Thursday, December 17, 2009

Cops and Victims of the Law

After running three Pixar films in a row (Toy Story (1& 2), Finding Nemo) as a substitute for dealing with my kids (my entertaining scatological sickness of earlier this week was followed by a bitch headache today (thus a short post only)), I flipped through the channels to find nothing much on.  Thus I settled on Cops, as it's almost always watchable (and maybe someone will get tased!!!).  However, three of the first four segments that have been on so far (into a second episode, and on the first commercial as I write this) were drug buy stings.  Not dealer stings, but busting people feeding a drug habit.  One man (purchasing crack) was older, had lung cancer, a morphine pump, no family, and a dog that was destined for the pound.  Another was a woman with three kids (one a baby) at home.

Of course I didn't enjoy this nearly as much as scumbags getting piled on, because the libertarian in me asks this question:  Who is the direct victim of the crime of drug use? 

Now to clarify, a victim of a crime is, by the act defined as a crime, deprived of life, liberty or property by the person committing the crime.  I'm coming up empty on who is harmed if someone ingests a substance.  The ingestion of said substance may precede or motivate the commission of another crime that does have a victim, but the actual use of the substance? 

Note that the same can be said for prostitution.

Now let me clarify:  I have no desire to fully legalize, promote, or support anyone in habitual drug use, because is a fast road to the destruction of life.  But until we can differentiate bottom-feeding criminals from addicts who are victims of their own weakness, and both of them from people who choose to medicate but still have control, we'll continue to waste resources and money in an endless war we can never win.

5 comments:

Satyavati devi dasi said...

The answer here entirely depends on the situation. The old guy is just doing speedballs (morphine+crack, woo!), that's his own issue. On the other hand, the woman's kids are probably suffering in more than one way if she's blowing all her money on her habit.

dmarks said...

"Note that the same can be said for prostitution."

But at least prostitution does not cause brain damage. I happen to have little sympathy for drug abusers.

Patrick M said...

Saty: That's why I'm clear that the the possession and use itself should not be a criminal act. But any crime committed (like child neglect) should be punished even more severely (followed by coerced rehab) when drugs are involved.

dmarks: Do you have sympathy for addicts that are trying to recover? Since you have little, I'd make sure that's where you focus the sympathy.

Toad734 said...

The funny thing is that eating a meal at McDonalds is more damaging to your body than smoking weed.

Toad734 said...

Dmarks:

But alcohol, boxing, cigarettes, guns, mercury in our fish, red meat, partially hydrogenated oils, are all legal and will probably damage your body and or brain just as bad or worse than a lot of drugs out there.

Why are you ok with all those things being legal, why is everyone ok with those things being legal?

Almost everything you eat is damaging to your body in some way yet they are not illegal. And ask a prostitute with AIDS if being a prostitute doesn't do damage?

I think it should all be legal and in the open but I just wonder why you have no sympathy for people on drugs, especially when they are addicts but act as if maybe a fat person just can't help it and is somehow better than a drug addict??? I know I put a lot of words in your mouth there but I would like to know the difference.