But beyond that, I think the Opiod and Fentanyl crises (or crisis, depending on how you see it) has really discredited the libertarian-leaning argument of simply decriminalizing everything, hoping thar people don't fuck up their own lives, and providing remedial assistance when some of them do.
Criminalization just leads to black markets and deregulated (i.e. laced) forms of drugs. It is much better to allow legal, regulated avenues for drug consumption, alongside social assistance for getting out of addictions, and education against using in the first place. America has a problem doing decriminalization, not because "decrminalization doesn't work", but because we have a highly deregulated capitalist political economy where the legal avenues for obtaining drugs are barely better than the illegal avenues. We also fail at providing social assistance and educating people. Anti-drug education is hysterical reefer-madness style propaganda that is misinformative and makes drugs frankly look rebellious and cool. There needs to be an effort to educate people on the real known differences between substances. It needs to be made clear to kids from a young age that smoking weed isn't going to fuck you up the way heroin does. But none of this is possible in our current society at a system-wide level, because it is designed to fail at these things in the first place. Capitalists need slave labor, and a good way to get that is having full prisons. This means convicting and jailing people for drug use / possession.
Also there has been endless discourse about the lack of walkable urban spaces, a "third place" (besides the church!) where people can go to be with each other outside of work/school, etc. I think these kinds of bleak environments are created by capitalism and lead to drug addiction and mental illness.
I agree with what you're saying and I just want to think about the black market aspect of this more.
Criminalizing anything conceivably leads to a black market. Murder is illegal, but there are black market hitmen. Rape is illegal but there are black market human sex trafficking operations. Child pornography is illegal but there's a black market for that too. Obviously no leftist in their right mind is going to advocate for legalizing murder/rape/CP to mitigate their harms, so how do we draw the line between something we legalize for harm mitigation and something we keep criminalized and come down hard on the black market for?
Moreover, would a socialist West (and I say West specifically because material conditions elsewhere are different) keep some of the more destructive drugs illegal, or does the line of harm minimization fall above all forms of drugs?
so how do we draw the line between something we legalize for harm mitigation and something we keep criminalized and come down hard on the black market for?
rape, murder, and child pornography aren't drugs and alcohol. That's where the line is.
Moreover, would a socialist West (and I say West specifically because material conditions elsewhere are different) keep some of the more destructive drugs illegal, or does the line of harm minimization fall above all forms of drugs?
the problem is criminalization of the substances themselves and not their unregulated manufacture and distribution. Why is possession and use lumped in with distribution? Because needs prison slaves
EDIT: Also let's be real, there's a race and class element to this as well. Some wall street schmuck can do a line of coke off his desk at work/home every day and a cop will never catch him because he is in a privately owned space and public law enforcers don't see him as priority. Public law enforces want to get poor addicts out of public spaces where their continued existence bothers the sensibilities of the petit bourgeoisie and into jail where their continued existence is converted into slave labor.
Public law enforces want to get poor addicts out of public spaces where their continued existence bothers the sensibilities of the petit bourgeoisi
Friday in Toronto two dealers who sold near a safe injection site started shooting at each other. They missed each other but shit a random woman multiple times. Her petit bourgeoisie sensibilities were so offended by these gunshot wounds that she died. What a square.
I'm talking about how the police funnel addicts into prison where they are exploited as slaves. You're talking about a (sample size of 1 anecdote) dealers shooting at each other at a safe injection site. I'm not talking about dealers, I'm talking about criminalization of addicts, and of possession with the intent to use rather than distribute. I'm talking about why this problem can't be solved in a capitalist political economy. Your response seems only tangentially to my post. Not sure what your intention is, here.
We’re talking about safe injection sites and peoples opposition to them in the context of the shift of opinion on the war on drugs amongst liberals and lefties, which includes the environments that form around safe injection sites. I agree that this problem can’t be solved in a capitalist political economy. I’m not sure why you’re confused. I’m taking part in the discussion same as you.
I'm not confused. you're responding to my comment that didn't bring up safe injection sites at all with a (sample size of 1 anecdote) dealers shooting at each other at a safe injection site. Your response to my comment had nothing to do with my comment. Typically when you respond to someone you respond directly to what they said.
The opium epidemic in China ended by China slaughtering anyone even remotely involved in the opium trade. If you're willing to go that scorched earth against drug abuse it can work, but if not you're probably better off just regulating it.
Yeah, I was mostly joking. The PRC's campaign against opium leaned much more on land redistribution to incentivize farmers away from poppies, rehabilitation for addicts, and mass propaganda campaigns then it did violence. Not to say that people weren't arrested and executed, but those were mainly dealers and ringleaders (proffiteers).
Compared against the failed attempts of both the Qing (hobbled by British interference and the collapse of their empire) and the KMT (hobbled by Japanese invasion and the KMT's own hilarious corruption), the PRC's programs were much more focused on incentives rather than violence.
finding a handful of opium peddlers and subjecting them to needlessly torturous and antiquated death penalties like "death by a thousand cuts" might be more brutal, but it is fundamentally less effective than eliminating the opium trade in its entirety through swift and effective revolutionary activity.
Criminalization just leads to black markets and deregulated (i.e. laced) forms of drugs. It is much better to allow legal, regulated avenues for drug consumption, alongside social assistance for getting out of addictions, and education against using in the first place. America has a problem doing decriminalization, not because "decrminalization doesn't work", but because we have a highly deregulated capitalist political economy where the legal avenues for obtaining drugs are barely better than the illegal avenues. We also fail at providing social assistance and educating people. Anti-drug education is hysterical reefer-madness style propaganda that is misinformative and makes drugs frankly look rebellious and cool. There needs to be an effort to educate people on the real known differences between substances. It needs to be made clear to kids from a young age that smoking weed isn't going to fuck you up the way heroin does. But none of this is possible in our current society at a system-wide level, because it is designed to fail at these things in the first place. Capitalists need slave labor, and a good way to get that is having full prisons. This means convicting and jailing people for drug use / possession.
Also there has been endless discourse about the lack of walkable urban spaces, a "third place" (besides the church!) where people can go to be with each other outside of work/school, etc. I think these kinds of bleak environments are created by capitalism and lead to drug addiction and mental illness.
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I agree with what you're saying and I just want to think about the black market aspect of this more.
Criminalizing anything conceivably leads to a black market. Murder is illegal, but there are black market hitmen. Rape is illegal but there are black market human sex trafficking operations. Child pornography is illegal but there's a black market for that too. Obviously no leftist in their right mind is going to advocate for legalizing murder/rape/CP to mitigate their harms, so how do we draw the line between something we legalize for harm mitigation and something we keep criminalized and come down hard on the black market for?
Moreover, would a socialist West (and I say West specifically because material conditions elsewhere are different) keep some of the more destructive drugs illegal, or does the line of harm minimization fall above all forms of drugs?
rape, murder, and child pornography aren't drugs and alcohol. That's where the line is.
the problem is criminalization of the substances themselves and not their unregulated manufacture and distribution. Why is possession and use lumped in with distribution? Because
needs prison slaves
EDIT: Also let's be real, there's a race and class element to this as well. Some wall street schmuck can do a line of coke off his desk at work/home every day and a cop will never catch him because he is in a privately owned space and public law enforcers don't see him as priority. Public law enforces want to get poor addicts out of public spaces where their continued existence bothers the sensibilities of the petit bourgeoisie and into jail where their continued existence is converted into slave labor.
Friday in Toronto two dealers who sold near a safe injection site started shooting at each other. They missed each other but shit a random woman multiple times. Her petit bourgeoisie sensibilities were so offended by these gunshot wounds that she died. What a square.
I'm talking about how the police funnel addicts into prison where they are exploited as slaves. You're talking about a (sample size of 1 anecdote) dealers shooting at each other at a safe injection site. I'm not talking about dealers, I'm talking about criminalization of addicts, and of possession with the intent to use rather than distribute. I'm talking about why this problem can't be solved in a capitalist political economy. Your response seems only tangentially to my post. Not sure what your intention is, here.
We’re talking about safe injection sites and peoples opposition to them in the context of the shift of opinion on the war on drugs amongst liberals and lefties, which includes the environments that form around safe injection sites. I agree that this problem can’t be solved in a capitalist political economy. I’m not sure why you’re confused. I’m taking part in the discussion same as you.
I'm not confused. you're responding to my comment that didn't bring up safe injection sites at all with a (sample size of 1 anecdote) dealers shooting at each other at a safe injection site. Your response to my comment had nothing to do with my comment. Typically when you respond to someone you respond directly to what they said.
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Yeah, I was mostly joking. The PRC's campaign against opium leaned much more on land redistribution to incentivize farmers away from poppies, rehabilitation for addicts, and mass propaganda campaigns then it did violence. Not to say that people weren't arrested and executed, but those were mainly dealers and ringleaders (proffiteers).
Compared against the failed attempts of both the Qing (hobbled by British interference and the collapse of their empire) and the KMT (hobbled by Japanese invasion and the KMT's own hilarious corruption), the PRC's programs were much more focused on incentives rather than violence.
finding a handful of opium peddlers and subjecting them to needlessly torturous and antiquated death penalties like "death by a thousand cuts" might be more brutal, but it is fundamentally less effective than eliminating the opium trade in its entirety through swift and effective revolutionary activity.
Murder, rape, and child pornography all violate consent. Drug use does not. That's where I'd draw the line: consent.