Kinja reply list

Read More
Bolivia Newton JohnHamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:13am
I thought the whole point of the war on drugs was to exploit and control our socio-economic underclass. In that sense, it’s been a rousing success.
Reply
- Read More
  KinjaNinjaOnABinjaBolivia Newton John
  2/22/16 10:17am
  exploit and control our socio-economic underclass
  
  And also, the browner peoples of the Earth.
  Reply
- Read More
  ARP2Bolivia Newton John
  2/22/16 10:21am
  Don’t forget it was also to help prop up the pharmaceutical industry with drugs that are often just as dangerous, if not worse.
  Reply
Read More
Ricki Spanish HarlemHamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:32am
Yeah, it’s been a failure but I think everyone forgets how scary the waves of drug epidemics were and still are. I grew up during the crack epidemic and everyone was scared out of their minds not with just the violence but the real toll it took on communities and families. People bash Clinton for his crime bills and others like it but it was a real outcry for someone to do something. Especially in black communities. Was it misguided at the time? Maybe—but it didn’t look that way to folks who just wanted their neighborhoods back and were willing to try anything. It didn’t all come from spite and racism, there was real fear and hopelessness. It’s definitely time to end it and the discussion is focusing more on rehabilitation and criminal justice reform but it’s going to be a tough sell to many Americans to legalize all drugs, no matter how much sense it makes to some economist crunching the numbers in his comfortable office far removed from places like Detroit, Chicago and rural W. Va.
Reply
- Read More
  Johnny ChundersRicki Spanish Harlem
  2/22/16 10:48am
  Your remembrance of the incipient drug war sounds suspiciously like the media narrative surrounding it.
  Reply
- Read More
  CantWaitForTheOscarsJohnny Chunders
  2/22/16 10:58am
  Anyone who thinks that Crack was a media invention grew up in an all-white neighborhood. Check your privilege- it DECIMATED black american cities.
  Reply
Read More
Kerberos824Hamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:15am
Do you think it’s going to happen in the next two decades? The evidence has been pretty obvious for years, but we continue to go down the same path. What magic shift is going to happen to change people’s minds? Look how slow marijuana legalization is taking. I can’t imagine how long it would take for legalization and regulation. Not that I don’t completely support it. I just have to assume, as a 30-something-year-old, that it wont happen until I’m old and grey.
Reply
- Read More
  ARP2Kerberos824
  2/22/16 10:20am
  Yeah, I don’t see it happening for a while. I’d say we’ll get legal weed in a number of states in the next 5 or so years and that will be it for a while.
  Reply
- Read More
  CantWaitForTheOscarsKerberos824
  2/22/16 10:56am
  I had a good friend in college who was a smart guy who burned his mind out on pot. I just ran into his girlfriend from that era and she has a perma-high, nowhere near the intellect she had in college, she’s teaching kindergarten and going nowhere. My friend I was with could not believe I knew someone who was so out of it. Both of these people are living in tiny apartments with no marriages or families 20 years after college. By every measurement I can think of, they’re failures.
  
  Marijuana activists have to recognize the intellectual toll the drug takes on people. The concept of the Burn-out is as real as the alcoholic. Just because you’ve never had a good friend turn into a lump on a couch doesn’t mean it won’t happen to you or your friends.
  Reply
Read More
The Noble RenardHamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:15am
You say that now, but just watch. True success is just around the corner and soon we’ll be living in a drug-free paradise where our only source of illicit pleasure is the the way that velvet feels when you stroke it the wrong direction.
Reply
- Read More
  Quasar FunkThe Noble Renard
  2/22/16 10:18am
  There is no “wrong” direction to stroke anything.
  Reply
- Read More
  $7CoffeeThe Noble Renard
  2/22/16 10:21am
  
  GIF
  
  OMG the face I made at your description of velvet.
  Reply
Read More
Underscored5Hamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:17am
If the goal of the war on drugs is to enrich those that profit from our for-profit prison system, the war on drugs has been a huge success. It’s all about how you define success and failure and who’s doing the defining.
Reply
- Read More
  Quasar FunkUnderscored5
  2/22/16 10:21am
  The funny thing is, many Americans would think you’re a conspiracy nutjob, but it’s so blatantly fucking obvious it’s infuriating.
  
  1.) Create war on drugs
  2.) Create for-profit prison system
  3.) PROFIT
  
  Reply
- Read More
  Johnny ChundersUnderscored5
  2/22/16 10:25am
  Think of all the money that went to police stations for surveillance and tactical gear over the past few decades. The (profitable) militarization of the police didn’t start on 9/11.
  Reply
Read More
The Devil Drives a Mustang (Rotary Pending)Hamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:28am
From Drugabuse.gov:

GIF

GIF

So my proposal to combat drug use is to stop the “war on drugs” and give all of that money to a marketing firm to produce commercials showing marijuana as an alien spider in a high school biology classroom, hot teen girls left swiping guys doing meth, and making fun of people for giving money to fat cat heroin dealers.

I have always found it funny that decades of marketing have done far more to stop cigarette use than decades of nearly totalitarian law enforcement has done to stop illegal drug use.
Reply
- Read More
  Psychopomps: Taking Gawker to the Great Blog in the SkyThe Devil Drives a Mustang (Rotary Pending)
  2/22/16 10:39am
  That’s pretty interesting data, though I’m not totally convinced that cheesy anti-smoking ads are the only reason. It could also be that because cigarettes are legal for 18+ individuals, it’s easier for the government to control supply of tobacco and more acceptable for kids and parents to have discussions on smoking before or after the kid starts.
  Reply
- Read More
  RemusShepherdThe Devil Drives a Mustang (Rotary Pending)
  2/22/16 10:43am
  Remember ‘This is your brain. This is your brain on Heroin.”? We’ve done the marketing approach to illegal drug use, and it doesn’t have much effect. I’m not sure why not — perhaps it’s a different model of addiction and dependency, or maybe there are more mental health issues present than with cigarette smokers. But it doesn’t look like a problem that lends itself to the same solution.
  Reply
Read More
Itto OgamiHamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:12am
Hot Take!
Reply
- Read More
  Quasar FunkItto Ogami
  2/22/16 10:16am
  Actually, this is a well-researched and reasoned opinion piece that cites a shit ton of sources and makes a lot of sense.
  Reply
- Read More
  toothpetardQuasar Funk
  2/22/16 10:27am
  Calling something a ‘hot take’ is by far the hottest of takes though, we must grant that.
  Reply
Read More
Bull MooseHamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:26am
Yeah, but how would local law enforcement and the DEA justify those sweet armored personnel carriers and rocket launchers and shit if not to take down cartel kingpins and meth labs?

Reply
- Read More
  Johnny ChundersBull Moose
  2/22/16 10:31am
  SO. BITCHIN.
  Reply
- Read More
  OurGIIIBull Moose
  2/22/16 10:57am
  Well, in fairness, it’s fucking DORAVILLE, homes. You want to go into fucking Doraville without a fully armored assault vehicle? Your funeral buddy. I got a guy who’s pretty heavy down in Bogota who’s like ‘fuck a bunch of Doraville.’
  Reply
Read More
ennui is boringHamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:55am
I agree with this piece 100%. And as far as I’m concerned, at this points the “war on drugs” has simply turned into too big a business to let go of. Without all the drug crime, we’d need less cops. Without all the drug crime, we’d need way, way less prisons. Prisons that are more often than not, private, for profit prisons. Half the lawyers would be out of work. There’s an enormous economic reason to keep everyone hopping along to the status quo. If we took just half what we spend on this stupid war and put it towards education and rehab, this country would be a much better place.

At the very least make marijuana legal in all 50 states. Not decriminalized - legal. Where you could just go to a corner shop and buy it. I really believe with all my heart and soul that a lot of people, given the choice of hunting down their dealer in what can sometimes be dicey situations, would rather just grab some weed at the corner store. There would be much less hassle.
Reply
- Read More
  CantWaitForTheOscarsennui is boring
  2/22/16 11:01am
  Under 10% of prisons are for-profit prisons. I do not support them but whoever is spreading the lie that “more often than not” prisons are for-profit is just wrong. There are too many for-profit prisons, because I am totally against them, but also there aren’t as many as people are suggesting.
  Reply
- Read More
  ennui is boringCantWaitForTheOscars
  2/22/16 11:04am
  Okay. I was going by what a prison guard told me a couple of years ago. Sorry about that.
  Reply
Read More
Sonic Reducer 151Hamilton Nolan
2/22/16 10:16am
I’ve been trying for years to cut down on my demand side of the drug market with limited success.
Reply
- Read More
  Johnny ChundersSonic Reducer 151
  2/22/16 10:20am
  It’s because the shit is inelastic.
  Reply