                             Deregulating Drug Use
                            an anarchist perspective


         The debate about drug use in this country is usually framed in
     terms of continued criminalization vs legalization. the positions
     in this debate mean continued harassment, including arrests,
     imprisonment, theft of property, and possibly in the near future,
     execution of drug dealers and users, vs legal regulation of drug use
     and sales, similar to that of alcohol and cigarettes, including heavy
     taxation, and restraints on where, when and to whom drugs can be sold.
     Both of these positions are based on the same assumption, government
     has the right to tell individuals what they can and cannot do. While
     legalization would surely be preferable to continued criminalization,
     there is a third alternative: decriminalization and deregulation.
     Decriminalization and deregulation of drugs would mean no laws against
     drugs, no government regulation of drugs sales and use, no arrests, no
     prisons, no taxes. Eliminating drug laws, instead of simply replacing
     them with different laws, would produce a free market in drugs where
     people would be free to sell, ingest, or inject whatever they wished,
     without government interference.

         Drug use is a voluntary, non-violent activity, and should be an
     individual decision, the business of no one but the user. Government
     has taken it upon itself to regulate drug use, just as it regulates
     alcohol use, restricts abortion, and registers and drafts people. in
     order to better control people. Criminalization of drugs has produced,
     just as prohibition of alcohol did, an enormous amount of violent
     crime. Most of this crime is motivated by the need to obtain money to
     pay the artificially inflated price of illegal drugs.
     This drug-associated crime is then used as an excuse for police to
     indiscriminately harass young black men, stopping and searching, and
     frequently arresting them on the street, for no reason other than that
     they live in a "high crime" area. Doing away with drug laws would
     dramatically lower the cost of drugs and thereby eliminate most street
     crime, as well as remove the excuse police use to terrorize black
     people.

         Decriminalization and deregulation and the resultant competitive
     market in drugs would produce purer and safer drugs, eliminating much
     of the death and illness associated with drug use, most of which is
     caused by contamination of drugs or needles, and unreliable drug
     strength, not by the nature of the drug itself. Heroin is no more
     dangerous than aspirin if it is carefully prepared without dangerous
     additives and injected with a sterile needles. And aspirin overdose
     can kill as easily as heroin overdose, it just takes longer and feels
     worse. Decriminalizing needle use would virtually eliminate the
     transmission of AIDS among IV drug users, as has been the experience
     in the 38 American states which do not restrict sale of sterile
     needles. Needle exchange programs are not enough; there need to be
     more needles available to eliminate needle sharing.

         Besides abolishing laws against recreational drugs, eliminating
     government regulation of "therapeutic" drugs would also benefit
     people. The FDA prevents many drugs from reaching the market,
     including treatments for AIDS, cancer and other serious illnesses. And
     those that do eventually become available are delayed for years by FDA
     rules, while thousands die. The government is currently responsible
     for restrictions on aerosolized pentamidine, a drug which prevents
     Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia. the most frequent cause of death in
     people who have AIDS. Just as drug laws lead to deaths associated with
     street drugs and keep people from obtaining sterile needles to prevent
     transmission of AIDS, drug laws are killing people with AIDS by
     denying them effective treatment. Drug laws in this country are also
     preventing marketing of newly developed abortifacients, drugs which
     induce abortion early in pregnancy, freeing women from their current
     reliance on the medical establishment for abortion services. these
     drugs would put the decision about abortion where it belongs: with the
     individual.

         Eliminating drug laws would greatly increase people's options in
     the areas of pleasure and health. It would also reduce crime, reduce
     death and illness associated with illegal drug use, and reduce deaths
     from AIDS and other serious illnesses. Individuals should be free to
     make their own decisions about drug use, and all other aspects of
     their lives, without the interference of government or "the community".

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                      of all or part of this to:

                     Boston Anarchist Drinking Brigade
                               (BAD Brigade)
                                PO Box 1323
                            Cambridge, MA 02238

                     Internet: bbrigade@world.std.com

                               November, 1988

