I’ve had friends that were cocaine addicts and some that really hit the bottom. This seems insane to me, this isn’t a fun and easy drug like weed imo. I’ve always lumped coke with meth and heroin.
Its harm potential is somewhere in between. To put it in perspective, alcohol is worse than heroin. And like alcohol addicts, your friends should be able to get a clean and safe source to reduce damage, and the help they need without any fear of persecution.
You can’t criminalize problems away. It evidently didn’t help your friends.
Thanks for the graphic, but many of those are laughably wrong. I guess it depends on their specific definitions. But for example solvents do irreversible damage with every use; meanwhile heroin is a drug available with a prescription (usually just in hospital use) and doesn’t do almost any long term damage on its own.
I agree with you. I know a lot of people who are cocaine addicts and their addiction makes them all incredibly unreliable. They are the kind of people who stay up partying until 7am then crash for 12 hours the day of a big event. I’ve also known people who died due to tainted cocaine. It’s not a safe drug by any means.
My friend’s brother just died of heroin overdose a few weeks ago and I just couldn’t help but feel for him. How many dark alleys did he have to go to to get his high? How many sketchy people were involved? Did he have access to clean needles? He overdosed alone, and likely felt subhuman due to being relegated to the fringes of society just to get his high.
Legalization would not have kept him from getting high, but it certainly would have enabled him access to clean drugs from a safe place, clean needles, and possibly made him viewed as someone who enjoyed getting high and not a piece of shit addict. He had a problem and it being illegal only made it worse for him.
Legalize it all. He was an adult, it’s his body. He can do what he wants with it, it’s nobody’s place to tell anyone what you can or cannot consume. He loved getting high on heroin and I don’t see a problem with that.
Yeah there is no safe amount of cocaine to do. There is also no safe amount of alcohol to do. At least if shit is legalised people can decide to use cocaine or not with informed consent and can be sure they are actually getting pure cocaine.
I had a friends cousin die from using cocaine but it was because they had bought it off a street dealer and it was tainted with fentanyl. They just wanted to have a little extra fun on a night out on vacation. They’d be alive and well if cocaine was legal.
Prohibition doesn’t work. It just adds suffering and stigma to addiction. One of the biggest factors to addiction is isolation something that criminalizing health issues greatly contributes to.
Nonsense. Alcohol is a carcinogen, every part of your body it touches has an increased risk of developing cancer. It is directly neurotoxic. It damages the liver and stomache. A bottle of it can kill you. Stopping taking it can kill you.
Weed taken orally is physically very safe. It can still be habit forming and there are other unwanted side effects but to act like it is physically comaparable to alcohol is silly.
I say there’s no safe amount of cocaine because it is directly cardiotoxic and has been known to cause heart defects in healthy young men at moderate doses.
I don’t think ant drug should be illegal I just think people should be aware of the dangers of substances so they can make an informed decision.
Yes but they aren’t legalizing it because it’s fun and safe they are legalizing it because jailing people over drugs does not help them and there is no point in filling your jails with such a high percentage of your population.
Regulation and the obliteration of the illegal drug trade which directly harms millions in the pursuit of profit.
It should however, (and I cannot stress this enough) be privatized. This would be a fucking nightmare and simply move the profit motive causing the harm to another source
I’d say legalization is actually better in this case, as you can provide licenses to pharmaceutical manufacturers subject to QA regulations, lab accreditations, etc. Decriminalization just means that guy with 1:1 cocaine:fentanyl is probably getting a ticket rather than arrested.
[Was going to put a ‘doesn’t help when the guy overdoses’ comment here, but thinking about it now people do overdose (and die) on just cocaine too. One of the factors that make this a different conversation than cannabis. Don’t know the thresholds for overdose re: just coke, though]
I’ve had friends that were cocaine addicts and some that really hit the bottom. This seems insane to me, this isn’t a fun and easy drug like weed imo. I’ve always lumped coke with meth and heroin.
Its harm potential is somewhere in between. To put it in perspective, alcohol is worse than heroin. And like alcohol addicts, your friends should be able to get a clean and safe source to reduce damage, and the help they need without any fear of persecution.
You can’t criminalize problems away. It evidently didn’t help your friends.
wat
Thanks for the graphic, but many of those are laughably wrong. I guess it depends on their specific definitions. But for example solvents do irreversible damage with every use; meanwhile heroin is a drug available with a prescription (usually just in hospital use) and doesn’t do almost any long term damage on its own.
Cocaine is also cardiotoxic at any level
I agree with you. I know a lot of people who are cocaine addicts and their addiction makes them all incredibly unreliable. They are the kind of people who stay up partying until 7am then crash for 12 hours the day of a big event. I’ve also known people who died due to tainted cocaine. It’s not a safe drug by any means.
I know people who do a bunch of dumb things that are bad for their lives - and only their lives - but they don’t become a criminal in the process.
They aren’t criminal by any means, it just makes them really shitty people to be around :/
My friend’s brother just died of heroin overdose a few weeks ago and I just couldn’t help but feel for him. How many dark alleys did he have to go to to get his high? How many sketchy people were involved? Did he have access to clean needles? He overdosed alone, and likely felt subhuman due to being relegated to the fringes of society just to get his high.
Legalization would not have kept him from getting high, but it certainly would have enabled him access to clean drugs from a safe place, clean needles, and possibly made him viewed as someone who enjoyed getting high and not a piece of shit addict. He had a problem and it being illegal only made it worse for him.
Legalize it all. He was an adult, it’s his body. He can do what he wants with it, it’s nobody’s place to tell anyone what you can or cannot consume. He loved getting high on heroin and I don’t see a problem with that.
I’m very sorry for your friend’s loss, and appreciate your empathy and desire to see less stigmatization for people who choose to use drugs.
This seems to be widely questioned view as of lately 😞
Yeah there is no safe amount of cocaine to do. There is also no safe amount of alcohol to do. At least if shit is legalised people can decide to use cocaine or not with informed consent and can be sure they are actually getting pure cocaine.
I had a friends cousin die from using cocaine but it was because they had bought it off a street dealer and it was tainted with fentanyl. They just wanted to have a little extra fun on a night out on vacation. They’d be alive and well if cocaine was legal.
Prohibition doesn’t work. It just adds suffering and stigma to addiction. One of the biggest factors to addiction is isolation something that criminalizing health issues greatly contributes to.
If there’s no safe amount of alcohol to do, there’s no safe amount of weed to do.
Nonsense. Alcohol is a carcinogen, every part of your body it touches has an increased risk of developing cancer. It is directly neurotoxic. It damages the liver and stomache. A bottle of it can kill you. Stopping taking it can kill you.
Weed taken orally is physically very safe. It can still be habit forming and there are other unwanted side effects but to act like it is physically comaparable to alcohol is silly.
I say there’s no safe amount of cocaine because it is directly cardiotoxic and has been known to cause heart defects in healthy young men at moderate doses.
I don’t think ant drug should be illegal I just think people should be aware of the dangers of substances so they can make an informed decision.
Weed can also cause cancer. In fact, it’s worse in terms of that.
Yes but they aren’t legalizing it because it’s fun and safe they are legalizing it because jailing people over drugs does not help them and there is no point in filling your jails with such a high percentage of your population.
then why not decriminalize instead of legalize?
Regulation and the obliteration of the illegal drug trade which directly harms millions in the pursuit of profit.
It should however, (and I cannot stress this enough) be privatized. This would be a fucking nightmare and simply move the profit motive causing the harm to another source
What difference does it make when the outcome is the same?
I’d say legalization is actually better in this case, as you can provide licenses to pharmaceutical manufacturers subject to QA regulations, lab accreditations, etc. Decriminalization just means that guy with 1:1 cocaine:fentanyl is probably getting a ticket rather than arrested.
[Was going to put a ‘doesn’t help when the guy overdoses’ comment here, but thinking about it now people do overdose (and die) on just cocaine too. One of the factors that make this a different conversation than cannabis. Don’t know the thresholds for overdose re: just coke, though]
And yet another factor is that cocaine is cardiotoxic. You’re literally killing your heart with every use.