Agree that you're right in terms of physical and physiological addiction. But the measure of psychological and physical addictions is very hard to measure up against each other. To say alcohol is more addictive is impossible to say, as it is to say a party drug is.
There is plenty of research on this matter, you only need to look it up. Clearly there are differing opinions on some substances and the fact that there are different versions of each substance, however there are enough consistant trends to highlight that some of the most dangerous and harmful substances are those that are legal.
Legalising substance centres for addicts has its positives as it gives a free and safe use for addicts that are trying to kick the habit. The same way smokers take Nicotine patches to take a safe dose of nicotine and gradually use less over time to kick the habit.
It's not only that, it's to do with education. At the moment the current drug education curriculum is purely a deterrant to taking drugs. They highlight only the negatives and explain how drugs will ruin your lives. A good example which you brought up is smoking, it's legal and always has been, however because it's legal the education around tobacco is purely to highlight the health issues associated with it, people know this is fact, accept it and choose to take or not take it. With drug use, people know that the information they are getting fed by the current education scheme is a lie, because they either know someone who uses or use themselves. Their own experiences contradict everything they are getting told and as such they pay no attention to it at all. The education is based purely to try and stop people starting, but there is no education to teach people harm minimisation which means once they start the education method has failed.
These centres wont stop the biggest problem of drug use which is the use of party drugs and first use cases. Drug centres on help the addicted, it doesn't stop the experimentation of drugs and the use of drugs to have a high cheap time and a party, club or event.
There is no way to stop the demand for drug use, the fact that people now substitute normal illegal recreational drugs for drain cleaner and fertilizer shows us that people want to get off their face somehow. The fact that there are 60-90% more adult drug users than smokers in Australia also shows that prohibition doesn't work, prohibition has NEVER worked so I'm not sure how this is a surprise. (There are 19% of Australians who say they are smokers, the stats I've seen on 16-39 year olds using drugs is around 31%, however the drug expert on the panel after Ben's documentary last night said that number is around 38%)
The major cost to society for recreational drugs is the law enforcement side. $3.8 billion dollars is spent on police, courts, prisons, etc for recreational drugs of a total cost to society of $6.9 billion, that includes health costs, early death and labour costs from missed work. Compare that to tobacco which costs society $12 billion dollars annually with $0 crime as part of that figure and $11 billion for alcohol, with $1.5 billion crime. If you take out the crime component, on a pro-rated basis, the total cost to society for tobacco is 6.3-7.9 times higher than that of recreational drugs. Remember, this includes early death, health costs, missing work, etc. This also groups ALL illegal drugs under one banner, no one in history has died from overdosing on marijuana and it is almost impossible to overdose on MDMA.
Does that make sense?
It makes sense that you believe this, most people do think this way. The problem is that its an antiquated belief and it's never going to get us anywhere. Hemp was predominantly made illegal by lobbyists for the cotton industry because they were threatened by the use of hemp in the use of textiles. Harder drugs were made illegal during a political campaign to distract from the Vietnam war. These decisions to make drugs illegal have never been based on scientific evidence. Even the laws in the US are predjudiced based on the classes. The punishment for crack cocaine, the substance used by predominantly blacks, is 99 times that of cocaine which is predominantly used by whites and the upper class. You get less time for 2nd degree murder than you do for crack cocaine. The Obama administration is looking at, or possibly even already has addressed this discrepancy. The main drug advisor in the British government got the sack when he publically said that the current drug laws had no basis of scientific fact behind them.
I haven't even touched on the international issues associated with the drug industry. 60% of the Taliban's funding comes from drug production. Afghanistan is completely corrupted from the president all the way down to the border guards because there is so much money to be made. South America's farming industry has been ruined by the US spraying poison over their crops to restrict the growth of coca plants, except it's also killed their normal crops, which the US have asked them to grow instead but no one wants to buy them.
Does this make sense? If not, trust me I have WAY more.
