Discuss: Teens and drugs

[Infected Mushroom]

Prevention = detecting and eliminating threats (hopefully before they do too much damage). Any viable strategy of Prevention must assume that every possibility is a possibility (hence anyone could potentially be a drug dealer or a drug user). But that's not the same thing as presuming immediately that everyone is Guilty and throwing everyone in jail immediately. No... people are not arrested unless they have done something wrong.

If you've done nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear.

How are those not the same things?

If there is a possibility you are a criminal you are criminalizing the person. You are assuming they are possibly guilty of anything.

Assuming everyone COULD be a drug dealer/drug user isn't the same as immediately condemning everyone as a drug dealer/drug user. While everyone is watched, only those who are confirmed as drug dealers/drug users are punished accordingly. That is the distinction.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

Which is precisely what will happen.

Intrusion for the sake of fighting something only makes censorship much easier.

what do you mean?

I'll give you an example: the great firewall of china for instance. It was regarded as "one more step in the fight of ideas against the West"; however, it has turned into a surveillance system which prohibits even to speak bad about the president or the government of China, it deviated from its original purpose into an all-encompassing digital surveillance system and policing system of justice.

In other words, you let the government breach on your privacy too much, it won't be long before they attempt to censor what you say or do.

[Soldati Senza Confini]

How are those not the same things?

If there is a possibility you are a criminal you are criminalizing the person. You are assuming they are possibly guilty of anything.

Assuming everyone COULD be a drug dealer/drug user isn't the same as immediately condemning everyone as a drug dealer/drug user. While everyone is watched, only those who are confirmed as drug dealers/drug users are punished accordingly. That is the distinction.

So you want something like the Chinese system of justice, which is invasive and unnecessary?

[Infected Mushroom]

what do you mean?

I'll give you an example: the great firewall of china for instance. It was regarded as "one more step in the fight of ideas against the West"; however, it has turned into a surveillance system which prohibits even to speak bad about the president or the government of China, it deviated from its original purpose into an all-encompassing digital surveillance system and policing system of justice.

In other words, you let the government breach on your privacy too much, it won't be long before they attempt to censor what you say or do.

i see...

but the US (and other Western countries) aren't as corrupt as China right? So if they implement a measure, it should be used for its announced purpose (the purpose of justice). I don't think our governments would do something that corrupt...

[Soldati Senza Confini]

I'll give you an example: the great firewall of china for instance. It was regarded as "one more step in the fight of ideas against the West"; however, it has turned into a surveillance system which prohibits even to speak bad about the president or the government of China, it deviated from its original purpose into an all-encompassing digital surveillance system and policing system of justice.

In other words, you let the government breach on your privacy too much, it won't be long before they attempt to censor what you say or do.

i see...

but the US (and other Western countries) aren't as corrupt as China right? So if they implement a measure, it should be used for its announced purpose (the purpose of justice). I don't think our governments would do something that corrupt...

You really underestimate the people behind a government if you think that way.

[Charellia]

We have restrictions on government power for a reason. If we abandon them, even for a just cause, then there is a very real risk of us becoming no different from any of the states you mentioned.

the electoral system and the bill of rights won't collapse overnight just because we decide to use a few technologies more efficiently to fight drug dealers.

Well the Bill of Rights will collapse pretty quickly if we start ignoring it and the electoral system won't mean much without it.

[Scomagia]

It's ludicrously expensive, unnecessarily invasive, and treats everyone like a criminal. Of course you'd support it.

It may be expensive, but it will be highly highly effective (anyone who has anything to do with drugs would be detected unless they were skipping school). And there needs to be a clause where the schools must comply or else get shut down with the state being able to press charges against specific administrators.

It is NOT unnecessarily intrusive. The drug problem has gotten way WAY out of control. Do you know how many schoolyards I've seen where the ''cool kids'' were pretty much OPENLY dealing drugs? The teachers walk right past lanes in the yards filled with the smell of pot and other drugs... its ridiculous. Something must be done.

And no it doesn't treat everyone like criminals. Unless you think airport security metal detectors ''treat everyone like criminals.'' Its the same concept really.

Nevermind false positives right? And what of homeschooled children? Should the government shove its anti-drug dick there too?

I don't care how many of anything you claim to have seen. Anectdotes aren't evidence and I suspect you're full of shit.

Airport metal detectors identify specific banned items that you may be carrying because they could be potentially used to cause harm to others aboard the plane. Mandatory drug screening for high-school students detects metabolites of illicit substances that the student may or may not have consumed on school property, and that possess absolutely no harm to the well-being of anyone. They are two fundamentally different concepts.

[DnalweN acilbupeR]

I think it's safe to assume that 99.9% of the negative effects of drugs are direct or indirect consequences of them being illegal. High price (which in turn encourages crime in order to support the habit) and low purity, social stigma, incarceration, and a decline in quality of life and healthcare users can afford, fueling and funding the underworld etc. This is what prohibition does. It's like one big vicious circle ; eliminate the "illegal" part and a huge, huge portion of the negative effects of drugs will simply disappear.

Well-off people who can afford comparatively pure drugs and proper healthcare don't look like your stereotypical addict for a reason.

[Nationes Pii Redivivi]

We have always been on and on about how our nation's youth are going to the dogs, breeding litters, drugging, shooting at each other... I don't think it is even that serious of a problem, as you make it out to be, it is the same complaint over and over, and then, research will come in, and tell us we've been fretting over our own hyperactive imagination applying our own character to our nation's youth.

[Nazi Flower Power]

I think something about the teenage brain attracts it to seek out risks, thrills and new experiences.

Which is why the scare tactics being used in the "War on Drugs" are counterproductive, because they make drugs sound edgier and more exciting...

[Infected Mushroom]

I think something about the teenage brain attracts it to seek out risks, thrills and new experiences.

Which is why the scare tactics being used in the "War on Drugs" are counterproductive, because they make drugs sound edgier and more exciting...

going to jail is not exciting

this is why enforcement is and has always been key

[Draica]

It is further criminalization of the issue. Furthermore, just because you can stop some drug dealers doesn't mean you will stop them all, or that they won't keep appearing as long as drugs are a profitable black market.

Legalize it, you don't have the problem of drug dealers.

that's like saying if you legalize murder the problem of murder will disappear. Its merely turning a blind eye to the problem or worse, allowing the private sector to carry out horrendous acts in plain sight for profit.

if something is wrong, you criminalize it and you fight it. You don't just give up and make it legal and say the problem has disappeared. Dealing drugs is wrong... it doesn't matter if its the people on the street doing it, or big corporations, or the government. Anyone who would exploit people like this needs to be stopped for the greater good.

At least with the current system, we get to catch some of these exploitative bastards and put them behind bars. Its about eventually catching all of them but I'll settle for and start with catching MORE of them... and this is what this method would achieve. Its enough for now. Do you know how many lives drugs have destroyed? And for many people it started in the schools because no one was there to stop the dealers...

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You make sense my dear, I agree with you one hundred precent

[Draica]

Assuming everyone COULD be a drug dealer/drug user isn't the same as immediately condemning everyone as a drug dealer/drug user. While everyone is watched, only those who are confirmed as drug dealers/drug users are punished accordingly. That is the distinction.

So you want something like the Chinese system of justice, which is invasive and unnecessary?

Then what is your solution for keeping drugs out of the hands of 14 year olds?

[Soldati Senza Confini]

So you want something like the Chinese system of justice, which is invasive and unnecessary?

Then what is your solution for keeping drugs out of the hands of 14 year olds?

Educate them about drugs?

I mean, my dad all he had to tell me about drugs (and he smoked marihuana in his youth, long before it was criminalized) was "it's like getting drunk, except without the aftereffects" so, what did I do? I closed the case and said "well, I can just wait until I get drunk then when I'm older"'.

If we legalized them and stop making it so hush hush and taboo (sort of like what your opinions are also on pre-marital sex) then we wouldn't have this issue. Down here in Texas it has been shown that people who know more about drugs are the least likely to do them, and the people who know more about sex from sexual education classes who are not abstinence only don't end up with a child in High School. Coincidence? I don't think so.

[Infected Mushroom]

that's like saying if you legalize murder the problem of murder will disappear. Its merely turning a blind eye to the problem or worse, allowing the private sector to carry out horrendous acts in plain sight for profit.

if something is wrong, you criminalize it and you fight it. You don't just give up and make it legal and say the problem has disappeared. Dealing drugs is wrong... it doesn't matter if its the people on the street doing it, or big corporations, or the government. Anyone who would exploit people like this needs to be stopped for the greater good.

At least with the current system, we get to catch some of these exploitative bastards and put them behind bars. Its about eventually catching all of them but I'll settle for and start with catching MORE of them... and this is what this method would achieve. Its enough for now. Do you know how many lives drugs have destroyed? And for many people it started in the schools because no one was there to stop the dealers...

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You make sense my dear, I agree with you one hundred precent

=)

[Page]

So you want something like the Chinese system of justice, which is invasive and unnecessary?

Then what is your solution for keeping drugs out of the hands of 14 year olds?

I'd rather let 14 year olds get drugs than give up my civil liberties. I'd rather a few 14 year olds overdose and die than give up my civil liberties (which some do and some would continue to even in your DARE dystopia). To me it's more utilitarian to not breed a populace so willing to allow their governments to invade their lives in any way imaginable; considering how many people were slain by their own governments throughout the course of the 20th century, I'd reckon there's still less people dying overall in a world where people reject totalitarian tactics like you propose.

[Zottistan]

So you want something like the Chinese system of justice, which is invasive and unnecessary?

Then what is your solution for keeping drugs out of the hands of 14 year olds?

Put money into informing kids about the effects of drugs, and social spending to make sure they have decent standards of living. The ones who are still curious enough to need to try for themselves will be the ones who would have tried anyway.

[Scomagia]

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You make sense my dear, I agree with you one hundred precent

=)

You two should really start a club for people who see A Scanner Darkly as utopia.

[Hurdegaryp]

Yes, let's drug test the children to make sure we can throw them in prison and destroy their lives for doing something mildly stupid.

On the contrary, my dear Frisi. We should let the market run its course and allow consumers to consume.

[Kiruri]

Then what is your solution for keeping drugs out of the hands of 14 year olds?

Put money into informing kids about the effects of drugs, and social spending to make sure they have decent standards of living. The ones who are still curious enough to need to try for themselves will be the ones who would have tried anyway.

Informing is probably not that effective. Not that information is bad or anything, I just doubt it would do much.

[MERIZoC]

Which is why the scare tactics being used in the "War on Drugs" are counterproductive, because they make drugs sound edgier and more exciting...

going to jail is not exciting

this is why enforcement is and has always been key

Oh yeah. Ever since we gave huge punishments for drug use, the rate of drug use has gone down quite drastically. Oh wait….

[Charellia]

So you want something like the Chinese system of justice, which is invasive and unnecessary?

Then what is your solution for keeping drugs out of the hands of 14 year olds?

Make it a legal regulated industry. License distributors and impose heavy penalties on those who sell to minors. It worked with alcohol.

[DnalweN acilbupeR]

Until people will get it through their thick heads that further prohibition will only make it worse, nothing can be done.

[Moon Cows]

Terrible, really. Drug use, including marijuana, and underage drinking needs to be more strictly punished... especially among teenagers. We need more people reporting it when they see/suspect it, rather than apathy... and sometimes encouragement.

[Moon Cows]

Then what is your solution for keeping drugs out of the hands of 14 year olds?

Make it a legal regulated industry. License distributors and impose heavy penalties on those who sell to minors. It worked with alcohol.

No it didn't. Alcohol usage is extremely popular, especially among minors. Legalization is the government issuing the thumbs up on drug use, and that could lead drugs to being as commonly used as alcohol is today.