Tide turns in favour of drug reform

[Gee]

Interesting article that was in the Sydney Morning Herald.

 

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/tide-turns-i...90826-ezph.html

[MadamePandora]

Wish they allowed comments on that site....

[jimbojones5678]

Obama has candidly discussed his drug use. ''Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow [cocaine] when you could afford it.'' He has also admitted the ''war on drugs is an utter failure'' and called for more focus on a public health approach.

about bloody time...

 

Jimbo

[TD.]

It recommended breaking the ''taboo on open debate" including about cannabis decriminalisation

 

Decriminalization dosnt make anything better....it just means you dont go to jail for your weed u get a misdemeanor charge and a fat fine....but society still says "no no no"

Furthermore it dosnt address the problem of the underground market for cannabis and the profits made by drug dealers.

 

nice read tho

Edited August 30, 2009 by TD.

[jabez]

Decriminalization actually makes it worse, since the coppers don't need to do all the paper work and can just write you out a fine. Which means there more likely to bust ya and the government uses it as a revenue raiser.

[gasandgrass]

Rather an on the spot fine anyday, rather than a record!

[jabez]

In victoria you get 2 formal warnings, but they have to do a whole heap of paper work, so they NEVER actually end up giving you the warnings, they just throw your weed down the drain and they never actively seek bong heads, it's just not worth the effort.

 

Every fucking time I've been to SA I get fuck wit coppers harrassing me and what people don't realize is in SA once you've been fined once, the next time they catch ya they can arrest ya, FUCK decriminalization!

Edited August 30, 2009 by jabez

[Cactus]

Decrimnalisation is better than how it is now, and it is easier to accomplish than legalisation. In my opinion its an important step towards legalising cannabis. Definitely not saying it should be decriminalised and thats it, but if the government is ready to decriminalise it then surely with a bit more pressure they would more readily consider its legalisation.

I dont see the government legalising cannabis with no step in between, even if the motion was pushed forward I'd imagine it getting voted down by right wing liberal fat cats. Although these right wingers would vote for a revenue raiser, which in turn puts us closer to getting it legalised.

[Token]

ahaa... I didn't realize that that is what decriminalization would mean.. that kind of sucks. But is a closer step towards legalization

 

..you learn something new everyday hehe

[jabez]

Decrimnalisation is better than how it is now, and it is easier to accomplish than legalisation. In my opinion its an important step towards legalising cannabis. Definitely not saying it should be decriminalised and thats it, but if the government is ready to decriminalise it then surely with a bit more pressure they would more readily consider its legalisation.

I dont see the government legalising cannabis with no step in between, even if the motion was pushed forward I'd imagine it getting voted down by right wing liberal fat cats. Although these right wingers would vote for a revenue raiser, which in turn puts us closer to getting it legalised.

 

It all depends on if they really are 'decriminalizing' it I suppose and not just putting the word in their policy. I mean how can they just say we will give you a fine first time we caught you, then call it decimalization, are people really that ignorant to believe that’s decimalization? All there doing in SA is giving you a formal warning in the form of a on the spot fine rather than a whole heap of paper work. So what happens is more people not only end up being harassed by the police but also more people actually end up in court on cannabis possession charges than states that still call it “illegal” and don’t give their formal warning in the form of a fine. So you’d want to make sure you don’t support a worse policy just because they call it a certain word.

 

What Holland has is a proper "decimalization" policy, based around harm reduction. It doesn’t fix the criminal aspect in the growing side of cannabis, but they’ve managed to get it out of schools and make it as safe as it’s ever going to be without straight out legalization.