The Harms of Drugs Versus the Harms of the War on Drugs

I personally find all currently illegal drugs loathsome; they stunt the mind, inhibit the body, and curtail productivity. I would never consume such substances myself, and I would advise others against doing so. Yet, compared to the adverse effects of their illegalization, the harm of drugs themselves is small indeed. Drug-taking is extremely unhealthy for the persons engaging in it, but not for anybody who abstains from it. The "War on Drugs," by contrast, harms everybody subject to a government that undertakes it. I have no sympathy for drug addicts; I wish to argue the case of the innocent, moral, productive people who have never used such substances in their lives but are nonetheless harmed by the coercive illegalization of drugs.

There are ethical problems with drug-taking, but the ethical problems with the War on Drugs far exceed them. Let us presume that someone has decided to ruin his life by consuming harmful drugs. That decision alone would likely deny him the voluntary association of respectable people; these respectable people would thus not be damaged by any adverse consequences to the drug-taker's health, career, and personality. By the very fact of strongly disapproving of drug-consumption on an ethical basis, one shields oneself from the adverse consequences of drug-consumption. This would be the case on a free market; the only damage from drug-taking would come to the drug addict himself-not to respectable others.

Yet this is not the case under a government-waged War on Drugs. The War on Drugs is waged with taxpayer money-which especially means the money of respectable, well-to-do people, who are taxed higher under the perverse "progressive" or punitive tax system. Thus, to regulate and thwart the activities of the addicts, the government expropriates substantial property from moral, productive people who do not even think about consuming illegal drugs. To punish the self-destructive, the government must also punish the self-improving and deprive them of the fruits of and the incentives for their self-improvement.