Why The War on Drugs Is a Huge Failure

As Clay Shirky succinctly put it: “Institutions will try to preserve the problem to which they are the solution.”

Many iron rice bowls are in the possession of the “warriors” on drugs, on terror, and on poverty.

A drug was enforced against, which was the stated purpose. Still it’s a massive waste of money that hurts people and their families far worse than the substances themselves ever would.

There’s a erowid report of a chemist who makes his own methylqualone and his wife gets annoyed with him when he takes some before they go out. One of the more entertaining reports.

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Is it?

Perhaps it’s accomplishing the real goals of those waging it.

The war in Iraq was a terrible failure, unless your real goal was enriching Halliburton…

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I never even got a chance to try them. Perhaps it’s a tragedy rather than a victory, but how could I know?

After watching The Wolf of Wall Street I’m inclined to see it as a victory, but I haven’t met anyone who has ever used them (and told me about it) so…

I read that some people abuse ambien and curiously both euphoria and dysphoria are listed as side effects. GABA drugs tend to run a little risky and sloppy motor skillsy (e.g. ethanol).

People dont use Quaaludes anymore because they dont make them anymore!

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My point, exactly; thanks.

No, they aren’t.

They’re tools, and as with most tools, the more powerful they are, the more dangerous they are. Good and bad lies in how they’re used.

This applies to recreational drugs just as much as medicinal drugs. Legalise, regulate, educate.

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BTW: articles such as https://theconversation.com/this-psychoactive-drugs-trip-isnt-working-17540 are what I used to write in my scientist days. Some of y’all might find some things of interest in that and the comments following it.

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If you ask some of my older friends who I met at raves in the 2000s (seriously, they were hardcore, like 40 year old guys who still showed up to dance), it’s a national disaster, and the most unfair thing the government’s ever done. Bad ecstasy intentionally adulterated with everything that you find on the bottom of a shoe has killed a lot more people than disco biscuits.

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My research suggests there was quite a bit of clandestine manufacture during the 80s that was unsustainable as it isn’t the easiest thing in the world to synthesize.

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