That is absolutely true. I didn't say civilization will collapse or anything like that. I'm just saying there will be a price. There's certainly room for disagreement over how high the price will be. But I think it's pretty ridiculous to pretend ending drug prohibition will be free.
>Only that isn't really true either. Some of the campaigns to make them illegal were based in racism.
I don't find this compelling. Yes, there was a feeling of "Don't smoke pot - only jazz musicians smoke pot." But if you really thought only jazz musicians smoked pot there wouldn't be any reason to make it illegal. And if there were 88% of the country wouldn't tolerate prohibition just to oppress the other 12%.
>Misinformation was spread, both before and after. My grandmother thought pot would make people insane, for example.
Yes, that's true, though I think there's a big difference between marijuana and, say, opiods, amphetamines, or barbiturates.
>There are drugs that I think are bad for folks that take them and their families, but we could actually help folks and their families instead.
If you read up a bit you'll see I'm in basic agreement with you on the right way to move forward. I just think it's naive to believe people won't take more drugs in the margin, and we won't be dealing with some problems as a result. The hope (and my belief) is the new problems will be fewer than the old problems we're getting rid of by getting rid of drug laws.
> Some number of those will end up hooked, and some number of those people will be breaking into houses (or worse) looking for stuff to sell so they can get their next hit.
But most folks won't do this stuff. Most folks won't even get addicted. It isn't like the US has affordable facilities to help folks, staffed with medical doctors and psychologists to help folks along. They do have AA and NA. A few are helped, many others aren't.
Some of the key with Portugal's decriminalization was they offered help to those addicted. Affordable help. Right now, you have people getting pills for surgery, etc. and some of them wind up addicted. Instead of the doctor being able to have an honest conversation with the person about warnings signs, etc, and offering free(!) help to those that wind up addicted, we choose to treat them like criminals.
>... let's not pretend these substances were made illegal out of groundless malice.
Only that isn't really true either. Some of the campaigns to make them illegal were based in racism. Misinformation was spread, both before and after. My grandmother thought pot would make people insane, for example. And research shows that most of these would have less effect on society than alcohol. There are drugs that I think are bad for folks that take them and their families, but we could actually help folks and their families instead. Punish for actual crimes instead of "a few of these folks could commit a crime".