Good Example Of Essay On Drug Legalization

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the ethical and philosophical issues, serving as an argument in the debate where the question ‘whether a person has the right to use drugs?’ will be answered with a definite answer ‘no.’ The main task was to put the theoretical justification of the ban for drug use, its ethical possibility and even its need. At the same time it appeared also the need for a detailed consideration of the issue of freedom and free will, which is a stumbling block in the issue of censorship and the dispute with supporters of drug legalization, the base of which lies in the liberal traditions and some of its hypertrophied and deliberately misinterpreted values.

Dialogue About Drug Legalization

1. – In order to solve the philosophical problem of drug legalization we should analyze the human right to choose to take drugs or not.
2. – I don’t think so, cause before we start talking about the human right to choose to take drugs or not, and the right to prohibit a person to take drugs, it should be given the appropriate attention to the question of human freedom and the freedom of choice in particular. The problem of freedom in ethics is a kind of traditional corner stone problem; it was interesting for the best minds of mankind since the earliest days of formation of the philosophical thinking, i.e. since the ancient times, and in XXI century, did not find its decision that, in principle, is not surprising due to the fact that it is one of the ‘eternal philosophical questions.’ The problems of human freedom was considered in the ethical teachings of Aristotle, F. Aquinas, Spinoza, Schopenhauer, Kant, existentialists, and many other philosophers, and this list would be filled with almost all thinkers related to ethics.
1. – However, it seems to me that for a better understanding it is necessary to negotiate about the issue, in relation to which a ban for drug legalization is justified. The object of study is not the whole drug addiction in general, but only a criminal part - non-medical, voluntary, ‘freely’ (though rather arbitrarily) consumption of drugs, for what a man can only be attributed to the full responsibility, both legal and moral (Husak). And it is unlikely that the supporters of the prohibition on the use of drugs would look moral, if they stubbornly insist on the use of narcotic drugs taboo in the case of the deadly disease in humans as a means to conceal the mind from the battering of the aches of the weakened body, bringing only the physical and perhaps spiritual suffering (Harris). Freedom is a special feature inherent exclusively to man, which distinguishes it from the universe of living beings inhabiting еру immensity ‘kingdom of nature.’ Accordingly, freedom is one of the basic values ​​of life, as well as one of the essential, objectively significant terms of morality. In the issue concerning drug legalization, the problem of freedom arises particularly acute in view of the fact that, in my opinion, freedom must be understood in a positive sense.
2. – Sure, but it should be specified what exactly the abstract noun ‘freedom’ means, and how it differs from the arbitrary actions as the permissiveness, promiscuity, absolute independence.
1. – I cannot agree and I argue for the drug legalization due to the fact that a man is a unique owner of pure practical mind, which gives people a universal moral law, the only principle of which is the autonomy of free will. The only reason of morality is precisely in the independence from the law regulations and bans. So, the individual is free to choose whether to take drugs using the own mind, and this individual can not be prohibited to do in such way. Man, therefore, manifests himself only in free will, and the actions can be judged only on the assumption of ‘causality through freedom,’ if to use Kant's language. Freedom, according to Aristotle, is possible only in the case when the real alternatives are present, the act is done deliberately, and no matter what that may be, compulsion. Thus, through the drug legalization it should be given the alternatives for the individual’s actions of free will (Harris).
2. – The way of addict is the result of an act of choice of unfree freedom or unfreedom free, or in short, is a result of the escape from freedom, responsibility, the result of the primacy of weakness of will, the ruling affects and indulgence to the rash impulses. After all, it is easier to abandon the freedom, as well as to prove its factual impossibility, citing the need that exists in nature, as well as citing the internal laws of mental development and the dictation of the subconscious, on children's complexes, etc. My opinion is that the freedom is not given to anyone from birth; it is only potentially present in the fact that we had the good fortune to be born as creatures endowed with reason, which is usually called a man. And truly moral freedom is achieved by people during their development, formation as individuals; it is not an inherently attribute, but rather a kind of ‘maximum program’ of every human life, along with the intellectual and spiritual growth, although these three elements are the links of one chain and largely determine each other (Kane) Freedom must be something super-valuable, personally mined, making it impossible to voluntarily agree to a narcotic slavery, and to any dependence; it is a value that is worthy to fight for it, and the protection of freedom is a matter (even a duty!) of each individual entity endowed with at least a modicum of intelligence, the presence of which imposes the certain obligations and responsibilities (Smith).
1. – But, how do You think, maybe a man can be charged with the responsibility only for the free actions, when considering the human being as a free author of his behavior. In general, the responsibility can be described as a special relationship of the person to the tributes, as a conscious willingness to answer for own actions, as a representation of the subject of the possible consequences of these actions. Moral responsibility arises when the interests of other people are affected.
2. – Drugs should be strictly prohibited - they destroy the value content of man and his moral, legal and spiritual space. It can be made only a strict disjunction between the drug legalization and the existence of man as a moral being - they are fundamentally incompatible and mutually exclusive (Dalrymple). And the system of moral education in conjunction with the state laws should instill a penchant for choosing the moral essence - it should appear more attractive to the individual than the legalization of drugs. The right to use drugs deprives a person of too many rights, destroys spiritual and social connections. Drugs deprive a person of spiritual connection with the past and the future; the addict is doomed to the spiritual death terrible for the sober-minded individual. Ethical ‘prohibition,’ including for the consumption of drugs, is possible because of its ‘ethicality’: morality can have the prohibitive character, while it can be logically justified and proven practically and theoretically (Smith). It makes sense to consider the norm of ban on drug use as the social and moral regulator, congruent to the legal regulations, which allows to make an unambiguously negative evaluation, expressed by the public opinion, projected onto the conscience of the individual subject.
1. – You have overpersuaded me, but I have the last question - how the ban for drug legalization is correlated with the moral autonomy of the individual? Is the freedom of the individual limited by a ban on drug use?
2. – On this misconception I have tried to answer in the first theses by introducing of the degrees of freedom according to reason and based on the starting inequalities of the personalities. The prohibition does limit not the freedom, but the arbitrariness, and protects the interests, rights and freedoms of individuals, and provides the social communication. Every day we see that the ban, as well as the state, is the great benefit that has been created by mankind; it is an effective means for the individual’s spiritual development (Dalrymple). Any intellectual rebellion and the crusade against the classical morality are possible only with the existence of the latter, with its specificity and universality.

Works Cited

Dalrymple, Theodore. 'Don’t Legalize Drugs'. City Journal (1997): n. pag. Web. 20 Mar. 2015.
Harris, Sam. Free will. New York: Free Press, 2012. Print.
Husak, Douglas. 'Four Points About Drug Decriminalization'. Criminal Justice Ethics 22.1 (2003): 21-29. Web.
Kane, Robert. The significance of free will. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. Print.
Smith, Paul. 'Drugs, Morality And The Law'. Journal of Applied Philosophy 19.3 (2002): 233-244. Web.