H4089, Drugs in the Americas
Paper #1
Due: 10/07/14
The American dream, that is to achieve success financially, has become an engraved necessity in today’s society. From the very beginning of our life, we are taught to go to excel in our academics, find a well paying job, purchase the little white house with the picket fence, and start our own family. However, what happens if you grow up in a lifestyle where you're unable to achieve these goals? Today, many grow up in less fortunate, negligent communities and families. As a result, ambition and hope of the American dream is lost and many find themselves lost in the drug world. As a consequence, our society at whole has responded to this drug dependency possessing; addiction, disease, and higher crime than ever before. Acknowledging this growing problem, our government has created and put billions of dollars into The War on Drugs policy. However, despite the great deal of efforts and money spent to put drug users and sellers to a halt , America still cannot shake the drug crisis. In this paper, I will discuss why the Drug War policy is doomed for constant cycle of failure, why it’s failing, and what must be done to successfully to free our society from possible gloom.
How is it possible that America, the strongest country in the world, cannot rid the use and sale of illegal drugs? First, we must take a look at what their policy includes. The Drug Wars’ “primary aim is to prohibit supply, so that Americans cannot find or cannot afford drugs to use; its secondary aim is to discourage those who do consume drugs, mainly by penalizing them,” (Bertram, pg. 3.) Still, with this policy and its lack of achievement, we deny any true change. “Despite a decline in casual drug use since the late 1970’s, and despite the billions of dollars spent to fight the drug war, the number of people suffering drug use or addiction, the level of violent drug-related crime, and the spread of diseases linked to drug