Some Pros and Cons to Legalizing Small Drug Possession
It is interesting looking at the pros and cons of decriminalising drug possession. What really is best for our country?
Forbidden Fruit
One of the points that pro-decriminalisation people tout is the forbidden fruit effect of illegalizing drugs. That by making them illegal, people, therefore, want to try them.
Unfortunately, the other side of this same coin is the example of cigarettes and alcohol as legal drugs. Cigarettes are made from tobacco and tobacco takes millions of people’s lives per year worldwide as does alcohol. In fact, these two are a couple of the biggest killers out there.
So are drugs dangerous because they are illegal or are they illegal because they are dangerous? Well, of course, the answer is they are illegal because they are dangerous!
Criminal Affair
The pro that I see in decriminalising drug possession (not the selling of drugs) is that people are more willing to seek help, advice and treatment if they feel there is no risk to themselves and they won’t then be considered criminal and outside of normal society.
The negative is that quite possibly the illegal factor deters a certain percentage of people that without that deterrent of criminal activity, would, if it was legal, try drugs. If that percentage is high, then that would be a big negative to the case of legalising drug possession.
Cultural Historic Cases
We all know what happened when alcohol was made illegal in the USA, and no one can say that bootleg period was a success story. Alcohol was still drunk, and a whole underground market popped up, just like there is now with drugs.
Interesting positive modern day story to decriminalising small drug possession is Portugal, where statistically this has had an extremely positive effect on drug use and overdose in the country, click here for more information.
Summary
There is no easy cut and dry answer to this question. In the end education on the true effects of drugs is what is going to make a real difference; but I think we should all take a real look at how Portugal are treating the problem, and follow in their example in helping rather than shunning those with a drug problem.
