Not OP, but laws against distribution? Absolutely.
Laws against consumption? A terrible idea.
What we should want to do as a society is funnel people interested in trying things we think they really shouldn't do towards legal chokeponts that are less onerous than DIY access under controlled distribution but still allow for attempts at prevention of the end outcome.
The clearest example of this even more than your drug scenario would be a drug that just immediately kills the user.
There's a lot of people every year that seek out that end result. While some can fall under a narrow scope of legal options under dignity laws when faced with terminal situations, there's many who seek out that outcome without physical ailments.
If there were a legal way to seek it which was overall less traumatic of a route, but which was also only on the other end of intervention measures like counseling, how many lives might be saved as compared to the rather ineffective prohibition that we see today which largely fails to prevent access and use, but whose illegality does prevent aspects of both research and prevention that might otherwise occur if distribution was the only thing targeted in laws and not attempted consumption?
If people are aware of the life ruining consequences of a drug but value their own lives so poorly that it doesn't deter them from throwing them away to seek out a drug, then society doesn't have a drug problem as much as it has a human experience problem.
There's few things more cruel in concept than ensuring people keep living under conditions where they'd rather not live at all. Whether they are seeking that result all at once or gradually throwing their life away, criminalizing their seeking rather than the conditions that motivate their seeking is wildly messed up.
Laws against consumption? A terrible idea.
What we should want to do as a society is funnel people interested in trying things we think they really shouldn't do towards legal chokeponts that are less onerous than DIY access under controlled distribution but still allow for attempts at prevention of the end outcome.
The clearest example of this even more than your drug scenario would be a drug that just immediately kills the user.
There's a lot of people every year that seek out that end result. While some can fall under a narrow scope of legal options under dignity laws when faced with terminal situations, there's many who seek out that outcome without physical ailments.
If there were a legal way to seek it which was overall less traumatic of a route, but which was also only on the other end of intervention measures like counseling, how many lives might be saved as compared to the rather ineffective prohibition that we see today which largely fails to prevent access and use, but whose illegality does prevent aspects of both research and prevention that might otherwise occur if distribution was the only thing targeted in laws and not attempted consumption?
If people are aware of the life ruining consequences of a drug but value their own lives so poorly that it doesn't deter them from throwing them away to seek out a drug, then society doesn't have a drug problem as much as it has a human experience problem.
There's few things more cruel in concept than ensuring people keep living under conditions where they'd rather not live at all. Whether they are seeking that result all at once or gradually throwing their life away, criminalizing their seeking rather than the conditions that motivate their seeking is wildly messed up.