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1. Adam (inkslinger@mastodon.club)'s status on Thursday, 18-Oct-2018 17:43:37 EDT Adam

   When did Maclean's become so liberal? Decrim all drugs! I agree, but didn't expect to read this in Maclean's.

   https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/the-next-step-for-canada-decriminalize-hard-drugs/

   1. Modern Industrial (modernindustrial@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 12:49:37 EDT Modern Industrial

      in reply to

      @ink_slinger Interesting that they went with the drug angle rather than prostitution. Hard drugs have provable harms that are tough to control, while prostitution is much more defensible.

      1. Adam (inkslinger@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 13:04:02 EDT Adam

         in reply to

         @Modern_Industrial I think the main point is that treating drugs as a criminal issue makes it much more difficult to treat them as a medical issue (which is the better way of reducing harm).

         I think similar arguments apply to prostitution: people are harmed, via trafficking , but treating the prostitutes as criminals means this harm continues because they can't safely come forward (to say nothing of people who enter sex work willingly and are treated as criminals for doing so).

         1. Adam (inkslinger@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 13:06:36 EDT Adam

            in reply to

            @Modern_Industrial That said, they were using cannabis legalization as the hook, so talking about other drugs is the natural next step. Prostitution and sex work are a whole other kettle of fish, despite some similarities in terms of the arguments for or against decrim/legalization.

         2. Modern Industrial (modernindustrial@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 15:03:22 EDT Modern Industrial

            in reply to

            @ink_slinger Absolutely. I think that makes a lot of sense for pain killers and downers generally, where risk to others is generally lower.

            When you shift to meth, though, where people do crazy stuff while on it, that's a whole other bag. One of my hopes with cannabis legalization is that it will serve as a reasonable, accessible substitute for harder, more dangerous stuff.

            1. Adam (inkslinger@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 15:06:48 EDT Adam

               in reply to

               @Modern_Industrial Even then, I think the criminal aspect should be the behaviour, not the fact of ingesting the drug.

               I also wonder if junk like meth would be less popular if we adopted something like the Portuguese model, where you can actually go to a clinic and receive a safe, clean dose of heroin (or whatever) and then go about your day. I suspect people initially turn to meth because it's a cheap high, not because it's necessarily their drug of choice.

               1. Adam (inkslinger@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 15:11:38 EDT Adam

                  in reply to

                  @Modern_Industrial We could decriminalize possession and consumption, but keep production and trafficking outlawed. We won't throw the meth user in jail, but we'll lock up his dealer if we catch him. That seems sensible, at least for particularly dangerous drugs: you treat the addiction as a health issue and the person exploiting that addiction for financial gain as a criminal matter.

                  It gets complicated when people turn to dealing in order to fund their own habit, though.

                  1. Adam (inkslinger@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 15:13:00 EDT Adam

                     in reply to

                     @Modern_Industrial I guess that maybe brings us back to Portugal where, if I'm not mistaken, you can actually get drugs from the government to manage your addiction. It's not just a safe consumption site, the gov't is actually giving you drugs that are safe and allow you to function in society.

               2. Modern Industrial (modernindustrial@mastodon.club)'s status on Friday, 19-Oct-2018 16:25:16 EDT Modern Industrial

                  in reply to

                  @ink_slinger "I see you're interested in meth - can I recommend Adderall instead? All of the excitement without the brain rot!"

   2. Geoff Wozniak (geoffwozniak@mastodon.club)'s status on Thursday, 18-Oct-2018 19:51:11 EDT Geoff Wozniak

      in reply to

      @ink_slinger There were some editions in a nearby health place (massage, chiropracty, etc.) mixed with a bunch of other questionable right-wingy/conspiracy-ish publications and the content seemed to fit with them. But then some recent ones have been less wack-o. I don't get that zine either.