Why police officers have to speak up
Hundreds of thousands of police officers are deployed daily in democratic states under the
rule of law to do their best for a big lie: the desirability and possibility of socially banning
the use of certain drugs. It is time for a more sensible policy, also given the life-threatening
risks for police officers.
From the early 1900s, drugs were increasingly banned under criminal law in the United
States, ostensibly to improve public health. The ban on alcohol consumption (‘the
prohibition’) caused a wave of violence so that the ban was reversed. This was not the
case with drugs such as opium. On the contrary, the list of banned substances kept getting
longer.
Also, after 1945, America began to put more and more pressure on other countries to join
its ‘health policy’. In the early 1970s, President Richard Nixon even declared war on drugs.
Bomb attacks, toxic spills, massacres – everything turned out to be allowed to realize a
world without drugs.
Fifty years later, this aggressive approach has not led to less available drugs, but only to
more corruption and violence and many, many victims among civilians, police officers,
lawyers, journalists and judges.
An extra bitter result when you consider that the number of deaths due to permitted drugs
such as alcohol and tobacco is many times higher than that of the prohibited drugs.
It is time for police officers to stand up to this misguided and hypocritical approach to a
sociology-medical issue. This can start by speaking out in favor of other political choices.
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