I can think of: One, it means that anyone who has used drugs is reluctant to call the police when they are the victim of a crime because of fear that the police will find out their history (perhaps they have drugs around still?) and arrest them instead of the perpetrator. Second, it keeps the prisons full of non-violent, often extremely petty drug crimes, leading to overcrowding and pressure to release some of the convicts. Because drug convictions often come with “no parole” sentences, the violent criminals get released instead. Therefore, I claim that rationalizing drug laws would be helpful for poor people as well as, possibly more than, rich ones. The rich already often find loopholes around drug convictions. Look at Rush Limbaugh.
I’m not, incidently, in favor of legalizing over the counter sales of every drug in existence. Some drugs should be given out only with outside monitering. But I don’t see the point of the draconian punishments for the use of a few drugs when other, often equally harmful drugs–ie alcohol–are legal. Maybe re-write the drug laws so that possession of controlled substances without a prescription is a misdemenor to minor felony, legalize the relatively harmless ones (ie marijuana) for OTC sale, and make treatment readily available for those who are addicted to restricted drugs but want to quit. Maybe give immunity from prosecution to anyone who completes drug treatment and shows themselves to be drug free for a certain period of time or something. Not saying my suggestions are perfect: they’re just ideas of ways to start.
Jake:
Yes. The old pre-booker guidelines were overly strict. But they actually did a decent job of preventing sentencing from too much variance based soley on race (of course, they didn’t affect arrests or invetigations or plea bargains, all of which also involve selective enforcement).
Now people will depart from the guidelines. And is that a good thing? Well, judges think so. You know, more “opportunity for justice” and all that bullshit. But they were written because judges (mostly white males, appointled for life) weren’t being as “unbiased” as they thought they were.
Oops.
The problem with setting up any system which is to provide “flexible justice” is that it often provide justice to folks you didn’t want to help, and screws over the people you were trying to assist. It only works if you trust the people who have discretion and there aren’t enough folks to go around who could qualify for those jobs.
Robert, I honestly think you have missed Radgeek points completly.
Lets see:
I guess he means morally illegitimate. At least you think it is morally acceptable to tell people what can or not do with THEIR OWN BODIES (without directly affecting or compromising third parties, and no, drugs DO NOT)! Since it is not (and the method is irrelevant…could be a “democratic” mandate or dictatorial decree), the rest of your comment falls on its own weight.
So when you write
You completly miss the point, since the point is not that there are some acceptable forms of controling peoples life using coertion and others that arent. Radgeek point was precisly that telling people they can’t use drugs, treatening with jailing them is as unaceptable in principle as telling people what school they should attend or what job they should work on.
So when you add that:
You are just asserting the point being discussed without justifying it! And you lie when you say it is a perfectly valid excercise according to US constitution (what part of the constitution grants the goverment that power?). But even IF IT DID, that will be still unaceptable (say, as when the constitution endorsed slavery, remember?).
Now, finally you claim that justice is subjective. Good, that may be the case (I am sure Radgeek does not agree), but then if it is so, how is that I should accept the decrees of the state concerning drug laws as absolutes?
Sergio, I think you’re wrong when you say :…without directly affecting or compromising third parties, and no, drugs DO NOT)!… as support.
First, what does it matter if it’s “direct”? If I get drunk and beat up my wife, does the fact that it’s “indirect” mean it’s not alcohol related?
If I shoot up in my apartment, and never see anyone when I’m high, is the effect nonexistent? Do you not count the drug dealer on the corener who’s there because I give him business?
There’s nop reason to only look at “direct” problems unless it’s a sneaky end run around discussing the meat of the matter. I DO NOT SUPPORT the way we currently try to manage drugs. I don’t think there’s a simple one sentence solution. I also disagree with Ribert on many of his points. But I think it’s sort of ludicrous to take up the “drugs only affect the person using them” line.
You completly miss the point, since the point is not that there are some acceptable forms of controling peoples life using coertion and others that arent.
If this is true, then government is impossible and justice unattainable; freelance coercion will replace state coercion. So if this tack is taken, then the discussion is pointless – coercion is not restricted to drug laws. Coercion is involved in *every* governmental activity, and if it is intrinsically illegitimate, then we can have no government.
Which some anarchists will sign on to, no doubt – but I prefer a little more social order, and so do most people, I wager. So, we DO have to accept coercion as a legitimate mechanism, and figure out what kinds of coercion are acceptable or not.
And you lie when you say it is a perfectly valid excercise according to US constitution (what part of the constitution grants the goverment that power?)
Disregarding the slur, I believe the answer is the commerce clause. That’s what Congress has rested things like the FDA and the DEA upon, and the Courts have upheld their decision. You are welcome to disagree, but I don’t see “Justice” in front of your name, so I’m guessing that your opinion is less valued than some others.
I happen to share your opinion; I don’t think that the Constitution should have been interpreted to permit the government to make rules about drugs. But that was settled by an argument, where both sides of the argument were legitimate points of view, and our side lost via the democratic process.
how is that I should accept the decrees of the state concerning drug laws as absolutes?
Who says you have to?
You just don’t get to pretend that this one area of law is magically invalid, while accepting the benefits of all the other areas of law.
Sailorman:
Well, the point is that there are inderect but clear forms of treatening others. The examples you use are irrelevant: not for the fact of being drunk or hight you turn into a wife beater or a potential murderer. I will say that it is more the case, for example, of driving drunk or high when you indirectly treath other’s people life. But then, that is not a reason for banning alcohol nor is a reason to ban the consume of drugs per se, only for prohibiting doing certain actions after consuming them.
Robert:
Well, my bet is that Radgeek being an anachirst, will certainly agree that goverment SHOULD be abolished. But I doubt he will accept that is the end of justice (actually he will argue that abolishing the state IS a just act). But anyways your post misses the point again. Cause if you are not an anarchist, you can still differenciate between unjustified agresion (the state coercing you to NOT DOING SOMETHING, when that something doesnt violate the rights oF anybody) and the state using force for stopping you from violating another person rights. Maybe I wasnt clear, but that is the basic difference we are arguing here. Drug laws violate the rights of people to control their own life and bodies, even if they are not harming anybody in the process. That is why they are unjust laws, not because Radgeek or I claim some sort of special authority to determine if they are not or not just.
Now, concerning your last apreciation: What does it has the supposed benefits I recieve from the actual social order with the moral status of drug laws?
Prison is a business. The War on Drugs is a business. Face it. Everything in this country is a business. As long as someone is profiting from it – it’s going to be there. Prison is a legal slavery business. The war in Irag is a business. Bodies is all they want, the Justice Department is not designed to put crimials in prison, it’s designed to put anybody away they can to keep the business of legalized slavery profitable – and thet’s why the prison are so bad – it’s designed to produce return customers. And it does what’s it’s business is designed to do to keep it in business.
The ones that have the guns and money have the power and don’t give a s___ about any of us. Period. Oh, and one more thing….they didn’t free the slaves…they in enslaves all of us – and got us to like it – the better slaves you are the more privileges you get. We’re fools, house niggers and field niggers is all we are to the elite and we grin because we have a better carriage or a bigger shack and praise them when they take our children off for fotter…. we’re such fools – it’s worse now then in the dark ages – except we got a proper place to s___ and can take a bath.
But our minds….crazy; everybody going in a different directions about everything, no unity – ‘they’ got us from all sides…..and we’ve got the nerve to through are noses up and think we’re so smart. Wake up people – we’ve been dupe. We all only ONE Degree from prison ourselves. The sheeples are herding the sheeple!!! We’re brain dead – entertained to DEATH. If you think your safe because you’re a law bidding citizen – your also a fool – cause they’re coming to get you too! It just a matter of “TIME”. And you best hurry up cause in a minute, it’s going to be to late.
I hate to see so much bickering going on. Expecially on this subject. It seems that whenever it’s brought up, there’s somebody who agrees with the war on drugs, and somebody who doesn’t. They go back and forth, ramming heads for half an hour and not one’s position is changed.
Personally, I think of US “politics” as a big game where in the end, you’re screwed no matter what. And that’s why I’m moving to Canada or Europe the first chance I get.
We fight about torture for a month, then on to immigration, then the “war on Christmas”, and nothing gets done. I’ve just given up. The majority of people want drugs legalized, but they’re already felons for carrying or growing some pot and can’t vote because of it. The system is fucked up.
I dunno. Just wanted to add my $0.02 :)
By the way, if you want unbiased information, check out http://www.erowid.org.
Consider that the picture of drug addiction includes a man in a business suit sitting at a desk every day working a full-time job. He has a family, children, a dog, and a wife. To everyone else, he projects the picture of having it all. The only problem is, the pressure of life got to him and he looked for a way out. A colleague offered him some cocaine. He liked the way it made him feel. Now he juggles credit card advances to pay for his $100 a day habit. The picture of drug addiction could also be the popular cheerleader at your child’s high school. She’s blonde, beautiful, smart, and personable. But every morning, she takes a shot of vodka to stop the shakes. At lunch, she drinks a six-pack in her car, and at night, she’s at all the parties drinking until someone has to bring her home because she’s passed out. Finally, the picture of drug addiction could also be in the form of a bored housewife. She has three children, laundry, dishes, and many other responsibilities. She’s tired all the time and sometimes just can’t get out of bed because of her exhaustion. She saw something on television about housewives taking their child’s Ritalin for energy. She decides to try it with her own 7-year old’s medication. Now she has to make excuses to the pediatrician why her child has run out of medicine before he should have.
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neil jones
louisiana drug rehab
I’m number 10 I really don’t care what happens to them one way or another. At a certain point they aren’t even human anymore. I would rather the money go to schools or medicare than paying to treat someone who is probably always going to be an addict.
Excuse me Lord Cerbereth, but you don’t fucking get to decide who’s human or not. You just fucking don’t
When someone is having other people tie them to a fridge, so they can shoot more poison into their arm I really don’t know what to do for that person anymore.
There is nothing anyone can do for that person anymore.
As far as who is and who isn’t a person when addicts get to a certain point they are dead they just haven’t realized it yet.
Your better off trying to help the living.
Lord Cerbereth,
Inappropriate. I think you should stop posting in the thread, but I suppose if you just knock it the fuck off then you can remain.
I’m just agreeing with Ampersand’s argument(lol).
Anyway me and “the compassionate American public” have our opinion on the issue just as you have yours and it seems unlikely that either is going to change, so I am not gonna force the issue.
Hey, Lord Cerbereth, remember that time when I banned you from posting comments on Alas?
Good times, man. Good times.
I don’t know whether it makes the top ten, but another reason the drug war continues is specific interests in the prison-industrial complex which are lobbying for longer sentences.
Another, which is more numerous but perhaps less influential, is people who only see the damage from the drug trade, and don’t want to believe that anything other than trying to force the drug trade to go away is tolerable. Perhaps their panel could be based on Bullwinkle saying “This time for sure”.