"uh…she wouldn't have been raped and almost died if she DIDN'T DO DRUGS. "
As long as drugs exist people WILL do them. So who is more responsible for these sorts of consequences? The people who use these drugs when the drugs themselves do not carry consequences of "side effect: you'll be raped" or people who won't make them legal and get rid of the majority of the worst consequences of drugs existing?
Is that why crime skyrocketed after the end of the Alcohol Prohibition? Actually, the exact opposite happened.
What exactly are they going to do that has the incredibly high profit margins and near-infinite demand of drugs and requires no skill besides standing out by a street corner in a shady neighborhood?
Adrianne is right, some of the biggest harms done to drug users are caused by their illegality. Being given the wrong drug, impure drugs, drugs of varying potency (leading to accidental ODs), having to pay tons of money for drugs which are cheaper to make than food, being arrested for a victimless crime and potentially becoming a felon, put in danger by their inability to get drugs anywhere else and frankly, it's a risk people will take just because drugs exist and a risk that can be eliminated simply by legalizing them.
What people who support and continue to support the drug war blindly don't understand is that it costs society more monetarily and ruins lives far more often when it is illegal. Even worse, there are so many horror stories from the victims of the war on drugs that it would be difficult for anyone to ever accept their responsibility in destroying so many lives and hurting so many people through complicity that they may just live in denial until they are dead.
As long as drugs exist people WILL do them. So who is more responsible for these sorts of consequences? The people who use these drugs when the drugs themselves do not carry consequences of "side effect: you'll be raped" or people who won't make them legal and get rid of the majority of the worst consequences of drugs existing?
What exactly are they going to do that has the incredibly high profit margins and near-infinite demand of drugs and requires no skill besides standing out by a street corner in a shady neighborhood?
Adrianne is right, some of the biggest harms done to drug users are caused by their illegality. Being given the wrong drug, impure drugs, drugs of varying potency (leading to accidental ODs), having to pay tons of money for drugs which are cheaper to make than food, being arrested for a victimless crime and potentially becoming a felon, put in danger by their inability to get drugs anywhere else and frankly, it's a risk people will take just because drugs exist and a risk that can be eliminated simply by legalizing them.
What people who support and continue to support the drug war blindly don't understand is that it costs society more monetarily and ruins lives far more often when it is illegal. Even worse, there are so many horror stories from the victims of the war on drugs that it would be difficult for anyone to ever accept their responsibility in destroying so many lives and hurting so many people through complicity that they may just live in denial until they are dead.