Legalise and tax soft drugs

Most drugs should be legal. I mean if I can buy drain cleaner and drink that, why should a grown adult not be allowed buy illicit substances? Properly regulated, it would bring in quite alot of indirect taxation for the Government, moving the activity away from illegal criminal gangs.

This was written in the Irish medical Times yesterday, strong words indeed from a professional dr . Some of his comments are absolutely ridiculous Imo.

Dr Ruairi Hanley
writes that for the sake of our young people’s mental health, drug use must remain stigmatised and should never be legalised in Ireland.


Regular readers of this column will be unsurprised to learn that I have never had any time for marijuana. Like anyone who attended an Irish university in the last 40 years, I was aware during my college years of the existence of a few long-term cannabis users. I freely admit I regarded these people as a bunch of brain-dead, attention-seeking idiots suffering from a chronic aversion to personal hygiene.
Unfortunately, these clowns usually attracted a cult following of guitar-strumming, arty types whose idea of a fun weekend was to stand outside Brown Thomas screaming abuse at customers intending to buy fur coats.
Another interesting feature of the male section of this half-witted species was their apparent inability to use a razor on a regular basis.
In fact, I cannot recall ever meeting a clean-shaven pothead. This is an approach to grooming they appear to share with trade union officials and borderline communist politicians.
To be fair, and with a few pathetic exceptions, I would say that medical students were among the least likely to regularly partake of illegal drugs while in third-level education.
For this reason, they were largely mocked by other, more ‘hip’ undergraduates as a bunch of boring nerds who were unwelcome in the various fashionable ‘societies’ where Celtic Tiger cubs went to play. No doubt the cool gang are still laughing from the higher moral ground of the dole queue today.
In favour
I was reminded of my college days recently when I learned that the Californian Medical Association has argued in favour of the legislation of marijuana in that state. While I recognise that medical professionals from that part of the world are infinitely more trendy that their Irish counterparts, I fail to see how this position makes any sense.
Recent research has shown a rise in the use of particularly potent forms of cannabis in Ireland. Already, doctors are seeing the disastrous effect this is having on the mental health of much of our population.
At this point, I believe anyone who argues that marijuana is a completely harmless drug is basically either in complete denial or is trying to justify their own illegal behaviour.
While there may be some argument in favour of the medicinal use of this drug in a limited number of patients, I feel this hardly constitutes grounds for allowing every vulnerable young person to legally get high.
Of course, there are those who would argue that criminalising illegal drugs is an unsuccessful policy, regardless of the medical issues involved. Legalising and taxing these products would reduce crime and provide extra revenue for the State.
Indeed, publications such as The Economist magazine have been urging this reform for decades. I freely admit that such an idea has its attractions. The idea of some Irish potheads actually paying tax for the first time in their lives is certainly appealing. Savings would also be made in law enforcement via the reduction in organised crime.
Massive rise
However, I strongly suspect that any such revenue would be largely wiped out in the cost to the State of dealing with the massive rise in mental health problems that would inevitably follow as a result.
I am afraid the only way to deal with illegal drugs is to stop people from taking them in the first place.
This must be achieved by making young people recognise that those who use these products regularly are not admirable, they are instead typically dysfunctional underachievers, many of whom have nothing to look forward to except long-term unemployment and welfare dependency.
Excessively judgmental
Unfortunately, I fear those involved in our anti-drugs campaigns find such an approach to be excessively ‘judgmental’ and thus prefer to describe all ‘addicts’ as sufferers of ‘diseases’ rather than vulnerable individuals who tragically succumbed to peer pressure amid difficult social circumstances.
I fully accept that helping those who have already fallen victim to the lure of illegal highs is essential. It should be a core aim of any civilised nation to assist addicts so that they can once again contribute to society and enjoy a higher standard of health and living. Drug treatment programmes, if successful and clinically proven to work, have a vital role to play and should be fully supported by all professionals.
Tolerant attitude
However, I would contend that such an approach must not be undermined by a permissive and excessively tolerant attitude towards those youths who are contemplating starting their own drug habit out of some warped sense of respect for those already using illegal substances.
Regardless of left-wing political ideology and middle-class guilt, I believe the only hope for many young people is to ensure that drug use remains stigmatised and never legalised. January 6, 2012, Irish medical Times.http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&q=http://www.imt.ie/opinion/2012/01/making-a-hash-of-our-health-system.html&ct=gas card=CAcQAhgBIAAoATAAOABAzZSc-ARIAVgBYgVlbi1JRQ&cd=XJGgYXpaOO4&usg=AFQjCNHCE35lXjH3P1yivvubh_b1zoT50Q

Think the doctor needs a joint himself to chill out.

paddyandy wrote: »

Take a walk around Any Cemetery in Ireland and look at the Recent Internments and look at the Ages and read the messages on wreaths left behind .See the Crying Relatives the hopeless silences written on peoples faces when a new grave has just been filled ...and when you have witnessed it ....come back and post .

All my closest friends are dead...Here I am posting for drugs to be legalised....
Your only trying to prey on peoples emotions here as your incapable of understanding anyone else's opinions beside the drivel you are posting yourself.

hatrick patrick wrote: »

To add: The long rant above is so full of stereotypes I would assume it came from The Onion. Faith in humanity is once again shaken.

Your assuming wrong it came from Dr RUAIRI HANLEY, Irish Medical Times, printed yesterday.

realies wrote: »

Dr Ruairi Hanley

writes that for the sake of our young people’s mental health, drug use must remain stigmatised and should never be legalised in Ireland.

What a plonker.

Just goes to show than having a licence to practice medicine does not ensure any sense of objectivity when considering complex social issues.

paddyandy wrote: »

Who pays all the rehab and medical expenses for all this ?????

Firstly you're confusing drug abuse with drug use.

Secondly, people pay for their own health through taxes and insurance.

Everybody pays...so it is everybodys business .!!!!!
There is ALWAYS A VICTIM in this case THE TAXPAYER !!!!!!

Billions upon billions of dollars worth of wealth has been squandered trying to 'win' the drug war.

That is far more costly to the tax-payer than decriminalisation would be.

In the US alone...

After 40 years, $1 trillion, US War on Drugs has failed to meet any of its goals

MEXICO CITY (AP) — After 40 years, the United States' war on drugs has cost $1 trillion and hundreds of thousands of lives, and for what? Drug use is rampant and violence even more brutal and widespread.
Even U.S. drug czar Gil Kerlikowske concedes the strategy hasn't worked.
"In the grand scheme, it has not been successful," Kerlikowske told The Associated Press. "Forty years later, the concern about drugs and drug problems is, if anything, magnified, intensified."

Source.

You just keep flogging that dead horse though.

paddyandy wrote: »

Chuck ...Dead as it is'nt you'd smoke it anyhow, anyway and anytime .

What now?