Drug laws under socialist/"DOTP"/anarchist countries?

[Skyhilist]

What exactly were drug laws like? Under Lenin, were drugs such as marijuana still illegal? What about Stalin? Mao? Hoxha? Tito? Or even under anarchist control in places like Catalonia or modern places like EZLN territory; what were/are drug laws like there? Did people seek to keep drugs illegal? And if so, why? I ask because I recently heard that drug laws in Cuba even for possession of marijuana is extremely harsh, which confused me as it would seem that someone who considers themselves to be a revolutionary like Castro would be against bourgeois ideas like drug wars. So have other socialist or DOTP or anarchist countries been similar to this? And if so, why?

[Starship Stormtrooper]

Peter Gelderloos has an interesting section on this in his Anarchy Works that you might want to check out. Basically, a section of it details the anti-drug policies in the autonomous Christania (in Denmark) and how the police attempted to sell drugs there. They ended up with the community as a whole agreeing to keep out dealers and use "social pressure" to deal with addicts.

[Astarte]

What exactly were drug laws like? Under Lenin, were drugs such as marijuana still illegal? What about Stalin? Mao? Hoxha? Tito? Or even under anarchist control in places like Catalonia or modern places like EZLN territory; what were/are drug laws like there? Did people seek to keep drugs illegal? And if so, why? I ask because I recently heard that drug laws in Cuba even for possession of marijuana is extremely harsh, which confused me as it would seem that someone who considers themselves to be a revolutionary like Castro would be against bourgeois ideas like drug wars. So have other socialist or DOTP or anarchist countries been similar to this? And if so, why?

Generally speaking, drug addiction is a social disease and should be treated as one. Just because the bourgeoisie seeks to bolster their for profit prison-industrial complex by way of the "drug war" does not mean that socialists have any sentiment for the "right" in some strange "libertarian" sense of people to destroy themselves with drugs which would just amount to further proliferation of addiction. A genuine DotP would fight addiction in the sense that drug use would be decriminalized in regards to the situation of the trapped addict. This means effective treatment would be given to get people off of and keep them off of destructive and addictive substances. Also, for those social parasites that would be profiting off of the proliferation of individually and collectively destructive and addictive drugs, I would imagine harsh penalties would be on the order of the day. The simple reason for this is that a society of a bunch of strung out addicts will not lead to socialism, but rather barbarism.

[Raúl Duke]

I think under a socialist society we will see a much more smarter "risk-adverse, health-focus" view of drugs. I think marijuana and perhaps even other non-addictive drugs like psychedelics may be legal in one way or another. The main focus in regards to "drug problem" will be on drug addiction and alcoholism and this will be treated in a rehabilitative rather than punitive manner.

In the subject of "harsh penalties" I would say it's possible that in the early days of the revolutionary process this may be possible (since there's the outright profiteering, particularly in a way that may make people ill which would be seen as ethically reprehensible, aspect), but over time as we move towards communism less likely as a recourse of action (since capital will be phased out when the workers take over society). I may be wrong, but I do hope that communism will bring a more enlightened view of drugs among other things.

[Deity]

So, you guys are saying that if I live in an anarchist/communist society and want to go to a rave and roll on tabs that won't be acceptable?

I understand what you mean about a society addicted to drugs, but I thought a big part of this movement was freedom.

[Raúl Duke]

So, you guys are saying that if I live in an anarchist/communist society and want to go to a rave and roll on tabs that won't be acceptable?

I understand what you mean about a society addicted to drugs, but I thought a big part of this movement was freedom.

That's not what I said...and in fact I do hope that the new society will allow me to still go to those trip-tastic 3 day music festivals out in the woods. So I'm with you on that.

[Os Cangaceiros]

I like altering my consciousness through various chemical means. I'd be pretty disappointed if I were no longer able to do that. :crying:

Drugs have some pretty harmful effects on society, but I actually have no problem with drug use from a philosophical perspective. Any drug use, not just drugs like caffeine or marijuana...as long as someone can function in a reasonable manner within society and their usage isn't really having a large negative effect on people around them, it doesn't really matter to me at all. It's just too bad that some drugs have a pretty strong pull on the ol' reward center of the brain.

Although of course when one speaks of drug usage in today's world, they're not just speaking about the individual user but the entire illegal (or, in the case of pharmaceuticals, legal) network that supplies users, and needless to say there are a lot of bad things associated with that. I don't really know how drug use would work post-capitalism and I don't really see the point in speculating...maybe alcohol will be replaced with pixie stix filled with MDMA? :w00t:

[homegrown terror]

i think a big part of any drug policy would be a clear delineation between "habitual" users, "dependent" (though not addict) users and "recreational" users. i think that recreational use, within the confines of a safe environment (i.e. no driving high, no tripping off your ass while caring for young children etc) would be largely accepted. dependent use would be accepted for health reasons such as pain management, glaucoma control and relief of depression/anxiety and other psychological conditions. habitual use (which most of us see as the only truly "destructive" sect of the drug community) would be curtailed through treatment, not punishment, and collective support to help people get clean and stay clean. as for those seeking to prey upon others using chemicals as their weapon, to a large degree those kinds of activities would be rendered obsolete along with the dissolution of a monetary economy, and as for the rest, communal vigilance and intercommunity communication would function better to keep them out than any police force can.

[Blake's Baby]

Free beer and fucking in the streets.

But also revolutionary asceticism.

Most countries only made marijuana illegal after the revolution in Russia, I believe. So cannabis (and cocaine and heroin) would 'still' be legal rather than 'still' being illegal.

In general, when state-capitalist dictatorships supposedly representing 'socialism' have had drug policies (ie, when they haven't pretended that drug-use was a 'bourgeois western decadent' phenomenon) they've been pretty savage.