Last Tuesday, day of the US presidential elections, Oregon became the first state to decriminalize the possession of small amounts of hard drugs.
According to an article on the guardian website:
At first, it sounds like, well, pretty freaking crazy, because what the hell are they doing? Legalizing drugs? Legalizing heroine and cocaine and other crazy-ass drugs? How is that a step forward in the war on drugs?
But it really kind of is though. At least in my opinion and, well, obviously the people that legalized this. For me there’s a couple of reasons why this is a big deal in a good way.
First and foremost,
It means realizing the fact that addiction is a disease and not just a choice. Something that requires something more than just will power to fix. A certain external factor – like a doctor or a therapist of sorts, since a lot of the times rug use results from internal psychological problems.
Growing up, I thought that my family friends and people I knew who smoked cigarettes were weak. That they didn’t have a back bone or any power of will. Then I started using porn. Then I tried to quit porn. And then I changed my opinion about addicts. Sounds pretty simple, but unfortunately not everyone goes through the same thought process.
You see, I realized how hard it is to drop this filthy habit. I realized it’s not just about your will power. It’s deeper than that. And, may I remind you, I wasn’t an addict to a substance. So in a way, obviously I can’t know this for sure, but I’m imagining it’s harder to drop codeine, morphine or heroine, than it is porn. One of the worst things about addiction is the stigma around it. How hard it sometimes is to ask for help, knowing the shame you’re gonna go through, or, in case of hard drug users, even worse – prison. Instead of helping drug addicts, they’re throwing them in jail. Like, imagine if you had the flu and, instead of seeing a doctor, you were put in jail so you don’t spread it to other people.
Second,
By making drugs, in a way, legal, you’re taking the cool-ness out of it so to say. The same reason for why there’s so much underage illegal drinking. This way, they’re just not so “special” anymore which might make them less appealing to certain individuals. I mean, humans are basically born with this idea that “rules are meant to be broken”, which in my opinion sounds pretty dumb, but I’m sure there’s people that disagree with me.
So, now, these type of people might not even get into this kind of stuff to begin with. And even if they do – there’s a rehab waiting for them where they can get professional help.
Last but not least,
This could mean the beginning of a better prison reform. This initiative stands on the idea of helping people instead of putting them in cages. Hopefully sooner than later this will happen with more criminal charges. In my eyes, the goal here is to hopefully one day get to a point where prisons are not just some hole where we throw people that we don’t have time to deal with, but instead a place of rehabilitation. A place where people could go for help, so that they could go through some psychological changes for the best before they rejoin society. A lot of criminals in today’s world leave prison in a worse mental state than they were when they got there.
Time will tell…
It’s only been one week since the decision, so it’s a bit early to see any results just yet. Hopefully this initiative will lead to bigger changes in society, hopefully for the better.
Anyway, that’s just my thoughts on it. Tell me what you think about it down below in the comments section. Do you agree with what I had to say or do you think that this was not the right decision for Oregon?
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