Facebook Mark Zuckerberg Gave $500,000 To Decriminalization All Drugs(Heroin) In Oregon And Initiative Passed

  • Thread starter Thread starter gam197
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Zzyzx_Road said:
If someone wants to use at home, no problem
Click to expand...
I don’t know how many of the commenters have actually fed the homeless, or dealt with many people who have severe drug or alcohol addictions but I have.

I cannot convey - there are simply no words - of the horror of what happens to the children of drug and alcohol addicted parents. The shattered families, the people killed in car accidents, the ruined businesses and just the unending tribulations that spread out in wave after wave, all because of drug and alcohol addictions.

If we just give those who are addicted more drugs, all we do is continue the problem. Not that I have any other solution, but I wanted to tell you what I have seen.

It’s the children that really break my heart and will be harmed most of all by having their mother continue to use heroin until she simply dies.
 
mercyalways said:
I don’t know how many of the commenters have actually fed the homeless, or dealt with many people who have severe drug or alcohol addictions but I have.
Click to expand...
I’ve seen the homeless. I’ve walked among them. I’ve fed them. I’ve contributed to food banks that serve them, both in money and in food. Yes I agree that’s bad, no doubt.

But nowhere near as bad as the violence inherent in the drug trade. Not even close. When there is an income tax-free means of supplying a desired commodity, being able to make money with no taxes is an enormous incentive. When there is a dispute in this realm, there is no access to the legal court system for resolution, hence violence is often the only solution possible. This is how the cartels get rich and violent so quickly. This is how the cartels have corrupted Mexico and the US poor areas so badly. This is how the cartels and their lieutenants in the US have the weaponry, the tactics and the numbers to wreak their carnage. It is long past time to admit that the War on Drugs has failed.

So my take is let’s end that war, let’s stop the burden on the courts and the prisons and let’s put the funds into education and rehabilitation.
 
Zzyzx_Road said:
So my take is let’s end that war, let’s stop the burden on the courts and the prisons and let’s put the funds into education and rehabilitation.
Click to expand...
Also housing. Way cheaper to give someone an apartment than imprison them, and once in stable housing they’re more likely to get a job and stop using. The local Catholic charity here is housing first, clients can drink and use drugs in their apartments if they want to.
 
Balto1 said:
48.png
Zzyzx_Road:
So my take is let’s end that war, let’s stop the burden on the courts and the prisons and let’s put the funds into education and rehabilitation.
Click to expand...
Also housing. Way cheaper to give someone an apartment than imprison them, and once in stable housing they’re more likely to get a job and stop using. The local Catholic charity here is housing first, clients can drink and use drugs in their apartments if they want to.
Click to expand...
And what if they are given education, rehabilitation, and housing and there are still a whole lot of drug addicts. What is the next step or will it be more money and more money, endless.?

There is this notion that all drug addicts are in poverty and that is simply not true. There are lots of middle class and rich drug addicts.
 
Last edited:
gam197 said:
And what if they are given education, rehabilitation, and housing and there are still a whole lot of drug addicts. What is the next step or will it be more money and more money, endless.?
Click to expand...
Well, as a Catholic I think we should continue to love our neighbors as ourselves and provide housing even if people continue suffering from substance abuse issues. If that doesn’t work for you it’s still cheaper to give someone housing than pay for the emergency room visits associated with homeless addicts.
 
Balto1 said:
48.png
gam197:
And what if they are given education, rehabilitation, and housing and there are still a whole lot of drug addicts. What is the next step or will it be more money and more money, endless.?
Click to expand...
Well, as a Catholic I think we should continue to love our neighbors as ourselves and provide housing even if people continue suffering from substance abuse issues. If that doesn’t work for you it’s still cheaper to give someone housing than pay for the emergency room visits associated with homeless addicts.
Click to expand...
Charity to our neighbors is not the issue, that is already done. The issue how does legalizing drugs help the drug addict. Your notion is that people are drug addicts because they are poor so if we make them wealthier, we will solve drug addiction. I am asking how much wealthier?

What is to be done with the middle and wealthy upper classes who have massive drug problems, how will legalizing drugs solve their addictions?
 
Last edited:
gam197 said:
The issue how does legalizing drugs help the drug addict.
Click to expand...
Not prosecuting someone is a massive help to them. Legal, regulated drugs reduce overdoses.
gam197 said:
Your notion is that people are drug addicts because they are poor so if we make them wealthier, we will solve drug addiction.
Click to expand...
This wouldn’t solve drug addiction, but it would reduce drug addiction.
gam197 said:
I am asking how much wealthier?
Click to expand...
Housing, health care, and basic living expenses vastly reduce the stress of poverty which in turn reduces substance abuse.
gam197 said:
What is to be done with the middle and wealthy upper classes who have massive drug problems, how will legalizing drugs solve their addictions?
Click to expand...
Reducing prosecution, incarceration, and overdose risk helps all substance users.
 
Is that correct? The drug addicts I know do NOT deal in drug selling.

BTW, the old-time intellectual and conservative, William Buckley, Jr., was in favor of decriminalizing drugs to take the profit motive out of drug dealing. Not saying I necessarily agree, but food for thought.
 
Last edited:
Balto1 said:
48.png
gam197:
The issue how does legalizing drugs help the drug addict.
Click to expand...
Not prosecuting someone is a massive help to them. Legal, regulated drugs reduce overdoses.
Click to expand...
How
Balto1 said:
48.png
gam197:
I am asking how much wealthier?
Click to expand...
Housing, health care, and basic living expenses vastly reduce the stress of poverty which in turn reduces substance abuse.
Click to expand...
So, it is not about getting rid of drug addiction, now it is about trying to reduce it. There are no reports on that. increasing wealth helps to reduce drug addiction. Middle and wealthy people have lots of drug problems.
Balto1 said:
48.png
gam197:
What is to be done with the middle and wealthy upper classes who have massive drug problems, how will legalizing drugs solve their addictions?
Click to expand...
Reducing prosecution, incarceration, and overdose risk helps all substance users.
Click to expand...
How does reducing incarceration and turning a blind eye to the problem help wealthy people with addiction issues?. I know you have said rehabilitation but we already have programs to help and they do not seem to be working.

As stated these ideas as not new ideas and have been floated for many years that decriminalization of drugs is a way to solve the drug problem. I just do not see how that happens.

We are a big country and have major drug cartels south of the border and in our own country. So the next step would be to expand the government and make them into drug sellers.
 
Last edited:
gam197 said:
How
Click to expand...
If you want to reduce drug use sensing someone to jail where the most popular pastime is doing drugs is not going to help. Losing your job and housing due to incarceration is massively destabilizing when stable situations help people stop using. Access to regulated drugs reduces overdose risk since the drug is a known quantity/purity.
gam197 said:
As stated these ideas as not new ideas and have been floated for many years that decriminalization of drugs is a way to solve the drug problem. I just do not see how that happens.
Click to expand...
Nothing will ever eliminate substance abuse, but these strategies have the most positive effects. My diocese is not pro-drug use but lets people use drugs and alcohol in their housing units because that’s the best chance of helping those people.
 
Balto1 said:
48.png
gam197:
How
Click to expand...
If you want to reduce drug use sensing someone to jail where the most popular pastime is doing drugs is not going to help. Losing your job and housing due to incarceration is massively destabilizing when stable situations help people stop using. Access to regulated drugs reduces overdose risk since the drug is a known quantity/purity.
Click to expand...
There we go. Regulation of drugs so the government becomes the regulator of the drug trade. That ought to be interesting when we can’t seem to do much without a great deal of corruption.
Balto1 said:
48.png
gam197:
As stated these ideas as not new ideas and have been floated for many years that decriminalization of drugs is a way to solve the drug problem. I just do not see how that happens.
Click to expand...
Nothing will ever eliminate substance abuse, but these strategies have the most positive effects**. My diocese is not pro-drug use but lets people use drugs and alcohol in their housing units because that’s the best chance of helping those people
Click to expand...
You stated they already allow drug and alcohol use in housing units and turn a blind eye to it. I do not see how this new law with help further with drug addiction… Again it is this end game idea that government can become the regulators.
 
Last edited:
Yes five hundred thousand ($500.000) could have been spent on helping poor drug addicts and I am sure that was a small percentage of the money spent to pass this law…
 
mercyalways said:
If we just give those who are addicted more drugs, all we do is continue the problem. Not that I have any other solution, but I wanted to tell you what I have seen.
Click to expand...
Have you examined the Portuguese solution to the drug crisis?

"On July 1, 2001, a nationwide law in Portugal took effect that decriminalized all drugs, including cocaine and heroin. Under the new legal framework, all drugs were “decriminalized,” not “legalized.” Thus, drug possession for personal use and drug usage itself are still legally prohibited, but violations of those prohibitions are deemed to be exclusively administrative violations and are removed completely from the criminal realm. Drug trafficking continues to be prosecuted as a criminal offense.

While other states in the European Union have developed various forms of de facto decriminalization — whereby substances perceived to be less serious (such as cannabis) rarely lead to criminal prosecution — Portugal remains the only EU member state with a law explicitly declaring drugs to be “decriminalized.” Because more than seven years have now elapsed since enactment of Portugal’s decriminalization system, there are ample data enabling its effects to be assessed.

Notably, decriminalization has become increasingly popular in Portugal since 2001. Except for some far‐right politicians, very few domestic political factions are agitating for a repeal of the 2001 law. And while there is a widespread perception that bureaucratic changes need to be made to Portugal’s decriminalization framework to make it more efficient and effective, there is no real debate about whether drugs should once again be criminalized. More significantly, none of the nightmare scenarios touted by preenactment decriminalization opponents — from rampant increases in drug usage among the young to the transformation of Lisbon into a haven for “drug tourists” — has occurred."

https://www.cato.org/books/drug-dec...essons-creating-fair-successful-drug-policies
 
The Catholic Church has enough issues without taking a side on the drug war.Helping drug addicts and their families they have always done.

This idea that government can become the drug dealers does not work, just more government control.

Mark Zuckerman(Facebook) Jack Dorsey(Twitter) and Google think they can throw their money around and use their sites to block information and control this country, they cannot.
 
Last edited:
Do you think it’s better to charge drug users with criminal charges and throw them into prisons? How is that any less “government control?”
 
That is a problem but the solution is not making the government the new drug dealers.
 
Decriminalizing drug use also does not eliminate illegal drug trade either … Illegal marijuana production and sales is still high in Oregon where the state has attempted to control and tax sales.

In California and around the nation illegal marijuana grow sites on public lands is rampant and a danger to citizens in far more ways than merely impacting lives of users. Every year they find these grow sites - many of which are on federal forests where much of the nations water supplies originate. AT these sites they find illegal herbicides - most smuggled across our porous and uncontrolled southern border. Those herbicides have injured employees and are a very distinct danger to watersheds and the municipalities who depend on the drinking water.

Meth houses and other illegal manufacture/distribution of illegal drugs will continue and are also an extreme hazard - just ask someone who has owned or bought a property that has been used in that manner … the health and hazard risks are very real.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top