2.7.5 Drugs in the Nordic countries
Description
This article is from the Nordic countries FAQ, by Antti Lahelma and Johan Olofsson, with numerous contributions by others.
2.7.5 Drugs in the Nordic countries
This is a controversial theme, which maybe can be illustrated by the
following quotes from the news group:
[ Stein J. Rypern writes: ]
At least Norwegian culture is pretty clear on this - drugs are out.
Alcohol and nicotine are allowed, but with some restrictions:
* advertising for either alcohol or cigarettes are prohibited
* there are hefty "sin taxes" on both products,
* there is a law against smoking in many public places
* spirits, wine and beer in tax group 3 (with more than about 4.5%
alcohol per volume unit) is only sold in the government monopoly
shops (and licensed bars and restaurants, of course).
Norway is culturally a part of the "vodka belt", where occasional
drinking yourself into a stupor at parties is socially acceptable, but
not really done all that much by people who are above the age of 20.
There is a fairly strong taboo against drinking and driving. It still
happens, of course - but most people have the sense to park the car
and take a cab home or arrange for one person to stay sober and drive
the others home when they have been drinking.
What has all this got to do with drugs? Not a lot, I guess :-)
Drugs just aren't socially acceptable. Might be part of the
puritanical heritage of Norwegians; might be common sense - we know
how to deal with drinking (we drink, get drunk, fall down, no problem
:-), but not with using drugs. Several decades of good propaganda work
by the health authorities have also firmly fixed the idea that
"smoking marihuana leads to the use of heavier drugs" in our minds. It
may or may not be true - I don't much care either way - I see no need
for people to use drugs when we have the time-honored way of getting
blasted - alcohol. :-)
I guess people also see using drugs as something done by junkies and
prostitutes and people who are down and out. There are no role models
who advocate the use of drugs.
I accept my neighbor's right to meddle in my decisions when what I do
affect him. When I expect him to pay my medical bills (through taxes)
if I need surgery or when I drive my car down the street where his
kids go to school after drinking or using drugs. In those cases it is
not just my personal choice, it is also my neighbors problem. Most
Norwegians seem to be somewhat more inclined toward the common good
than individual freedom.
The "relaxed" attitudes of the Scandinavian countries are mostly an US
myth, I suspect. Just because we don't have all your hang-ups about
sex and don't pay lip service to "godliness" doesn't mean that
anything goes over here :-)
Coffee, loud music, fat food, skiing slopes too steep for you - all
these things might cause some kind of damage to your health. It is
neither desirable nor practical to try to ban everything that "is bad
for you". I am willing to accept some risks.
After all - life is dangerous - must be close to a 100% fatality rate,
eh?
;-)
Keeping drugs banned is practical politics as long as the number of
drug (ab)users is fairly limited. Politics is doing what we believe is
right, within the confines of what is possible in the real world.
I don't think you can cure most drug addicts from their addiction. I
would prefer to spend whatever resources we can afford to spend on
preventing or actively hindering people from being recruited into drug
addiction. Based on the principle "one stitch in time saves nine".
Prevention tend to be less expensive both in terms of money and human
suffering than trying to cure an existing condition. I don't know what
is the cheapest alternative. I believe that it is that as few people
as possible use drugs. I also believe that making drugs illegal, hard
to get and as expensive as possible will make fewer people start doing
drugs. I draw my line between smoking /drinking on one side and doing
drugs on the other side. For practical reasons - it is a line I
believe can be enforced.
[ Mikko Hakala <hakala@cermav.grenet.fr> writes: ]
The situation also varies from country to country. Denmark is most
tolerable, and in contrast, Sweden's attitude towards drugs has become
something close to paranoia, planning to criminalize even
prostitution. I feel that since Palme's murder Sweden hasn't been the
country it used to be. As if the nation had lost her faith in
tomorrow.
Norway and Finland are somewhere between. Probably more close to
Sweden than Denmark. Most Scandinavians don't come personally in touch
with drugs. They see drugs only in (American) movies. Therefore the
Nordic sense of reality hasn't become part of their drug-policy.
If one is caught in Finland with, say, with 2 grams of hash, there
won't be any prosecution. BUT the considering, which takes one minute
for a policeman in the streets of Helsinki, may take several days for
a rural police chief in Kajaani. - Meanwhile the "criminal" stays in
custody!
[ From: Anders Nordseth <anders.nordseth@sn.no> ]
In Copenhagen, Denmark, they also sell cannabis in the open, in the
so-called Pusher Street in Christiania. There they have sale-stands
where they sell hashish, and the police bothers only once in a while.
I would agree that Norway and Finland are closer to Sweden than
Denmark. For smuggling cannabis products in larger amounts you might
in Norway risk 21 years in prison, which is the highest sentences one
can get in Norway (the same as homicide).
Recently, a person from Denmark was caught smuggling 30 kg of hashish
from Denmark to Norway. He escaped from Norway and went back to
Denmark. The Norwegian authorities wanted to seek extradition for him,
but the Danish authorities didn't look at the crime as serious enough,
so they didn't extradite him. He is a free man in Denmark, in Norway
he would have been a "very dangerous criminal".
Possessing smaller amounts of cannabis, is not that serious. In the
bigger cities (like Oslo) you would usually get a fine, in smaller
places in Norway you might risk some days in prison.
The crimes involved with drugs are caused by drug addicts who need
money to finance their use of drugs. If it wasn't prohibited, the
price would not have been as high, and they wouldn't have to resort to
theft, prostitution or robbery to finance their drug use.
Use of alcohol leads to violent behavior more often than the use of
drugs. A stoned person is quite harmless. I've been driving cab in
Oslo for several years on weekend nights while studying. Drug addicts
or stoned people have never caused me any problems, drunk people have
very often caused me problems.
It's a dilemma, what problems should we choose? My opinion is that it
would be a more fair distribution of the problems if we legalize
drugs. Today a lot of innocent people suffer for the criminal acts
done by drug-addicts hunting for money. By legalizing drugs, more
people will probably have personal problems, but less innocent people
will have problems caused by drug-use. And remember, everyone has that
choice to "Just say no". It might be a cynical view, but freedom has
its costs.
[ From: Nils Ek <armn033@cmc.doe.ca> ]
The serious health risks imposed by cannabis, cocaine, heroin, etc.
have been well established (at least to the satisfaction of most
educated people) by responsible medical groups. In Scandinavia, those
who abuse their bodies with alcohol and/or drugs are entitled to
publicly-funded health-care. So perhaps it's no wonder that the
governments decide they'd rather not put up with the medical as well
as social costs of de-criminalized intoxicant drugs. Of course these
arguments and conclusions have been vehemently denied by the addicts
(or counter-culture drug proponents, if you will).
Rather than tolerance, the issue may be one of: whom do you believe?
The Nordics probably have more respect for their medical community
than elsewhere, e.g. compared to U.S. where it's perceived as
"big-business". Meanwhile the counter-culture types typically believe
they have tapped into some ancient secrets of the orient. However, I
believe that for many people, this has to be a turn-off because of the
use in oriental "natural" medicine of bears' gall-bladders, tiger
penises, and rhino horns. Perhaps this is why pro-drug arguments of
(American) counter-culture seem to have less of a foothold there.
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