this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2023
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I would argue that society should reserve the right to punish individuals who harm others for their personal benefit.
And I would argue that selling a physically addictive substance that directly causes harm with no benefit to the user for personal profit is causing harm.
So while I don't support arresting people for smoking, I 100% so support arresting people for selling.
Again, I just see mental gymnastics.
So you just outright said that people should be free to smoke, but anyone who sells what is being smoked should be incarcerated.
How is that not a complete oxymoron?
No. You have a factually flawed bias against a thing, and you want to mob up with other people to enforce your opinions and will upon people you disagree with.
As a result, you want to imprison poor people and not accomplish what you claim to want to accomplish.
There is no oxymoron.
Smoking is harming oneself.
Selling is harming another.
They are not equivalent.
Again. Stunning mental gymnastics.
I'll note that you have nothing to refute with.
Should outlaw knife-selling cause those harm people!
Also should probably outlaw cars. And concerts, those are harmingly loud. Also alcohol I guess.
Okay, in all seriousness, I agree with you, but prohibition doesn't work. Drugs won the war on drugs.
My first gut response was 'We should outlaw murder, I bet that'd stop murder from happening!'.
But as hilarious as it is, lets ignore the hyperbole.
The fact is that laws never stop all the activity they are intended to prevent. If they did we wouldn't need a court system.
No, the question is does the law do more good than bad for society?
Smoking causes 480,000 extra deaths yearly according to the CDC.
And smoking related illness costs around $300 billion annually in the US.
As we both agree, outlawing the sale will not prevent 100% of usage. But it will almost certainly prevent some usage.
And I agree that a black market will form and that black market will cause some societal damage.
So the question is, will the affects of the black market created by prohibition do more damage to society than the reduction in existing societal damage that we should see from prohibition?
Considering the above statistics, it may be worth the gamble.
But there's the other part of the picture: black market drugs kill more people than legal drugs. Who knows what'd happen to the quality of tobacco!
Sure, like I said, there is going to be harm the black market creates.
I still feel there is a good chance for a net positive here.