• Punish those who are breaking the real law Punish those who are breaking the real law By STAN GODES Does anyone really believe that waving signs by the side of the road, or ‘summit’ meetings in Honolulu, or watching
• Punish those who are breaking the real law
Punish those who are breaking the real law
By STAN GODES
Does anyone really believe that waving signs by the side of the road, or ‘summit’ meetings in Honolulu, or watching hour long TV documentaries, or saying prayers, will have any appreciable impact on the Crystal Methamphetamine problem?
Will the much publicized bust of one ‘ice house’ on Kauai really have any effect on the supply of the drug available on the streets? Especially if the defendants are given a slap on the wrist and turned free to ply their trade again.
Did we not learn anything from the experiment with Prohibition? It didn’t cut down on the use of alcohol – just raised the price, made everyone a ‘criminal’ and generated an underworld criminal supply system which switched to other illegal trades when prohibition ended and still haunts us today.
We just had another in a long series of ‘green harvest’ marijuana eradication raids. Have these costly programs eliminated pot? Far from it. However, they have reduced supplies enough to drive the street cost so high that ‘ice’ is cheap by comparison.
Throughout recorded history, many (most?) have turned to a variety of psycho-active drugs for a variety of purposes. It is human nature to want to feel good. It is the nature of civilization to put stress on people. There is nothing inherently wrong with eating, drinking, or smoking something that helps one to feel happy and relaxed. The Hawaiians used Kava. The American Indians used Peyote. The Orientals used opium. The South Americans used Coca leaves. Our kids eat Happy Meals.
Some of the things we currently use are deemed ‘good’ while others are ‘evil’. Why are chocolates, or Prozac, or Ritalin for hyperactive kids, or wine and beer good for relaxing while marijuana, tobacco (which used to be ‘good’) and other such things both natural and artificial considered evil and/or illegal. The differentiation seems pretty arbitrary to me and is often subject to change.
It is true that some ‘recreational’ products are much more habit-forming and dangerous than others. But the danger is to the user – and we can not protect people from themselves. Such an attempt often backfires. I believe that the ‘ice epidemic’ can be partially blamed on the marijuana raids which have driven the cost high enough to make ice seem cheap by comparison. People are going to use something – why drive them to something that is as habituating as crystal meth?
So, what can we do other than waving signs? Prohibition, as well as our current ongoing ‘war on drugs’ has shown that we will never stop the supply of things that people want. Trying to do so is a waste of time, money and resources.
Punishing the users just fills up the jails or expensive ‘treatment centers’ without appreciably changing much. Why not let anyone eat, smoke, drink, or inject anything they voluntarily choose – without making them a criminal. It is his or her own body and his or her life. If the user wants to waste it – so be it. Society can never be ‘my brother’s keeper’ nor should it try. Perhaps we all need to read Orwell’s 1984 again. It is sad to see someone throw away their life and reject responsibility for themselves and their families – but it should be their privilege.
The real danger to society is not those who are willing to waste their lives being druggies. It is the means they use to obtain money to support their habit – from welfare enablements to stealing, robbing, breaking into cars etc. And the higher the cost of the drugs becomes (because of the misguided ‘war’) the more theft is required.
We should stop welfare payments, food stamps, and other handouts to those who can work, yet choose not to (because of drug use or any other reason). Then put all our money and effort from the ‘war on drugs’ into a ‘war’ on those who break real laws with real victims. The system must then provide harsh (but fairly applied) punishment. And I don’t mean the Kauai Correctional facility where inmates can promise to be good and get to go on beach picnics with the warden. We need hard labor boot camps and chain gangs that are unpleasant enough to make people think twice before going back. Besides getting these people off the streets, it will help to beautify our island.
And I bet that seeing sweating offenders laboring along the roadside dressed in black and white striped uniforms will be a far greater deterrent to potential ice users than sign waving or TV commercials.
Forget the dealers. Forget the users. Punish those who break the real law.
Stan Godes is a Hanalei resident.
