Pubdate: Thu, 12 Dec 2013
Source: Independent  (UK)
Copyright: 2013 Independent Newspapers (UK) Ltd.
Contact:  http://www.independent.co.uk/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/209
Author: Owen Jones

THOUSANDS OF LIVES ARE RUINED EVERY YEAR BY OUR HEAVY-HANDED DRUGS 
POLICY. IF URUGUAY CAN CHANGE, THEN WHY CAN'T WE?

It's a policy that would be a hammer blow to criminal gangs.

It would stop criminalising non-violent people, drastically undermine 
racist policing, improve people's health and it would save lives.

But while a mainstream British politician is more likely to have 
smoked cannabis than to propose its legalisation, the courageous 
Uruguayan government has done just that.

Uruguay made a pragmatic choice.

It could continue to leave cannabis production and sale in the hands 
of violent criminal gangs, or the state could take it over and 
regulate it properly. "A regulated market that is visible has greater 
oversight than prohibition," as Diego Canepa, the president of 
Uruguay's National Drug Board, has put it. Uruguayans who register on 
a national database can buy up to 40g of pot from a pharmacy, and 
adults are now allowed to grow up to eight marijuana plants each.

The gangs of Uruguay must be incandescent with rage. The so-called 
war on drugs has been the ultimate money-spinner for the criminal 
underworld. In the five decades since its catastrophic inception, 
more people are using drugs than ever before, and the illegal market 
is booming.

According to the UN, it is now worth $330bn globally a year, which is 
bigger than most countries' economies.

Governments spend $100bn a year supposedly cracking down on it. The 
US alone has thrown a trillion dollars at it since Richard Nixon 
unleashed his war. It is a self destructive waste on an epic scale.

Just look at the fruits of Britain's war on drugs.

In 1970, 9,000 people were cautioned or convicted for drug use. A 
quarter of a century later, the figure had leapt to 94,000, and last 
year it reached 133,000. According to the Crime Survey for England 
and Wales - with all the caveats of the problems of self-reporting - 
36.5 per cent of British adults have tried drugs.

What exactly is being served by treating so many millions of Britons 
using a drug far less dangerous than alcohol as though they are criminals?

As demand for drugs has grown, attacks on its supply has simply 
driven up the cost. That's not something that only gangs can 
capitalise on - it helps drive other forms of crime, too. It's been 
estimated that around half of property crime in Britain is 
drugs-related because users steal to fuel their expensive habit.

It has destabilised entire nations, leading to thousands of deaths. 
Around 60,000 people have died in drugs-related violence in Mexico 
since 2006, and the violence escalated as then-president Felipe 
Calderon unleashed the might of the state against the cartels.

No wonder Uruguay's President Jose Mujica has declared that "the 
effects of drug trafficking are worse than those of the drugs themselves".

People are criminalised for non-violent offences, in some cases ruining lives.

It has a frightening racist dimension, too. In the United States, for 
example, two-thirds of those languishing in prisons for a drug 
offence are black or Hispanic, even though the odds of them either 
selling or using drugs is roughly the same as white Americans.

It is a similarly bleak story in this country, too. As pioneering 
drugs charity Release has found, black people are more than six times 
as likely to be stopped and searched on suspicion of drug possession 
in London, even though they are actually less likely to use drugs. 
Disgracefully, a black person found with cannabis on them is five 
times more likely to be charged than a white person.

This is outright racism. But we should simply stop persecuting people 
for having weed in their pockets.

Six out of 10 people being prosecuted for drugs possessions are being 
done for cannabis.

For what? Legalising cannabis would drastically decrease the 
involvement that ethnic minority people have with an institutionally 
racist justice system.

When it comes to problematic drug abuse and addiction, a more 
constructive approach would be to deal with the causes, not the 
symptoms. All the studies show that problematic drug use is far more 
common in poorer communities. Let's deal with poverty and leave 
prisons to the violent, the rapists and the killers.

With cannabis in the hands of the state, we can get rid of 
lower-quality and more dangerous forms of the drug. We can impose age 
restrictions. We can separate the market.

At the moment, drug gangs can encourage cannabis-users to take other 
more dangerous drugs.

By taking it out of the black market, we can get the lost tax revenues.

We can free-up time and resources battling cannabis and put it to far 
better use.

We've had 50 years of the war on drugs, and the results are in: it is 
an absolutely calamitous failure.

Albert Einstein famously defined insanity as "doing the same thing 
over and over again and expecting different results", which may as 
well be the slogan of the proponents of this criminal escapade.

They are the best friends of the profiteering criminal gangs, who 
they would leave in monopoly control of drugs.

When will British politicians show the farsightedness and courage of 
Uruguay? Because until they do, money will continue to be wasted, 
lives will be ruined, and people will keep dying.

It is quite a price for stubborn stupidity.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom