I've posted this before.
I know my kids have taken a lot of psychoactive substances over the years (legal and illegal). They got a lot of enjoyment from them in the past and don't bother much anymore.
Except smoking. It's so fucking difficult to give up.
If there's one substance I could wish into non-existence, it would be nicotine.
Nicotine on its own is a pretty good drug TBF. Weight loss, focus, extensively used by people with severe mental health issues to self medicate (the stats for schizophrenia and smoking are ridiculous). The delivery mechanism of burning shit and sucking it into your mouth is terrible though. And obvs the addiction issues. Though I know people addicted to caffeine on a similar level.
Are we as a society saying addiction alone is the requirement for a ban? I think it’s a fair bar, but one that would require gambling being looked at as well as a fair few others things (insert porn addiction is it real debate here).
I think generally I err on the side of personal responsibility for things that generally only affect the individual. I don’t think the state can keep everyone safe from themselves all the time. As long as the externalities are appropriately taxed so other people arent picking up your tab.
Once you get into deciding certain things should be banned, that logic almost always takes you to unintended places. Impact on NHS? Look at fast food. Addiction? Gambling. Impact on society? Alcohol. I’m just not sure there’s a clean line that puts bad things on one side and good on the other. I’m also very wary of banning psychoactives without a solid understanding of how we can replace what they bring to a lot of people in terms of coping strategies for mental health.
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
