STATE HAS GIVEN UP THE RIGHT TO PROHIBIT DRUGS

"The senses are nails on the soul" - Plato

Why are recreational drugs illegal? I mean, really? It's a question I've
been pondering for a number of years, because the official explanations
don't make much sense. And they make even less sense when you consider that
this is a free country with a Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Heck, Alberta can't even pull 16-year-old prostitutes out of trick pads for
three days because that violates their rights to security of the person, or
whatever. Meanwhile, people are still jailed for smoking dope which, if you
take the idea of individual rights seriously, ought to be a private,
personal decision.

The official explanations include;

* Drugs lead to crime.

Yes, but if recreational drugs weren't illegal, then the users wouldn't be
part of a criminal subculture, and might not have to steal to get their fix.
In other words, there'd be less crime.

* They'll be more addiction if drugs are made legal.

Well, they're illegal now and I don't see drug addiction going down. As many
others have pointed out, the war on drugs has been lost; we're just making
life tougher for addicts and everyone else by continuing it.

* Drugs wreck people's lives.

Of course they do - the addicts' as well as those close to them - but here
we get to the nub of the thing. Over the past few years, since the Charter
came into being in 1982, the courts have gradually been transforming what
used to be called "vices" into inalienable human rights.

What constitutes a vice is a matter of interpretation, but it isn't normally
a criminal act as such; it's indulgence in some form of sensual activity
that society disapproves of. The list of vices , in the past, was long;
intemperance, drug addiction, sexual indulgence, adultery, prostitution,
gambling, pornography, public indecency, etc., etc.

Why has society opposed these practices, even if they were never, ever
actually eradicated? In part because vices were seen as dangerous to the
social fabric (which they are if unchecked). But also, based on a religious
viewpoint, legislators believed they had the moral authority and duty to
protect people from themselves.

Vices are sins, after all, and the wages of sin is hell. So society's war on
sensual indulgence was, in part, a well-meaning attempt to save souls.

As far as I can tell, the so-called war on drugs is the last vestige of
society's attempts to preserve a moral order, and to shelter people from
temptation. But the authorities can't actually say that - they may not even
understand what they're doing - so they trot out all the other excuses and
look ridiculous.

There is much merit in the old position, and Plato was right in stating that
the senses are the nails on the soul; people who spend their whole lives
seeking nothing but pleasure or running away from responsibility - like the
drug addict - will never enjoy the true peace of mind that we are all
actually looking for.

Here's a minor example of how any addiction to pleasure can be a nail on the
soul:

A few years ago my family doctor told me I had to give up caffeine: no more
coffee, tea or colas. It was a nightmarish diagnosis, because I loved
coffee. I had to have my three or four cups a day, and especially that
pleasurable rush in the morning. But doctor's orders were doctor's orders so
I gave up caffeinated drinks.

I was sick in bed for two days, and realized near the end that I was going
"cold turkey". I wasn't addicted to drugs, but I was addicted to caffeine.

Afterward, I figured that life would be bleak without my three or four daily
fixes. To my utter surprise, I found the exact opposite. Suddenly I didn't
have to have a cup after breakfast, or mid-afternoon, or before bedtime to
feel good - I felt good without it. I realized, to my astonishment, that I
was freer and happier than I'd been before. I'd given up an addiction, and
that made me better off, not worse off. I'd removed one small nail from my
soul.

People do drugs, or indulge in any other vice, because they think it will
make them happier. In practice, this type of happiness is very short-lived.
In the longer term addicts increase their unhappiness because they're so
dependent on getting a fix.

In short, drug-taking (or any serious addiction) hammers a whole coffin-full
of nails on the souls of people who indulge them. But, under the Charter
society no longer has the right to protect people from themselves. People's
souls are their own business, not the state's. We are no longer our
brother's keeper, at least in the spiritual sense.

That's why the current drug laws no longer make sense, why they can't hold,
why the courts have begun sweeping them away, and why in a few years, like
it or not, most recreational drugs will be legal.