It’s the first law in US that decriminalizes small amounts of drugs

This is interesting.

Firstly, I love that states inherently have the power to set their own laws. This allowed Oregon to be a great large scale experiment for drug policy.

I saw some interesting quotes:

But estimates from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show, among the states reporting data, Oregon had the highest increase in synthetic opioid overdose fatalities when comparing 2019 and the 12-month period ending June 30, a 13-fold surge from 84 deaths to more than 1,100.

Despite public perception, the law has made some progress by directing $265 million dollars of cannabis tax revenue toward standing up the state’s new addiction treatment infrastructure.

I guess since only cannabis is sold, it’s the only taxable substance in the mix.

Some lawmakers have suggested focusing on criminalizing public drug use rather than possession. Alex Kreit, assistant professor of law at Northern Kentucky University and director of its Center on Addiction Law and Policy, said such an approach could help curb visible drug use on city streets but wouldn’t address what’s largely seen as the root cause: homelessness.

Homelessness leads to drug use? Or drug use leads to homelessness? Couldn’t it be either?

In the first year after the law took effect in February 2021, only 1% of people who received citations for possession sought help via the hotline, state auditors found.

Critics of the law say this doesn’t create an incentive to seek treatment.

Thoughts:

  • Maybe just start with cannabis and see how that goes? Or do we really need to progress collectively to heroine, meth, cocaine, MDMA?

  • Is the major public health crisis the use of more illicit drugs, or overdoses? Is possible that recreational use of cocaine/MDMA/others wouldn’t be as big of a crisis as meth and fentanyl?

  • Should heroine be legal for use?

  • Should MDMA be legal for use?

  • Should cocaine be legal for use?

( I am not advocating for or against use of these substances with this post. Posted for discussion/interest. Questions are posed for discussion. )

  • treefrog
    2·
    4 months ago

    I mean that too.

    But also the conditions causing pain to begin with. Like, people being forced into taking jobs they wouldn’t otherwise to survive and ignoring pain signals from the body to do so. Or simply finding comfort in pain medications because they’ve been shit on their whole lives for being the wrong color or having the wrong sexual orientation or identity.

    Some of which was the cause of my own chronic pain.

    I wasn’t debating your point. But adding to it.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
          1·
          4 months ago

          Haha, thank you. I have like Lemmy face blindness so I rarely know who anyone is, but I’m sure you are also worthy of love.

          The nice thing about (most) people on Lemmy is that we can disagree- or even just think we disagree when we don’t- and still get along afterward.

          • treefrog
            2·
            4 months ago

            For sure. We had a nice conversation when I migrated over from reddit during that whole mass migration and mod stuff over there.

            I’m a frog, you’re a squid. Jog your memory?

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
              1·
              4 months ago

              Vaguely? I’m really sorry. To be fair, I am dealing with a lot of shit right now, but I’ll try to keep an eye out for your username in future. :)

              • treefrog
                2·
                4 months ago

                It’s all good. I only pop in from time to time. I hope your situation gets better and will just say what I said then, I enjoy reading your posts and your contributions to this community :)