27 May 2012 | Potheads, Shut Up

We hear this spate of media stories telling us about the failed war on drugs; how costly it's been, how pointless is it and that the best remedy is as least to legalize marijuana because it's relatively harmless, but a symptom of how insane the drug laws are.

Legalize pot, we've been told, and we'd run the black market into the ground and send low-level drug pushers packing.

But, what if I don't want to smoke pot?

Why am I being told that legalizing pot is going to be the panacea for the "failed" war on drugs? In other words, why are people telling me that honestly, it's okay to do drugs at all? I don't even like taking prescription drugs (which are far more abused than pot, I admit) because I don't feel that taking any drug is something I want to do. For me, the stigma of being a pothead has less to do with a case of the munchies or hysterical laughter at something stupid and more along the lines of having a personal aversion to doing any drug at all.

Smoking pot will not make me free, or a well-rounded person. **It's a drug.** All the loudmouths who are clamoring that pot should be legalized like to frame it as a correction for a failed drug policy, or abolishing unfair sentences for youthful and first-time offenders. But I never hear any of these self-appointed drug policy critics telling me why *I* should smoke pot. Oh, sure, they'll say it's up to me to make that choice, but that's a bit of a cop-out. You're not telling me why having legal access to a *drug* is supposed to make me a better person. You are, effectively, telling me that doing drugs is actually an okay thing in and of itself.

Since when and why? What is real reason people smoke pot? To get high, plain and simple. To experience what a hallucinogenic drug does best: temporarily alters your brain chemistry to do, what, exactly? You can accomplish the same thing with alcohol (a legal drug) or prescription drugs. A drug is a drug is a drug, whether it's legal or illegal, and the sole purpose of using drugs like pot or alcohol is just to feel good. Don't try to tell me about the failed war on drugs and how we shoulg legalize pot, or how useful hemp is for making shirts and ropes when the true reason is that you want to get high. You can point to European countries that legalize drugs (see Portugual especially) and tell us what a wonderful paradise they are now because...oh wait, they're not exactly paradises because you can legally shoot up in Lisbon. People get addicted to legal and illegal drugs and that's not going away just because we made it okay to smoke dope.

People are going to get high no matter what, but I just wish one of these legalize drugs advocates would tell me why having legitimate access to an hallucinogenic is supposed to be the hallmark of a free individual.