Canuckistani

I'm so torn on this issue, I can't decide where I fall.
 
On one hand, I don't think governments should tell grown adults what they can or can't put in their bodies. That goes for food, drugs, or nutritional supplements. On the other, I think we should do far more than we already do to keep harmful things from kids. I don't know what the middle ground is... you can do whatever you want to yourself, but it's still a serious crime to sell it to someone else (especially a minor)?
 
The other sticky part is our public health system. If we are going allow people to do whatever they want with their bodies, should we still expect everyone else to pick up the tab? For instance, part of me still thinks that perhaps tobacco should be outlawed because of the health consequences. If smoking were illegal, smoking ANYTHING would likely be covered by that, bring us back to where we are with pot, just for a different reason. Maybe the answer is to treat health care the way other insurance is done -- deliberate acts of "bad health" make your coverage get cancelled. For instance, we have socialized insurance for cars in manitoba, and people can and DO get their coverage pulled for bad driving.

Pot is easier for kids to access than booze, exactly because pot is illegal and dealers don't check for ID.

If prohibition worked, I'd be all for outlawing booze and smokes. They cause a lot of harm. But, it doesn't work, people still get their drugs, just in a less safe way.

As for the medical coverage argument - far cheaper to provide treatment than to deal with the fallout of of not providing it. And with pot, the costs are insignificant, as a BC study showed - all of the social costs associated with pot were for enforcement. Tobacco, otoh, has very high medical costs to society.

But not moonshine. You brew your own wine with companies. Would the government allow unlimited growth in someone's garden.

I sure hope not. There would be a limit and it's for personal use only, just like it is with brewing beer or wine. I've brewed my own beer, I know lots of people who make their own wine, no companies involved. Those places are just for people that want the easy way. If you're stupid enough to grow pot in your garden, you are unlikely to have much of a crop left come harvest time, and the quality will likely be poor to.

What if you want to sell your stash tax free? Laws would still apply. Decriminalisation is a nice balance.

No selling without a license. Decrim is stupid - bust the producers but not the users? Note how neither WA or CO have gone that chickenshite route.

I'm not a user, I think using any drug is stupid. But many people seem to want to do so with little ill effect. Actually I'm for legalizing all drugs, tho regulations would be different depending on the drug. Drugs like crystal meth or crack, I don't now how you legalize them, but making them illegal certainly hasn't prevented their use. Would you or anybody you know (except Rob Ford) use those drugs if they were legal?

I was wondering what everyone thinks of pot being legal. I think it should be, its less harmful than alcohol. Why should the government be able to tell me what I can and cannot do.

Pot is still can cause harm.  But the harm of criminalizing it outweighs the harm of legal use, IMO.

And have to pay ridiculous sin taxes like the alcohol and tobacco consuming suckers? No thanks!

Pot costs about as much to produce as tobacco. You would pay a lot less with legal pot, and the govt could still rake in a good whack of taxes. Plus growing for personal use would have to be allowed, just like you can brew beer and wine for yourself now.

We should be providing more of the services I have described - ie community based supportive housing.  That would prevent a lot of problems.

 

Wouldn't have caught Li tho, and I don't think anything we do, short of locking up everybody who acts a bit "weird" would do so.  Many people look lost, almost none go on to kill and eat other people.

 

With Li, and other NCR people, I have no problem with releasing them back into the community if deemed safe to do so, as long as close support and monitoring exists in that community - ie make sure they take their meds every day. If they don't, or otherwise go off the rails, they should be re-institutionalized. Not for punishment because they are responsible, but for the safety of themselves and the community.  As for something to lose by going for help, that was not likely his motivation. It's the stigma of being labelled, as well as his internal reality that tells him he's quite sane and how will he stop the aliens if he's locked up.

 

We do no punish alcoholics for being alcoholics.  They are free to drink themselves to death. We punish them because of illegal actions they take that might be driven by their alcoholism.  We do deem them rational beings able to make decisions.  Which is kind of funny, because when somebody is blotto, they're not rational, not able to make good decisions, so maybe they should all be found NCR for killing somebody too.  And in fact we do have the diminished capacity defense for just that. "I was too drunk to form intent, you're honor, so I'm not guilty of murder"