We often have the knee-jerk reaction to the illegality of drugs in: “Of course drugs should be illegal! They cause so much damage and ill health, they aren’t good for the body, the bad effects of illegal drugs are well known and the government is protecting people from these effects.”
So why doesn’t the government outlaw tobacco and alcohol? Why doesn’t the government regulate the abundance of fast food and junk food which also cause illness and death? Alcohol and tobacco are the number 1 and 2 related causes of death in the USA, and the dangers of a bad diet are well known to everyone of us here. In contrast, 0.9 % of the working-age population uses cocaine, while 10% of the working-age population uses ganja in Jamaica. If the usage is so low, why is the drug-related crime so high?
Illegal drugs are illegal because many years ago, those in power in the higher classes decided that any substance that could be used by the lower status to achieve a narcotic effect must be outlawed and controlled “for their own good.” In doing so however, they created a black market effect which is obvious today, and which has led to the equality:
DRUGS = MONEY = POWER
At one recent seminar of Swiss bankers, it was estimated that the global take from illicit activities had reached over $1 trillion annually, the vast majority of which comes from drug dealing. In Mexico, the country's gross domestic product was $280 billion last year, while estimates of drug money flowing through the country range from $70 billion to $200 billion annually. Presidents there are now turning to the drug cartels to ensure financing of their traditional, and unofficial, multimillion-dollar retirement accounts. In Jamaica, corruption has become a more visible issue. What would you guess is the most likely source of these corruption funds?
With so much money available in drugs, how can someone resist the lure? For the love of money, people will swallow drugs and risk years in prison or death from ruptured bags. For the love of money, people will strap on drugs to their body and risk humiliation and years in prison. For the love of money, young black men will take up illegal guns and defend their turf to sell their product. For the love of money, young black men will kill each other and anyone who gets in their way of making that money. For the love of money, those in power will ignore this reality and keep this truth under wraps: the illegal nature of these drugs is what makes the crime related to these drugs so prevalent.
Ignored in all this love of money is the love of the product that causes so much suffering among the disenfranchised and poor in society. If there were no demand for illegal drugs, there would be no drug traffic. I ask you however; how can you cut the demand for drugs?
You can’t. If you want to go out tonight and get drunk, or get high, or hook up with a prostitute, or do whatever vice you wanted, there isn’t a soul in this room who can stop you or remove that desire from you. Even if we were to beg and plead with you to try and persuade you to not do it, the final decision would be yours and not ours. If we were by some miracle able to remove all coke or prostitutes or whatever your vice may be, odds are that you would just find another vice to fill whatever hole or need you that you think that vice can fill. It is society’s duty to help our fellow man to find purpose and meaning in life, and we will not do that by making these substances illegal. By doing so, we simply reduce him to a common criminal, when he is really a soul crying out for help. We need to guide him a greater purpose instead of attempting to remove the purpose that he currently has.
I am not preaching the virtues of ganja, or the medicinal properties of cocaine. I’m not promoting the obvious truth that people can put whatever they want with their bodies, nor am I saying that the government should not have control over these substances. I say that with more legal control over these currently illegal drugs, much of the power that goes with that money will revert from the hands of criminals into the hands of the authorities. We can either leave the money from drugs in the hands of unscrupulous criminals who then corrupt the government, or we can put that money directly into the hands of the government by legalizing the drugs. Which is the lesser evil?
