Decriminalisation of drugs... your thoughts?

Oct 9, 2006
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Yes, by decriminalising, Portugal has been able to address lots of social issues.

Do note, that decriminalisation should not be conflated with legalisation. They're two separate notions and most people are going to see decriminalisation and throw a hissy fit because they don't want a free-reign for drugs, when in reality that's not the case at all.

This.

Decriminalisation works. Portugal and the Netherlands are evidence of this.

Tougher laws, heavy handed policing and longer sentences do not work. If they did, there would be no drug problem such is how the use of drugs is legislated across most jurisdictions.

But whilst we have narrow minded puritans who use a book of fairytales as their moral compass driving the debate, the "war" on drugs will never be won.
 
Jun 19, 2011
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This.

Decriminalisation works. Portugal and the Netherlands are evidence of this.

Tougher laws, heavy handed policing and longer sentences do not work. If they did, there would be no drug problem such is how the use of drugs is legislated across most jurisdictions.

But whilst we have narrow minded puritans who use a book of fairytales as their moral compass driving the debate, the "war" on drugs will never be won.
Do you think current day Australia is comparable to post Salazar Portugal?
Do you think Portugal is performing better than the rest of Europe?
 
Jun 14, 2015
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Do you think current day Australia is comparable to post Salazar Portugal?
Do you think Portugal is performing better than the rest of Europe?
Well, in terms of what we're actually talking about: in Portugal 1.8% of the population have a drug or alcohol disorder. In Australia it's double that.

Portugal are doing really well with the discrimination of drugs. There's heaps of data on it.
 
Jun 19, 2011
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Well, in terms of what we're actually talking about: in Portugal 1.8% of the population have a drug or alcohol disorder. In Australia it's double that.
That's very impressive. Have you got a link to that? Of course you'd need to look at legal and illegal drugs separately, since that's what were talking about
Portugal are doing really well with the discrimination of drugs. There's heaps of data on it.
Do you mean compared to where they were before legalisation, or comparative to Europe?
 
Oct 9, 2006
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Do you think current day Australia is comparable to post Salazar Portugal?
Do you think Portugal is performing better than the rest of Europe?

What has that got to do with the subject at hand?

Do you think that what we are doing now is working? Do you think that it is morally responsible to allow kids to die because we won't even do something as simple as to trial pill testing at festivals?

The ignorant jump up and down and claim that if people didn't do drugs then they wouldn't hurt or kill themselves. The ignorant overlook the fact that people ARE taking drugs and no amount of finger wagging and Bible quoting will change that. So to mitigate the destruction perhaps it is time to try something that we haven't tried before and that has been shown to work in more forward thinking places. Decriminalisation works. Not because drugs become a free for all, but because the flow on effect is to clean up the product/s being taken. People are going to continue distributing and/or taking drugs whether they are illegal or not. More cops and heavier sentences are NOT and never have been a deterrent. Only a complete idiot thinks that heavier policing will have a positive effect. All evidence points to the contrary.
 
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Jun 19, 2011
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What has that got to do with the subject at hand?

Do you think that what we are doing now is working? Do you think that it is morally responsible to allow kids to die because we won't even do something as simple as to trial pill testing at festivals?

The ignorant jump up and down and claim that if people didn't do drugs then they wouldn't hurt or kill themselves. The ignorant overlook the fact that people ARE taking drugs and no amount of finger wagging and Bible quoting will change that. So to mitigate the destruction perhaps it is time to try something that we haven't tried before and that has been shown to work in more forward thinking places. Decriminalisation works. Not because drugs become a free for all, but because the flow on effect is to clean up the product/s being taken. People are going to continue distributing and/or taking drugs whether they are illegal or not. More cops and heavier sentences are NOT and never have been a deterrent. Only a complete idiot thinks that heavier policing will have a positive effect. All evidence points to the contrary.
Answer my questions. Then ill answer yours.
 
The lives of seven young people were potentially saved at the weekend when a second pill testing trial at the Groovin the Moo festival in Canberra identified lethal substances.

Patrons discarded their drugs after testing alerted them that their pills contained dangerous n-ethylpentylone. MDMA was the most common substance identified followed by cocaine, ketamine and methamphetamines.

Organiser Gino Vumbaca from Pill Testing Australia hailed the trial a success and said 171 samples had been tested on behalf of 234 participants. He said there were long queues to use the pill testing service and people waited patiently for up to 20 minutes. Testing takes about 10 minutes.


https://www.theguardian.com/austral...-potentially-saves-seven-lives-organisers-say

And for those wondering, n-ethylpentylone = bath salts, which has been proven to be very fatal.
 
Apr 24, 2013
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meanwhile 30 coppers just raided the Hemp embassy in Nimbin. Is there an election coming or something?


Go back to sleep ferby, your government is in control.
 
This is a major problem if this is the source for my cbd oil.

I dunno really. I played footy in Nimbin for about a decade and so i got to know a few of those people. I dunno who supplies what around there and certainly wouldn't want to say in a public forum if I actually did know. It was mardi grass on the weekebnd just gone so it was probably just the usual Mardi grass related harassment. I know of one guy who supplied alot of CBD oil and got busted pretty heavily over a year ago and definitely doesn't do it any more cos he has a suspended sentence hanging over his head. But that is about it as far as CBD goes. I don't get into growing that stuff myself and even tho I know a few people who I'm sure do i don't go prying into people's business either.

Living around Nimbin certainly opens your eyes to the stupidity of drug laws tho. Especially now that so many people use it for medical reasons. Although iirc CBD is now relatively legal (whatever the * that means.)

You don't need to answer if you don't want - but if you do what do use it for?

Like I said don't answer if you don't want to.:thumbsu:

Its all good.
 
Apr 13, 2019
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I actually buy it for someone who otherwise relies in lyrica and oxycontin.

They are in excruitiating pain and get judged and turned away when they go to GPs. CBD oil is the only thing that really works because they have built up a tolerance to opioids.

I like having cbd oil in my cupboard as i find it very calming. I have used it for injuries in the past.

I want to ask the government who, in their ivory towers make decisions about peoples access to anxiety and pain medication. If you are so determined to make it impossible for people.to access benzos and pain medication then what incentives do you recomend in place of benzos and oppioids?

It is all very well to be judgmental puritants bur this doesnt change the fact that people are suffering from severe pain and anxiety. So don't withhold something without offtering something in its place.

Dumb campaigners.
 
Sadly true. Luckily we don't have the US system of an entirely privatised prison system combined with judge elections.
Not yet. Libs are pressing hard though.
I would venture that Dutton has already registered businesses for this express purpose should his mob of inbreds win power again in his lifetiime.
 

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Not yet. Libs are pressing hard though.
I would venture that Dutton has already registered businesses for this express purpose should his mob of inbreds win power again in his lifetiime.

Look out, it may be happening now !!

In the US they are finding the number of car crashes involving stoned people has doubled since decriminalising. So you'd hope there was a crackdown to stop it happening here.

I couldnt care less if people get stoned in front of the TV. I do care if they endanger others.
 
Apr 24, 2013
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Look out, it may be happening now !!

In the US they are finding the number of car crashes involving stoned people has doubled since decriminalising. So you'd hope there was a crackdown to stop it happening here.

I couldnt care less if people get stoned in front of the TV. I do care if they endanger others.

I have never seriously bought the whole stoned vs bad driver thing.
 
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