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Title: Bans or Legalisation Author: Ray Cunningham Date: 1996 Language: en Topics: drugs, legalization, Ireland, Workers Solidarity Source: Retrieved on 5th December 2021 from http://struggle.ws/ws/legal47.html Notes: Published in Workers Solidarity No. 47 Spring 1996.
SINCE THE DAYS of Concerned Parents Against Drugs (CPAD), the growth of
the heroin problem in inner-city Dublin has largely gone without
comment. In the last few months, two factors have pushed it back into
the spotlight â the governmentâs declaration of a âWar on Drugsâ, and
the emergence of the city-wide campaign against heroin which has been
set up by Inner City Organisations Network. In this article, we look at
these campaigns, and how we, as anarchists, would deal with the problem
of drug-abuse.
Itâs not a coincidence that the heroin problem is concentrated in
communities with the highest rates of unemployment, worst housing, etc.
The inner-cities have been written-off already, it doesnât make
political sense to spend money on people who are poor, unemployed, and
probably donât vote anyway. Besides which, everyone knows that as long
as these areas remain run-down unemployment black-spots, people are
going to keep turning to drugs, if only because thereâs nothing else to
turn to.
Instead, the government is concentrating on soft drugs, cannabis and
Ecstasy mainly, because these are the drugs which have broken out of the
ghetto. Even the most paranoid suburban parent is unlikely to think that
their teenage son or daughter is developing a smack habit, itâs much
easier to picture them smoking a joint or taking an E at a rave. These
parents are the swing voters, the people that political parties must win
over to get elected, so they are the ones at whom the publicity campaign
must be targeted. The proof of this is in the number of customs seizures
of heroin as opposed to those of hash or E.
There are few, if any, grounds for criminalising cannabis. Countless
studies have shown it to be a drug that is not addictive and has next to
no adverse physical effects, especially compared to alcohol and
nicotine, Irelandâs drugs of choice. Ecstasy, though dangerous in large
quantities (as with most drugs, legal or illegal), is safe at its normal
dosage provided basic guidelines are followed1, drinking enough water if
dancing, etc. The two main health risks associated with using Ecstasy
are of allergic reaction â a small percentage of people can be killed by
a bee sting, a similar number of people may have an equally dangerous
reaction to E â and the fact that not everything sold as Ecstasy is in
fact MDMA. Lack of testing facilities means that people are at risk from
unscrupulous dealers.
Because neither of these drugs is addictive, it is (relatively) easy to
control their usage. Heroin is a different matter. The physical craving
for heroin, and the side-effects of withdrawal, prove unbearable for
many, and ensure that there is a steady demand, even if the price is
driven up by raids or seizures at customs. It requires a lot of
resources to deal with the problem of heroin in any meaningful way.
Needle exchanges are essential to stop the spread of disease through
dirty needles. Helping someone get off heroin means supplying them with
other drugs to lessen the withdrawal symptoms, providing them with
support facilities so that they do actually clean up rather than just
develop another addiction, and finally, making sure that there is an
alternative waiting for them so that they donât get hooked again six
months after detoxing.
The absence of this support means that heroin is likely to remain a
problem in Dublin for some time. But it is important to realise exactly
what the problem is. Too often, analysis goes no further than âDrugs are
bad, heroin is a drug, therefore heroin is badâ. Given that most of the
people reading this article will have used some illegal drug â acid, E,
speed, almost certainly cannabis â this is hardly a very credible
argument. The difference with heroin (the most common âhardâ drug in
Ireland) is that it is highly addictive.
Smack is an expensive habit, and since most drug users (like most
smokers, heavy drinkers, and Lottery âplayersâ) come from poor
backgrounds, they have to turn to crime. Addiction to something as
demanding as heroin means that most users cannot afford a sense of
social responsibility. This is the destructive side of drugs, this is
why it is not mere moralism to describe heroin as a problem. When so
much of crime is related to a particular drug, that drug is obviously a
problem.
So what can we do? The first step is to stop treating drugs as one
undifferentiated mass, and to distinguish between those that are
physically dangerous and those that are not, between those that are
addictive and those that are not. If we allow people to smoke
cigarettes, why not allow people equal access to other recreational
drugs, perhaps with the same age restrictions as apply to alcohol
consumption. Legalisation would allow regulation, which in turn allows
testing, so that people wonât be poisoned by dealers ripping them off.
For more serious drugs, there are a number of options. At the very
least, the current type of support programme needs to be properly
funded. More sensible approaches could also be tried. For example, a
doctor in England used to supply all of his addicted patients with
medical heroin, which was both safer for them, as it removed the risks
involved with using heroin available on the street â often cut with
other drugs and of varying strengths â and better for those around them,
as it allowed them to live a relatively normal life.
The fundamental question is of freedom. People must be free to do what
they like with their own bodies, but the freedom of others must not be
restricted. Where a drug effects only the user, like cannabis or LSD,
there can be no excuse for preventing a mature adult from using it. If a
drug effects others, like heroin, alcohol (indirectly responsible for
how many road deaths and assaults per year?), or nicotine (cigarette
smoke is bad for everyone who breathes it in, not just the smoker), then
we can justify restricting its use to situations where bystanders are
not harmed. In short, then, we call for the decriminalisation of drugs,
to allow people to make up their own minds on what they will use, and to
make the circumstances under which they make that choice as safe as
possible.