Alcohol is different how?

Great Debates
1

I’ve gotten involved in too many drugs legalization threads on this board, and something has struck me - those opposed to legalization always assert that legalization will cause massive social ills. The ills they put forward are those caused by … alcohol.

Alcohol is an addictive substance that may cause impaired judgment (driving), crime (domestic violence, vandalism), and physical injury (alcohol poisoning, cirrhosis of the liver, etc.).

Why is it that people consider alcohol as somehow different from illegal drugs? Wouldn’t a coherent criminalization policy also ban alcohol?

Sua

2

I think that a coherent criminalization program would include alcohol and all drugs for that matter.

To make the regulation logical they would have to make all drugs available through prescription only.

More deaths are caused by tobacco than all illicit drugs combined. More driving under the influence of alcohol happen than all other illicit drugs combined. Then the violent crimes committed on alcohol outstrip the illicit drugs as well.

But, our system isn’t logical. We live in a democracy, and the majority drink. Not the majority of drug users. More people drink than don’t. So with certain drugs illegal the politicians can have something evil to fight, the sheep can have something to fear and the teens can have something to rebel with on saturday night. And, what the heck, anyone that wants to get high still can. Anyone at anytime.

So, instead of making everyone a criminal we keep alcohol legal and the rest illegal.

Was that better, dad?

3

Excellent question. I’ll not answer it. But, in this vein, what occurs to me is that some people content themselves with a nonintoxicating dose of alcohol. People will tell you they enjoy the taste of their alcohol of choice and drink it for reasons other than its intoxicating effects. I’ve often wondered whether people smoke marijuana just to enjoy the smoke and stop before there’s any chance of intoxication.

So, would a coherent criminalization policy account for why people use the substance? I think the purpose of use could be an important distinction. A line could be drawn at whether the primary purpose of the substance is to intoxicate.

Well, its near the end of the day and I need a beer.

4

They consider it different because it’s more widely used. Attempts to argue it logically seem to break down (once past verbiage) into:

Given: Alcohol is different than other drugs.
Proposition: Alcohol is different than other drugs.
Proof: By the given, alcohol is different than other drugs.

Logically, that is unassailable. It’s not all that helpful, though.

And frankly, I think that’s about as far as cogent reasoning goes on that point. Then again, I’m firmly in the “legalize everything and let people make a mess of themselves as they like” camp.

5

Most people I know who smoke pot, don’t. :slight_smile:

IMO, the notion that alcohol is somehow different is mostly used by people who abuse alcohol, but want to have someone to point to as worse than they are. “Maybe I’m drinking too much, but at least it’s not heroin.”
/me shrugs
I’m not sure how true that is. Just strikes me as awful likely. :slight_smile:

They did for a while. Given what happened, I’m not surprised nobody’s tried again.

I think the deal here is…alcohol has been the drug of choice in Western civilization, since there has been Western civilization. In vino, something, something. :slight_smile:

These other drugs: opium, cocaine, pot, whatever…they’re newer. They’re not built into the culture. So it’s easier to make laws against them.

6

actually the difference to me is timing.

If tobacco were ‘discovered’ today, I think it would have been highly, highly regulated if not outright outlawed. And alcohol would most likely also have been much more regulated than it currently is.

That of course, is MHO.

The other aspect of the ‘why grass and not booze’ concept is that while you focus on ‘gee, we have more problems w/booze than grass, why not outlaw the other instead’, the other side is ‘we have enough problems with having this one legalized, to add in additional substances (which would mean determining the critical ‘point of influence/intoxication’ and ‘level of abuse’ categories per substance), would make additional problems, so why add to a bad situation?’

and when you go back to the ‘but that one’s worse, so why not make the other legal and the worse one illegal’, then you go back to point #1, which is that trying to suddenly make something illegal that people have been doing forever makes for huge social upheaval and we didn’t like the effects the last time.

there. now do you feel better? :smiley:

7

Robb: <raises hand> Me… I love the smell of pot. Probably because I am a cigarette smoker, I also don’t have any ickypoo feelings about the taste. The high, however, I could do without.

8

Thanks, LifeOnWry, I learn something new every day here. :slight_smile:

9

I agree with Grey Matters

Alcohol is not substantially different from other drugs. Illegal drugs are a scapegoat. Any number of social ills can be blamed on them, and they make a great excuse for increased police interference in people’s lives. It also makes great propaganda: “Look, we’re fighting a WAR to improve your lives here, people!”

10

It was generally conceded at the time that the Feral Government had no power to prohibit alcohol. Thus, the necessity of the XVIII Amendment.

Given that the XXI Amendment repealed the XVIII Amendment, we must concede that the FG has no power currently to prohibit alcohol. Since the War on Some Drugs is almost entirely an endeavor of the FG, we can see that there is not, and is unlikely to be (until the XXIX Amendment appoints Sidney Wolfe Food Czar) another War on Alcohol.

OTOH, the authority of the FG to prohibit other drugs has not been successfully challenged (go bust on SCOTUS, not me, for this). As history shows that governments will grab off as much power over their subjects as is possible without provoking armed rebellion, it is unsurprising that the War on Some Drugs exists.

11

I drink, but I don’t do any illegal drugs. A big deterent for me is that they are illegal, and I suspect there are alot of us for whom it is not worth the risk legally, so why go there.

If other drugs were legal, I probably would be a little more experimental.

The big problem I have with the “let’s legalize everything” camp is that. The assumption being made are that

  1. These drugs are no more harmful than booze
  2. The same number of people who do drugs now will do them when they are legal.
  3. Hi Opal

I agree that booze is more harmful, that is, kills more people/causes more social ills than other drugs, but I think that the reason is because, as it is legal, more people do it. If, suddenly, pot, heroine and cocain were legal and easy to get, more people would use, and abuse them, and the negative impact on society of those drugs would be greater than they are now. OCTJMO,AIMBW.

As to the OP. I agree that all drugs should be treated the same. I think it is absurd that smoking is legal at all. Alcohol at least has been shown to have some health benefit. I agree though with other posters, I think there would be a huge backlash politically if boozer were banned. It seems quite hypocritial to me.

12

I have alcoholic drinks every now and then chiefly because I like them, not because of their effect (I will often choose a less-alcoholic beer, if I like the taste.

However, I don’t think there’s a great deal of qualitative difference between alcohol and, say cannabis or E (if we were talking about acid or PCP then I might feel inclined to disagree)

In my mind, it’s not a simple case of:
“A and B are roughly equivalent, therefore if A is legal, then so should B be”

but rather:
“we have problems already because A is legal (however, criminalising A may cause more problems), will legalising B add new problems?, if so, do we find that acceptable?, will any problems caused by legalising B be balanced by resulting in solutions to different problems? if so, will everyone find that a fair exchange?”

13

In terms of popular, recreational substances alcohol is simply much milder than either cocaine or heroin. I would say its about par with marajuana.

The vast majority of people who use alcohol or marajuana, even those that use it regularly, are not alcoholics or drug addicts. Whereas anyone who uses cocaine or heroin regularly is basically an addict.

14

Um … didn’t we already try this? I mean, there was that whole 18th Amendment thing with the prohibition and all…

15

I agree. Alcohol causes so many problems, but people don’t even consider it to be as bad as illegal drugs- although alcohol is a drug. Alcohol will never be illegal because it can be taxed. However, there is no way to tax all the illegal drugs we have now. If the government can’t tax it, they won’t legalize it. It’s all about the money.

…but that’s just my opinion. :slight_smile:

16

Why is alcohol different? Two words: Bathtub Gin. Anyone with some brewers yeast can make alcohol. After trying for over ten years to enforce prohibition, the federal government gave up. They’ll give up the war on drugs after someone genetically engineers yeast to produce THC, heroin and cocaine.

17

Erm, just doesn’t stand up. Marijuana should be legal then, no?

18

Sua, Oliver W. Holmes, Jr., the Great Dissenter, probably had it right when he said that a page of history is worth a thousand pages of logic, or words to that effect. The principal difference between booze and, for instance, marijuana, is that booze has been around for as long as the institutional memory can recall. There was a time not so very long ago that most Europeans went around half looped all day every day.

19

This might be of interest:
TALLINN, Estonia – Thirty six people have died and 65+1 are in hospital after drinking a deadly homemade liquor apparently laced with poisonous methyl alcohol.
Most of the victims are thought to have consumed the tainted alcohol on Saturday and Sunday in and around Pärnu, 125 kilometers (75 miles) south of the capital, Tallinn, in the ex-Soviet republic.

The death toll had risen from 15 earlier on Monday. Those in hospital are believed to be in a serious condition.

A police statement said people suffering from methyl alcohol poisoning had begun arriving at hospitals in the area on Sunday.

Nine were flown by helicopter to hospitals in Tallinn and another city, Tartu.

Police spokesman Indrek Raudjalg told The Associated Press that the alcohol was thought to have been purchased from the same illegal source, but at different times in recent days.

Most of the victims had been looking for cheaper alcohol, although he said the toxicity probably occurred inadvertently during the distilling process.

“We don’t think those making these spirits wanted to kill their clients. It was probably a mistake, but that’s something being investigated,” said Raudjalg, adding that tests were being run on samples to verify the lethal ingredient.

Estonian government spokesman Priit Poiklik urged anybody who still had the bootleg alcohol not to drink it and to hand it in to the authorities.

“The incident is of course deplorable. It shows we should boost our efforts to fight bootleg alcohol,” he told Reuters.

Four people suspected of making and selling the homemade brew have been detained for questioning.

Police also said they had seized counterfeit alcohol and discovered a suspected illegal bottling operation.

Steep rises in the cost of alcohol have driven many Estonians to search for cheaper options.

Methyl alcohol, or methanol, which is an ingredient in antifreeze, is highly poisonous if consumed, causing blindness and death.

All that I have to say:
Be sure of what you drink before drinking it.

20

I fail to see why you assert that the government couldn’t tax these drugs. Sure, as long as they’re illegal, they cannot be taxed. However, if cannabis products were legalized (I could take the more extreme stance and mention other drugs, but I won’t because it raises too many issues), what would stop a government from taking over the trade aspects of the product, and impose taxation?

When you buy drugs on the black market, you’re paying for the “risk factor,” the “it’s gone through numerous hands” factor, and the general greed of dope dealers. If these drugs were legalized, some of these factors could be eliminated, thereby decreasing the price tremendously. After all, cannabis is an easy plant to grow, and not particularly expensive to mass-produce. So, keeping this decrease in price in mind, the government would then be free to tax the hell out of cannabis products, and STILL manage to make it available for a lesser price than the standard “street” price, thereby effectively neutralizing the black market.

In time, once people have forgotten all about the old black market days, the government would be free to increase the tax to a ridiculous level, as they pretty much do with everything anyway.