Comment by chucksta
5 years ago
Meth was legal until the 70s, society functioned. The current problem is another side effect of the war on drugs
5 years ago
Meth was legal until the 70s, society functioned. The current problem is another side effect of the war on drugs
According to period newspapers, it very much was a problem almost immediately after public introduction in the late 40s and early 50s. Here's an example from Australia, which banned it by 1955:
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/71874426?searchTe...
Reading today's newspapers, you'd think Southern California just survived the apocalypse after the half inch of rain last weekend.
This is very much false, and completely contrary to the actual history. War on drugs only happened because of greatly increased social dysfunction due to drugs, not the other way around. It enjoyed wide social support at the time it was started, precisely because people saw how damaging the drugs are to their communities. The idea that drug-related social dysfunction is an effect of war on drugs is yet another of those "wet streets cause rain" ideas.
No. The war on drugs was an acknowledged political act to disenfranchise black people and the anti (Vietnam) war movement. Lopez, German (March 22, 2016). "Nixon official: real reason for the drug war was to criminalize black people and hippies". Vox. Archived from the original on May 30, 2017. Retrieved June 13, 2017.
Which is why when the War on Drugs started, the Congressional Black Caucus met with Nixon to urge him to stop it.
…no, they didnt, in fact they urged him to do the opposite: to ramp it up as fast as possible, precisely to stop the damage the drugs were causing to black communities.
https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/08/16/212620886...
The linked material came out on NPR in 2013, before it was decided that the history needs to be revised. I recommend taking a look at it before it is also revised, to remove all references to what had actually happened, to how black leaders were main force behind the War on Drugs.
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How do you explain this quote then, surely the war would cause a decrease no? Odd usage spiked decades _after_ they banned it
>Use of crystal meth in the United States exploded in the early 1990s. Between 1994 and 2004, methamphetamine use rose from just under two percent of the U.S. adult population to approximately five percent.
Society functions while people have access to guns too, yet there are still consequences to that choice. I am pro legalization of most drugs, but meth does give me pause. No one smoking a joint or tripped out on opioids has ever attacked me while screaming at ghosts in the street, I don't know enough about the role of meth in those kinds of instabilities but anecdotally meth, and alcohol too, sure seem to cause a whole lot of trouble in my city.