Arguing from a utilitarian perspective, decriminalization still does not compute. Sure, most people who use recreational drugs don't become addicts who burden the state. But the occasional weekend toke on a joint or dose of Ecstasy at a rave has consequences far beyond the brief escape from reality. The economic costs of drug use, including legal drugs like alcohol and tobacco, are staggering.
The Center for Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University recently found that states spent more than $83 billion "shoveling up" the wreckage of substance abuse. Most of that sum was devoted to the criminal justice system, foster care, and social services (not including treatment). More than three-quarters of the average state's criminal justice spending and 25 percent of health spending was related to substance abuse. In Colorado, for example, 95 cents out of every dollar spent on substance abuse went toward cleaning up the mess, while just five cents was allocated to prevention and education.
I will grant that for many, drugs are fun and harmless. But a drugless society would be a better society. It may be more enjoyable to sit at home and get stoned or go to a bar to drink, but doing so means foregoing myriad opportunities for personal growth, public service, and community-building. I enjoy concerts and sporting events without ingesting mood-altering chemicals, and I can be productive the next day instead of nursing a hangover. The rewards I get from making my community a better place far outweigh any drug high.
We need to demonstrate that it is possible to enjoy a chemical-free life; there are alternatives to participating in a drug-based economy. But most importantly, Americans need to redirect our resources toward prevention and treatment or we will never win this war.
Mark C. Gribben
Lansing, MI
Please explain that the "public health" position of some misguided individuals is false. Typhoid, tuberculosis, polio, and other "communicable" diseases are public health concerns. Your neighbor sitting at home overindulging in pot -- or alcohol or cheeseburgers, for that matter -- is not. No one ever caught "addiction." Addiction is a choice. Taking drugs is a vice, not a crime or an illness. Drug use is a matter of private morals and social values of no concern to "public health" officials or any other therapeutic state moralizer.
Chris Buors
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Canada
2-D Violence
"The Whipping Boy" by Jib Fowles (March) illuminates the tendency of many Americans to pay lip service to the power of free markets. Television may promote violent behavior and various anti-TV violence groups may sincerely believe this, but rarely do these groups advocate that people stop watching TV. Instead, they want more government regulation or they want everyone to boycott sponsors or they want TV manufacturers to install V-chips; anything except taking responsibility for their behavior and turning off their televisions.
The average American child will watch 200,000 acts of violence and 16,000 murders on TV by age 18. Will this cause children to become violent criminals? I'm glad I will never know with my kids. My family stopped watching TV 10 years ago. Every consumer has this choice.
Paul Olson
Breckenridge, CO
The arguments presented in "The Whipping Boy" apply equally to the wars on drugs and guns. Yet television violence is not without blame. Brandon Centerwall's research focused on TV itself, not its content. As evidence of the influence of TV violence on behavior, we have "copycat" violence, increased Smith & Wesson sales post-Dirty Harry, and the interest generated in the obscure "Bren Ten" by Don Johnson's Miami Vice character. Frequent portrayal of military-style machine guns coincided with the misperception, cynically manipulated, that similarly styled semi-automatic rifles and shotguns were major crime tools. Sales of industry-hyped "assault weapons" rose as reports (or misreports) about them increased.
We shouldn't dismiss violent images. Although crime rates may not be greatly affected, lives are lost, and misplaced priorities increasingly erode our liberties.
William J. Durr
Cornwallville, NY
I am disturbed by Mr. Fowles' thesis that "television violence has never been shown to cause hostile behavior." This is a prime example of the current psychobabble pervading the intellectual idiocy of higher education. The idea that the constant portrayal of violence has no debilitating influence on behavior is ludicrous.
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