response 197 of 331:

Feb 28 22:56 UTC 2006

 I tend to find illegal drugs to be a horrid problem in this country, and
 what's sad is that I have no real clue as to how to go about ending it.
The country or the epidemic? >:)

response 199 of 331:

Feb 28 23:07 UTC 2006

Re 196  They cause problems in my life indirectly as I volunteer with three
kids whose parents are meth addicts.

response 201 of 331:

Feb 28 23:46 UTC 2006

Re. 199:  Volunteering for a position that is set up to have you deal with
people who have problems with something is hardly going to give you a very
good idea of how it works when someone doesn't have a problem with that thing!

Nonetheless, we can be sure that the real problem here is BAD PARENTING.  The
parents of these children had a CHOICE to use methamphetamine in whatever way
has caused their children trouble.  Such people would be bad parents,
regardless of how much 'methamphetamine' (whatever THAT is) they've smoked.

response 203 of 331:

Mar 1 00:32 UTC 2006

 :(

I'm a terrible person.  :(

response 205 of 331:

Mar 1 01:26 UTC 2006

And I agree with edina that there really is no good solution to the 
drug problem.  I also agree with what someone else posted, that there 
is a culture surrounding drugs where part of the attraction is the 
drugs being illegal, and hard to get.  Legalize it and you take away 
some of the mystique 

response 207 of 331:

Mar 1 01:47 UTC 2006

fo shure

response 209 of 331:

Mar 1 02:16 UTC 2006

resp:185 It looks like a prescription heroin program is being started in
Vancouver so I guess we might all get to find out if heroin junkies
function better than alcoholics or other drug addicts. Based on past
heroin prescription programs, I think there is at least some evidence to
support that. 

Personally, I think that most substances should be legal but also that
some effort should go into educating people about the actual
consequences of taking drugs (including over the counter drugs,
nicotine, caffeine, etc. I think some recreational drugs should be sold
under similar regulations as alcohol and others, perhaps, should only be
available by prescription. 

Legalizing drugs will not make the drug problem go away any more than
legalizing alcohol has made alcohol problems go away. What it would do
is free up a lot of resources that are currently being devoted to
enforcing drug laws. It also would allow for more regulation of
substances. But trust me, there will still be a lot of abuse and
addiction. 

response 211 of 331:

Mar 1 15:15 UTC 2006

There is a level at which I'd like to see both recrational drugs and 
prostitution be legal.  If they were both legal for truly consenting 
adults, who would be presumed to understand the risks and be 
responsible for the consequences, and could be kept away from those too 
young for those things, I would favor legalization.

But that's not the world I live in.  Drug dealers *target* young 
people.  Drugs are probably more available in schools than anywhere 
else.

Prostitution is a very seamy, dark business in which the youngest and 
the most innocent are in the most demand.  Children are brought into 
prostitution by being misled, by being given addicting drugs, or by 
straightforward abduction.  They're used up and discarded when they're 
too old and broken to be fun any more.  They don't keep any of the 
money they bring in.  If they manage to escape, they are tracked down 
and forced to go back, or they are killed.  I think you'd have to be 
pretty naive (or pretty callous) to want to legalize prostitution.

response 213 of 331:

Mar 1 15:22 UTC 2006

Someone up there said prostitution is now legal in just a couple of 
counties in Nevada.

response 215 of 331:

Mar 1 15:44 UTC 2006

re #209 prescription heroin makes sense since you can and always have been
able to prescribe morphine.  thats like making scotch legal and vodka illegal.

response 217 of 331:

Mar 1 16:16 UTC 2006

jep in europe that is in america, in europe they prefer older women.

also men can be prostitutes too, ever see "American Gigolo"

response 219 of 331:

Mar 1 16:30 UTC 2006

>*speculating* that prostitutes who are young women and adolescent girls 
>are likely to bring a higher price than a mature adult.

My guess (wink wink) would be that price depends mostly on category. 
Streetwalkers would be in a low price range, "massage" parlors and
"escort" services higher, private word-of-mouth clients most expensive.
I would imagine that, within those categories, youth and beauty do
indeed carry a higher price tag.  My guess, too, would be that underage
prostitutes are most likely to work the street, rather than in
quasi-legal business front operations which would theoretically need a
minimum age for employment to reduce the threat of prosecution.  Hence
then, I suppose, the argument that if you legalize prostitution and give
customers a legal place to go, you'd largely eliminate the street crowd
and therefore the biggest supply of underage prostitutes.

response 221 of 331:

Mar 1 16:37 UTC 2006

I think if prostitution was legalized and regulated, as it is in some places
where "sex workers" must be licensed and pass regular health/aids tests, and
the industry limited to certain areas, some of these problems wouldnt be
there.  In any industry that has no controls you are going to have employees
being abused.  Children get abused in sweatshops making clothing, does that
mean clothing factories should be illegal?  No, they just need to be regulated
properly as they are in this country.