Recreational Drug Use Legalization

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by glatt

I've been watching The Wire lately on DVD and they really keep pounding this point home. I think it's a valid one.

It used to be that cops would walk a beat and get to know the people of a neighborhood. They would know every kid by name and stop to talk to the citizens as they went around. If anything ever happened, the cop would hear about it from the law abiding citizens. They were approachable.

Now, with the war on drugs, virtually everyone in places like West Baltimore knows someone who has been locked up in the war on drugs. Maybe they have been locked up. Maybe it's their father or brother. Maybe a friend. The cops took that freedom away, and they are the enemy. Nothing good comes from talking to a cop. So the cops don't get any breaks. Homicide witnesses won't come forward. The cops are the enemy.

Get rid of the war on drugs, and the cops can go back to protecting a neighborhood from real crime with the help of the citizens.

You really don't think it is that simplistic do you. BTW I love The Wire.

I do think that cops walking a beat is a good thing, we just restarted that in a major city near us. But the practicality of it no longer fits todays demographic, not to mention the fact that you can't hire a person for $17,000 a year and expect him to love life walking in a neighborhood war zone the size of many small US towns. To much area, to many ingrained thoughts and ideas, to many generations removed from any fantasy that all cops are good guys, cause they are not. They are not paid to be either. Crime in general is to much and there are not enough good people available to do the job effectively, and one reason is there are to many people to police.

Cops are not the enemy because of the War on Drugs, that is but one small element. Much of the violent crime is related to the struggle between factions that want to control drugs. Legalization will not change that. People will just look to circumvent the system, legal or not, to keep their income and piece of the power pie.