Posted on by Nathan Riley

If It’s Fun, It Must Be Illegal

If it’s fun, it’s illegal—a common conviction of my youth. Often said in jest, in the 1950s as I grew up it was folk wisdom. My parents were 11 years old when Prohibition took full effect in 1922 and drank in their teens illegally and with glee. Hence the folk saying if it’s fun, it’s illegal was grounded in history.

By 1932 their rebellion became legal. Franklin Delano Roosevelt downplayed his support for repealing prohibition, and he suffered no backlash in his landslide victory. My parents never supported prohibition and spent little time justifying their view; prohibition made government do bad things. Virtually everybody in New York City agreed.

But the specter of prohibition stayed with my parents; they never thought marijuana should be illegal. They were quick to realize cigarettes caused cancer years before warning labels. My mom compromised and smoked 3 cigarettes a day, my father, whose willpower I found awesome, simply stopped. It was an individual decision. Government’s obligation was to do research and to dispute tobacco’s propaganda, but the bottom line, the decision was up to the individual.

My parents and I do not object to government expressing strong viewpoints about personal habits. My objection is to the use of government coercion. The application of punishment is rarely fair. Marijuana is illegal, but nobody bothered the fans at a Grateful Dead concert. They were clearly getting high and the police stayed away. The Dead, in turn, made sure caretakers were immediately available to help people who had bad trips.

Yes there was potential for harm, and the sensible response is helping people who are in trouble. It was manifestly obvious that most people were having fun and weren’t in trouble. The law was not enforced.

But these laws are aggressively enforced against spurned groups, especially the black and brown communities. White people with ties to the community skate when drugs are found, but the courts all too often bring down the hammer and police sweeps arrest thousands for doing the same thing that white people do without punishment. Even when it came to the tricky question of selling the illegal drugs, whites find legal exits that are denied to black and brown. There is no racial justice in drug enforcement or, for that matter, prostitution enforcement.

Forcing the law to accept individual choices would end these racial injustices. Clearly, imprisonment is unjust and doesn’t fit the crime. The push for legalization is a push for equal justice. Some people who do drugs need help. They should be able to get medical care, counseling, and other assistance without court orders insisting on little evidence that it is necessary. Medical care should not be guided by the Drug Enforcement Agency and the courts. It’s a private matter between the patient and the doctor. Doctors should be free to use their best medical judgment on the proper treatment. That would clearly include allowing patients to use drugs while attention is directed at other problems.

Legalization would bring additional medical impacts. The corporations making drugs would have to adhere to safety rules. Bad trips, fentanyl poisoning, and other ill effects would be reduced dramatically. Perhaps the most important benefit is that users will get safety information that stays the same because the product is uniform and its dose is standardized.

Under prohibition, unskilled people willing to risk arrest are forced constantly to change their preparations. Law enforcement in its fruitless efforts to stamp out drugs frequently bans an ingredient. These legal interferences mean drug users often are forced to take a new drug they are not used to. It is a dangerous form of government interference.

These legal strategies encourage additives like fentanyl, which have a big kick but often catch users by surprise. A little bit of fentanyl can produce a big high, but, as we well know, it also brings overdoses. The legal manufacture of drugs is a safety precaution for users.

The public is well aware it can buy dozens of different kinds of alcohol. But they only select drinks they like. The fact that the currently illegal drugs would be available and uniform would not require the public to buy them. We know for a fact that people exercise choice when it comes to getting high. Adding legal drugs to the list is not a big step.

It would be irresponsible to say drugs have no risk. Carl Hart, the Columbia professor who has spent his life studying drugs has found that 70% of legal users would enjoy their habits without ill effects. At the same time, he also clearly states that 30% have trouble. Making something legal does not mean it would be safe. Football is legal, but it is fraught with injury. Smoking is legal, but many smokers get cancer. Driving is legal, but hardly safe without drivers paying close attention and following the rules.

Making drugs legal will not make them safe unless the users exercise caution. But making drugs manufactured according to uniform standards would make the exercise of caution much easier and allow users to tell other users about safety.

And perhaps the most important benefit is racial justice. We don’t have to depend on police learning new habits; they will not be allowed to arrest gamblers, drug users, prostitutes, porn watchers, and other habits that are the private business of the individual.

I must renew my plea for somebody to offer help. Everybody I have approached has declined. I’m 83 and nearly blind and need a functioning adult to help me get this project off the ground. Interested? Contact me by email.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Freedom Solves Problems

Supporting freedom offers advantages that make it a wise policy choice.

The most obvious: it keeps people out of jail. If we can buy safe drugs legally, then the Mexican drug cartel suffers a disastrous defeat. The United States buyers stop sending millions of dollars to the violent groups that supply drugs north of the Mexican border. Since no good deed goes unpunished, Mexico will have to adjust to a major change in its economy and social organization. But even this problem has a sunny side. These adjustments will have an ending. The smuggling of drugs to the United States has no ending. Americans have made it crystal clear that they will use drugs no matter what laws politicians write. Bringing the law into alignment with human behavior is a basic benefit of freedom.

Instead of saying “No, don’t.” We say “Work with your doctor, and buy drugs made safe for users.” Making it legal brings tax revenue, another benefit of freedom, at a time when budget deficits present a seemingly insurmountable problem.

To make it obvious, freedom slams the Mexican drug smugglers, ends or dramatically reduces fentanyl use since the legal drugs will offer safety and a consistent high to consumers, allows doctors and patients to work harmoniously, and eliminates the threat of jail to the millions who have used illegal drugs.

One big policy change solves problems that are caused by the flawed policy of telling Americans they can’t use certain drugs when they have demonstrated they will use them no matter what public opinion, judges, police, and politicians say.

The justification for this dramatic change is written into the nation’s founding document: The Declaration of Independence. The men who told the monarch to get lost—so the United States could separate from England. They listed their grievances and specified a plan to make the United States a free country. One of their principles: governments are “instituted” to protect “the pursuit of happiness.” If there is one common theme to the reason why drugs are used it is, “It makes me feel happy.”

The simple truth: all the drugs can be used safely by adults, and in fact in the majority of cases drugs are used safely. Professor Carl Hart has “published numerous scientific and popular articles in the area of neuropsychopharmacology and is coauthor of the textbook Drugs, Society & Human Behavior (with Charles Ksir).” After a lifetime of study, he concluded that “recreational drugs can be used safely to enhance many vital human activities,” (Carl Hart. Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing Liberty in the Land of Fear (p. 9)).

A major reason why we fear drugs: no freedom. Harsh laws have prevented users from discussing their pleasures with friends and neighbors, “Stop worrying. I’ve done it, and it caused no more problems than drink.” Hart offers a practical remedy. He wants drug users to come out of the closet and ignore the laws that force drug use into secret corners. It stops evil moralists from creating scary stories without fear of contradiction. Anyone who has worked for drug reform, realizes that policymakers and well-intentioned people falsely claim the illegal drugs have magical properties. Although merely chemicals, the peddlers of pathology state that illegal drugs overpower the human will, forcing people into a life of desperation.

In this way, millions who have used drugs silently acquiesce to those whose one-sided focus is exclusively and misleadingly on the problems caused by drugs, while ignoring their positive qualities. “Research shows repeatedly that such issues affect only 10 to 30 percent of those who use even the most stigmatized drugs,” (p. 11).

Professor Hart practices what he preaches. In his book, he cites his own experiences: “I am now entering my fifth year as a regular heroin user. I do not have a drug-use problem. Never have. Each day, I meet my parental, personal, and professional responsibilities. I pay my taxes, serve as a volunteer in my community on a regular basis, and contribute to the global community as an informed and engaged citizen. I am better for my drug use” (p. 14).

Freedom solves this problem, allowing truth to flourish. Drug users may freely speak of their own use of drugs and expose this truth to the light of day. Your friends and neighbors have used drugs and suffered no lasting harm. In fact, some of the happiest moments of their life are drug related.

Freedom lets truth flourish. It is the enemy of drug stigmatizers, which is often circulated even by fair-minded people like Senator Bernie Sanders, who accepts marijuana but damns harder drugs.

Today homosexuals are active players in government. Only rarely will we find a person who knows no one in the LGBTQ+ community. They became accepted as people learned their friends and neighbors were gay or had gay experiences. If we had freedom for drug users then we would know that they are responsible, average people like you and me. Freedom would stop the lies, allow truth to flourish.

A supermajor benefit of drug legalization is the defeat of racist practices. It stops the ugly record of arresting black and brown Americans in large numbers. Drug use no longer becomes a false explanation for poverty.

This change draws on the basic American principle: the pursuit of happiness.

I am still seeking an organizer who would bring life to the Freedom Democrats. At 83 and nearly blind, that person will not be me. I need help.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

It’s Time for “Whatever” People to Unite

Freedom Democrats reach a cross section of America among  them are viewers of porn and its performers , are close to the LGBTQ+ community, sex workers and their clients, and drug users. They number in the millions and respect each other’s habits and do not tell other people how they should live their lives.

Political scientists tell us voters join their friends and become a stable voting bloc. A key organizing tool of this new group are weekly parties. The “whatever” people form the core of the Freedom Democrats.

Around 2015, many drug reformers rejected the idea that drugs are a problem. Millions like to get high, and they objected to a negative focus that fed shame. In truth and in fact it is absurd that the pleasures of drug use should be considered criminal. People having a good time are not committing a crime!

Marginalizing people with demeaning laws betrays our heritage; the right to the pursuit of happiness is enshrined in the Declaration of Independence. So fundamental is this right, that the Declaration insists that governments are “instituted” to “secure these rights.” Laws prohibiting drug use directly conflict with the Declaration. For this reason, reformers rejected the idea that their drug use requires government management.

This blog hopes open minded people will unite and vote.

For years, arguments supporting drug legalization accepted the idea that drug use is a problem. Reformers made the case that criminalizing drugs was bad policy; it increased the danger of drugs and the risk of harm to users. In 1981, the futile fight against drug use cost $1.5 billion; currently, it costs $35 billion. Except in those states that made marijuana legal and collect tax money rather than spending it. As early as 1944, NYC Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia issued a study backing marijuana legalization. In the eighty years since then, expert after expert voiced support for similar conclusions. What is new is the growing recognition that even “hard drugs” like heroin are used just as safely as marijuana or alcohol. These scientific conclusions buttress the arguments for the universal right to get high, guaranteed by the Declaration of Independence.

Roughly ten years ago, and growing every year, drug users and reformers reject the notion that these pleasures are unmanageable. A vocal advocate for this change repudiated many of his earlier ideas. Carl Hart, a professor at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, when he started his study of drugs, thought drug use was a major cause of the crime and poverty infecting black neighborhoods like the one he grew up in. Over the years, Professor Hart’s research led him to repudiate this hypothesis; he concluded it was nonsense.

Drug use is often scapegoated as a cause of poverty, which is more closely tied to society’s neglect. Students in these neighborhoods often receive minimal encouragement at school, their families struggle and don’t earn a living wage, and government services are inferior to nonexistent. Explanations for downtrodden conditions cannot be reasonably traced to the bad habits of the residents. It’s an unworkable explanation. Middle class people use more drugs than the poor, they can afford it, and their lives don’t fall apart.

Those blaming the poor’s problems on drug use seldom mention that a half-a-million people are arrested every year, “to say nothing of the shameful racial discrimination in marijuana arrests,” wrote Professor Hart. In 2013, black people were four times more likely than white people to be arrested for marijuana possession. At the federal level, three-fourths of the individuals arrested for marijuana possession were Hispanic. Undoubtedly, the growing legalization of marijuana has improved this situation, but its main lesson is still in its infancy: society can absorb legalization without trauma.

Moreover, Hart’s years of research on drug use in a university setting dispelled the notion that crack, meth, or psychedelics were more addictive than marijuana. Other legal substances like alcohol, caffeine, or food most adults have no real problem handling but which cause some people real difficulty. The connection between overeating and obesity is a far greater health problem than drug use. But there is no call to wage war against food and make it illegal.

By propagating the myth that drugs made people dangerous, society gave new life to older racist prejudices enflaming fears that marginal groups like Blacks, Chinese, or the Irish threatened society. Myths about the danger of drug use spawn alarming headlines, increase media audiences, and justify increased funds for police, drug testing, and treatment programs. The true beneficiaries of drug prohibition. By casting it as an evil, politicians were relieved of the obligation to offer a helping hand other than making the only acceptable outcome: stop using the drug now.

Professor Hart’s fury and sense of moral failing was directed at himself and other drug users who showed little solidarity with the persons ensnared by hostile laws. In his radical book Drug Use for Grown-Ups, the professor clearly admitsthat he lived a happy life using drugs. It increased “affability, euphoria, and energy—all conducive to a party atmosphere.” If he was free to enjoy his life with these drugs, the Professor insisted that morality demanded solidarity with others captured by the criminal law. Adults who use drugs sporadically for pleasure, Hart insists, must come out of the closet for the same reasons that lesbians and gays made their habits known. Once people realized that their friends and neighbors were gay, it became difficult if not impossible to believe that it was a problem. Hart makes a convincing case that users will also change people’s attitudes.

He describes delightful moments with his wife, often with enhanced intimacy and sexual pleasure. Drugs accompanied him in many special moments in their marriage. Hart’s pleasure is not pot, he likes heroin.

The conclusions from his research reinforced his politics. He eloquently dismantles the 1980’s crack scare. It was a successor to previous racist lies that this or that evil drug made blacks insanely dangerous criminals. Today we laugh at the absurd tales in the movie Reefer Madness, but these mean-spirited tales led to a degree of police intervention that has no justification in a free society. At the height of the crack scare, Governor Mario Cuomo called for life sentences even for small amounts of crack worth $50 while Congressman Charles Rangel “advocated for the deployment of military personnel and equipment to rid cities of the drug.” These mythic drug scares are a reoccurring part of American life. They have no scientific basis and are dangerously totalitarian.

In the ensuing panic, Congress passed “legislation setting penalties that were literally one hundred times harsher for crack-trafficking than for powder cocaine–trafficking violations. From a pharmacological perspective, Professor Hart notes, crack is no more harmful than powder cocaine. “They are the same drug.”

The obvious and racist difference between powdered coke that is snorted and crack that is smoked is the color of the user’s skin. Decades later Congress stopped ignoring these criticisms, but even then they could not bring themselves to make the penalties for crack and cocaine equal. Congressional reform reduced the sentencing disparity, but still in the throes of the dangerous drug nonsense, the “reform” reduced the disparity to 18:1. Thank you, but no thanks.

Policy-based arguments seeking reform but which accept the idea that drugs are exceptionally dangerous easily leads to compromises that make the 18:1 seem like an acceptable improvement.

It is far better to insist that drug use is legal and allow adults to control their use. Drinks during alcohol prohibition were often laced with dangerous ingredients. Once drinking became legal, whiskey became safer. Making drug use legal would make drugs safer and improve education on the safe use of drugs. Drugs would have standardized ingredients and users would receive sound advice backed by medical research. Such a plan recognizes that adult drug users like Professor Hart will manage their use successfully and doctors, friends and family will help those whose use cause problems.

Drug users are often a picky lot. Those who like opium understand that methamphetamines have an entirely different effect. The users and their community can sort out these problems without having their privacy invaded by strangers and the law. Driving is legal but often dangerous, and in all probability some users will find ways to make drugs dangerous. But most users will choose safe habits. That is why Professor Hart entitles his book Drug Use for Grown-Ups. Freedom requires that we allow adults their right to pursue happiness and society will work with users to enhance pleasure rather than promote danger.

Freedom Democrats will not only fight for adults’ rights to use drugs, but they will stop racist police practices. The opposition to drug laws is another chapter in stopping the U.S.’s history of terrorism against blacks.

Professor Hart insists drug users unite and demand the simple truth that in the United States getting high and happy is a basic human right. The Declaration of Independence guarantees the fundamental right to pursue happiness.

The professor has shrewd observations to encourage drug users unity. For example, he warns that there is a negative side to “the current popular psychedelic movement.” He cautions that it is “dominated by people who justify their use of these drugs by couching it in medical or spiritual jargon.” Their careful arguments avoid “the stigma associated with using these substances, so long as the reason for use is not to get high.” But the professor prefers the libertarian attitudes like those of a psychedelic icon like Jerry Garcia. Garcia—it should be added, but the professor doesn’t mention—was a heroin user, even if the Grateful Dead’s devoted followers preferred LSD they knew that drug laws violated their rights.

Professor Hart calls for all drug users to come out of the closet. Getting high is an inalienable right protected by the Declaration of Independence. This freedom should become a cornerstone of the argument for drug legalization.

Launching Freedom Democrats requires the help of smart persons who will join an old man like me. I’m 82 and nearly blind and must find activists who want to help.

Organizing Freedom Democratic requires no special skills. The starting point are weekly parties that invite sex workers, porn watchers, drug users, and LGBTQ+, the “whatever” persons who share a common attitude. They want a new birth of freedom in the United States. The weekly parties will give people who share common views the opportunity to work together and become a political force.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Drug Use Has Comparable Risks To Drinking A High-Ball

Freedom is tied to the discovery of new ideas, what we often call “truth.”

Freedom in the United States is a constant struggle. The most famous and obvious is slavery. Slavery was practiced all over the world, long before it was used to make sugar or grow tobacco. Slaves are a constant backdrop in the Bible. Between 20 to 40% of the Roman population was slaves. Supporters of slavery insisted that once freed blacks would do no work and rape white women. Slavery, we were told, was a pillar of civilization.

As freedom became accepted, slavery conflicted with changing moral standards. Making drugs legal is no greater a change in moral standards than when the United States abandoned slavery or allowed women to vote.

Appeals to freedom, frequently meant changing minds; what was considered “right” became “bad.” Conventional morality opposed a new freedom and then became accustomed to it, even insisting on it.

Freedom permits us to challenge existing ideas; slavery stopped being a “good” and became an appalling evil to many Americans. Freedom allowed reformers to challenge existing ideas and insist on a better reality. Today it is harder to accept that drug use is criminal behavior that good people should stop, an evil that harms us. It is simply untrue that poverty is caused by drug use, multiple reasons are tied to poverty: more people than there are jobs, education that doesn’t instruct many young people, and few programs that help people learn after they are 18 and start to recognize the importance of schooling.

Arguing that drugs are an evil is being challenged. If gambling, overeating and alcohol are addictive it becomes difficult to claim heroin has some special evil factor making it more addictive than other activities. Moreover, drinking, eating, and gambling are legal and most people do not become addicted to these pastimes. People get high at reasonable times in reasonable ways. They do it for the same reason people eat and drink to be merry and have fun. Users feel convivial, have better sex and more fun high.

It’s a pleasure that adults should have the right to enjoy. More and more scientists agree controlled use is possible. Much of the argument gets enmeshed in medical jargon about receptor cells and the way the brain works. However difficult the arguments, these scientific disputes are earth-shattering in their conclusions.

With the same caution that we practice with alcohol, being cautious about how much we consume and when we drink, scientists are telling us that the illegal drugs may foster fun and are just as safe as drinking, which has been legal for nearly 100 years. Many scientists, like Carl Hart in his indispensable book Drug-use for Grown-ups, are saying the public has the facts wrong. Heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, cocaine, psychedelics, etc. can be used safely, and it’s possible to clearly explain this safe use to the public. In short, there is no scientific basic for making the drugs illegal. The law has got its facts wrong and is impinging on our right to pursue happiness. Freedom Democrats can help persuade the nation to support this reasonable policy. Drug legalization offers freedom to drug users and their suppliers. It is a good thing. It makes sense to weigh the opinion of the scientists; after all, their claim is a breakthrough.

A big mistake is assuming that an illegal drug has the power to control your life. Those of us who live happily with drug users know that people can get high on Friday and be energized for work on Monday. We see this with our naked eyes but public hostility leads us to remain silent. We protect users from the law by keeping them in the closet. This strategy has a bad effect, it prevents the public from seeing the truth. Drug users know that the risk of a highball and a snort are comparable. If drug users left the closet, the public would know that drug users should have the freedom to choose their highs.

A major implication of the scientists’ conclusions is that we overemphasize the dangers of drug use. Focusing on danger moves our thoughts into anxiety, making it easier to accept the false conclusion that this is a high risk activity. A major reason that people use drugs is happiness, a right protected by the Declaration of Independence. Not just protected but one of the three core values in our democracy, “the right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Making drugs legal is a simple act of respect, recognizing that the millions of Americans who get high know when they are having fun, and wish to have that feeling again and again. Drinkers know the pleasure of that first drink after work. A decent respect for opinion should make it clear that if drug users say it’s fun they know what they are talking about. The argument for drug legalization is just that simple. Don’t believe it when they tell you drugs destroy your lives. It only happens occasionally and is usually not permanent but just a stage in life. It makes more sense to say, “You should be careful, and learn how to use the drugs safely.”

In turn, it is our obligation to recognize that allowing drug users to pursue their habits is an act of respect. Users should be able to buy drugs conforming to strict government standards. A pill taken to get high should be as safe as a pill prescribed by a doctor. Obviously, there would be restrictions. You wouldn’t want pills that look like candy, you don’t want your children to eat a whole box full. The pills should be child-safe. When it says 60mg of whatever drug, it damn well had better be 60mg. At the same time, the legal drug industry should have the right to recognize that their products are used for pleasure. They should have permission to advertise that people enjoy their products, just as alcohol is advertised with people enjoying themselves.

A debate surrounding the legal sale of drugs that get you high and happy should help protect the users and minimize harms. Legalizing drugs means putting to bed the nightmares that surround the myth of addiction. If gambling and overeating can be an addiction, then it is improbable that there is something especially malevolent in a psychedelic or heroin. Sometimes addiction happens; usually it does not.

Freedom would stop the police from interfering with users’ habits. A decent respect for drug users should recognize their heartfelt plea for civility. We will not harm your children, but we will save the young from the harms of harsh criminal penalties. Instead of threats, we insist on respect and recognition, telling the public, “We will listen to you if you will listen to us.”

{If you think ideas like these can become important by showing how many people think this way, then please contact me. I am 82 and nearly blind and looking for an enterprising person to launch Freedom Democrats.}

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Allow Grown-Ups To Use Drugs

It doesn’t matter if you’re a cosmopolitan sipping a martini after a day at the office or a gourmet tasting only half a serving of dessert, you must exercise self-control. Adults can’t stuff their face without getting fat, and an adult can’t spend an evening chugging beer without getting drunk. Self-control is a critical component of good health.

So it should come as no surprise that heroin users must practice self-control.

The best research confronts the obvious truth that people all over the world get high and that those foolish moralists who would ban drugs and alcohol use cause harm and threaten the liberty of our citizens.

Carl Hart, a Columbia professor who spent years doing biased research to prove that marijuana and other drugs were harmful until he reached a conclusion that a fair reading of the evidence demonstrates that using the illegal drugs with the same self-control that we promote for drinking and eating poses no danger to health and may in fact be a sensible part of a healthy life.

My father died at 91. He had his last martini on a Thursday and died on Saturday. Drinking was one of his great pleasures, and like many of his generation that lived through alcohol prohibition, he was convinced that marijuana and even heroin used judiciously were pleasures that any adult should be free to choose. What he knew from experience, scientists have supported with research.

Professor Hart is just one of a growing chorus of reformers who believe adults should be free to choose their pleasures. It is a well-known fact that moderate consumption of alcohol reduces the risk of heart attack and stroke. Professor Hart extends this same principle to heroin. He uses it. But quite reasonably insists that the user should be prudent and exercise self-control. In his book Drug Use for Grown-ups, based on his research and his personal habits, he demonstrates that using heroin with self-control is fun and can be part of a happy life.

The research is extensive and available to those doubters who want scientific affirmation for what other people discover while growing up. If you aren’t self-aware and don’t control your use, all of these substances can cause substantial harm. But in fact the greatest harm is caused by the government and law enforcement programs to stop illegal drug use.

Perhaps the most important proof and one of the key points that another researcher, Dr. Peter Grinspoon, makes in his book Seeing Through the Smoke is that overeating can be an addiction. That is, what should be a pleasure, when used judiciously, can be life threatening if the eater insists on experiencing the pleasure of food to excess.

Without a doubt, obesity causes more premature deaths than fentanyl, alcohol, and car accidents. A study in the distinguished New England Journal of Medicine, concluded, “We are also simply eating more calories per person: Portion sizes have gone up, and eating outside of the home often means heavier, unhealthier foods, and sugary drinks to wash them down.” According to the researchers, a high body weight contributed to 4 million deaths globally — or 7 percent of the deaths from any cause — in 2015.

Eating unhealthy foods causes more deaths than fentanyl or car accidents. This is a worldwide problem. It is worst in the United States. Put bluntly, Coca-Cola and soft drinks kill more people than any of the illegal drugs. This is of course not a plea to make sugary foods illegal. In terms of policy, it is a plea to give public health officials more authority over the habits of U.S. residents.

Anybody my age, 82, has watched as public health techniques dramatically reduce cigarette smoking. When I was growing up, every house had ashtrays on most tabletops. A fun evening with guests would probably lead to the smoking of almost a pack of 20 cigarettes. Nobody went outside to smoke; it happened in the living room with everybody present. Public health messages, over decades, made smoking uncomfortable, a bad habit. Cigarettes are still with us, but their use is dramatically lower than it was in 1950. The discomfort with smoking is widespread. Among young people, who quite commonly decline not only tobacco but marijuana to protect their lungs. Without arresting anybody, public health policy changed our national habits.

In one of his most arresting passages, Carl Hart argues that the illegal drugs don’t follow this public health impulse because of racism.

Controlling illegal drug use costs billions that pay the salaries of police, judges, prison guards, and even drug treatment programs. The police prison industrial complex is uniformly racist, and encourages public fear, and its arrests threaten personal freedoms. It continues the U.S. history of applying terrorism against black and brown communities. Almost uniformly, white people who use the illegal drugs are given more compassion. They have a problem. Those with a different skin color are dubbed criminals, burdened with a record, and even imprisonment for their supposed moral failings. Sheepishly, Professor Hart admits that at the start of his drug research he believed drug use caused poverty and antisocial behavior in his communities. He has freed himself from these racist delusions.

The simple truth is some of the people who use drugs harm themselves; others, quite possibly a large number of others, get pleasure and relaxation from their drug use. It contributes to their sense of well-being. The drug war and its billions of dollars threaten all users. Public health measures would dramatically reduce the number of people earning good wages to fight the drug war, but will be more effective. Without burdening the taxpayers, public health measures would solve most of the problems associated with drug use, just as it has reduced but not ended the health problems associated with smoking. And cause no threat to our freedoms.

Perhaps the biggest benefit of this approach would be the increase in freedom in the United States. Police intrusions into the lives of our citizens are prompted all too often by suspicions that an otherwise law-abiding citizen may be involved with illegal drug use. At its most extreme, hundreds of Americans have been shot and killed by police officers enforcing the drug laws. Freedom Democrats would end this threat to our liberties.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Drug Use Is No More Addictive Than Overeating

Since World War II, caring people have rejected stigma, recognizing its cruelty.

Freedom Democrats enthusiastically join in the fight against stigma. The latest group to hold its head high and say, “We are doing nothing wrong,” is drug users. It has become increasingly difficult to accept the stigma that using hard and psychedelic drugs is always harmful and should be illegal. More and more drug users reject the hostile conclusion that getting high must be destructive behavior. Some people have problems with drugs, just as some people have problems with overeating, but the growing body of evidence makes it clear that many people use drugs and have fulfilling lives. It is mean to look down on drug users.

In the United States black people were stigmatized before and after slavery. Black workers were stigmatized as lazy and stupid. Whites were often surprised by blacks’ intelligence and shrewdness. Written before the Civil War, Frederick Douglass’s autobiography was greeted with skepticism. No black, the stigmatizers said, could write that well; a white person must have been the actual author.

When it comes to stigma, the unfair treatment of blacks has lasted an extraordinarily long time, but other stigmatized groups have shed their negative labels since World War II. Historically homosexuals were mocked, occasionally locked up, until the nation went crazy. Immediately after World War II, gays became a national threat. They were considered security risks. Homosexuals could stay in the closet, but if their loves became public, they lost their jobs. It became illegal for Uncle Sam to provide employment to LG persons.

During this gruesome period, supporters of homosexuals helped lesbians and gays stay in the closet. These heterosexuals, like my parents, thought it was helpful to call lesbians and gays “sick.” Sick people deserved compassion and treatment. Psychiatrists thought that gays could become heterosexual with treatment. In other words, lesbian and gay people could become “healthy” by just being like straights. Men chasing women was considered “normal.” “Sick” had turned into a stigma.

During this same period, women fought stigmas that labeled them overly emotional flibbertigibbets who created confusion until men straightened out the problems. Men were the smart, rational backbone of government and society. Women took care of the home. This prejudice was stupid. Virtually every open-minded person understood that some women were smarter than some men and that women often had better solutions to problems. Feminism blossomed and so did the view that women are equal to men.

By the 1960’s, a growing population across the globe realized that labeling groups as “inferior” was wrong. Stigmatization demeaned same sex love, women, blacks, Spanish speaking, and in the northern United States southern whites were stigmatized. It took George Wallace running for President to demonstrate that some whites in the North were just as racist as some whites in the South.

The battle against stigma was widespread in the United States after the upheavals of the 1960’s. As the times changed even the military, long considered a deeply conservative institution, adopted anti-stigmatization policies. Gay and lesbian soldiers opened doors that allowed the transgendered to work in the military. Women, blacks, and Spanish speaking people became senior officers whose rank required them to command white men. Stigma didn’t disappear, but it became dubious and presumptively illegal in the eyes of the law.

This social change is attacked by the Donald Trump administration. Diversity is damned, and employees are dismissed for supporting it. It will be a hot-button issue as long as Trump is president.

Nonetheless, the battle against stigma is being fought on a new front. The latest group fighting stigma is drug users. Slowly but surely, it is being recognized that drug users are not sick nor demented.

In fact, much if not most of drug users’ pain is caused by stigmatizing drug use. Change has been painfully slow. In the 1960’s, using marijuana was considered dangerous. It led to laziness, opened the door to stronger drugs like heroin, and demonstrated a contempt for law. This argument failed. Marijuana use became widespread, and its users did not become drug addicts. Stigmatizing people is dangerous, wrong, and causes harm.

World War II and the German Holocaust had exposed the dangers of racial categories. Their acceptance could justify horrific acts. As the lesson of World War II became clear, segregation in the army and the classroom became illegal. The battle to give blacks the right to vote and end Jim Crow practices created interracial friendships. Smoking pot was not only fun, it was a form of solidarity with the victims of racism.

Pot use skyrocketed and by high school teenagers had been to parties where some people got stoned. It became impossible to claim pot was dangerous. The menace of drug use had been disproved. Zero tolerance, or the goal of making America drug free, became absurd extremism.

In city after city, all over the world, it became recognized that some people did drugs, always had and always will. Policy makers were forced to answer the question, what is the harm? If it was the spread of disease from needle-sharing, then it became obvious that drug users should have a steady supply of sterile needles. Though by no means universal, harm reduction became a public health objective. Cities like San Francisco boasted of their accomplishments in reducing drug related harm. Other cities kept their policies lowkey and faced attacks if their harm reduction programs became public knowledge.

Harm reduction is a major step forward, but like supporting homosexuals because they are “sick” it doesn’t dispute the belief that drug use is dangerous and inferior behavior.

A growing chorus of thinkers now argue that drug users are not sick and those who have problems deserve help. It is generally understood that gambling can become addictive and lead to financial disaster. In fact, most gamblers watch their pocketbook and stay within a budget. Gambling is fun, and that is why people like it. Drug users are just as sensible.

The argument that heroin is dangerous because it is addictive has become suspect. Gambling can be addictive for some but not for others, the same is true for heroin. Bankers, plumbers, and college professors use heroin without harming their careers. A Columbia University professor came out of the closet about his drug use. Carl Hart makes this argument in his book Drug Use for Grown-Ups. Consider this observation: lock-ups in cities all over the United States don’t help heroin users going through withdrawal. For some, it is horrible agony, but for many it’s just a challenge and they “tough it out.” Don’t think you know about heroin’s effects because you read newspaper stories or saw antidrug movies. The effects are individual, and they vary with the individual, just like gambling and drinking. Some people get great pleasure from eating and preparing food; other people overeat. You can’t generalize about drug use anymore than you can generalize about eating.

Addiction is a troublesome concept. Using heroin, methamphetamine, is a problem for some but not everyone. That is the lesson that Freedom Democrats are learning and disseminating.

In a free country, no judge should be allowed to tell a person you must go into treatment. It should be up to the person to decide if they want help. Nobody should be allowed to shout “Don’t do this! You will go to jail!” That is not freedom; it is stigmatizing and ignores the right of persons to make their own decisions about how they live their lives.