All drugs should be decriminalized and/or made legal

Sorry for taking a while to get back to this. I have been having a rather lengthy debate with another opponent. Decriminalized - (verb) Cease by legislation to treat (something) as illegal. Drug - (noun) A medicine or other substance which has a physiological effect when ingested or otherwise introduced into the body. I would just like to point out that decriminalizing an object or action is the process of making it legal. I will be arguing that the act of decriminalizing drugs is not an action of legislation that our federal or state governments should be taking under consideration. Argument # 1: The process of legalizing drugs will not alleviate crime. The fact stands that according to the bureau of Justice, drug users are more likely to commit crime than nonusers. And this is not the crime of possession, it stands as domestic and violent crime. Any way you put it, drugs are correlated with violent crime, and legalizing it only makes obtaining narcotics and other substances easier. In the process of legalizing drugs crime may become more prevalent. In another report the bureau also concluded that nearly 80% of drugs imported or trafficked in were consumed by only twenty percent of the population that uses drugs. They also concluded that most crime committed by drug users was in an attempt to support their drug habits. This twenty percent group also happens to be responsible for a high amount of violent crime, ranging from assault, rape, murder, and manslaughter. So statistically speaking, when you compare populations, a more drug ridden one is subject to more crime. https://www.bjs.gov... Argument # 2: Drugs and the Link to Health It is well known that many drugs pose a health issue, and according to the CDC, nearly half a million people have been killed by opioid overdose since 2000. They have also concluded that nearly 91 Americans a day are killed from overdoses. Paired with violent crime, drugs are not only a health risk but a social one as well. And given their terribly addictive nature, once you legalize drugs, they will become mass marketed to the public, you are bound to have these statistics rise. There is also another inevitability, Once drugs are legalized, you are promoting their use. Again, paired with the crime and health problems, this cannot be beneficial. And what is made more available to adults inevitably trickles down to youth. Ill touch more into this in a later argument. https://www.cdc.gov... Argument # 3 Drugs and Poverty According to an economic analysis of drug consumption and poverty, drug use is much more prevalent in intercity slums, where unemployment is also much higher. They also concluded that with families with an annual income of 12k or lower, drug use is much higher, ranging from 30 to 40 percent among these families, across a variety of drugs. http://www.nber.org... As a recap. 1 - Drugs are factually associated with crime besides the act of possession, and the majority of felons are trying to support drug use habits. Groups that consume a massive amount of drugs are responsible for the majority of drug related crime (murder, rape, assault, manslaughter). Given the addictive nature of drugs, legalizing these substances only will contribute to more violent crime in these communities. 2 - The health concerns for drugs are real. legalizing them only encourages use, and could cause a new epidemic. 3 - Drugs and poverty have a direct association, and are also a sever case of unemployment. Again, mainstream access to drugs may increase this problem. As to your point with the Netherlands, they have a very different culture and temperament. Not everything that works for another country works for us. In particular, they have a much lower population and higher income.