Kat Murti: How To End the Drug War for Good

The head of Students for Sensible Drug Policy clarifies the misconceptions around decriminalization, safe injection sites, and whether Trump or Biden is better on drug policy.

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Kat Murti: How To End the Drug War for Good

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Today's guest is Kat Murti, the new executive director of Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), the country's oldest and most influential student group challenging the war on drugs. Before taking the helm at SSDP, Kat was a longtime staffer at the libertarian Cato Institute, a founder of Feminists for Liberty, and an SSDP chapter head at the University of California, Berkeley, where she attended undergrad. Reason's Nick Gillespie talks with Murti about the role that young people in particular can play in ending prohibition, why marijuana has yet to be legalized at the federal level, and whether Donald Trump and Republicans or Joe Biden and Democrats are actually worse when it comes to drug policy reform.

This interview was taped live at an event cosponsored by The Psychedelic Assembly in midtown Manhattan.

00:00:00—Introduction

00:02:03—What is Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP)?

00:05:59—The Drug War is far from over

00:08:45—Don't let politicians get away with empty legalization promises

00:10:45—What's the best legalization model?

00:16:26—How do we activate the youth vote?

00:19:10—Harm reduction vs. prohibition

00:22:51—Drug education and safety

00:26:33—ALL of us are on drugs

00:27:17—The Rat Park Experiment

00:29:30—How to make safe injection sites Work

00:34:48—SSDP & psychedelics

00:40:50—Shifting attitudes toward drug legalization

00:46:45—Kat Murti's career in drug policy

00:49:19—How to pursue drug policy wins despite polarization

00:51:19—Audience Q&A

Previous appearance: "Kat Murti: 'The State Has Been One of the Largest Perpetrators of Gender Inequality and Violence.'"

Today's sponsors:

• ZBiotics. ZBiotics Pre-Alcohol Probiotic Drink is the world's first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by Ph.D. scientists to tackle rough mornings after drinking. Make ZBiotics your first drink of the night, drink responsibly, and you'll feel your best tomorrow. Get 15 percent off by going to ZBiotics/TRI and using the code TRI at checkout.
• The Psychedelic Assembly. The Psychedelic Library is a coworking space, library, community center, and event space in midtown Manhattan. It's a place to forge synchronistic and meaningful connections in the psychedelic space. And a place to Find the Others.
• The Reason Speakeasy. The Reason Speakeasy is a monthly, unscripted conversation in New York City with outspoken defenders of free thinking and heterodoxy. Go here for an online archive, and go here to sign up for information about upcoming events.

• Video Editor: Ian Keyser

Comments

[Don't look at me!]

Another crazy chick.

[Cloudbuster]

Crazy and stupid.

[Rick James]

How the fuck is this not the biggest story on Reason today?

DHS Advisory Made Up Of US Intel Spooks Is Ordered To SHUT DOWN

Is it because it was a group of Trumpy Trumpists who successfully shut down a shadow CIA agency?

[Gaear Grimsrud]

"Is it because it was a group of Trumpy Trumpists who successfully shut down a shadow CIA agency?"
No. There was not a single mention of AI, Ron DiSantis, food trucks, or sex workers in that video. The issues raised are simply of no interest to libertarians.

[mad.casual]

In their defense, the epilogue to the story is "And nothing else happened."

[mad.casual]

As an aside, the last time I saw a woman like Jessica Burbank in a sleeveless leather top with makeup lines as bad as hers, I married her and had 3 kids.

[Rick James]

Someone at The Hill has an interesting hiring process. I'd like to know more.

[Chumby]

Giant Meteor 2024 has a plan to solve this. Rock the vote.

[Zeb]

Or should it be iron-nickel the vote?

[Rick James]

In the political space, everyone is in Trump's orbit.

[Chumby]

Hoping for a meteoric rise in the polls but currently has an astronomically low chance of winning the election.

[Don't look at me!]

A true rising star?

[Ersatz]

In the political space, noone can hear you (R) scream.

[chemjeff radical individualist]

I am currently favoring Giant Meteor so far.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

This woman's hair is of a color found in nature and she has no visible face piercings. Are we supposed to take her seriously?

[The Mysterious Edwin Dunkel]

Remember the last time we legalized something under the proposition that what an individual did in their own home was none of the public’s business?

Well, it's the public’s business now, whether they like it or not.

Cheers!

[Roberta]

This is true. As soon as people learn that an action has ever been subject to government policy, it's "in play" forever. The existence of constitutional provisions means people can adopt constitutions with whatever content they decide.

[Zeb]

The question shouldn't be "should X be legalized?". The question needs to be whether the laws are morally and constitutionally justified in the first place. At the very least, federal prohibition fails on the constitutional question.

[The Mysterious Edwin Dunkel]

And who does the Constitution designate as the competent authority to interpret the Constitution? That's right! The courts!

And did the courts find these laws Constitutional?

Yeah, they kinda did.

So, where do you appeal when the authority entrusted with interpreting the Constitution (by the Constitution itself, no less!), interprets those laws as Constitutional?

Unfortunately, we don't all get to have our own personal Constitution to interpret as we see fit. We have an authority that's tasked with interpreting it. And if that authority rules a thing as Constitutional, then, by definition, it is.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Pack The Court until it agrees with my personal constitution.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

The question shouldn’t be “should X (formerly known as Twitter) be legalized?”.

[IceTrey]

Drug prohibition is immoral because it's coercive.

[R Mac]

I didn’t LTTFI, did anyone bring up the fact that the federal government has no authority to ban drugs?

[Roberta]

TL;DL yet, but...there's no such thing as "for good". What has been done once can always be done again.

[Rick James]

00:29:30—How to make safe injection sites Work

Progress: We're at least now admitting that they don't work, but will work once these common-sense changes are put in place!

[Don't look at me!]

More funding needed!

[mad.casual]

And the specific part of the piece was laughable. She/They assures us they don't have a pollyanna-esque view but then points right past the "This subway has been operating for X number of days since someone was stabbed in the neck." sign at New York as an example of how well drug abuse is being handled.

[Wizzle Bizzle]

Can we lace all drugs with lethal amounts of fentanyl? Then I could get behind the drug legalization movement.

[AT]

ngl, my first thought from the headline was "Capital punishment for drug crimes."

Which would absolutely work. And be a net positive in the grand scheme.

But, alas, I'm against capital punishment. So... mandatory rehab. And real cold-turkey rehab, not this "weaning" nonsense.

After re-introduced to society, if relapse occurs, life in prison.

Drug war solved.

[JeremyR]

I think the recent shenanigans on colleges across the West have pretty much killed any credibility that "students" might have had in the first place, which was basically none, since they don't live in the real world anyway.