There are many drugs such as marijuana, cocaine, heroin, PCP, crack, ecstasy, ice, which are illegal because these drugs can be addictive, mind-altering, and in some cases lethal. Since these drugs are illegal but also in demand all the time, the making and selling of these products it is very difficult. What makes it more difficult is that governments such as the United States have declared a war on drugs, but this is not working out too well and it’s throwing out too much taxpayers’ money. These are some economic figures to demonstrate how much money goes into drug war. In 2005 there were about 253,300 inmates because of drug offenses which cost the state an estimated $6,245,301,475 per year. Instead of wasting so much money in a cause that the government seems to be losing, a good idea would be to legalize drugs, and that way they can be taxed highly just like with alcohol and tobacco. I agree that there are some cons about legalizing drugs, but there are also pros. So the point of this post is to analyze based on the information I have gathered is to find which would be a better option, legalizing drugs or keeping them illegal.
First of all since drugs are illegal, drug producing countries have lots of violence going on in their territories. Since there is a big difference between how much the drugs sell for in the producing countries and the United States, most drug lords will do anything to get the drugs here. I’ll use heroin no.4 to demonstrate the difference of sell value it has. In producing countries such as Pakistan, Afghanistan and Colombia a kilogram of heroin no.4 was valued at $4,159, $2,405 and $9,992, respectively. But in consuming countries such as the United States the value of a kilogram of heroin no.4 is of $71,200!!! As you can see drug lords can make more than a 1000% more if the sell the drugs here in United States. But it is not that easy for drug organizations. Since drugs such as marijuana, cocaine and heroin are illegal and many countries such as the United States, Mexico and Colombia have declared war on drugs, drug organizations have resorted to violence and inhumane tactics to smuggle drugs into the United States.
After some background information that I just gave you, now I’m going to talk about why people use drugs and the wars that the high demand of drugs have caused throughout the world. And then lastly, I want to get closer to the answer to my main question which is, if legalizing drugs would destroy or save more lives than keeping them illegal and having to deal with the drug wars?
The group that is mostly always associated with drugs is the teenagers. This is because even though there are many adults addicted to drugs, most of them started during their teen years. The main reasons why teenagers use drugs are the following:
Curiosity, teenagers just want to know what it feels like, they want to feel the thrill of doing drugs and once they start and get that feeling of the euphoria, for many it is hard to stop.
Peer pressure, everybody needs to fit in with a group of people, and sometimes teenagers in order to not feel like losers or rejects end up getting into drugs, so they are accepted by their friends.
Stress, in this fast paced world that is so competitive people get stressed and they can’t keep up with it so they resort to drugs in order to try and escape all their problems and responsibilities.
Use by parents, even if the parents tell their children not to use drugs, but they themselves use them, children are more likely to use them as oppose to kids whose parents don’t use drugs.
Loneliness, a person doesn’t feel happy because they are alone, so they use drugs to escape their loneliness.
Some people may think that drug use only affect the people who are “dumb” enough to do it, but the truth is that it alsoaffects society. Some circumstances are when children are abused or neglected by their parents when they are under the influence of the drug; if drug abuser has a job he might steal money or property in order to sell it to buy more drugs; lastly if the user has no money he/she has to resort to stealing, prostitution or even murdering for money in order to get their drugs.
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