Illegal immigration - Does it unduly affect US crime rates?

I'm not so sure. I don't think you can generalise about motivations for drug use. For instance, opioid's emotional deadening make them attractive to people with emotional problems and histories of abuse in a way that other drugs can't match.

 

You just made an argument for legalisation. Was that deliberate?

 

Yeah. Although we aren't allowed to say that sort of thing round here are we?

 

Oh yeah.

Lock up the scallies! Let's all go and have a nice, socially acceptable and totally legal pint.

Such a shame that evidence-based drug policies are taboo for whatever reason.

Remember the flak David Nutt got when he said that MDMA and LSD were less harmful to society than alcohol? He also annoyed the wrong crowd when he said that it was more dangerous for your teenage kids to go horse riding than take ecstasy. Didn't go down well in the Cotswolds!

 

Would not make one jot of difference

 

I think it would.

 

The interesting thing is that there is science to support the idea:

Medical Cannabis Laws and Opioid Mortality

 

I think that's not quite the same deal as, say, coffee shops and street heroin users.

If you look at the Netherlands, heroin use is probably around the same level it would be with or without decriminalised cannabis. Interestingly, cannabis use is also around the same level in comparable countries that haven't decriminalised the sale of cannabis, maybe even a little lower.

 

I think it would have effect with legal opioid use in chronic pain conditions, which is where many overdoses happen.

Unfortunately once its legal, abuse tends to happen, however MJ misused is much better then misused opioids.

 

Here have another: American Public Health Association (APHA) publications

So there are several possibilities for this and the paper doesn't really suss out what's happening: 1) People like marijuana better than heroin. 2) People just want to get screwed up in some way that isn't alcohol, and they go for the lowest hanging fruit. 3) Marijuana helps people quit opiates by acting as a substitute. 4) People in pain need something for that pain. The fact that marijuana hits some of the same neuronal receptors as heroin, coupled with its use as a substitute pain reliever makes me think that 3 or 4 might be possibilities, and lend credence to the idea that medical marijuana should be legalized, recreational should not.

 

I think having a medical permit system in place also allows for the monitoring of say, pilots, heavy machinery operators, etc., rather than outright legalization. The fact that we don't really have a test for if someone is currently under the influence makes me wary of outright recreational legislation.

 

I agree that 3 and 4 seem likely, and are intertwined.

But I don't think we can take that as evidence that availability of cannabis has an appreciable effect on usage rates for hard street drugs such as crack, cocaine and heroin.

On interesting case is the rise of synthetic cannabinoids in the UK, even though cannabis is readily available.

 

Why wouldn't OD rates be a proxy measurement for usage?

Yeah, the genetic revolution is going to blow the drug market open WIDE. I don't even know how you regulate it after that.

 

Because it doesn't differentiate between prescription opioid overdoses and street heroin overdoses. In the Netherlands there wasn't much impact at all on hard drug usage, but you also don't have the prescription opioid addiction crisis.

Synthetic cannabinoids, known as "spice" in the UK, are synthesised chemicals, not genetically engineered strains.

 

The only reason synthetic cocaine didn't become more popular is because its more expensive than the real thing. Whats the price of spice compared to the real thing? Americans love Mexican air and Colombian red.

 

Yeah with the medical system in the US I think there's much more bleedover between the two.

I'm aware, but what happens if you can get yeast to make you a hallucinogenic chemical in any petri dish?

 

I presumed you were, that was mainly for the peanut gallery

Legislation already can't keep up with synthesised chemicals, so you'd have no hope once you can genetically engineer psychoactive products.

 

Prices are comparable by weight, but the synthetic cannabis products have much stronger effects and include nasty withdrawals.

The rising popularity of spice goes against your idea that people would be less inclined to use "nasty" drugs if they could get hold of cannabis. Some people simply want to get as obliterated as possible.

 

Where do they buy their weed?

Dealers

Where do the buy their crack?

Dealers

Most weed users don't move on unless they want to with illegal purchase; that won't make one jot of difference when it becomes legal

 

Look at Freetown Christiana as an interesting case study of why absolute freedom of access in theory doesn't carry over into practice....there are drugs and there are D-rugs