Guest Editorial

By Young Master Ross (Name withheld due to age)

“That humanity at large will ever be able to dispense with Artificial Paradises seems very unlikely.
Most men and women lead lives at the worst so painful, at the best so monotonous, poor and
limited that the urge to escape, the longing to transcend themselves if only for a few moments,
is and has always been one of the principal appetites of the soul.” (Aldous Huxley)

As Huxley said, drug use and the desire to alter consciousness are innate in humans. Before Europeans even discovered of the new world, Native Americans were using peyote and teonánacatl (“magic” mushrooms) as sacraments. Today, millions of people throughout the world are being jailed for drug related offenses. Is that what governments were meant to do; jail people for doing what is natural? Surely any person with reasonable intelligence knows the answer to that question. Drugs should be legalized. It would benefit society greatly, especially with the growing national debt. Also, whether the legalization of drugs would have positive results or not is moot. Governments have no right to tell people what they can or cannot do to themselves. Thomas Hobbes explained in Leviathan that people surrender certain rights to protect themselves from others, not themselves. In other words, a victimless crime is not a crime at all. Prohibition is a clear and egregious breach of personal liberty.

America’s thirty year war against its own citizens is a failure, and will be until it is ended. Legal drugs would be much safer for consumers. Poisonous substances are frequently found in illicit drugs because there are no regulations for the black market. In a legal market, producers would have a financial incentive to provide quality product at low prices. Standards would be put in place to make sure consumers receive exactly what they purchase. Street violence would decrease dramatically with no black market. Rite Aid and Walgreen’s seldom engage in shoot outs over who is selling products on the other’s turf. Legalizing drugs would save countless innocent lives that are harmed by street violence ever day. If money makes the world go ‘round, then why is the government throwing away billions of dollars on a war they can not, and will not, win. The National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws estimated saving ten billion dollars a year in enforcement costs alone if marijuana were legal. This does not take into account the hundreds of other illicit substances. They also estimate saving over six billion dollars a year on taxes. Again, this does not take into account hundreds of other illicit substances. Legalizing drugs would lead to spin-off industries, coffee shops, and innumerable jobs that would boost the economy. One can only hope that the advocates of prohibition in the government will not cut off their nose to save their face, and make the smart decision.

The government of the United States of America is said to be of the people, by the people, and for the people. In 2003, ninety million Americans, or forty percent of the population age 12 or older, reported trying marijuana at least once. Almost half of the population has used marijuana, yet the government still sends people to jail for using or distributing the substance. This does not sound like a government of, by, or for the people. Jail is a place for murderers and rapists. It is a place to keep them isolated from society, for the purpose of protecting innocent citizens. Using drugs harms no one except the user. When did the government (wrongly) assume that they have the right to regulate what its citizens choose to consume? It is scary to think about which freedoms the government will steal next. Whether one supports drug use or not, they must rise up and regain their liberties that have been taken away.

To whomever it may concern:

Give me back the freedom that has been fought for since the beginning of time.