illicit drugs should be legalised

Defense: (my opponents words in bold)1) drugs being illegal has not helped to solve this problem at all.Wrong, drug illegalisation helps stop drugs but nothing will ever be able to destroy it for good. This statement which Pro makes seeks to imply that legalising drugs will solve the problem, I dare him to prove that, since it is his claim after all. amount of DUI deaths will "skyrocket." Studies cannot be done here due to the fact that no government in their right mind will allow it. It follows that if there is x amount of drug users with 49%[1] of x being involved in drug related accidents, then if x rises by 50-500% as is expected if drugs should be legalised, then my opponent cannot state that the 49% will reduce to compensate for the new drug users who normally wouldn't take drugs if it were illegal. That is laughable. More people maybe taking drugs, but the amount of those users that are injured severely will remain at 49%.b) so a pregnant parent doing drugs violates no rightsDrug abuse does not kill the child as often as it spares him/her. So the child is born with horrific defects and is stuck like that for life. How can Pro justify that? He tries to justify it by saying that drugs 'harms [the mother] more than anyone else.' What rubbish! Even though she is harmed by it (and she sure deserves it for her cruelty) it is the child that suffers! Being born with fatal genetic failures and trisomy and birth defects in your chromosomes is one of the most hideous tortures a parent can inflict on their child. Now look what he says: " I propose we abandon this point for the sake of staying on topic." No. This is not off-topic. Address this injustice Pro.c)Neither drug legalization or criminalization are ever going to change the fact that some people are naturally cruel and should not be raising children.This was my opponents response to my point that the drug use of a parent destroys the entire family and ruins the children's lives. What a likewise inhumane justification. My point was that people using drugs ruin their families and Pro says that it would happen regardless? If the drugs were not there then this would never have happened. Look what he says: "...and blames the drugs, not the people." Concession/argument in my favour. Yes, I'm trying to say that the drugs are to blame due to their influence on the people. sub arguments b and c have not been refuted, please try again.2) By my opponent's logic, I should have been 'protected' from having to make this choice because it wasn't really my decision.When making insignificant decisions, it doesn't matter what the influences are that shaped it. When it is life changing and life threatening however, every decision must be carefully considered and weighed to ensure that the person is not making a misinformed decision. Furthermore, people who start taking drugs lose the ability to decide to stop. So in essence, they have lost free-will. How then will we know if they really wanted to stop and salvage what's left of their lives? We don't know. So we need to know beforehand, which is where we use regret. If a person regrets their decision, then if we could, we would be obliged to go back in time and stop them from making it. Since we can't, we stop them from doing it due to the fact that the majority of people regretted it and it follows logically that the next generation of drug abusers will likewise share the same regret. And in a democracy, we are trying to please the majority.3) My opponent is correct when he says that drugs are an inefficient means of happiness.A strange way to begin a rebuttal, but anyhow...If one were to purchase a car (spending much more money than on drugs) and find that they don't like the car, should the car be illegal to purchaseNo, buying a car will not guarantee the destruction of your life. But let's entertain his thoughts for a moment. We cannot illegalise you buying a car that you will wish you had never bought in the future simple because we cannot predict it, and if we could, cars are still a small matter compared to life. Since we can predict that you will regret starting on drugs we have sufficient reasons to attempt to dissuade you, namely by making it illegal. We are not stopping you, just trying hard to make it hard for you.4) Nothing will ever stop teenagers from getting drugs. While its true that more teenagers take drugs than what I would want (21.5%)[2], this is all the more reason not to legalise it, where it would become readily available to all of them. Pros rebuttal is frankly amusing.Rebuttals:C1: This point has been refuted by O1: b and c. The act of taking drugs will violate others rights due to the negative repercussions that arise out of substance abuse. Harming yourself also negatively affects those around you, how would your family feel if you committed suicide or became a homeless unemployed and probably criminal person living on the street? Not only would you cause them emotional harm, but people like you would then force taxpayer money to be spent worthlessly on rehabilitation programs designed to help you. Pro should not be short sighted, it is very hard to hurt yourself without harming others. Even if you could, I have demonstrated why harming yourself is against your will.C2: My opponent makes a claim and has introduced a grenade in his own works.the government made alcohol illegal.Alcohol was readily available anywaySo, he has explained why the plan to illegalise alcohol failed: It is really easy to make and distribute. Drugs however, are so hard to make that a single kilogram of cocaine in the USA, where laws are slack will sell for $35,000. In places like Australia, the same drug sells for $190,000 per kilo.[3,4] Now compare the two countries: Australia with population of about 22 million has roughly equal demand to USA now that demand in Australia has increased.USA has 311 million and drugs are hard to make there due to a higher density of humans per square kilometre. Drugs in USA must therefore be made next door in Mexico (it is far harder to smuggle drugs than it is to make it locally). So the differences in law have caused a significant difference in the value of the drugs. The price is determined by the substances scarcity and since that is so, prices should be higher in the USA. Now going back to the argument, illegalising drugs works better than illegalising alcohol since drugs are so much harder to be made without the police catching you. Let it also be noted that this point does not attempt to affirm the resolution, since the illegalisation of drugs is serving its purpose.I realise that there is an argument there so I request Pro to both defend and refute.C3: More power to gangs/cartel.Mexico has got a huge mafia due to a failed police system. In tougher places, like Australia, the mafia has been completely destroyed. So its not the presence of drugs that cause big gangs, its the absence of law enforcement. Gangs will still exist even if we legalise drugs, so what's the point? We know that a more effective law enforcement system will work, so why jump to the conclusion that drug legalisation will work? It won't. These gangs will just turn into massive retail and manufacturing empires if they are ceased to be hunted down. C4: Users cannot be helped if they were scammed This point does not help my opponent at all. In fact, it helps me. If someone is scammed by a drug user then they will have a reason not to buy drugs. The fact that they are doing something illegal means that when something illegal happens to them in turn, they will suffer for it as just punishment.Concluding, I would like to see some rebuttals from my opponent and some stronger arguments if he can help it.The resolution remains unaffirmed.I have put the sources in the comments since they wont fit here.