The Drug Policy Alliance visualizes a fair community in which drug usage and control is based on science, understanding, well-being and fundamental rights, in which people are no longer prosecuted for what they put into their bodies. But this is only for crimes committed against society, and in which the apprehensions, discrimination and disciplinary restrictions of the present are no longer there.
Mission
DPA’s plan of action is to promote those guidelines and perspectives that best lessen both the risks of substance use and drug restriction and to encourage individuals’ control over their minds and bodies.
A Comprehensive Alliance
DPA’s followers are people who feel the war on drugs has to end. Collectively, they are working to ensure that the drug policy of our nations no longer detain, jail, suppress, and even damage millions – particularly the younger generation and people of colour unreasonably impacted by the war on drugs.
Following many years of criminal restriction and comprehensive police struggle to free the country of unauthorized drugs. Savage traffickers are still endangering life in our cities, a regular surge of drug perpetrators are still pouring into our jails and prisons, and lots of cocaine, heroin, and marijuana are even crossing our borders unchecked.
The war on drugs is aiming at reducing drug use. The main goal is to wipe out and prevent foreign drug trafficking — making drugs limited and more costly, and thereby making drug use expensive. And while some of the evidence suggests that drugs are becoming cheaper, drug policy experts commonly agree that the drug war still reduces drug addiction by making the drugs barely available.
By allotting inadequate funds to tackle the drug war, the government intensifies violence in various ways. Brutal offence against the law and property crime escalate because resources are used from fighting them to detaining drug lawbreakers; those who commit violence come back to the streets early to make room in overflowing jails for drug offenders serving forced minimum punishments. Moreover, although placing a rapist or murderer in prison reduces the number of rapes and murders and makes society free from harm, putting a drug dealer in jail has an adverse result. The black market incarcerated drug dealers are often replaced by those who fill their shoes, thereby raising the overall number of these men. And when drug traffickers bail out of jail, after years of practising to hone their worst abilities, they come back to poverty-stricken slums to make them even riskier.
In certain parts of the world, proceeds from the war on drugs are used to fund terrorism. The more triumphant the drug war becomes in transforming drug trafficking into a lucrative industry, the greater the profits are from high prices, and the more drug money goes to help terrorist groups. Also, at a time of opposing demands for scarce government money, the ten of billions of dollars dedicated to the war on drugs divert substantial funds from the anti-terrorism fight.
Since traffickers need to stuff as much illegal drugs into as small a space as possible, the black market is forcing people to use higher dosage levels, thus more dangerous dosage levels. Just as restriction promoted a progression from pure, safe low-dose alcohol (beer) to high-dose alcohol (whiskey) of uncertain protection from harm, drug prohibition promoted a change from low-dose coca to powdered cocaine to a controlled substance. Because marijuana is sizable and pungent, it is simple to recognize and, thus, to catch. This propels up marijuana’s black market price compared to that of cocaine and heroin and provides an economic opportunity for more people to use “hard drugs” over “soft drugs.”
Money from illegal sales demoralizes American attorneys, judges, law enforcement officers, and lawmakers; it has twisted and destroyed entire economies abroad, and has manipulated and destabilized entire governments. The black market reacts to severe, adult criminal punishments by engaging poor children at high wages. This contributes to increased drug use and violence among minors, youth crime, unsafe schools, and deaths of children benefiting or caught in the conflict of the black market. Drug restriction spreads AIDS because there is no safe supply of sterile needles. And the ever-expanding black market created by the prohibition of narcotics leads to ever more stringent attempts at regulation. All over the place, as the battle on drugs has intensified, the scale, strength, and harm of the black market have expanded-leading to demands for further augmentation of the war and worsening matters.
Drug restriction has resulted in many deaths from drug abuse and drug contamination, from territory wars and other drug-related violence, and the spread of AIDS. It has destroyed the lives or harmed the careers of many men, whose only crime was the crime of enjoyment, or curiosity, or submitting to social pressure.
We have corked a gusher of funding for terrorism. It has devastated our society and third world countries, weakened our political institutions, demolished our foreign policy, and released a movement of terrorist funding.
DPA’s Principles and Priorities
Lessening the position of criminalization in drug policy mostly so that individuals are no longer condemned for what they put in their bodies.
The decriminalization of drug use and possession is one way to reduce the number of people swept into the criminal justice system (or deported) for drug law violations. Decriminalization is the abolition of criminal punishment for infraction of drug law (usual possession for private use). We can lessen the abuse of drug misuse by decriminalizing possession and investing in treatment and harm reduction services while improving public safety and well-being.
Advantages of Decriminalization
Decriminalizing the use of drugs and investing in prevention and harm reduction programs will bring significant benefits to public health and safety, including:
- Lowering the number of individuals captured;
- Expanding interest in drug therapy;
- Decreasing the number of people detained;
- Decreasing the costs of criminal justice and moving money from criminal justice to health care systems;
- Diverting peace enforcement resources to deter severe and violent crime;
- Reducing one-sided racial inequality in drug law enforcement and sentencing, imprisonment, and relevant health characteristics and outcomes;
- Minimize the social rejection of drug users and create an environment in which they are less afraid to seek and access medication, use harm reduction services and receive HIV / AIDS services;
- Develop a relationship between law enforcement and the public;
- To shield people from the massive and crippling effects of a criminal conviction.
They are campaigning for responsible and unbiased regulation of marijuana to reduce the harms caused by restriction and to obtain new sources of tax revenues.
When marijuana is used responsibly, subjecting users to harsh criminal and civil penalties will not bring any public welfare and will cause extreme inequality. For consideration of everyone’s safety, public health, commerce, and justice, the prohibition laws should be reversed to the degree that they criminalize sensible cannabis use.
Sensible cannabis users come from all walks of life and are ordinary people who contribute to society. Some utilize cannabis for relaxation, medicinal or spiritual purposes, audiovisual, and creativity improvement, among other personal reasons with no issues in social settings or at home. Cannabis is a positive and highly valuable part of our lives when combined into a healthy, balanced, and responsible lifestyle. Nevertheless, as in anything else, too much of a good thing can be misused or cause harm.
To sustain a healthy relationship with it and stay out of trouble, adults need to be careful of their use.
They are supporting health-focused drug policies by the campaign for services such as therapy as required, managed consumption assistance, drug maintenance analysis, and syringe access programs.
Misuse of drugs and substance use conditions directly impact millions of people every year, causing accidents, robberies, injuries, diminished quality of life, poor health, and far too many deaths.
The dilemma generated by substance abuse is not limited to drug use disorders, but consist of many other possible health and safety problems that can result from substance misuse even in the absence of disease;
- The issues traceable to drug abuse are not limited to substance use disorders but include many other potential health and safety concerns that arise from substance misuse even in the non-appearance of disease;
- Consumption of drugs has diverse biological and social factors, and drug use disorders are medical disorders involving interruption of main brain circuits;
- Restriction schemes and strategies focused on sound evidential standards have been shown to reduce drug abuse and associated harms naturally;
- Data-based therapeutic and medication-assisted therapies (MAT) administered using a chronic illness-management approach have been shown to promote improvement from drug use disorders, avoid relapse, and enhance other outcomes, such as minimizing criminal activity and eliminating infectious diseases;
- A habitual-illness-management strategy may be needed to care for the most severe disorders of drug use;
- Exposure to treatment support programs will help former consumers of drugs achieve long-term well-being and sustain it.
Enabling young people, parents, and educators with truthful, real-life drug education that goes beyond unreliable, fear-based information, and no tolerance policies.
The first few years of life are vital to developing positive morals, self-esteem, and the skills required to avoid alcohol and other drugs being misused.
Families need to start talking to kids about all sorts of issues, like drugs, when they’re young. Children must be provided with clear and accurate instructions about what’s expected of them. They need to have guidelines and restrictions. Children are noticeably curious about what they see around them and should be encouraged to ask questions. The children know that when parents listen carefully to their problems, they are relevant. They also get satisfied with clear, direct answers.
Kids should understand that people put something good and bad into their bodies. They know that milk and fruit can keep them healthy and safe, but can make them sick by too much of even good stuff. They will understand that medicine can be beneficial for people as well but only when used correctly. Parents can start educating their children about medicines, even when they are very young.