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Modern war on drugs
Cause and effect of war on drugs
Modern war on drugs
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More handpicked essays just for you.
Modern war on drugs
Cause and effect of war on drugs
Modern war on drugs
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
The documentary 13th focuses on past policies and presidents that have led to a broken criminal justice system. Duvernay focuses on policies made by president and companies such as ALEC throughout the documentary (Privatized corporation for profit prisons). There are many aspects to why the criminal justice system is broken, but the War on Drugs really pushed the corruption. President Richard Nixon created the War on Drugs policy in order to stop drug addiction throughout the United States, instead, the policy gave the authorities a legal way to target minorities. The War on Drugs was implemented 46 years ago by Richard Nixon and is still going to this day.
To understand the War on Drugs one needs to understand the cultural landscape that made the war on drugs advantageous. Ronald
Later in the 1980’s, President Reagan revamped this, with it being called Reagan’s Intensified War on Drugs. The issue was that some people believed Reagan had intended certain consequences with this “war” while others disagreed. Things such as police brutality rose and so did arrests on non-violent drug use. That being said, Reagan’s Intensified War on Drugs had more unintended consequences than it did intended ones.
Many critics believe that because of the way drugs are looked down upon society, they become ever more enticing to buy them even through illegal and dangerous means. For instance, President Richard Nixon said in 1971 that “America’s public enemy number one in the United States [was] drug abuse,” and because of this, “it [was] necessary to wage a new, all-out offensive” (Sharp, 1994). Another drugfree advocate, William Bennett, who served in office as the Secretary of Education under President Ronald Reagan, blamed the drug problem squarely on the loose and unethical morals of corrupt people. Another reason that Nixon’s War of Drugs was ineffective was in that the federal government could only prosecute national crimes, handing over the responsibility to the local law enforcement to keep the streets safe, meaning it would have to cross state lines to be under federal judication. Operation Intercept’s main contribution to the drug trade has been the restructuring of how drugs were exported.
The War on Drugs was purely political. Before the ‘war’ was implemented, illegal drug use was not a prominent issue in society, it was actually declining. The police force just enforced federal orders. Alexander wrote, “ Huge cash grants were made to those law enforcement agencies that were willing to make drug-law enforcement a top priority.” Here, Alexander pinpoints exactly why the police force took part in the War on Drugs.
Chapter two introduces the policy problems related to the War on Drugs, as well as other policies that banned or limited other use of alcohol and drugs. Authors start with the history of the regulations of mood altering substances that began in colonial times, and then it escalated with “The Father of Modern Drug Enforcement”, Dr. Hamilton Wright. President Roosevelt assigned him to be the first Opium Drug Commissioner of the United States. Dr. Wright saw drugs as a big problem, according to the text the drug prohibitions started with his opinions on limiting drug use. In 1906 the Pure Food and Drug Act was signed and required the labeling of the ingredients of the products.
The ongoing "War on Drugs" has been a losing battle for at least five decades. Similar to Prohibition keeping "street narcotics" such as marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamines, and Ecstasy illegal has allowed cartels to flourish and flood the black market with billions of dollars in unregulated substances. This enormous amount of revenue has allowed corrupt individuals like Pablo Escobar (Columbia) and most recently El Chapo Guzman (Mexico) to use this financial power to influence government, law enforcement, and even the average citizen. This only creates a volatile environment where violence and crime are inevitable.
It is shocking to see that although we have already tried this approach we are trying it again. The similarities between the prohibition of alcohol and the war on drugs is something that can not be denied. Much like today, in the 1920’s you could see a raise in the population of people who went to prison, organise crime, and the amount of people who actually use the drugs. People lost their jobs because of alcohol just like people lose their jobs because of drugs. People found new ways to get alcohol just like today people found new ways to get their hands on drugs.
So why not attack the problem at the fuse directly? The world could be totally different as we have lost so many potential world changers and future leaders due to our war on drugs. The difference is on the way and should happen soon. Now if we look at the not so obvious benefits of the decriminalization of all drugs. Imagine a society where medical offices are allowed to make strides in cancer as HIV we have already discussed would start to have a decreasing rate in the reduction of needle sharing within society.
The main issue when it comes to drugs in the United States is the inefficient policies and sentencing laws that have been created. Also, the injustices within these policies pertaining primarily to race. Once the “war on drugs” was claimed the only way the government and law enforcement saw fit to handling this skyrocketing issue was to incarcerate offenders. Although this solution worked for a while, other alternatives needed to be made. However, these alternatives were not made and this left the drug policies, sentencing laws, and injustices at a standstill.
Essentially, although drugs have been held accountable for gang violence and other acts of violence that have occurred within communities, the illegality of drugs indeed may have aggravated the situation. In addition, it has become evident that one of the primary objectives of the war on drugs, which is to limit supply and demand, has been largely ineffective. CSDP (2007) “ According to the United Nations, profits in illegal drugs are so inflated that three-quarters of all drug shipments would have
As of September 26, 2015, there is a total of 93,821 inmates in prison for drug offenses, which is equivalent to 48.4 percent of the prison population. The use of illegal narcotics has been an issue within the country for decades; however, is incarceration the way to solve this problem? I think not. During the late 1960’s, poverty was a substantial issue within urban cities and secluded rural areas. On the other hand, recreational drug usage promoted by fashionable young, white Americans as a symbol of social upheaval and youthful rebellion coincided with the deprivation within many of these areas.
In the name of fighting drug abuse, governments unleashed a war on drugs that continues to rage today. Drugs have numerous negative consequences that can result from an addiction, but some can have positive effects when used appropriately and under the care of a healthcare professional. The War on Drugs is a government-led initiative aimed at stopping illegal drug use, distribution, and trade by issuing increased prison sentences for drug-related offenses, and it increased federal funding for drug-control agencies and treatment efforts. Instead, it has resulted in a disproportionate amount of incarcerations of minorities.
When people take these synthetic heroin pills, they do not feel as though it is a drug addiction as much as it is a way for them to deal with pain, over-stimulation, and as a tranquilizer. Today, we are currently facing an epidemic with drug addiction and continuously trying to solve the problem with a war on drugs. “The U.S. spends about $51 billion a year enforcing the war on drugs, and arrests nearly 1.5 million people for drug violations, according to Drug Policy Alliance, a drug policy reform group” (Ferner). Since the United States spends so much money on this epidemic, the numbers should start to go down, but it is instead doing the opposite. It is easy to figure out the numbers through doctors, “Increases in prescription drug misuse over the last