(or are they? have I been disinfo'd?)
I am of the opinion that the drug war is evil: cops and jails ruining someone's life because of a recreational activity. And the evidence shows it does more harm than good, not stuff I have to go over again.
But DPRK and China are harsh on drugs, not sure about Cuba.
What's up with that?
First counterargument that comes to my mind is a lot of capitalist countries are very harsh on drugs as well, like the very capitalist Singapore, so you couldn't draw a correlation. What other counterarguments should a comrade consider?
That makes sense for opium, but china has used medicinal and industrial cannabis for millennia, and only outlawed it at the behest of America in the 80s.
How did China's perspective on cannabis evolve to be anywhere near that of opium in the last 40 years?
I don't think it is in practice. People smoke in Beijing, I've uh seen it. Easy to come by in rural areas too.
I'd say alcohol affects productivity equally if not more so than cannabis.
They did it because everybody else was doing it and they wanted to play along to not cause any drama during their opening up. It's also not really the only time Chinese policy was influenced by the West, the one child policy was heavily influenced by western think tanks and NGOs.
Almost all countries have a “negative impression” of drugs, doesn’t excuse draconian drug policing
Unlike the US and europe, these countries have had people enslaved and their wealth looted for cartels and drug manufacturers to pump cheap drugs to the US. It’s no different than any other neoliberal policy. They’re “nerds” about it because their entire histories have been subjugation, and now they’re expected by some western communists and liberals in their ivory towers to legalize everything or else they’re bad(tm) people.
Why is it that almost every country outside the west is socially conservative? It’s almost as if having your resources plundered to all hell and your people seen as subhuman on the world stage stunts your development and views of the world.
Also, in the case of the Zapatistas, they’re basically surrounded by the cartels on one side and the government on the other (who are often in cahoots with the cartels) so it makes sense why they don’t want to attract cartel violence seeking to eliminate the competition, or the government’s forces looking for an excuse to end their movement. They’re also don’t have too many resources so prohibiting drugs is one of the only methods they have for prevention
It’s almost as if having your resources plundered to all hell and your people seen as subhuman on the world stage stunts your development and views of the world.
I think this idea is probably better phrased as having uncontrolled change being forced on your society by outsiders at gunpoint probably makes you skeptical about uncontrolled change, especially when espoused by the same outsiders who fucked you over the first time.
Personally I would not say that the global south has a "stunted" view of the world.
To my understanding, DPRK tolerates cultivation of marijuana for personal use.
China has history of Opium War, which looks large in the cultural memory and has definitely had a influence on both the PRC's anda Taipei's harsh position on drugs.
As you state with Singapore, most countries in East and South East Asia have very strict drug laws.
It's more an East Asian thing, it's banned in Japan and Taiwan too, idk about South Korea. But in the DPRK is pretty common to see people using cannabis.
The Opium wars was one of the major reasons why they hate most drugs. Also drugs are banned in Cuba, as for SocDem countries in LatAm, Bolivia and Colombia allow the cultivation and usage of Coca plants. Cannabis is legal in Colombia.
Bolivia allows indigenous communities to make cocaine which is pretty rad lol
But in the DPRK is pretty common to see people using cannabis.
This is actually a myth. The DPRK cultivates low-THC hemp for industrial use, and due to translation errors of articles about this the idea that they grew a lot of pot became widespread. People who've visited the country however, including a Swedish ambassador, confirm that the drug is not actually legal there.
Here's an AP story about the myth, which drops the fun fact that it may have been started by Radio Free Asia.
because they're states. their purpose is to marshal populations for production.
anarchists: "the state only cares about production, they are fash"
also narcs: "buh? you think Biden's ban of menthols is good? Actually its racist to oppress small consumer joys" (woke Pete Buttigieg neoliberals talk about "consumers" but not "workers", unable to make any mention of the fact wage slaves get addicted to this stimulant because they are hungry and tired at work and live in a fascist Mussolini style productivist society)
like i genuinely don't care about this issue and i don't really see what it has to do with anything i or any other anarchist said, but surely you don't think "people who criticize a decision made by neoliberals are in doing so cryptoneoliberals themselves" is a convincing line of reasoning?
the end goal is total liberation of all of humanity. i'm not saying production is a bad thing, i'm saying when it's the only goal (and contrasted with the only alternative of "doing nothing"), it necessarily precludes anything else.
First, I'd consider the status quo in the US: the poorest are pushed out of society and daily degraded or assaulted by state forces, drug use is kept high by despair, and drug laws' primary purpose is to authorize a permanent domestic anti-insurgency campaign disguised as public safety
And second, I'd consider the historical context of each country. I think you'll find that AES countries' harsher drug laws virtually always form in response to real campaigns to weaponize drugs from western aggressors
We continuously create our drug problem and use it in a feedback loop of class violence, while they addressed what drug problems they had (inflicted on them) less violently and more effectively than we do and haven't made new ones by dehumanizing their population
i think i’ve read about socialist orgs and autonomous zones in western countries banning drug use too. iirc it’s due to pigs using them to infiltrate
Kinda, but then you get the problem where the cops can achieve the same goals just by laundering their drugs through a layer of non-cop middle men.
Meth or Crack or heroin is going to fuck people up regardless of whether its coming from the cops or not.
Yeah, most substances have a healthy use case. I really wonder about if people can have a healthy relationship with meth. I know in England there seemed to be a club scene that had seen luck with it, but it is hard to picture
These drugs have also historically been used by colonizers to make populations pliable
which is why AES bans them. Thats the whole conclusion of this conversation, and most other opinions are wrong.
Its also about disipline, for ideological reasons, if you believe in that.
Marijuana is cultivated in China for industrial and medical use since it has a history as a component in Traditional Chinese Medicine. However, Traditional Chinese Medicine is a regulated field so TCM doctors are trained and accredited like any other type of doctor. Moreover, my understanding is that the medicinal component is mostly seeds instead of leaves.
Smoking marijuana recreationaly is still very illegal in China and if you're a foreigner you can be deported for testing positive for marijuana, even if you smoked overseas in a country where it is legal.
The existing rate of drug use in China is very low compared to most Western countries, which is a hard-won accomplishment of the early PRC. There is no widespread support for drug legalization, and at the same time there is no destructive widespread drug war as in the West.
Consider how historically, what imperialists have done to the east using drugs.
Also consider what the CIA et al currently do to the US's own marginalized population using drugs.
Also consider that AES states have yet to be able to leave siege mentality when it comes to more covert forms of warfare such as that.
the drug war is evil
NWBCW https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_War_but_the_Class_War
the evidence shows it does more harm than good, not stuff I have to go over again.
(historical materialist scientists crying)
China are harsh on drugs
Fun fact: their raw, natural tobacco has less chemical additives and fewer incidences of cancer compared to the Big Tobacco "blended tobacco product" designed by McKinsey be addictive and cancerous. Woke radlibs called Biden racist for banning and oppressing these "small consumer joys" which is a very Pete Buttigieg style rhetoric neoliberal argument which ignores "workers" in favor of "consumers in the free market". Imagine spending the last ten years scolding people about "black lives matter" despite cheering 40000 black wage slaves dying of cancer each year. Echoing the incessant free markets think tank corpo funded propaganda about "getting kids addicted to flavored vapes is harm reduction, actually".
Fun fact: their raw, natural tobacco has less chemical additives and fewer incidences of cancer compared to the Big Tobacco “blended tobacco product” designed by McKinsey be addictive and cancerous.
Its literally bullshit. The Tobacco itself is not less cancerous than the additives(this myth originally comes from 'natural' tobacco manufacturers in the West)
And combined with the common myth (in China) that Chinese people are less susceptible to lung cancer...
Ehhhh, I have a feeling that this comes from salty English teachers who got deported after being caught with pot.
Drug users are not subject to the prison system and are given treatment rather than criminal penalties. Drug use of most types is considered an administrative offense rather than a crime, so closer to a traffic ticket than murder.
Unfortunately the best most recent source I could find in English is infected with liberal brainworms, but it does point out:
Individuals entering the [Drug Control] system because of illicit drug use may be punished by up to five days in detention or a fine of up to 500 yuan. More serious offenses may require up to 15 days detention or a fine of up to 2,000 yuan.
Like okay being held (in a treatment facility, not prison) for 5 days and having to pay an $80 fine is not pleasant, nor is being held for 2 weeks and paying a $260 fine, but thats pretty light for something that'll ruin your life forever and land you jail time in most Western countries.
And yeah, there'll be ongoing monitoring for drug users and they'll have to attend regular counseling and drug tests until they've been clean for 3 years, but again, compare that to the prison time you'd get in many places in the West (especially if you're PoC) and that's much better.
I'll be the first to say that the system can improve and more resources should be devoted to rehabilitating drug users but idk if you can consider anything in that link "very harsh" compared to the West, never mind globally.
He actually died back in 2003, but the CPC couldn't borrow the Juche Necromancy Machine so they've just been Weekend At Bernie's-ing him for the last 20 years
I'm not particularly knowledgeable about the subject, but I think alcohol abuse/addiction was a widespread problem in the late Soviet Union. It would not surprise me if current AES states recognize that problem from history and are attempting to prevent something similar from happening.
What do you think the US response to Cuba would be if they legalized the cultivation of drugs? More or less unhinged than our response to FARC or the Cartels in Mexico?
I would guess in resource starved countries they don't want to add any more problems than they already have with more drug use, and any place that is suffering from poverty and scarcity will be ripe for problematic drug use.
On top of that the US has been using it's financial leverage to lead anti-drug efforts worldwide since at least Nixon or whatever. If there was a history of indigenous use for certain drugs there can be push back or tolerance, but they risk sanctions and a violent US response.
Socially conservative places that place high value on tradition will keep up drug laws for anything they aren't familiar with long past the point where it makes any sense.
I'm absolutely shooting from the hip here but: I also wonder if Cuba has arable land, fertilizer, and workers to spare on growing drug crops, as opposed to food?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_the_Soviet_Union – actually not particularly draconian: 1926-1974 there was 1-3 years for dealing, 0 for personal use. From '74 on: 1-3 years for personal use 10-15 for dealing.
