except putting people in prison for a medical condition (addiction to drugs) is not really smart?

Except it is, if you call it a rehabilitation clinic.

Except it is, if you call it a rehabilitation clinic.

except rehab is in no way comparable to the US prison system

except rehab is in no way comparable to the US prison system

you're right, it's worse than prison if you're poor and they call it a "country club" if you're rich.

Because drugs not only ruin many peoples lives but also ruins society. How it ruins society I don't even have to mention since everyone already knows pretty much / or can figure it out.

no actually i don't know

i completely fail to see how drug culture can possibly be any more counter-productive than a CRIME CULTURE.

or maybe you see losers smoking weed in their dorms as somehow being more socially reprehensible than gangsters shooting each other in the streets over the status of a couple of kilos of a fucking plant. no matter what the fuck stupid, backwater belief you hold on shit like this, you should be aware that criminalization of ANYTHING of this nature WILL bring many more clones of Al Capone into existence and create unreasonable amounts of crime that otherwise wouldn't have occurred. i don't think it's going out on a limb when i say that a significant amount(if not majority) of people in prison for marijuana crimes wouldn't be in prison or engage in criminal activities otherwise. you may want to double-check your priorities if you think drug use and drug culture is THAT severe of a problem that it warrants creating such an absurdly costly situation

i completely fail to see how drug culture can possibly be any more counter-productive than a CRIME CULTURE.

Depends on what drug you're talking about.  Something like weed that's addictive, plentiful, and relatively harmless isn't going to tear down the walls of America but cocaine, heroine, and crack are some pretty terrible shit and no man should be subjected to using it.  My problem with the drug crowd isn't the users themselves but the pushers who sell this shit to CHILDREN and low-income people with dependents because they're dumb, impressionable, and easily available for a quick buck.  Seeing a 12 year old trip out and rack his brains against a brick wall because he can't get his fix is a terrible sight to behold and just as bad as some jackass who steals someone's only means of support because he got them hooked on a lethal substance.

The last thing I want is speed and and crack readily available at the corner shop for any elementary school kid to buy with his lunch money.  I'd rather there be a handful of Capones than a society of lethargic addicts.

Depends on what drug you're talking about.

honestly, i was more talking about weed in this case, as that was what bisse was directly responding to.

yeah, i'm definitely not in favor of complete drug de-regulation. i just get irritated when i see people put shit like marijuana and psychedelic culture in the same classification as the culture of the heavily addictive and dangerous drugs

they should get all those prisoners in a stadium or some shit and have them do mad feats of group coordination

You mean like this?  I think America needs to step up and beat their record!

There's not much else I can say about this general topic of too many people being in jail.  I'm not too surprised about the Kentucky statistic though, pretty much every other person is in jail here, mostly because they drink too much.  That could have something to do with the increase in violence too, because every time I hear of a violent crime happening here it turns out to have been caused by either drinking or drugs.  Basically the people here who aren't in jail died when their meth lab blew up and somehow their 1 or less year old child was found in the wreckage with only minor injuries.

edit:  Also I don't know about other towns but in my home town we JUST made it legal to sell alcohol in restaurants, and if other towns just recently did the same it could explain why there would be more DUI's (which is the main reason people are arrested around here), there is no such thing as responsible drinking in my area.

My problem with the drug crowd isn't the users themselves but the pushers who sell this shit to CHILDREN and low-income people with dependents because they're dumb, impressionable, and easily available for a quick buck.  Seeing a 12 year old trip out and rack his brains against a brick wall because he can't get his fix is a terrible sight to behold and just as bad as some jackass who steals someone's only means of support because he got them hooked on a lethal substance.

The last thing I want is speed and and crack readily available at the corner shop for any elementary school kid to buy with his lunch money.  I'd rather there be a handful of Capones than a society of lethargic addicts.

you contradict yourself here. first you say that it is not the drug users you have a problem with, it is the dealers. then you say you would rather have the drug dealers we already have than more drug users.

putting aside the assumption that legalisation of a drug will make it substantially more popular, the most awful thing about the drug business isn't really the dealing of the drugs themselves.

if something which is in constant demand is made illegal, then an illegal trade is going to appear. there is absolutely no stopping this, because there is constant demand, and where there is demand there is gonna be supply. that's why a war on drugs, or whatever, is futile. when something is legal, this is okay because no-one is going to get killed over it but when you put a product into the hands of people who are willing to break the law then you are going to find that when business is not running smoothly, people start getting hurt. then you factor in the fact that the product is an addictive drug and things start to get really awful because the level of demand is so high that people get desperate and they start losing their family, friends and all their money in the pursuit of this thing they are addicted to. when the only supplier of the substance is the kind of person who disregards the law and does not mind selling addictive and lethal substances to people, these addicts are in for a tough fucking time, and the only two outcomes are dying or getting off the drug.

if a drug was legalised and regulated so that there was no reason for it to go into the hands of illegal dealers (because if there is a reason, there is no stopping it), then things wouldn't be as bad. for the addicts it is still gonna fucking suck, i mean alcohol is legal and it's still a big problem for a lot of people including me, but it would be so much worse if it were illegal. talking about 12 year olds buying coke from a corner shop is ridiculous because it is exactly what happens now only they are getting it from behind the corner shop and from people who will kill them if they don't pay up.

you also say that if drugs are legalised, everyone will become an addict. i'd expect there would be a spike in drug use among idiots, but you seem to think that the only thing holding people back from trying certain drugs is the fact that it is illegal. that is probably true for a certain amount of people, but i think alcohol is a good example to bring up here, again. it's legal, but there are serious regulations on it's use. we still have alcoholics, and it still causes a certain level of violence but it is so much better than ridiculous gang warfare, kids being used as runners, innocent bystanders getting killed and on and on. if drugs were to be legalised there would have to be regulations, obviously, but as long as the suppliers remain legitimate and remotely moral, it would be much better than what exists now.

drugs and addiction are always gonna exist, but the level of drug crime these days doesn't need to.

and this is relevant to the topic!!!

yah the only reason I am drug free is because it hasn't been GOVERNMENT APPROVED, and not because of my views and opnions on the subject.

The whole being banned thing is totally ridiculous. Canabis has been reclassified to a higher class over here or something. Canabis is easier to obtain here then booze or fags, both of which being legal.
America's "war on drugs" is a major joke, because you're like putting the measly little runners, the nobodys into prison, and that's not changing a damn thing, infact it means that the money incentive (or RISK PAY) for such things goes up meaning MORE PEOPLE want to be runners for the extra moolahs. The "War on drugs" seems to have done the opposite to it's purpose, by making the drugs trade a whole lot more profitable and dangerous and by forcing people to be more careful and trickier to catch.
But yah filling up prisons with runners... totally worth it.

the war on drugs is one of the worst foreign and domestic policies to ever exist

edit:

you're right, it's worse than prison if you're poor and they call it a "country club" if you're rich.

hint: poor/uninsured people can't go to rehab

jamicus, you seem to forget that people counterfeit alchohol and tobacco on a daily basis.  Breaking up a distillery or burning a tobacco farm isn't a big deal and never makes national news but people will do anything for a dollar.  If drugs were legalised and a government tax was put on them, you'd still have the same number of guys growing the shit in their backyard or importing it from other countries but the difference here is that it'll be available in every corner shop and in the pockets of pushers.  You're just doubling the exposure. 

And yeah, the fact that it is illegal and widely frowned upon in the country is a pretty big deterrence.  Any job worth a damn (especially government jobs but shit like McDonalds have started doing it) does random urine tests and they'll either fire you or put you on suspension if you test positive.  I'd rather keep my money than get a quick fix and lose everything.

you're right, it's worse than prison if you're poor and they call it a "country club" if you're rich.

Wait, how is rehab 'worse than prison' if you're poor? Granted, you don't get into the Richie Rich Mind and Body Refreshment Club for the Chemically Inclined, but how is it worse than having other inmates shove you around while armed guards watch your every movement?

I'm not sure if anyone (by anyone I mean the ANTI-EVERY-DRUG people) but there are societies which exist that have weed (and other drugs) legalized yet have not fallen apart (one of them is actually very highly ranked as one of the happiest places on Earth [and ][/and]).

Wait, how is rehab 'worse than prison' if you're poor? Granted, you don't get into the Richie Rich Mind and Body Refreshment Club for the Chemically Inclined, but how is it worse than having other inmates shove you around while armed guards watch your every movement?

Because when I say rehab, I don't mean AA meetings where everyone sits in chairs and talks about how much their lives suck.  For serious patients, they strap you to a bed and make you sweat out the drug.  I can't speak from experience, but I'd much rather have the basic freedoms of prison life than being confined to a rack for a month.  People who normally go through withdrawl have been known to claw their skin off or slam their heads against the ground.  That shit scares me more than anything else.

AA meetings are worse than prison in certain respects anyways. It's a cult that brainwashes you

fff

if you seriously think any poor person has access to rehab you're fundamentally stupid

the rich can go to rehab and get better, the poor go to jail and the process continues

it's called hegemony.

Because drugs not only ruin many peoples lives but also ruins society. How it ruins society I don't even have to mention since everyone already knows pretty much / or can figure it out.

In Thailand the punishment for drug use is execution. Sweden has deals with Thailand so they just send swedes back here, but if you're from a country that doesn't have a deal or a native, you're royally fucked. The reason for this is because they need to deal with the entire fucked up society that drugs create. That's why you have tougher punishments, there is only one reason and it is very simple, it's an attempt to make people not fucking do drugs.

He was talking about Marijuana though.... not opium. Marijuana is no more harmful than say... alcohol. Both in effects and long term consumption~

also people who are high on pot generally don't beat the shit out of other people for no reason like they do on alcohol