"But it doesn't work"
- Thread starter BoyStan
- Start date
If so, Prohibition was a booming success.
But deterrence is a function of the law. It's why we don't have prohibition. You see, laws that don't deter, almost always make things worse.
But deterrence is a function of the law. It's why we don't have prohibition. You see, laws that don't deter, almost always make things worse.
So we can remove a prison term as punishment as nothing changes. If somebody is put away until they die, or in a wheel chair, then maybe. Start executing rapists, slave traders (those that solicit prostitutes), murderers and kidnappers and we could save hundreds of millions a year.
ok doser
lifeguard at the cement pond
contrary to the general current fables spun about prohibition and accepted by the retarded, it was indeed a "roaring" success - prohibition grew out of a need to control the rampant alcoholism and social disruption resulting, especially among the poor in the urban centers
in that, it was successful
the best lesson to take from prohibition is that the law of unintended consequences will always bite you in the butt
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The data indicate that prison terms are a rather effective deterrent. Not as good as the certainty of getting caught, as Robert Peel observed a couple of hundred years ago.
Nope. As Peel said, it wasn't the severity of the punishment, but the likelihood of being caught that is an effective deterrent.
If creating a cynical disrespect for the law, and producing large organized crime syndicates is success it was.
That failed, too...
We estimate the consumption of alcohol during Prohibition using mortality, mental health and crime statistics. We find that alcohol consumption fell sharply at the beginning of Prohibition, to approximately 30 percent of its pre-Prohibition level. During the next several years, however, alcohol consumption increased sharply, to about 60-70 percent of its pre-prohibition level. The level of consumption was virtually the same immediately after Prohibition as during the latter part of Prohibition, although consumption increased to approximately its pre-Prohibition level during the subsequent decade.
http://www.nber.org/papers/w3675
From the Cato Institute:
Although consumption of alcohol fell at the beginning of Prohibition, it subsequently increased. Alcohol became more dangerous to consume; crime increased and became “organized”; the court and prison systems were stretched to the breaking point; and corruption of public officials was rampant. No measurable gains were made in productivity or reduced absenteeism. Prohibition removed a significant source of tax revenue and greatly increased government spending. It led many drinkers to switch to opium, marijuana, patent medicines, cocaine, and other dangerous substances that they would have been unlikely to encounter in the absence of Prohibition.
Those results are documented from a variety of sources, most of which, ironically, are the work of supporters of Prohibition—most economists and social scientists supported it. Their findings make the case against Prohibition that much stronger.
https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/alcohol-prohibition-was-failure
Any legal prohibition that is not a deterrent, will make society worse.
ok doser
lifeguard at the cement pond
| We find that alcohol consumption fell sharply at the beginning of Prohibition, to approximately 30 percent of its pre-Prohibition level. During the next several years, however, alcohol consumption increased sharply, to about 60-70 percent of its pre-prohibition level. |
you sir, are a retard
good day
Actually, Prohibition Was a Success
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/10/16/opinion/actually-prohibition-was-a-success.html
"Laws that don't deter". Which laws would those be?
Saxon Hammer
New member
This made me laugh of course the would be a newspaper of the time saying this was a success just like all public opinions this does not make it a fact.
Cannabis prohibition which is gradually replacing alcohol as the taxable drug of choice by the people in some states in the U.S.A.
Or littering and dog fouling - telling the 'truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth' - Marriage and a whole lot more.
Saxon Hammer
New member
Lets be honest here all laws are made by people. Some laws are made to protect people from other people others to prevent undesirable consequences (like rubbish in the street) for all people. However laws are also made for a great many reasons that have little to with day to day living for most people.
People with power (money or arms) can break these laws with ease and yet are protected by their power from many of the consequences often not even coming to the attention of the law enforcement agencies.
People also collectively enforce the law or not by their own individual actions and our enforcement officers are not provided with the information they need. These officers are also people so they themselves have needs/desires that may conflict with the application of the laws.
To improve the whole of society we would need to improve the moral fortitude of our children so that they do not want/need to break the law when they grow up.
People with power (money or arms) can break these laws with ease and yet are protected by their power from many of the consequences often not even coming to the attention of the law enforcement agencies.
People also collectively enforce the law or not by their own individual actions and our enforcement officers are not provided with the information they need. These officers are also people so they themselves have needs/desires that may conflict with the application of the laws.
To improve the whole of society we would need to improve the moral fortitude of our children so that they do not want/need to break the law when they grow up.
Saxon Hammer
New member
I agree that a law should be upheld at all times while it is the law. However not all laws that have been passed are good laws and many bad ones have been removed.
There is no point in a law that people HAVE to break in order to survive nor in a law that nobody agrees with BUT yet again this is the law and so should still be of equal value to any other law.
The purpose of the law is to instruct all persons as to the correct behaviour within the society that agreed the law should be created.
However the JOB of the law enforcement agencies to to catch those undisciplined people that break the law. They are supposed to be fully supported by society in their efforts that also requires those disciplined members to inform the enforcement agency of the wrong doings of other less disciplined people.
Your comments are largely born out of the general frustration that it just does not work that way (not all the time).
Originally Posted by aCultureWarrior
Actually, Prohibition Was a Success
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/10/16/op...a-success.html
When you're finished with your dope-smoking giggles, refute the information that was in the NYT's Opinion page that was written by a professor of criminal justice at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
Quote: Originally posted by aCultureWarrior
"Laws that don't deter". Which laws would those be?
I don't believe that I've ever read a post by a Libertarian such as yourself where the term "victimless crime" wasn't used. This is a first.
Actually, Prohibition Was a Success
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/10/16/op...a-success.html
This made me laugh of course the would be a newspaper of the time saying this was a success just like all public opinions this does not make it a fact.
When you're finished with your dope-smoking giggles, refute the information that was in the NYT's Opinion page that was written by a professor of criminal justice at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
Quote: Originally posted by aCultureWarrior
"Laws that don't deter". Which laws would those be?
I don't believe that I've ever read a post by a Libertarian such as yourself where the term "victimless crime" wasn't used. This is a first.
Saxon Hammer
New member
Umm - this link is a problem
QUOTE=aCultureWarrior;4990639]When you're finished with your dope-smoking giggles, refute the information that was in the NYT's Opinion page that was written by a professor of criminal justice at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.[/QUOTE]
I am sure the professor's views were considered reportable and printable at the time BUT again this is not know to be fact in the studies that followed both in economics and social studies. History is always written by the victors and facts are studied where available.
This is the second derogatory remark you have made with absolutely no grounding and shows how poorly your mind is functioning given the commandments of this site. HOWEVER it made me laugh so much I do have to thank you
Yes, deterrence is a major role of the law. Unfortunately today our laws and courts and prisons do not deter!
Yep.
In prison until he is in a wheel chair lowers crime because he is unable to do it again. It is also unjust, but it does lower the crime.
Here is an excerpt from the article:
"Actually, Prohibition Was a Success
By Mark H. Moore; Mark H. Moore is professor of criminal justice at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
Published: October 16, 1989
CAMBRIDGE, Mass.— History has valuable lessons to teach policy makers but it reveals its lessons only grudgingly.
Close analyses of the facts and their relevance is required lest policy makers fall victim to the persuasive power of false analogies and are misled into imprudent judgments. Just such a danger is posed by those who casually invoke the ''lessons of Prohibition'' to argue for the legalization of drugs.
What everyone ''knows'' about Prohibition is that it was a failure. It did not eliminate drinking; it did create a black market. That in turn spawned criminal syndicates and random violence. Corruption and widespread disrespect for law were incubated and, most tellingly, Prohibition was repealed only 14 years after it was enshrined in the Constitution.
The lesson drawn by commentators is that it is fruitless to allow moralists to use criminal law to control intoxicating substances. Many now say it is equally unwise to rely on the law to solve the nation's drug problem.
But the conventional view of Prohibition is not supported by the facts.
First, the regime created in 1919 by the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act, which charged the Treasury Department with enforcement of the new restrictions, was far from all-embracing. The amendment prohibited the commercial manufacture and distribution of alcoholic beverages; it did not prohibit use, nor production for one's own consumption. Moreover, the provisions did not take effect until a year after passage -plenty of time for people to stockpile supplies.
Second, alcohol consumption declined dramatically during Prohibition. Cirrhosis death rates for men were 29.5 per 100,000 in 1911 and 10.7 in 1929. Admissions to state mental hospitals for alcoholic psychosis declined from 10.1 per 100,000 in 1919 to 4.7 in 1928.
Arrests for public drunkennness and disorderly conduct declined 50 percent between 1916 and 1922. For the population as a whole, the best estimates are that consumption of alcohol declined by 30 percent to 50 percent.
Third, violent crime did not increase dramatically during Prohibition. Homicide rates rose dramatically from 1900 to 1910 but remained roughly constant during Prohibition's 14 year rule. Organized crime may have become more visible and lurid during Prohibition, but it existed before and after.
Fourth, following the repeal of Prohibition, alcohol consumption increased. Today, alcohol is estimated to be the cause of more than 23,000 motor vehicle deaths and is implicated in more than half of the nation's 20,000 homicides. In contrast, drugs have not yet been persuasively linked to highway fatalities and are believed to account for 10 percent to 20 percent of homicides.
Prohibition did not end alcohol use. What is remarkable, however, is that a relatively narrow political movement, relying on a relatively weak set of statutes, succeeded in reducing, by one-third, the consumption of a drug that had wide historical and popular sanction.
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/10/16/opinion/actually-prohibition-was-a-success.html
A statement was made that Prohibition didn't work. Facts were shown that it did. I will agree that our cultural more's are much different today then they were back then (our society is a moral sewer), but facts are facts.
Quote: Originally posted by aCultureWarrior
I don't believe that I've ever read a post by a Libertarian such as yourself where the term "victimless crime" wasn't used. This is a first.
This is the second derogatory remark you have made with absolutely no grounding and shows how poorly your mind is functioning given the commandments of this site. HOWEVER it made me laugh so much I do have to thank you
This place is overflowing with Libertarians. Funny thing is, none of them will stand up and defend their Godless secular humanist doctrine.
Would you care to at least attempt to defend it?
I would be concerned if you didn't think so. As you learned, the long-term effects of Prohibition was a 30 percent decrease in alcohol consumption, wide-spread violation of the law, and the rise of organized crime in America. If you think that "works" then I don't want you to think I'm thinking well. And you have a good one too, hear? |
ok doser
lifeguard at the cement pond
stop being a retard and go back and read my post
in the above, that refers to the original purpose of prohibition, the need to control the rampant alcoholism and social disruption resulting, especially among the poor in the urban centers
nowhere there did i say it was successful in totally eliminating alcohol consumption
and i addressed the unintended consequences, something you might have noticed if you weren't such a retard
Saxon Hammer
New member
Many thanks I am sorry that I could not read this before making my reply and thank you for your patience
The real problem is that human beings will take substances for whatever ails them. In the case of the legal drug alcohol which can be made by anyone at home with little in terms of investment vs cost of buying a supply. Indeed it is made in our UK prisons according to at least two previous inmates that I have known.
So there must be reasons for the population as a whole to feel the need for a substance to relieve their ills and because of the fact that it was legal and easily accessible alcohol was their choice at the time.
Prohibition made it dangerous to produce alcohol to share with others so instead it was sold only by strong (in some way) people and where there is profit there is crime (at least the temptation is very high).
This is the situation with all substances classed as dangerous in society right now that may be better replacements to alcohol.
Why would I feel the need to defend myself against name calling?
If you ask specific questions I will respond as best as I am able HOWEVER I do not accept your label.
What ails them is a spiritually empty life.
I have to admit, calling someone a Libertarian is pretty low isn't it?