> A health issue with a cost burden on responsible people who exercise good judgment. Addicts rarely pay for their own treatment.

Find a facility that invoices "responsible people" and will treat someone without health insurance or very deep pockets. Find a person who is hopelessly addicted to marijuana so much that they burden responsible people with their expensive treatment.

Again, draw the comparison to cigarettes and alcohol, both harmful and deadly addictive products. Responsible people don't burden the healthcare system with health issues caused by smoking or drinking. Responsible people don't expose themselves to the harmful effects of prolonged stress through overwork and sleep deprivation enabled by legalized stimulant intake (caffeine, nicotine, Adderall, modafinil).

Reminder that addicts come in all forms of people you might consider responsible contributors to society. Surgeons, businessmen, lawyers, politicians, CEOs, computer programmers.

> We were all taught growing up that mind-altering substances should be avoided at all costs, and it paid off with a virtual 0% drug usage rate in the family.

That you know of. Adolescents rebel, seek novelty, don't have the best judgment and have misguided priorities and influences; addicts and alcoholics learn to hide questionable behavior. People don't talk about it out of shame and not wanting to disappoint.

I lost two childhood friends to the disease. Their families would have said the same thing. One family found out after the autopsy. They were a model family and they were completely blindsided. "How could this happen to him of all people?" was the prominent reaction I remember.

> Contrast with your family where you yourself openly admit to using drugs recreationally and think they are good, yet your brother died overdosing on them. I would venture to guess that there are other, unnamed members of your family that use drugs and have or had drug problems in the past.

I know more families than I can realistically count who openly drank in front of their children, even encouraged consumption, yet their kids didn't grow up to be alcoholics. I know of people who raised kids with a realistic outlook on marijuana use, yet none of them have overdosed and died.

I know families who blatantly used highly addictive drugs in front of their kids, yet somehow, their children grew up to deny that lifestyle and still be successful and drug free.

You can instill values through lessons and experiences in children, yet as they gain autonomy it is up to them to accept, reject, interpret or reflect on them.

You may have chose to accept those experiences and attribute them to your lifestyle, but the same cannot be universally applied across the population.

It is a low blow to use the overdose of someone's brother to try to raise your anecdote as fact.

> The best and simplest place to stop drug abuse is in the home via good parenting.

Good parenting can't stop people from making the choices they want to make. People are people, not robots to be programmed, who have a multitude of varied beliefs and reasons to approach mind altering substances.

Murderers, rapists, thieves and war criminals can and have come from homes with good parents. So can addicts.

> I believe that if my parents and grandparents taught us it was okay to experiment "safely" with drugs and such that the amount of drug abuse in the extended family would go way up

The truth is people are capable of responsible use of drugs including alcohol. There are also dangers, risks and consequences behind consumption; some of them not good at all.

However, I would want my child to come to me if they had a problem with drugs including alcohol or addiction. Lying breeds resentment. Drawing hard but false lines in the sand is a good way for someone to file you away as a person who can't be turned to when they need the help of someone honest and trustworthy.

> That is my vision for what America should strive for. I can't lend my support to your cause because I don't believe in it.

Or we can approach addiction with a realistic outlook: people are going to drink and use drugs. By virtue of the way our brains work, some people will become addicted. There isn't a single way to stop this and there are many, many reasons it will continue despite best efforts to end it. What we can do is educate, take preventative measures, limit availability, ensure quality and purity, reduce harm, move addiction from out of the shadows of criminality and provide accessible/affordable treatment.