Honest talk about the cost of being ugly

[DrZoidberg]

I remember the free condom debate.

Conservatives didn't want to encourage sex before marriage, so conservative countries blocked free access to contraceptives and in some cases made screening for STD's illegal.

When the results were in it showed that abstinence only policies had zero impact on how much teenagers had sex. But had a massive impact on the prevalence of AIDS. As well as unwanted children born.

These policies are directly responsible for the catastophic AIDS epidemic in Africa and Far East Asia.

A better poster child for harm reduction is hard to find

 

[Loren Pechtel]

There are no health benefits to be gained by taking legal (non-medicinal) or illegal drugs.

Well, that's almost certainly not true of alcohol. A small amount of alcohol seems to have measurable health benefits, though few consumers of alcohol do so at such low levels as to have the good outweigh the harm.

Appears to be busted. As with so many "health" measures it's measuring ability rather than effect. Those who never drink include many that for whatever reason can't drink. And the can't population isn't as healthy as the average.

 

[Elixir]

[SOME OF] The underlying and resulting issues will not go away.

FIFY
Many of the undesirable outcomes would go away.

The idea that legalising all drugs means not doing anything at all about their harmful impacts is absurd propaganda

That.
In fact it would make addressing those impacts much much easier.

 

[Elixir]

There are no health benefits to be gained by taking legal (non-medicinal) or illegal drugs.

Well, that's almost certainly not true of alcohol. A small amount of alcohol seems to have measurable health benefits, though few consumers of alcohol do so at such low levels as to have the good outweigh the harm.

Appears to be busted. As with so many "health" measures it's measuring ability rather than effect. Those who never drink include many that for whatever reason can't drink. And the can't population isn't as healthy as the average.

Appears to be a stretch. You cannot quantify “those who can’t drink” so invoking them as evidence of lack of benefit, is totally specious.
Personally, I take the benefit derived from the 8-10ml of alcohol I routinely consume at bedtime to be real and not subject to your argument. I don’t extend that benefit to anyone else, but even as a single case, it obviates your assertion.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

There are no health benefits to be gained by taking legal (non-medicinal) or illegal drugs.

Well, that's almost certainly not true of alcohol. A small amount of alcohol seems to have measurable health benefits, though few consumers of alcohol do so at such low levels as to have the good outweigh the harm.

That's tabloid science reporting. At no point has any serious researcher ever claimed the positive effects of alcohol outweigh its negative effects. At any dosage.

Disagree. It has long been known that light drinkers average better than non-drinkers. More recently opinion is shifting towards this being a selection bias, as those who don't drink sometimes have a medical reason for not drinking. Most, but not all, of the effect goes away when comparing light drinkers to never drinkers. However, the never drinkers might be that way from having seen it harm a relative, so we can't be sure.

 

[Elixir]

However, the never drinkers might be that way from having seen it harm a relative, so we can't be sure.

You’re still buying into an artificially constructed dichotomy.
I’ve come to revile drunkenness, alcoholism and all the outward symptoms of alcohol consumption, having seen it destroy lives that were close to my own. Yet I still experience and appreciate the benefit of “sub-toxic” alcohol consumption under constrained circumstances. I can no longer “go out for a beer” because a beer intoxicates me unpleasantly. But I can consume a third of a beer’s worth of alcohol at bedtime in my own home, and experience no negative effect.

TDMTP, even in the case of alcohol.

 

[southernhybrid]

RFKjr said the social benefits of alcohol outweigh the negatives, and ended government recommendations an alcohol consumption limits.

That's a different argument. Its an argument where we weigh the social benefits of a drug against its negative effect on health.

That's hard to quantify, so you could spin this whichever way you'd like.

Where addicts are given maintenance doses crime has gone down in the area, at east in some cases.

In which cases hasn't it?

Jut what we need, a nation addicted to more drugs.

Now that we have long term data on pot consumption it is far from harmless.

I've had pot smoker friends all my life. From my experience, I think its the most destructive drug of them all. Because its kills ambition. The side effects are maneagible enough for addicts to function in society. So they feel no pressure to get off it. So it just continues. They're content in their little bubble of nothing happening, perpetually. Its like a time machine that only goes forward in time.

Every friend of mine who used THC worked for a living, never committed a crime and most only used in the evening or on the weekend. My next door neighbors both use THC. She is a cosmetologist who cuts hair but she has a second job teaching cosmetology. Her husband is a veteran with PTSD but he also has a job delivering things locally for a small company. I've worked with many professional nurses who worked full time but also. used THC recreationally. One of my former doctors not only used but she sold t-shirts in her office promoting the legalization. Imo, she probably smoked too much because she was pretty ditzy or maybe just incompetent. I rarely use anymore. it's never been hard to stop. Sure, everything in moderation is best. Oh, I forgot. A close friend who is much younger than I am also uses. She said she gets crabby is she doesn't have any, but she never uses during the daytime or before work. Her biggest problem is that despite trying for years to stop smoking tobacco, she doesn't seem to be able to do that. My late father stopped smoking 2 packs a day immediately after the first info came out about the dangers of smoking. He also stopped using ETOH after becoming a religious nut. He weaned himself off of several Rx. drugs, including Valium. So, people are different in how they react to different drugs, as well as food.

When I mentioned food addiction earlier in this thread, I was referring to people like a former friend of mine. He lost a lot of weight by only eating once a day and exercising for hours after work. He told me that if he had a pint of ice cream in his freezer, he couldn't eat one serving, he had to eat the entire thing, regardless of the size of the container. He was an example of what I think of as a food addict. I have a friend who currently takes the GLP drugs and has lost 50 lbs so far. She told me that she gets very cranky if she can't overeat, but the drug has helped her limit her food intake.

I am able to manage my diet and almost never over eat. I count calories and do my best to keep them under 2000 per day. I exercise to help me control my weight. I am a small, older woman. I love food, but I am not a food addict, but I have compassion for those who are, including several friends of mine. I have compassion for addicts but someone who uses any drug in moderation and never drives while UTI, is not an addict. Still, ETOH and tobacco are currently the most abused drugs in the US. At least that's what the course I took last year claimed.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I suspect that the abusers would die off within a generation or two.

I suspect that would be as effective as eradicating homosexuality by sterilising all the gays.

I think there would be some effect.

Look at the Old World vs the New World. The big killer was the disease that the Old World had millennia of selection pressure favoring those less susceptible. The New World did not and were ravaged far worse. And the Native Americans have famously been extra susceptible to the "firewater". Why should we not suspect that it's the same thing, Darwin culling the most vulnerable? The New World had alcohol but only in a ceremonial context, no steady supply as would be needed to be an alcoholic.

 

[Toni]

[SOME OF] The underlying and resulting issues will not go away.

FIFY
Many of the undesirable outcomes would go away.

The idea that legalising all drugs means not doing anything at all about their harmful impacts is absurd propaganda

That.
In fact it would make addressing those impacts much much easier.

Do you know any one who has grown up with alcoholic parents?

Do you think k that decriminalizing recreational drugs will make drug users less likely to be dysfunctional? To be more emotionally healthy? Less abusive?

Yes, it will probably reduce a great deal of crime. It will not make drug rehab programs increase or lessen the damage of the addict’s dysfunction in their family, friends, coworkers, communities.

I read my local news police blotter pages. Almost every single arrest is directly because of alcohol intoxication. Duis, assaults, some thefts. Don’t get me wrong: there are plenty of drugs around too. But most of what is on the police blotter is alcohol related.

Decriminalizing drug use will not touch any of that. It won’t make addicts more amenable to rehab. It won’t address underlying problems with chronic pain or emotional or mental health problems.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What Tigers is advocating is a system that maximises addiction and maximises the damages of addiction. Which goes counter to what he says he's advocating.

Yes, and it is the global “conservative” position, created and perpetuated by profiteers in the drug manufacturing/dealing and incarceration businesses.

That sounds a bit conspiracy theory. While some conservatives might profit from it, the vast majority have no vested interest in it.

The right needs bad things to protect society from. You can pretty much count on them taking the path of harm maximization.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The theory goes that being addicted is a mental problem, rather than a naughty lifestyle choice. The theory builds on an assumption that there's a psychological issue at the core of the addiction and if they didn't have this issue, they wouldn't be addicted. The addictive substance or behaviour is employed to crowd out the distressing thoughts triggered by the psychological problem. And if they work on that issue, they will then be able to kick the addiction. And if we force addicts to have to chase drugs we make it harder for them to work on the underlying issue, thus perpetuating the addictive cycle. The goal with harm reduction is to give the addicts less problems, rather than more problems.

Couple of quibbles here:

1) It's not a mental problem, it's a coping mechanism for a problem.

How isn"t that a mental problem?

2) The problem might not be a psychological one in the first place. Drugs are often an escape from a hellish situation.

How isn't that a psychological problem?

Why are you assuming the root problem is mental?

Look at what happened with Vietnam. Lots of soldiers smoked opium while they were over there, most quit upon returning to the states. It was coping with the horrors of jungle war.

 

[Elixir]

Do you know any one who has grown up with alcoholic parents?

Yes. Not relevant.

Do you think k that decriminalizing recreational drugs will make drug users less likely to be dysfunctional?

I think it will produce more responsible users of drugs on average, and fewer of them overall.

To be more emotionally healthy? Less abusive?

As concerns the entire population, yes. As applied to abusive, over-consuming outliers, no. Over time I believe we’d have much fewer of those.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

legalization will only reduce the harms of some of the effects of drug/alcohol use or tobacco use, for that matter.

True, there is no silver bullet. But the primary harms are just the tip of the iceberg of secondary and tertiary fiscal, social and other harmful effects that legalization can be expected to mitigate.

What concerns me about legalization is that for a lot of people they think that if it is legal, it's not really bad.
Or: if it's legal, it's safe.
If it's legal, and we stop arresting people for using (is selling next?) the problem solved. The underlying and resulting issues will not go away.

Also there are always some people who chase bigger thrills, the stuff that's forbidden.

Tobacco.

Clearly #1 in risk. Legal.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I remember the free condom debate.

Conservatives didn't want to encourage sex before marriage, so conservative countries blocked free access to contraceptives and in some cases made screening for STD's illegal.

When the results were in it showed that abstinence only policies had zero impact on how much teenagers had sex. But had a massive impact on the prevalence of AIDS. As well as unwanted children born.

These policies are directly responsible for the catastophic AIDS epidemic in Africa and Far East Asia.

A better poster child for harm reduction is hard to find

Yeah. One state tried a program of providing free long acting contraception to some people. Unquestionable success, the welfare savings more than paid for it. The conservatives killed it.

Or, long, long ago I did some math on condom distribution simply from a standpoint of pregnancy prevention. The percentage making it onto dicks to make it worthwhile was well under 1%.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

However, the never drinkers might be that way from having seen it harm a relative, so we can't be sure.

You’re still buying into an artificially constructed dichotomy.
I’ve come to revile drunkenness, alcoholism and all the outward symptoms of alcohol consumption, having seen it destroy lives that were close to my own. Yet I still experience and appreciate the benefit of “sub-toxic” alcohol consumption under constrained circumstances. I can no longer “go out for a beer” because a beer intoxicates me unpleasantly. But I can consume a third of a beer’s worth of alcohol at bedtime in my own home, and experience no negative effect.

TDMTP, even in the case of alcohol.

And how are you measuring the long term health implications? Especially since you have a sample size of one?

It's the long term health implications we are talking about. Less is better--except a small amount is better than zero.

 

[Toni]

Addicts tend not to be very nice people if they are using too much or in need of a guy or just because their need to feed their addiction interferes with their ability to manage their emotions, best case scenario.

Sure, but it's not illegal to be an asshole, and plenty of people manage it without recourse to addictive substances.

Sure they do. There is no shortage of asshole. But asshole is an entirely different level than addict not in recovery.

I am not arguing against decriminalization.

I’m saying that only takes some of the pressure off of the prison system. Not off if society.

As a society, we’re still going to be dealing with some pretty horrific side effects of addiction. And I suspect that will get worse at least for a while.

 

[Toni]

Do you know any one who has grown up with alcoholic parents?

Yes. Not relevant.

Do you think k that decriminalizing recreational drugs will make drug users less likely to be dysfunctional?

I think it will produce more responsible users of drugs on average, and fewer of them overall.

To be more emotionally healthy? Less abusive?

As concerns the entire population, yes. As applied to abusive, over-consuming outliers, no. Over time I believe we’d have much fewer of those.

Really? No, alcoholics did not become ‘more responsible’ after prohibition. Or less obnoxious. Or less likely to drive under the influence. Or become less abusive to anyone close to them.

Drug users will similarly not become better people until and unless they quit using. And get lots of help. Also their friends and family will still need lots of help.

People will still ruin themselves financially and others, too if they get the chance.

They just won’t go to jail for possession. Dealers will just go legit. Or legit-ish.

Again: I am not arguing against decriminalization. I’m just saying that’s it won’t solve most of the problems and wont address the most expensive problems.

 

[Toni]

Coping mechanisms that require the sufferer to use illegal substances or substances that are legal to excess are indeed mental health problems pls ty of addicts ( to whatever) use in order to cope with ( situation, condition, etc.) which might be better managed with good access to skilled mental health professionals.

Whether or not that is the case, criminalizing possession and consumption of select substances is a big fat LOSER for everyone, both individually and collectively.
To me it’s as stupid as criminalizing dropping a rock on your foot.

I absolutely agree.

But legalization will only reduce the harms of some of the effects of drug/alcohol use or tobacco use, for that matter.

People will still lose or be unable to keep jobs due to addiction. People will still experience serious ill health effects ( physical, emotional, social) and some of those effects will be visited upon friends and family even if the friends and family do not use. People will be less able to regulate their emotions, will be more prone to violence, will be more likely to be victim in d if crime, including violent crime, will drive and cause accidents, injuries and deaths while under the influence. They will still cause deterioration of important relationships.

Yes, which is why we need laws and support systems to help reduce and mitigate these harms, and to protect the public from them.

The idea that legalising all drugs means not doing anything at all about their harmful impacts is absurd propaganda; We have plenty of harm reduction in place for the already legal substances, including such things as bans on smoking in public places, and the detection and punishment of drunk drivers.

In my state, it is illegal to smoke in a private car, if children are present. You can't smoke in a pub or club, other than in a designated smoking area, and those areas have rules to protect staff from secondhand smoke - for example, they must be substantively outdoor areas, not enclosed rooms (and of course, children are not allowed in them). You cannot smoke within 5m of the entry/doirway of a non-residential building, nor in any public transport, including at bus stops or on railway stations, even where these are not enclosed.

None of this encourages organised crime, in the way that prohibition and/or punitive taxes do.

There's a lot we can do (and in many places, are doing). Legalisation doesn't mean total deregulation.

1. At least in the IS, we are already not doing nearly enough to prevent or ameliorate the effects of drug and alcohol abuse and addiction.

I have absolutely zero faith that we will change this if drug use is decriminalized.

I have zero faith that any of the harms of illegal drug use will drop significantly. For one thing, in the US we have a very robust fir profit prison system. For another, in my very small microcosm, most of the arrests that involve drugs or alcohol are not for actual use or possession and only very rarely for sale or distribution. The arrests are mostly DUIs and domestic violence. Some larceny may be related bit not definitely. Decriminalization will not lessen these offenses or make them less deadly. Australia maybe different.

Again: My argument is NOT against decriminalization.

My argument is there is ann under recognition or plans for alleviating the harms caused by addictions. And no plans for helping address substance abuse.

 

[southernhybrid]

Just to clarify. We currently have no private prisons in the US, at least not at the federal level and based on other things I've read, th ere were never more than a small percentage of privately owned prisons. Most of the prisons in the US are inhumane and nobody should be placed in one of them for any reason, as I said before. We need drastic prison reform. And, why can't most non violent offenders be offered house arrest with community service etc. Wealthy non violent criminals could be made to give their wealth to charity and required to do community service while wearing a monitor etc. Yes. We do need to keep violent offenders away from the rest of us, but even they should receive humane care in prisons and in some cases, rehabilitation and a chance to return to society, assuming that are not psychopaths, which is currently believed to be a disorder of the frontal cortex, which has no cure as of yet.

As of 2023, 28 states used privately run prisons — along with or instead of local jails and state-run facilities — to hold 7.1% of prisoners. Prison facility data is specific to sentenced prisoners and does not include federal detention centers where immigrants are held.

In January 2021, former President Joe Biden signed an executive order ending the use of privately operated prisons citing the importance of prisoner rehabilitation and redemption and the need to alleviate federal reliance on profit-based correctional systems, and noting that private prisons underperform in inmate resources and inmate and staff safety. The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) ended the use of private prisons on November 30, 2022.

Although President Trump has since overturned Biden’s executive order, there are zero inmates in private federal institutions as of March 5, 2026.

Sorry, I lost the link that this info came from, but it's easy enough to look up.

 

[Toni]

Just to clarify. We currently have no private prisons in the US, at least not at the federal level and based on other things I've read, th ere were never more than a small percentage of privately owned prisons. Most of the prisons in the US are inhumane and nobody should be placed in one for any reason. I said before. We need drastic prison reform. And, why can't most non violent offenders be offered house arrest with community service etc. Yes. We do need to keep violent offenders away from the rest of us, but even they should receive humane care and in some cases, rehabilitation and a chance to return to society.

As of 2023, 28 states used privately run prisons — along with or instead of local jails and state-run facilities — to hold 7.1% of prisoners. Prison facility data is specific to sentenced prisoners and does not include federal detention centers where immigrants are held.

In January 2021, former President Joe Biden signed an executive order ending the use of privately operated prisons citing the importance of prisoner rehabilitation and redemption and the need to alleviate federal reliance on profit-based correctional systems, and noting that private prisons underperform in inmate resources and inmate and staff safety. The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) ended the use of private prisons on November 30, 2022.

Although President Trump has since overturned Biden’s executive order, there are zero inmates in private federal institutions as of March 5, 2026.

We absolutely DO have private fur profit prisons in the US: not including ICE

Private Prisons in the United States – The Sentencing Project

Twenty-seven states and the federal government incarcerated 90,873 people in private prisons in 2022, representing 8% of the total state and federal prison population.

www.sentencingproject.org

I’m sorry: my phone is not allowing me to paste in info from the link.

In 2022, nearly 90 thousand people in the US were incarcerated in private fir profit prisons in the US. Including in Georgia.

Private Prison Industry: Overview | Law | Research Starters | EBSCO Research

<p>The private prison industry in the United States emerged in response to the country's high incarceration rates, which began to rise significantly in the 1980s due to policies related to the War on Drugs and strict sentencing laws. The first modern private prison, operated by Corrections...

www.ebsco.com

The private prison industry has a long history in the United States, but its modern incarnation was born in 1984 in Tennessee when the Corrections Corporation of America, later known as CoreCivic, was awarded a contract to take over a facility in Shelby County. An increasing number of private prisons followed. Private prisons are controversial in the United States, though they do provide some practical benefit. These for-profit companies can be more nimble than public prison systems, which are subject to government bureaucratic processes. Private prisons can alleviate overcrowding and save taxpayers money. With the management of prison facilities and responsibility for those incarcerated delegated to private companies, supporters argue that the government can focus on other pressing public issues.

The introduction of for-profit prisons, however, means higher incarceration rates now benefit private interests, and some companies even hold contracts requiring states to reimburse them when a prison is below capacity. When the regular prison population began shrinking around 2000, private prison companies acquired contracts to run immigration detention centers. Critics argue that the profit motive has led to a greater dehumanization of the prison population and that while private prisons responded to a need initially, they now have a financial stake in ensuring rising incarceration rates. These companies are heavy political contributors and a powerful lobby in state and federal government, further reinforcing the criticism that profit can drive legislation regulating incarceration. Critics argue that private prisons work against the public interest, since they have no motive to drive down the highest prison population in the world.

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