h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It certainly should!

My view hinges around the fact that if you wanted any, you would have to be seriously socially lacking if it took you any longer than a month to get some - everyone, at least, knows somebody who knows someone who might be able to get someone if they asked (and if you didn't you do now )...

Therefore, there must be a substantial proportion of the population who do 'use' it. Many of the poeple who do lead absolutely 'normal' lives - is it then fair to brand these people as criminals when all they are doing is the equivalent of a glass of wine and a fag when they get home?

I think not.

I think every recreational drug should be legalised, brought under strict government control (I know, I know), taxed (I KNOW ALREADY!) and made as available as a beer, an aspirin, a pack o' smokes (imagine "the Guardian, a pint of milk and 20 Skunk Specials please...").

Why?

Talk of decriminalisation is one thing, but how about removing the criminal element completely, generate a new revenue stream for the country (maybe reduce other, e.g. fuel, duties at the same time), and don't worry about sending one of your mates who "has a mate" to go on a trek down some seedy back alley (okay, not necessarily) to walk into a den of inequity to 'score'.

The criminal underworld that fuels the "abuse" of drugs would be destroyed, or at least decimated, overnight - no more control of prostitutes through their heroin habit, etc. etc.

I concede, there will always be some underworld connection, indeed part of the thrill and enjoyment of partying is the knowledge that it is illicit, but at least we're all free to choose, not drawn down roads to hell that began as pleasure seeking experiments.

Dig?

I'm there with my 50 tonne Caterpillar!

Actually, I don't think you'll ever get rid of the criminal element, mainly because making an industry out of it would bring quality right down. Look at the brewers and their so-called ales and premium lagers - pish! There'd have to be somebody to supply the real deal.

If they did it right you would be able to grow your own. Make it as good, or as bad as you want No more anyone you don't really want to see. Until later....
BCNU - Crescent

It'd take more than that for me not to bump into anyone I didn't want to see. Really. I'm a great beleiver in the 'world is FAR too small' theory!

I dunno. I don't think I would decriminalize *all* drugs.

I think you have to weight the social consequences of jailing the users against the consequences of keeping them out and about in public, with easier access to drugs. Some drugs really do encourage violent behavior, and make it very difficult to live a normal workaday life. This is a burden on the user, but it is also a burden on their family and society.

Cannabis is unusual in that the consequences to society of its usage are arguably less even than alcohol. I think you do more detriment to society by jailing the users than you do in allowing them out and about. But that's just my opinion.

Roll up, roll up, a whiff of cannabis reform is in the air. No, it's not a bunch of stoners calling for a fresh look at our cannabis laws, or hippies challenging us to turn on and drop out. The call comes from health professionals, scientists and police. It follows increasing evidence that prohibition does not work, and society needs to investigate other ways to reduce harm from all recreational drugs.

Should cannabis be decriminalised in New Zealand? Both Health Minister Annette King and Justice Minister Phil Goff visited South Australia earlier this year to look at the state's system of cannabis decriminalisation. Goff has said he personally doesn't favour decriminalisation but has signalled that the government will review cannabis law. It is, of course, bound to provoke howls on both sides - from those who demonise cannabis, and those who deify it. Myth and opinion have clouded the debate for decades. Recently, however, the smoke seems to be clearing.

Years of research have uncovered enough facts to fuel a proper debate. Cannabis doesn't inexorably rot our brains, nor necessarily load to harder drugs. It may have some medical uses. It is much less harmful than alcohol and tobacco. Smoking it is not good for our lungs, and smoking during pregnancy should be avoided. It's not a good idea to operate machinery while stoned. It's not a good idea to get stoned and drive. It's an even worse idea to get stoned, then drink and drive. It's a bad idea to smoke cannabis in your early teens. The cannabis culture thrives, despite its illegality criminals make a lot of money precisely because of that illegal status. New Zealand police would prefer decriminalisation, leaving them more time and resources to catch serious criminals. In a briefing paper to the new government late last year, Deputy Commissioner Rob Robinson said handing out infringement notices would allow police to deal more efficiently with cannabis possession.

A parliamentary select committee inquiry has called for a review of cannabis laws with a corresponding increase in resources to minimise drug harm. Reconsider the legal status of cannabis, it said, and make a greater concerted effort to research its use and impact in the community. The mental health aspects of cannabis, the committee said, appear to have been overstated, “particularly in relation to occasional adult users of the drug". Cannabis use didn't cause behavioural problems, cause suicide or "severe or gross impairment of cognitive function". It posed few risks to the mental health of most adult users. It was, however, frequently used by youth who were predisposed to deviant behaviour, and could exacerbate schizophrenia in vulnerable individuals.

Equally important, the committee found that the double standard that surrounds cannabis use was an impediment to effective anti-drug education. The US Government is locked in battle with several states that have independently decided that doctors should be allowed to prescribe cannabis to their patients. A 1999 US Institute of Medicine report found that cannabis was less harmful than tobacco and not a gateway drug. In Britain, the Blair Government is split over the issue. One police district has published a report comparing cannabis prohibition to the failed alcohol prohibition in the US in the 1920s. Several Australian states have a form of partial prohibition, or decriminalisation. Spain has decriminalised cannabis, Portugal is about to, and most other European nations are not bothering to prosecute for possession.

The Netherlands has not disintegrated into an orgy of looting, raping and killing, despite allowing personal use of cannabis since 1976. The US, on the other hand, sometimes seems as though it has, despite vigorous war against cannabis. However, it is comparatively easy for pressure groups to argue that it is time for a change; much harder for politicians to take the plunge. Public misconception can be a powerful force.

Western societies have been here before. The 1972 Le Daim Commission recommended that Canada seriously consider decriminalising marijuana for personal use, to no avail. In 1973 in the US, the Shafer Commission came to the same conclusion. Just a year earlier, the Blake-Palmer committee recommended that prohibition in New Zealand continue only so long as it was clearly working. In 1976, a special commission set up by President Gerald Ford concluded that marijuana didn't pose any imminent threat to the health and well-being of US citizens. Conversely, the budding popularity of cannabis inflamed a more conservative sector of society, epitomised by Nancy Reagan's anti-drug campaign.

Now the tide appears to he turning once more. Hardly anyone would claim that cannabis is a totally safe drug. In some cases, it is a lousy drug. But, when a British police force issues a report warning that the war on drugs is being lost, and says it is time to consider the alternative - legalisation and regulation of some or all recreational drugs - that whiff of reform gets stronger.

Even the most fanatical anti-cannabis advocate would find it hard to dismiss the facts. Two drug use surveys in 1990 and 1998 by Auckland University's Alcohol and Public Health Research Unit found that New Zealanders in increasing numbers were trying marijuana. The number of people aged between 15 and 45 who had tried cannabis rose from 43 percent to 52 percent by 1998. Compare that with the Netherlands' 16 percent. During the same decade, police spending and resources devoted to the war against cannabis almost doubled, up from $12.6 million and 181,000 man hours in 1992/93 to $22 million and 305,000 man hours in 1997/98. Opponents argue that legalisation would encourage more people to smoke cannabis. Prohibition doesn't seem to have stopped them, and the Netherlands' experiment shows the opposite. Not only does prohibition fail to stop people trying cannabis, but it alienates those convicted of cannabis offences, leaves control of the drug to a criminal underworld, and makes it increasingly difficult to carry out effective drug education.

"It does increasingly seem to be the view, particularly of the police, that prohibition is ineffective," says John Marks, doctor, consultant psychiatrist, and chair of the Drug Policy Forum Trust, a high-powered group that has suggested legalising and taxing cannabis as a better method of control. "It is wasteful of police time and alienates police and the citizens, so that in many Western societies they feel like an occupying army, vilified by the population. Of course, it's an elementary police maxim that you can only police a society by consent, and if more than 50 percent of society have smoked cannabis, then it makes the police job difficult. On the other hand, the medical profession, of which I'm a member, is very wary about the misuse of drugs of any kind. I mean, we've got problems with alcohol and tobacco.

The debate lies in where society goes from here. Suppose you are a parent worried that your teenager will want to try cannabis, or that he or she smokes too much cannabis. No one suggests that it's good for teenagers to smoke. Most cannabis advocates just want freedom for adults to use moderate amounts in peace.

However, under prohibition, you should be worried. Clearly, cannabis is available. There is a thriving black market that targets young people. The drug's status glamorises it, especially for young people who may be going through a rebellious stage. Contrast that with tobacco, a legal drug fast becoming socially unacceptable. To say that cannabis is more dangerous is obvious hypocrisy and a key to understanding why its use has flourished. The report from the Cleveland police force in Britain sums it up fairly succinctly: "If there is indeed a war on drugs, it is not being won; drugs are demonstrably cheaper and more easily available than ever before." Cleveland police say there is no apparent logic in making tobacco and alcohol available when there is clear evidence of their harmful effects and cannabis is seen as less harmful by many scientists. The prohibitionist approach, says the report, was little more than a historical accident and leads to a charge of hypocrisy that is difficult to counter. "If a sufficiently large, and apparently growing, part of the population chooses to ignore the law for whatever reason, then that law becomes unenforceable. A modern Western democracy, based on policing by consent and the rule of law, may find itself powerless to prevent illegal activity - in this case the importation and use of controlled drugs."

If prohibition did not work, the report went on, then the consequences must he accepted or an alternative found. "The most obvious alternative approach is the legalisation and subsequent regulation of some or all drugs." Which is exactly what Fred Fastier, Emeritus Professor of Pharmacology at Otago University, recommends.

Fastier, in an impressively argued work released last year, advocates legislation aimed at reducing drug abuse, not drug use. Like the Cleveland police, he argues that legalisation and government control is the best way to control all recreational drugs, even to the point where alcohol advertising is only allowed at point of sale. Note that Fastier doesn't believe that all recreational drugs should be freely available, just that the government should be in control.
It is a stance sure to prompt sharp intakes of breath around the country. But look logically at the facts, says Fastier, who sat on the Blake-Palmer committee and has more access to the facts than most of us. "The catch, of course, is that so many people are misinformed about drugs. They have their own classification about what's nasty and what isn't. A few years ago, for example, I'd have found it very difficult to convince people that you can become addicted to nicotine. People just didn't believe this. They thought addiction to opium would be much worse. That's not to say you can't become addicted to my of these drugs, but when it comes to potential harm, people tend to make too facile a distinction between what they took to be the goodies and the baddies. There’s been a great deal of work on this. I think we know enough by now simply to go on the effects of what works and what doesn’t, and to have much more sensible legislation than at present. I’m not particularly concerned with cannabis – I’m concerned with drug legislation as a whole. I don’t favour the use of cannabis any more than I do smoking. But I don’t regard it as a particularly nasty habit in the short run.”

Fastier’s work examines just what constitutes crime, the history of drub abuse in New Zealand, the legal war on drugs, public sanctions and misconceptions. Is prohibition a genuine attempt to protect individuals from harm and maintain civil order, or is it based on some misguided concept of morality?

"One of the whole complications is legislation aimed at particular drugs instead of the misuse of drugs," says Fastier. "Take driving, for example. If you examine roadside accidents, you find that deaths from cannabis are considerably lower than you'd expect. But if people combine cannabis and alcohol, that seems to be absolutely deadly. Fortunately, in the case of driving, we have a sensible act where no drugs are specified, but if your performance is impaired through taking drugs, then that's it. That strikes me as eminently sensible.

"Unfortunately, of course, so many people don't regard alcohol or tobacco as particularly nasty drugs and yet they cause far more injury and trouble than the rest put together. In the case of alcohol, we have sensible legislation in that you can take alcohol as long as it doesn't harm other people. But if you become drunk and disorderly, or if you try to drive a car, you're for it because you've done something which is potentially harmful to other people and that makes sense to me. I think we could do better in that way, but of course there are various ways of controlling drugs and one is to control supply.

"Take alcohol and tobacco. You can push up the duty to such an extent that this becomes quite an important control in itself Quite a few people have decided to try to give up smoking when the cost becomes too great. There are other sanctions, like public opinion. Just think about smoking - smoking by adults has dropped very substantially simply because most people now are pretty well convinced it is dangerous and antisocial behaviour, and yet there have been hardly my significant legal changes. Public opinion has been much more important.

The Drug Policy Forum Trust followed a similar line in its 1998 report, noting that scientists and professionals around the world had been effectively excluded from the debate on recreational drug policy. The result was drug policy based almost exclusively upon emotion, rhetoric and politics. Prohibition was untenable and counterproductive, it argued, because it impeded effective public health and education measures by driving cannabis use underground. It created a large and thriving black market that preyed on young people, did little to discourage drug use, burdened thousands of young New Zealanders each year with criminal records, and created disrespect for the law and diverted scarce police resources.

The trust offered several alternatives, including prohibition with an administrative expediency principle – the Dutch model, in which cannabis remains illegal, but authorities agree not to enforce the law under clearly defined circumstances; partial prohibition - the South Australian model that hands out spot fines with no criminal record for possession; and legalisation, combining the three most popular recreational - drugs - tobacco, alcohol and cannabis - under one government agency. That's highly unlikely in the present climate.

The trust cited evidence from a 1998 report by the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence that looked at decriminalisation and more police tolerance of recreational drug use. It rejected the notion that cannabis was a gateway drug, suggesting that less stringent legislation would discourage users from progressing to harder drugs because they were less likely to be exposed to them through dealers or other users. The trust noted a New Scientist evaluation of the Dutch policy that found that the Netherlands had a smaller percentage of people using either cannabis, or hard drugs, than most countries that practised prohibition, even though the Netherlands considered it had a problem with hard drugs. If there were serious problems caused by legalising marijuana, then 20-plus years of the Dutch experiment had not revealed what they were, said the New Scientist.

The trust believes that a sound drug policy should aim to protect public health, minimise cannabis use, eliminate the black market and provide effective cannabis education and treatment programmes. A corollary to curbing abuse was to allow responsible use by adults. "This privilege is essential to any workable cannabis policy and, unless it is established, none of the policy goals can he achieved. At the same time individuals must bear full and ultimate responsibility for their actions."

It expected a backlash. Opponents would most likely claim that cannabis law reform would harm children, lead to greater drug-related problems, and send the wrong message. "Such claims, all of which are false, are often supported by personal anecdotes but seldom or never by reference to major scientific studies on the subject. This fact must be exposed by the media to a greater extent than has occurred to date." The trust is seeking a meeting with the Minister of Health, using Professor Fastier's book as a basis. Informed debate, says Dr Marks, is vital. "It's difficult to get away from prohibition because the opposite is always posed like a straw man, and criticism of prohibition is met with responses like, 'Oh you want give ice cream and heroin at school gates, do you?' It's so juvenile and, because it hasn't got beyond that, there hasn't been much of a shift. We want to promote intelligent, wide-ranging debate on the issue instead of these emotional soundbites.”

Grrrr, why does h2g2 have a problem parsing stuff typed in Word?

Or to put it another way.....

Why can't word write in ASCII so that h2g2 can read it properly?

It seems to be due to word trying to fancy punctuation marks instead of the plain ones.

I had to have a smoke to calm down