Pubdate: Wed, 29 Jan 2003
Source: Huron Expositor, The (CN ON)
Copyright: 2003 The Huron Expositor
Contact:  http://www.seaforthhuronexpositor.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2183
Author: Alan Randell

MAKING CERTAIN DRUGS ILLEGAL DOES NOTHING TO REDUCE CRIME, SAYS READER

To the Editor,

Re: Huron OPP speaks to SPS students about Crimestoppers and drugs, Jan. 22.

Why do governments prohibit certain drugs. Is it to protect users from harm?

No, that can't be the reason because users suffer more (adulterated drugs 
and jail time) when a drug is banned as compared to when it is legally 
available.

My wife and I became well acquainted with this aspect of government policy 
when we lost our 19-year-old son to street heroin in 1993.

The harm argument is moot in any event because two of our more dangerous 
drugs, alcohol and tobacco, are legal. Is it to reduce the crime associated 
with illegal drugs?

No, that can't be the reason because banning a drug always gives rise to 
more crime (drug cartels, petty crimes by users as prohibition makes drug 
prices much higher, violent disputes between dealers) than when the drug is 
legally available.

Is it a bid to distract and entertain the majority by conducting a brutal, 
Hitler-like pogrom to ruin the lives of the innocent minority who ingest or 
sell certain drugs?

Bingo!

Why do we put up with this loathsome program?

Because the media support it.

Why do the media support drug prohibition? Let us count the ways:

1. It provides many "exciting" news stories and pictures about various 
busts, murders and assaults as well as adrenaline-pumping accounts of cops 
battering down doors - usually in the poorer areas of our cities and towns.

2. It enables editors to wax poet as they pledge their undying support for 
these fascist-like horrors "to protect the children", taking care to omit 
the hell some children are thrust into when their parents are jailed for 
the "crime" of using or selling a drug the majority doesn't approve of.

3. It provides many opportunities to publish "moving" accounts of born 
again former drug users giving their just-say-no nonsense to a roomful of 
children and imploring the kids, "don't do what I did, do what I say" as 
they pocket speaking fees and expenses far in excess of what they could 
earn if they hadn't clambered aboard the taxpayer-funded drug war gravy train.

4. It provides many drug scare stories passed along by the cops who are 
anxious to keep prohibition going because it provides them with bigger 
budgets and more power - not to mention free drugs.

5. Misery, suffering and hatred sell more newspapers and produce higher TV 
ratings than happiness, contentment and love. Perhaps the world would have 
been a better place of the mass media had never been invented.

Alan Randell

Victoria, BC
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