advantages of war on drugs essay

9 Important Pros and Cons of the War on Drugs

Drug trafficking is a global problem, an illicit trade that involves the manufacture, cultivation, distribution and sale of prohibited substances. While every nation in the world works hard to fight against drugs, drug trade is still a booming business. The dynamics of drug trafficking is simply incredible in the sense that consumption and distribution continues to rise even with continuous efforts to curb drug-related crimes and offenses.

War On Drugs Overview

In a bid to reduce the illegal drug trade, a campaign of drug prohibition, military intervention, and military aid was established. It includes effective drug policies that are designed to discourage distribution, consumption, and production of psychoactive drugs that were made illegal by the UN and participating governments.

While declaring war on drugs seems to be logical, opponents think it might be a waste of time and resources. Some claim that criminal acts are a consequence of drugs being declared illegal. Because people can’t acquire these substances through official channels, they will resort to illegal production, distribution and consumption.

List of Pros of War on Drugs

1. Deter or lessen drug-related crimes. When drug addicts will not have easy access to illegal substances, they will not experience the highs or hallucinations that will drive them to commit crimes. They wouldn’t need to steal either so they can buy drugs. Put simply, without the pushers there will be little to no users.

2. Culprits will be penalized Included in the policies of war on drugs is the penalty that will be afforded to manufacturers, distributors and users of illegal drugs. The level of punishment that will be imposed depends on the gravity of the crime. Knowing that there are consequences to be paid will make people think twice before embroiling in any stage of the illegal drug trade.

3. Helps create a place that is drug free A drug-free area or community may seem impossible given the present situation, but it is achievable as long as everyone does their share in the fight against drugs. War on drugs should not only involve the government and local authorities, but also friends and family of drug users or sellers.

List of Cons of War on Drugs

1. Widespread corruption Watch any drug-related movies and you’ll see that the people who introduced and imposed the war on drugs are the same people who could be peddling the illegal substances. Political analyst also see a projected increase in corruption within the government because of the funds that will be allocated to control drug abuse. What are the odds that these funds will be used for personal gain?

2. Provides a smokescreen to hide the real problem behind drug abuse A majority of the population that are easily lured into drug dealing are those within and below the poverty line. People who have no hope of achieving very much because of their circumstances would resort to drug dealing where knowledge and skills are not required in their resume. They also see it as a way to make something of themselves, and to have the resources to fund their own drug habits. Would it not be better when the billions allocated for anti-drug campaigns are used to help improve the lives of these individual? For the last 40 years, an estimated $1 trillion was funneled to the war on drugs. Taxpayers are paying big for a war that is showing no signs of being victorious any time soon. In fact, the flow of drugs into the United States are increasing year after year.

Perhaps everyone would turn out to be good citizens if they are provided with all the basic necessities to help them achieve their dreams. Viewed this way, the war on drugs is nothing more than a nasty and vindictive smoke screen.

3. Increases risk on the lives of policeman and military Missions against drug lords is no joke, considering that they too have their own army that has no care about the lives that will be lost during a shootout or drug bust operation. What do policemen have against assassins and mercenaries? Not to belittle the skills and capacity of law enforcement, but a mission against drug pushers and manufacturers are increasingly worse. The safety risks on the lives of many policemen are also very high. Friends and family of these brave men and women would be very unhappy if something happened to them.

4. Increase racial tension The soaring arrest because of the war on drugs disproportionately targeted African Americans, according to the Human Rights Watch. From 1995 through 2000, the US Department of Justice reported that’s arrest for drug offenses rose by 126%, which also “accounted for 27% of the total growth among black inmates, 7% the total growth among Hispanic inmates, and 15% of the growth among white inmates”. In 2008, the Washington Post also reported that one in five black Americans are behind bars because of drug-related laws.

5. Disparity on sentencing Opponents complain that sentencing in drug-related crimes have major flaws. There is a huge problem in the sentencing between possessions or trafficking of powder cocaine and crack. For example, those convicted for possession of 5 grams of crack and those in possession of 500 grams of powder cocaine basically have the same punishment – minimum mandatory sentence of being incarcerated in a federal prison for 5 years. Judging from the differences of the drugs in question, sentencing is definitely unfair.

Moreover, the ruling is perceived as discriminatory against minorities, because blacks, Hispanics and other races are likely to use crack than cocaine. Does this mean that white people go free for as long as they are not in possession of 500 grams of coke?

6. Never-ending chain reaction One man incarcerated for drug abuse or drug-related crimes is likely to have children who are growing up without a father. Statistics show how this can have a bad effect on the little ones. If they are in the same situation as their father before them, they could end up drug users or sellers as well, whichever comes first. So the cycle just goes on and on. It will be a never-ending ride of history repeating itself.

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The War On Drugs: 50 Years Later

After 50 years of the war on drugs, 'what good is it doing for us'.

During the War on Drugs, the Brownsville neighborhood in New York City saw some of the highest rates of incarceration in the U.S., as Black and Hispanic men were sent to prison for lengthy prison sentences, often for low-level, nonviolent drug crimes. Spencer Platt/Getty Images hide caption

During the War on Drugs, the Brownsville neighborhood in New York City saw some of the highest rates of incarceration in the U.S., as Black and Hispanic men were sent to prison for lengthy prison sentences, often for low-level, nonviolent drug crimes.

When Aaron Hinton walked through the housing project in Brownsville on a recent summer afternoon, he voiced love and pride for this tightknit, but troubled working-class neighborhood in New York City where he grew up.

He pointed to a community garden, the lush plots of vegetables and flowers tended by volunteers, and to the library where he has led after-school programs for kids.

But he also expressed deep rage and sorrow over the scars left by the nation's 50-year-long War on Drugs. "What good is it doing for us?" Hinton asked.

Revisiting Two Cities At The Front Line Of The War On Drugs

Critics Say Chauvin Defense 'Weaponized' Stigma For Black Americans With Addiction

As the United States' harsh approach to drug use and addiction hits the half-century milestone, this question is being asked by a growing number of lawmakers, public health experts and community leaders.

In many parts of the U.S., some of the most severe policies implemented during the drug war are being scaled back or scrapped altogether.

Hinton, a 37-year-old community organizer and activist, said the reckoning is long overdue. He described watching Black men like himself get caught up in drugs year after year and swept into the nation's burgeoning prison system.

"They're spending so much money on these prisons to keep kids locked up," Hinton said, shaking his head. "They don't even spend a fraction of that money sending them to college or some kind of school."

Aaron Hinton, a 37-year-old veteran activist and community organizer, said it's clear Brownsville needed help coping with the cocaine, heroin and other drug-related crime that took root here in the 1970s and 1980s. His own family was devastated by addiction. Brian Mann hide caption

Aaron Hinton, a 37-year-old veteran activist and community organizer, said it's clear Brownsville needed help coping with the cocaine, heroin and other drug-related crime that took root here in the 1970s and 1980s. His own family was devastated by addiction.

Hinton has lived his whole life under the drug war. He said Brownsville needed help coping with cocaine, heroin and drug-related crime that took root here in the 1970s and 1980s.

His own family was scarred by addiction.

"I've known my mom to be a drug user my whole entire life," Hinton said. "She chose to run the streets and left me with my great-grandmother."

Four years ago, his mom overdosed and died after taking prescription painkillers, part of the opioid epidemic that has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans.

Hinton said her death sealed his belief that tough drug war policies and aggressive police tactics would never make his family or his community safer.

The nation pivots (slowly) as evidence mounts against the drug war

During months of interviews for this project, NPR found a growing consensus across the political spectrum — including among some in law enforcement — that the drug war simply didn't work.

"We have been involved in the failed War on Drugs for so very long," said retired Maj. Neill Franklin, a veteran with the Baltimore City Police and the Maryland State Police who led drug task forces for years.

He now believes the response to drugs should be handled by doctors and therapists, not cops and prison guards. "It does not belong in our wheelhouse," Franklin said during a press conference this week.

Aaron Hinton has lived his whole life under the drug war. He has watched many Black men like himself get caught up in drugs year after year, swept into the nation's criminal justice system. Brian Mann/NPR hide caption

Aaron Hinton has lived his whole life under the drug war. He has watched many Black men like himself get caught up in drugs year after year, swept into the nation's criminal justice system.

Some prosecutors have also condemned the drug war model, describing it as ineffective and racially biased.

"Over the last 50 years, we've unfortunately seen the 'War on Drugs' be used as an excuse to declare war on people of color, on poor Americans and so many other marginalized groups," said New York Attorney General Letitia James in a statement sent to NPR.

On Tuesday, two House Democrats introduced legislation that would decriminalize all drugs in the U.S., shifting the national response to a public health model. The measure appears to have zero chance of passage.

But in much of the country, disillusionment with the drug war has already led to repeal of some of the most punitive policies, including mandatory lengthy prison sentences for nonviolent drug users.

In recent years, voters and politicians in 17 states — including red-leaning Alaska and Montana — and the District of Columbia have backed the legalization of recreational marijuana , the most popular illicit drug, a trend that once seemed impossible.

Last November, Oregon became the first state to decriminalize small quantities of all drugs , including heroin and methamphetamines.

Many critics say the course correction is too modest and too slow.

"The war on drugs was an absolute miscalculation of human behavior," said Kassandra Frederique, who heads the Drug Policy Alliance, a national group that advocates for total drug decriminalization.

She said the criminal justice model failed to address the underlying need for jobs, health care and safe housing that spur addiction.

Indeed, much of the drug war's architecture remains intact. Federal spending on drugs — much of it devoted to interdiction — is expected to top $37 billion this year.

The Coronavirus Crisis

Drug overdose deaths spiked to 88,000 during the pandemic, white house says.

The U.S. still incarcerates more people than any other nation, with nearly half of the inmates in federal prison held on drug charges .

But the nation has seen a significant decline in state and federal inmate populations, down by a quarter from the peak of 1.6 million in 2009 to roughly 1.2 million last year .

There has also been substantial growth in public funding for health care and treatment for people who use drugs, due in large part to passage of the Affordable Care Act .

"The best outcomes come when you treat the substance use disorder [as a medical condition] as opposed to criminalizing that person and putting them in jail or prison," said Dr. Nora Volkow, who has been head of the National Institute of Drug Abuse since 2003.

Volkow said data shows clearly that the decision half a century ago to punish Americans who struggle with addiction was "devastating ... not just to them but actually to their families."

From a bipartisan War on Drugs to Black Lives Matter

Wounds left by the drug war go far beyond the roughly 20.3 million people who have a substance use disorder .

The campaign — which by some estimates cost more than $1 trillion — also exacerbated racial divisions and infringed on civil liberties in ways that transformed American society.

Frederique, with the Drug Policy Alliance, said the Black Lives Matter movement was inspired in part by cases that revealed a dangerous attitude toward drugs among police.

In Derek Chauvin's murder trial, the former officer's defense claimed aggressive police tactics were justified because of small amounts of fentanyl in George Floyd's body. Critics described the argument as an attempt to "weaponize" Floyd's substance use disorder and jurors found Chauvin guilty.

Breonna Taylor, meanwhile, was shot and killed by police in her home during a drug raid . She wasn't a suspect in the case.

"We need to end the drug war not just for our loved ones that are struggling with addiction, but we need to remove the excuse that that is why law enforcement gets to invade our space ... or kill us," Frederique said.

The United States has waged aggressive campaigns against substance use before, most notably during alcohol Prohibition in the 1920s and 1930s.

The modern drug war began with a symbolic address to the nation by President Richard Nixon on June 17, 1971.

Speaking from the White House, Nixon declared the federal government would now treat drug addiction as "public enemy No. 1," suggesting substance use might be vanquished once and for all.

"In order to fight and defeat this enemy," Nixon said, "it is necessary to wage a new all-out offensive."

President Richard Nixon's speech on June 17, 1971, marked the symbolic start of the modern drug war. In the decades that followed Democrats and Republicans embraced ever-tougher laws penalizing people with addiction.

Studies show from the outset drug laws were implemented with a stark racial bias , leading to unprecedented levels of mass incarceration for Black and brown men .

As recently as 2018, Black men were nearly six times more likely than white men to be locked up in state or federal correctional facilities, according to the U.S. Justice Department .

Researchers have long concluded the pattern has far-reaching impacts on Black families, making it harder to find employment and housing, while also preventing many people of color with drug records from voting .

In a 1994 interview published in Harper's Magazine , Nixon adviser John Ehrlichman suggested racial animus was among the motives shaping the drug war.

"We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the [Vietnam] War or Black," Ehrlichman said. "But by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and Blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities."

Despite those concerns, Democrats and Republicans partnered on the drug war decade after decade, approving ever-more-severe laws, creating new state and federal bureaucracies to interdict drugs, and funding new armies of police and federal agents.

At times, the fight on America's streets resembled an actual war, especially in poor communities and communities of color.

Police units carried out drug raids with military-style hardware that included body armor, assault weapons and tanks equipped with battering rams.

President Richard Nixon explaining aspects of the special message sent to the Congress on June 17, 1971, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency." Harvey Georges/AP hide caption

President Richard Nixon explaining aspects of the special message sent to the Congress on June 17, 1971, asking for an extra $155 million for a new program to combat the use of drugs. He labeled drug abuse "a national emergency."

"What we need is another D-Day, not another Vietnam, not another limited war fought on the cheap," declared then-Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., in 1989.

Biden, who chaired the influential Senate Judiciary Committee, later co-authored the controversial 1994 crime bill that helped fund a vast new complex of state and federal prisons, which remains the largest in the world.

On the campaign trail in 2020, Biden stopped short of repudiating his past drug policy ideas but said he now believes no American should be incarcerated for addiction. He also endorsed national decriminalization of marijuana.

While few policy experts believe the drug war will come to a conclusive end any time soon, the end of bipartisan backing for punitive drug laws is a significant development.

More drugs bring more deaths and more doubts

Adding to pressure for change is the fact that despite a half-century of interdiction, America's streets are flooded with more potent and dangerous drugs than ever before — primarily methamphetamines and the synthetic opioid fentanyl.

"Back in the day, when we would see 5, 10 kilograms of meth, that would make you a hero if you made a seizure like that," said Matthew Donahue, the head of operations at the Drug Enforcement Administration.

As U.S. Corporations Face Reckoning Over Prescription Opioids, CEOs Keep Cashing In

"Now it's common for us to see 100-, 200- and 300-kilogram seizures of meth," he added. "It doesn't make a dent to the price."

Efforts to disrupt illegal drug supplies suffered yet another major blow last year after Mexican officials repudiated drug war tactics and began blocking most interdiction efforts south of the U.S.-Mexico border.

"It's a national health threat, it's a national safety threat," Donahue told NPR.

Last year, drug overdoses hit a devastating new record of 90,000 deaths , according to preliminary data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The drug war failed to stop the opioid epidemic

Critics say the effectiveness of the drug war model has been called into question for another reason: the nation's prescription opioid epidemic.

Beginning in the late 1990s, some of the nation's largest drug companies and pharmacy chains invested heavily in the opioid business.

State and federal regulators and law enforcement failed to intervene as communities were flooded with legally manufactured painkillers, including Oxycontin.

"They were utterly failing to take into account diversion," said West Virginia Republican Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, who sued the DEA for not curbing opioid production quotas sooner.

"It's as close to a criminal act as you can find," Morrisey said.

Courtney Hessler, a reporter for The (Huntington) Herald-Dispatch in West Virgina, has covered the opioid epidemic. As a child she wound up in foster care after her mother became addicted to opioids. "You know there's thousands of children that grew up the way that I did. These people want answers," Hessler told NPR. Brian Mann/NPR hide caption

Courtney Hessler, a reporter for The (Huntington) Herald-Dispatch in West Virgina, has covered the opioid epidemic. As a child she wound up in foster care after her mother became addicted to opioids. "You know there's thousands of children that grew up the way that I did. These people want answers," Hessler told NPR.

One of the epicenters of the prescription opioid epidemic was Huntington, a small city in West Virginia along the Ohio River hit hard by the loss of factory and coal jobs.

"It was pretty bad. Eighty-one million opioid pills over an eight-year period came into this area," said Courtney Hessler, a reporter with The (Huntington) Herald-Dispatch.

Public health officials say 1 in 10 residents in the area still battle addiction. Hessler herself wound up in foster care after her mother struggled with opioids.

In recent months, she has reported on a landmark opioid trial that will test who — if anyone — will be held accountable for drug policies that failed to keep families and communities safe.

"I think it's important. You know there's thousands of children that grew up the way that I did," Hessler said. "These people want answers."

A needle disposal box at the Cabell-Huntington Health Department sits in the front parking lot in 2019 in Huntington, W.Va. The city is experiencing a surge in HIV cases related to intravenous drug use following a recent opioid crisis in the state. Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post via Getty Images hide caption

A needle disposal box at the Cabell-Huntington Health Department sits in the front parking lot in 2019 in Huntington, W.Va. The city is experiencing a surge in HIV cases related to intravenous drug use following a recent opioid crisis in the state.

During dozens of interviews, community leaders told NPR that places like Huntington, W.Va., and Brownsville, N.Y., will recover from the drug war and rebuild.

They predicted many parts of the country will accelerate the shift toward a public health model for addiction: treating drug users more often like patients with a chronic illness and less often as criminals.

But ending wars is hard and stigma surrounding drug use, heightened by a half-century of punitive policies, remains deeply entrenched. Aaron Hinton, the activist in Brownsville, said it may take decades to unwind the harm done to his neighborhood.

"It's one step forward, two steps back," Hinton said. "But I remain hopeful. Why? Because what else am I going to do?"

• opioid epidemic
• public health
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The War on Drugs, Essay Example

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The “Drug War” should be waged even more vigorously and is a valid policy; government should tell adults what they can or cannot ingest. This paper argues for the position that the United States government should ramp up its efforts to fight the war on drugs.  Drug trafficking adversely affects the nation’s economy, and increases crime.  The increase in crime necessitates a need for more boots on the ground in preventing illegal drugs from entering this country.  Both police and border patrol agents are on the frontline on the battle against the war on drugs.  The war on drugs is a valid policy because it is the government’s responsibility to protect its citizens.  Citizens who are addicted to drugs are less likely to contribute to society in an economic manner, and many end up on government assistance programs and engage in crimes.

Introduction

This paper argues that The War on Drugs is a valid policy, and that government has a right, perhaps even a duty to protect citizens from hurting themselves and others.  Fighting drug use is an integral part of the criminal justice system.  Special taskforces have been created to combat the influx of illegal drugs into the United States. The cost of paying police and border control agents is just the beginning of the equation.  Obviously, the detriment to the US economy is tremendous.  But the emotional stress on the friends and family of the drug user represent the human cost of illegal drugs.  Families are literally torn apart by this phenomen.

(1). The cost of police resources to fight the drug war is exorbitant, but necessary .  In order for a war against drugs to be successful, federal, local and state authorities must make sure that there a plenty of drug enforcement officers to make the appropriate arrests.  This means that drug enforcement officers must be provided with the latest equipment, including technology to detect illegal drugs (Benson).  The cost of providing all the necessary equipment to border patrol agents and the policemen and policemen on the frontlines is well justified.  It is necessary to have a budget that will ensure that drug enforcers have everything they need to combat illegal drugs at their disposal.

(2). The government has the responsibility to protect its citizens.   If a substance is illegal, it should be hunted down by law enforcement authorities and destroyed.  The drug user is a victim of society who needs help turning his or her life around.  Without a proper drug policy in effect, the drug user will continue to purchase drugs without the fear of criminal punishment.  That is why the drug war is appropriate.  The government has a right to tell citizens what it cannot ingest, particularly substances that when ingested can cause severe harm to the individual.  This harm may take on the form of addiction.  Once a person is addicted to drugs, the government has treatment programs to help him or her get off drugs.  The economic cost of preventing illegal drugs from getting into the wrong hands, and the cost of drug treatment is worth the financial resources expended because people who are not addicted to drugs are more involved in society and in life in general (Belenko).

(3). Anti-drug policies tend to make citizens act responsibly .  Adult drug users must understand that what they are doing is negatively impacting society.  Purchasing illegal drugs drains the nation’s economy.  These users have probably been in and out of drug rehabilitation programs many times with little to no success.  These drug programs are run by either the federal, state, or local governments (Lynch).   Each failed incident of a patient going back to the world of drugs costs the taxpayers money.  Once the drug user is totally rehabbed, he or she will realize the drag that he or she has been on society.  Therefore, the drug treatment centers are a way to teach adults how to be more responsible.

(4). Drug regulation in the United States has an effect on the international community.  America’s image to the rest of the world is at stake.  If America cannot control its borders, rogue leaders of other countries will think that America is soft on drugs.  This in turn makes America’s leaders look weak (Daemmrich).  Border patrol agents on the United States-Mexican border represent the best that America has to offer in preventing illegal drugs from entering the United States.  It is imperative that part of the drug policy of the United States provides enough financial resources for the agents to do their job.  The international community must see a strong front from the United States against illegal drugs.  Anything less is a sign of weakness in the eyes of international leaders, including our allies.

(5). Women are disproportionately affected by illegal drug use and therefore neglect their children.   As emotional beings, women have to contend with many issues that evade men (Gaskins).  The woman’s primary responsibility is to her children.  If a woman is a drug user, her children will be neglected.  Most of the children end up becoming wards of the state.  Having to cloth and feed children places a major burden on organizations that take these children of addicts in.  A drug addict cannot take care of herself, and she certainly cannot take care of her children.  Both the woman and her children will become dependent on the government for food and shelter.  This person is not a productive member of society.  Increased prison sentences may seem harsh for women with children, but these sentences may serve as deterrence from using drugs.

(6 ). If students know that the criminal penalty is severe, it may serve as a deterrent to drug related crimes.   Educating students, while they are still in school about the harmful effects and consequences of using drugs is imperative in fighting the drug war.  However, many students may tune out the normal talk about how drugs affect them physically.  The key to effectively making the point to students that illegal drug use is wrong is to present them with the consequences of having a felony drug conviction on their record (Reynolds). In fact, having a criminal record is bad enough without the felony drug conviction.  Students should know that such a record can prevent them from obtaining employment in the future.  It should be stressed that many companies will not hire anyone with a criminal record, especially if the conviction was related to illegal drugs.  The threat of extensive incarceration should also deter students from using illegal drugs or participating in drug related activities.

(7). Parents who use drugs in front of their children are bad influences and contribute to the delinquency of the minor.    Children are extremely impressionable, and starting to use drugs at a young age can be devastating to their future.  The government fights the drug war to protect law abiding citizens, and to punish criminals.  People who use illicit drugs are criminals, and parents who influence their children by introducing and approving of their drug use need to suffer severe penalties under the law (Lynch).  It is more than likely that the parents that use drugs have been incarcerated at one time or the other.  This incarceration may be drug related.  Children see their parents go in and out of jail, so that becomes their “normal.” Thus you have generational incarcerations which are an expense to prison sector and taxpayers.  The government is right in ramping up the penalties on drug use in front of children.

(8). People who use drugs are likely to drive under the influence which has all sorts of possible negative outcomes. There are so many consequences resulting from illegal drug use that they are too numerous to list.  One of the “unspoken” consequences is driving under the influence.  The entire population has made a concerted effort to curtail drinking and driving, and the deaths from alcohol related traffic accidents gave gone down significantly since strict laws have been put in place.  The government needs to find a way to crack down on drivers who are under the influence of illegal drugs (Belenko).  Drivers must be clear headed and focused to driver responsibly.  The government should get harsher, and find a way to test (as in the breathalyzer for alcohol) for marijuana.  The government has been successful in keeping the number of drunken drivers down.  However, many drivers are still legally able to pass a breathalyzer test if they are smoking marijuana, or using other drugs.  Accidents can still happen regardless of what drug the driver is under the influence of.  The government must find a way to crack down on these drivers who think that they are beating the system.

If the United States wants to get serious on the war on drugs, it should wage the war more vigorously.  Although the war on drugs is a valid policy, it needs to receive more attention and financial resources from the Federal government.  Preventing illegal drugs from crossing our borders is costly, but highly effective if there are plenty of border patrol agents on the United States-Mexican border.  This is the main avenue by which illegal drugs make it into the United States.  The argument that the government has the right to tell citizens what they can ingest is correct.  This is because it is the government’s responsibility to protect its citizens.  Keeping people off of drugs makes for productive citizens who contribute to building a drug free society.

Works Cited

Belenko, Steven R., ed. Drugs and Drug Policy in America: A Documentary History. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2000. Questia. Web. 2 Nov. 2012.

Benson, Bruce L., Ian Sebastian Leburn, and David W. Rasmussen. “The Impact of Drug Enforcement on Crime: An Investigation of the Opportunity Cost of Police Resources.” Journal of Drug Issues 31.4 (2001): 989+. Questia. Web. 2 Nov. 2012.

Daemmrich, Arthur A. Pharmacopolitics: Drug Regulation in the United States and Germany. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina, 2004. Questia. Web. 2 Nov. 2012.

Gaskins, Shimica. “”Women of Circumstance”-The Effects of Mandatory Minimum Sentencing on Women Minimally Involved in Drug Crimes.” American Criminal Law Review 41.4 (2004): 1533+. Questia. Web. 2 Nov. 2012.

Lynch, Timothy, ed. After Prohibition: An Adult Approach to Drug Policies in the 21st Century. Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2000. Questia. Web. 2 Nov. 2012.

Reynolds, Marylee. “Educating Students about the War on Drugs: Criminal and Civil Consequences of a Felony Drug Conviction.” Women’s Studies Quarterly 32.3/4 (2004): 246+. Questia. Web. 2 Nov. 2012.

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Drugs and Thugs: The History and Future of America's War on Drugs

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How can the United States chart a path forward in the war on drugs? This book uncovers the full history of this war that has lasted more than a century. The book provides an essential view of the economic, political, and human impacts of U.S. drug policies. It takes readers from Afghanistan to Colombia, to Peru and Mexico, to Miami International Airport and the border crossing between El Paso and Juarez to trace the complex social networks that make up the drug trade and drug consumption. Through historically driven stories, the book reveals how the war on drugs has evolved to address mass incarceration, the opioid epidemic, the legalization and medical use of marijuana, and America's shifting foreign policy.

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Dissonant Narratives of the Philippine War on Drugs

by Filomin C. Gutierrez

June 26, 2020

When Rodrigo Duterte assumed the presidency in the Philippines in July 2016, a war on drugs was immediately cascaded into Philippine communities. This campaign saw members of the Philippine National Police coaxing drug users to voluntarily surrender and pledge to cease the habit, with over a million “drug personalities” surrendering just six months into Duterte’s administration. The anti-drug campaign was popularly known as Oplan Tokhang, a portmanteau term for toktok and hangyo , which means “to knock” and “to plead,” respectively, in the Cebuano language. Since 2016, tokhang has become a euphemism for extra-judicial killing (EJK) by either the authorities or anti-drug vigilantes.

The rising death toll of the drug war drew criticism from human rights groups. Official sources reported that as of July 2019, some 5,375 drug personalities have been killed in police operations. Human rights groups estimate that the overall death toll, which includes EJKs, has reached beyond 25,000. The International Criminal Court (ICC) started investigating Duterte for crimes against humanity in February 2018. Public opinion surveys by the Social Weather Stations (SWS) in late 2019 indicated that 75% of Filipinos believe that many human rights abuses took place as a result of Oplan Tokhang.

The war on drugs generated enormous interest among Filipino social science researchers, most of whom are sensitized to the human rights perspective. Conflicting death toll estimates, along with contrasting assessments of the extent and severity of the drug problem, matched the debates surrounding the morals and politics of the anti-illegal drug campaign between the authorities, human rights groups, and experts, including social researchers.

Narratives of suffering from those arrested and widows of those who were killed compose the backdrop of a new, violent Philippine reality. This reality is attended by the paradox of hyper-stigmatization of drug use by the current political and criminal justice regime vis-à-vis the “normalized proliferation” of drugs, articulated by the term talamak (chronic), commonly used by arrested persons, media, and much of the public.

In my own studies, I struggled to make sense of the dissonant narratives of suspected drug offenders, specifically involving the stimulant methamphetamine (locally known as shabu ). I interviewed 27 men in jail, most of whom are working-class individuals in their early and middle-to-late adulthood arrested in the first year of Oplan Tokhang on drug-related charges. They claimed that they had been wrongly arrested, that police officers planted evidence, and that they were mistreated or tortured to confess their guilt. They described their plight as walang kalaban-laban (defenseless) against the police who forcefully descended into their dwellings. Despite their tragic personal plight, many of them still support Duterte’s anti-drug campaign because it represents a decisive action against a worsening drug situation that had long been ignored.

Clearly, the “drug offenders” are very much a part of the “penal populist” public that generated support for Duterte’s presidency in 2016. A moral panic about the rising number of drug addicts and unsafe neighborhoods propped up the resurgence of penal populism, a term proposed by John Pratt as an approach that adopts more punitive measures against criminality based on public sentiments rather than on empirical evidence or expert opinions. This can be observed in public opinion polls released by SWS at the end of 2019 indicating that Duterte enjoyed a net satisfaction rating of 72% from Filipinos, and his war on drugs a net satisfaction rating of 70%.

Prior to Duterte’s presidency, studies by Gideon Lasco showed that the youths of a Philippine port community used shabu as pampagilas (performance enhancer) for their work in the informal sector (e.g., vendors, porters, sex workers). Similarly, participants in my study also confessed to using shabu to regain strength from tiredness, stay awake, and take up jobs that are either hard to come by or require long unpredictable hours (e.g., truck and jeepney drivers, construction workers). They refused to be called “addicts” because, in their belief, they can stop anytime they wish, and they don’t let it become a habitual vice. That they purchase it using their own wages and not with funds derived from theft, robbery, or any other crime confers shabu the legitimacy of a consumer commodity in the open market. The scope of analysis of its use, therefore, needs to go beyond notions of leisure or retreatism and subcultural theories of addiction, and toward its function as a mainstream means to cope with the stresses of poverty and economic precarity.

Despite the participants’ defense of their drug use, the denouement of my conversations with them was their recognition that shabu is a “destroyer of families,” “a source of criminality,” “ultimately evil,” and “a national problem,” which must be eradicated. One key aspect of their narrative is that the misinformed police made a mistake in capturing them instead of targeting those who are truly guilty: addicts who commit heinous crimes to support their vice, money-hungry traffickers who exploit them, and corrupt policemen who extort money from the addicts and peddlers.

My preliminary interviews with police officers on Oplan Tokhang also suggest an experience misunderstood by human rights groups and misrepresented by the media. They spoke of their conviction in carrying out the mandate and ideals of protecting the country and its citizens from a drug menace “that does not seem to end.” While they recognize that drugs do fill a vacuum created by poverty and that drug lords economically exploit an addicted and impoverished population, they also regard drug personalities as combatants, armed with weapons, who are ready to retaliate. More importantly, they reflexively look back on Oplan Tokhang as a campaign that has exposed the “true depth of the drug problem,” and how it has “gravely corrupted the police ranks.” If a deep story – an approach used by Arlie Hochschild to capture the experience of right-wing American Republicans – can be told from the narratives of “drug offenders,” it might render a starkly different account of Philippine reality assembled from the narratives of the police.

Social science research on the Philippine war on drugs can indeed contribute to providing evidence-based policies, whether these involve the methodological expertise of quantifying addiction levels, reconceptualizing drug use typologies, or interpreting public opinion on criminality. The challenge for sociology is that it must heed caution about frameworks that offer binaries that reduce the drug question in the Philippines to a battle between the good guys versus bad guys, the addicts versus those who are not, and the good cops versus bad cops. More importantly, sociologists researching the war on drugs must be wary of privileging penal elitism, a term which Victor Shammas uses to refer to an overvaluation of scientific or expert opinion and dismissal of a public regarded as emotional, irrational, or simplistic. Such self-reflexivity then calls for sociologists to be comfortable with contesting narratives within groups of social actors and between the supposed camps of the political and moral spectrum that makes up the public.

Filomin C. Gutierrez, University of the Philippines, Philippines and member of ISA Research Committees on Sociology of Deviance (RC29), and Women, Gender and Society (RC32) < [email protected] >

Read more about Sociology from the Philippines

Mainstreaming Mindanao in Philippine Sociology

by Mario Joyo Aguja

Making Public Sociology Work in the Philippines

by Phoebe Zoe Maria U. Sanchez

Navigating Conflicts through a Queer Lens

by John Andrew G. Evangelista

Urban Studies in the Philippines: Sociology as an Anchor

by Louie Benedict R. Ignacio

Doing Sociology in the Philippines

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Essay on War Against Drugs

Students are often asked to write an essay on War Against Drugs in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on War Against Drugs

What is the war against drugs.

The War Against Drugs refers to the global campaign initiated to reduce the illegal drug trade and consumption. Governments have taken a tough stance against the production, distribution, and use of illegal drugs to protect their citizens from the harmful effects of drug abuse.

Scope of the War Against Drugs

The War Against Drugs is not just about fighting drug traffickers and users. It also includes campaigns to educate people about the dangers of drugs, provide drug addiction treatment and support, and reduce drug-related crime. Governments around the world work together to share information and resources to combat drug trafficking and abuse.

Success and Challenges

The War Against Drugs has been successful in reducing drug trafficking and abuse in some countries. This has been achieved by strict law enforcement, effective drug prevention programs, and international cooperation. However, the problem of drug trafficking and abuse still exists, and it continues to be a major challenge for law enforcement agencies, governments, and communities around the world.

250 Words Essay on War Against Drugs

War against drugs: a futile battle.

The “War Against Drugs” is a worldwide campaign led by the United States government to discourage the production, distribution, and consumption of illegal drugs. It began in the 1970s and has since been a topic of intense debate.

A Disastrous Approach

The “War Against Drugs” has been a costly and ineffective approach to addressing drug-related issues. It has led to mass incarceration, with the United States having the highest incarceration rate in the world. The criminalization of drugs has disproportionately affected minority communities, leading to racial disparities in the criminal justice system.

Failed Policies

The focus on harsh drug laws and punitive measures has done little to reduce drug use or trafficking. In fact, it has driven the drug trade underground, making it more dangerous and profitable for criminal organizations. The “War Against Drugs” has also failed to address the root causes of drug abuse, such as poverty, mental health issues, and lack of opportunities.

Alternative Approaches

Instead of relying on criminalization and punishment, a more effective approach would be to focus on harm reduction, public health measures, and evidence-based treatment programs. Decriminalization of drugs has been shown to reduce crime, improve public health, and free up resources that can be invested in treatment and prevention programs. Expanding access to affordable and quality healthcare, including mental health services, can also help address the underlying issues that contribute to drug abuse.

The ongoing “War Against Drugs” has been a colossal waste of resources and has caused immense harm to individuals and communities, particularly marginalized groups. Embracing a more compassionate and evidence-based approach, one that prioritizes public health, harm reduction, and treatment, is essential for addressing drug-related issues effectively and humanely.

500 Words Essay on War Against Drugs

War against drugs: a global perspective.

The War on Drugs is a worldwide campaign that began in the early 20th century. It includes various government actions aimed at stopping the illegal drug trade, reducing drug use, and punishing people involved in drug-related activities.

The History of the War on Drugs

The War on Drugs started in the United States in the early 1900s, when the government banned drugs like opium, cocaine, and heroin. In the 1970s, President Richard Nixon declared drug abuse “public enemy number one” and launched a massive campaign against drug trafficking. This led to more arrests, harsher sentences, and increased funding for law enforcement. The War on Drugs has since spread to many other countries, and it has had a significant impact on global society.

The Impact of the War on Drugs

The War on Drugs has had both positive and negative effects. On the positive side, it has helped to reduce the availability of illegal drugs and decrease drug use in some areas. It has also led to the arrest and imprisonment of many drug traffickers and dealers. However, the War on Drugs has also had several negative consequences. It has led to the mass incarceration of nonviolent drug offenders, disproportionately affecting people of color and low-income communities. It has also fueled the growth of the black market for drugs, leading to violence, corruption, and instability in many countries.

The Future of the War on Drugs

The War on Drugs has been a costly and controversial policy. In recent years, there has been a growing debate about the effectiveness of the War on Drugs and the need for reform. Some countries, such as Portugal and Uruguay, have decriminalized the possession and use of small amounts of drugs. Other countries are considering legalizing and regulating the sale of certain drugs. The future of the War on Drugs is uncertain, but it is clear that the current approach is not sustainable.

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War On Drugs - Free Essay Samples And Topic Ideas

Writing argumentative essays on War on Drugs is pretty challenging as it unleashes the current problem of modern society in America. It requires thorough research of lots of data to introduce the relevant paper. This is a broad matter which can be split into different essay topics. For example, you can raise the issue of drug trafficking or provide arguments on the harmful effects of abused drug consumption. Also, you can touch on the engagement of the government in fighting against illegal drug use, current drug prohibition rights, etc.

There are so many ideas to include in your research paper, yet it is difficult to streamline your thoughts. That is why essay examples on War on Drugs are good options. They can help you compile an outline where the introduction, main body, and conclusion are the key parts. It is essential to stick to one topic and articulate it in one thesis statement and notice it in the introductory part. Then, you need to expand the topic by providing particular arguments and proof, so then to conclude with your thesis. We recommend you get familiar with essay examples on drugs on our platform. They might be a good prompt for you to define your topic and research path.

War on Drugs and Mass Incarceration

The purpose of the law is to maintain societal order, while the criminal justice system operates to bring justice to the commission of crimes. In the United States, however, modern day criminal justice systems disproportionately disadvantage particular groups of people and undermine the intended functionality of law enforcement structures. This phenomenon of racial minority overrepresentation and overall prison population surge has endured since the 1970s. The declaration of the 70s "War on Drugs" was proceeded with mandatory minimum, amplified sentencing […]

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Performance-Enhancing Drugs: the War on Drugs

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The History of Drugs and the War on Drugs

A drug is a substance which has physiological effects when administered to the body. Drugs come in various shapes and forms such as lozenges, tablets, aerosols, and syrups to name a few. There are five ways a drug can be administered into the body. The routes of administration are oral, sublingual, rectal, topical, and parenteral (intravenous, intramuscular, and subcutaneous.) There are seven drug types and each come with different effects and risks. They are stimulants, depressants, hallucinogens, dissociatives, opioids, inhalants, […]

An Effect of Mass Incarceration

It is no surprise that the United States has a major issue with the incarceration of its people. In fact, the U.S. incarcerates more people, per capita, than any other country in the world, 714 in 100,000 people, or about 3.5 for every 500. We lock up more than 4 times the people than the United Kingdom [1]. When considering what leads people to prison two main components come to mind: crime and drugs. Crime is the most diverse and […]

The War on Drugs: Explained

Abstract The research conducted, was a general view of gathering information on the significance of what drugs consumption and possession has on the general society. Sharing the overall history and importance of drug prevention in America and what are laws and regulations in place in containing drugs in the streets. In addition, sharing what the criminal justice system done to aid those in prevention on recidivism. After thorough research, the number of those who suffer victim to personal encounters in […]

The Global War on Drugs

The War on Drugs started in June 1971 when US president Richard Nixon announced drug abuse to be 'public's big enemy' and raised federal funding for drug-control agencies and drug treatment efforts.The War on Drugs is a term used to refer to a government-led initiative that aims to stop illegal drug use, distribution and trade according to the article written by A&E. (A&E) In this short essay I will be discussing many points that deal with the war on drugs […]

America’s Mass Incarceration Problem

In February of 2018, President Donald Trump released the Trump Administration's fiscal budget for 2019. The budget was predictably set on what President Trump had mentioned what he found most important; there was a substantial increase in defense spending, ICE and border control, and infrastructure, as well as a decrease in Medicare and Environmental Protection. One of his more notable budget increases stands out, however: an increase in programs that are often associated with the infamous, ongoing "War on Drugs". […]

Legalization or War on Drugs

 Drug preclusion channels over $140 billion per year into the criminal black market. Its disallowance drove respectable organizations into organised crimes or bankrupt by and large, which prepared for mobsters to make millions through the underground market. Also, by Legalizing drugs cultivation tremendous assets spent by governments executing or detaining individuals is reduced. This could help disarm countries and stop the harm done to families whose members are murdered or detained for moving, developing and disseminating drugs and its items. […]

The War on Drugs in the Sports Industry

On April 13th, 2018, the National Basketball Association suspended Washington Wizards’ player Jodie Meeks. Meeks tested positive for Ipamorelin and growth-hormone-releasing peptide-2. Both of these substances are banned by the NBA. In the past year, five NBA players have been suspended for violating the league’s anti-drug policy. The NBA has a very specific policy applying to drugs and any violation of this results in the immediate suspension of the respective player if some type of banned substance is found in […]

The Age of Mass Incarceration

When we typically think of crime and punishment we view it as a "conveyor belt" of justice: Usually the guilty are found guilty and sentenced to either long or short imprisonment terms depending on the crime committed. For some criminals the belt continues to move in a constant cycle from time of arrest, appearance before a judge, trial, the start of their punishment and finally the end of imprisonment, assuming that some go on to probation or are simply set […]

The War on Drugs and its Impact on the United States

Illegal drugs have been a very prevalent issue in the United States for decades, with almost no clear solution to stop the spreading and use of them. With the epidemic of opium currently ravaging the U.S, it all stemmed from a colossal failure in the 1980s: The War on Drugs. While the intent of the War on Drugs was to stop the spreading of illegal drugs, it managed to become more negative for America than it was originally intended. The […]

Opinion about War on Drugs

The War on Drugs began in the 20th Century and aimed to address the marijuana and opioid epidemic that plagued the United States. The War on Drugs, declared in the 1970s by President Richard Nixon, primarily targeted nonviolent drug offenders and resulted in unprecedented growth of the U.S. penal system and has been criticized for creating a “new Jim Crow” in which incarcerated people of color are targeted for arrest, and put into jails where they work for free or […]

War on Drugs | History

Abstract The War on Drugs, or prohibition of illicit substance abuse, has been a long and grueling legislative approach that has changed the rhetoric and the foundation of our American ideals regarding substance abuse. As currently defined, illicit substance use encompasses the “cultivation, distribution, and possession of many intoxicating substances that are intended solely for recreational use” (Durrant & Thakker, 2003; Sacco, 2014). Through Karger and Stoesz (2018) four-pronged model, it is important to note the societal turmoil that was […]

War on Drugs Among Teens

In 2003, Danielson, Overholser, and Butt undertook a study on the larger discipline of teenage depression and the use of drugs. The study was aimed at evaluating whether or not levels of depression differ in the adolescents who had shown attempts to commit suicide and those who had not as influenced by their use of alcohol. From the clinical perspectives, the researchers appreciated that alcohol use among adolescents could significantly influence levels of depression. The higher the level of alcohol […]

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The Office of National Drug Control Policy (2017) reported that the United States requests $27.8 billion on prevention, treatment, domestic law enforcement, interdiction and international operation to addressing the drug problem. Furthermore about $9.2 billion Federal resources are directly related to support domestic law enforcement efforts. The legalization of drug as a policy option for curtailing drug abuse is increasingly worth serious consideration. In addition, drug prohibition’s limited capability could lead to severe adverse effect regardless of how harmful the […]

War on Drugs is a Struggle to Survive

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Drug abuse has been happening over so many years and it’s bad for our community. A drug isn't a good thing to mess with it understandable if its used for reasonable reasons but more than needed is drug abuse. Some people disagree with this and opposed to other side drugs are good for our community. Many people coming back from the war will be addicted to drugs and alcohol due to the massage amount of drugs that is given to […]

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In America, there are many factors that influence how we as a society interpret the world around us and what may unequivocally or indirectly impact our everyday behaviors and cognitive processes. We do not merely live day by day free from any conflict or mitigating circumstances; instead we are surrounded by a host of issues that shape the world in which we live in. There is often a blurred line between political and social issues in America, as issues seem […]

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Home — Essay Samples — Law, Crime & Punishment — War on Drugs — Ending The War On Drugs In America

Ending The War on Drugs in America

• Categories: Drug Addiction War on Drugs

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Published: Dec 16, 2021

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Just What Is So Wrong With the War on Drugs?

June 2011 marks the 40th anniversary of President Richard Nixon’s declaration of a “war on drugs” — a war that has cost roughly a trillion dollars, has produced little to no effect on the supply of or demand for drugs in the United States, and has contributed to making America the world’s largest incarcerator. Throughout the month, check back daily for posts about the drug war, its victims and what needs to be done to restore fairness and create effective policy.

All our lives we have been taught that when someone uses or sells drugs, justice dictates that he or she should go to prison. We are taught that those who commit drug crimes are a threat to society , either because they want to turn others into addicts or steal from them for drug money; they belong in prison, safely away from law abiding citizens. But lately, newspapers and legislatures are abuzz with a message that is just the opposite: relying less on prison sanctions for drug crimes can actually increase public safety.

The rhetoric and policies of the so-called war on drugs may be the cultural norm, but they aren’t always sensible. Our lawmakers should have listened to Milton Friedman, who from the start warned that the drug war would result in disastrous consequences for inner city neighborhoods with the only benefit being a highly profitable black market for drug cartels .

This Friday, June 17th, marks 40 years from the date President Richard Nixon first declared a “war on drugs,” referencing the policies he implemented in the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act . The progeny of this Act have left us with a convoluted maze of billions of pages of federal and state criminal codes that dole out stiff, lengthy sentences for drug crimes. The proffered goal: to reduce and ultimately end the production, distribution, and use of drugs labeled “illicit.”

So what’s the verdict 40 years later? Have we won the war on drugs? Quite simply, no. From a public safety perspective, the war has been completely ineffective at stemming the supply or use of drugs in this country. From a cost perspective, it’s been horrific — with a whopping $1 trillion price tag thus far and an unimaginably higher toll in lives and families lost to prison. In terms of fairness, it has been a total bust as well. The effect on communities of color has been astonishingly tragic: there are more African-Americans under the control of prison and corrections departments today than were ever enslaved by this country. Even the current head of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske , and more recently the Global Commission on Drug Policy , have announced that the drug war has been an abject disaster.

According to the federal government, drugs are increasingly widely available and the rates of drug use are actually up by 10 percent since the start of the war on drugs. Drug supply and use have increased despite the 2.3 million people languishing in prisons — about 25 percent of whom are locked up for drug violations . If we look at just federal prisons, things are even worse, with nearly half of those in prison locked up for drug crimes.

When we incarcerate drug offenders, they stay locked up for insanely lengthy periods of time — and often forever. We increasingly sentence them to life in prison under three-strikes-and-you’re-outlaws for petty drug crimes. And disappointingly, our Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of laws imposing disproportionate mandatory sentences of life without parole for simple possession of drugs.

To make matters worse, the policies of the drug war have made an intentional — though baseless — determination that certain segments of our population deserve to be imprisoned for drug crimes more than others. You don’t see cops busting through NYU dragging away young coeds for smoking up in their dorm rooms or selling coke to their friends at East Village bars. Instead, you see the NYPD executing massive drug sweeps in housing projects and on the street corners of Harlem, throwing black men into cop cars for minimal amounts of marijuana in their pockets. These types of selective enforcement practices are the reason our prisons are bursting at the seams with black Americans convicted of petty drug offenses — despite the fact that white Americans use drugs at a higher rate than African-Americans .

There is nothing rational about such drug policies. In no other area of criminal law do we lock up huge numbers of people because they might pose threats to themselves, but have done nothing to harm another person.

So what’s the alternative? Some say legalize and regulate drugs the way we do alcohol and tobacco. Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron estimates that legalizing drugs would inject $83 billion a year into the U.S. economy.

But even if you think that drugs should be illegal, it’s hard to justify prison sentences for possession or nonviolent drug crimes. Imprisoning people for drug offenses basically destroys their lives — even if they’re lucky enough to exit prison . Prison neither treats nor trains nor rehabilitates. Instead, prison makes people more likely to commit crimes in the future and makes them effectively unemployable with little hope of a future. Evidence indisputably shows that treatment is far more cost-effective than incarceration for drug offenses, rehabilitating individuals so they can be productive members of society.

Recognizing this reality, several states have recently reformed their drug laws. Texas has increased the use of treatment and rehabilitation and now has its lowest crime rate since 1973 . This year, Connecticut decriminalized possession of small amounts of marijuana and California is considering a proposal to turn drug possession into a misdemeanor. These policies are far more sensible ways to address drug abuse than the drug war policies that not-so-blindly lock people up and throw away the key.

Driven by politics and fear, the war on drugs has been ineffective, fiscally irresponsible, racially biased, and just plain foolish. Simply put, it hasn’t worked and has actually made us worse off. If 40 years of failed drug policies and our status as the largest incarcerator in the world isn’t a sufficient wake-up call that we need to change the way we deal with drugs in this country, it’s hard to imagine what else could be.

(Originally posted on ACSBlog.)

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Drug Addiction: Advantages and Disadvantages

What are the advantages and disadvantages of drugs essay introduction.

A drug is a substance containing a chemical with the ability to change the normal biological processes and functions. It is used in medicine to correct or cure diseases and socially as a psychological stimulant to enhance pleasure. Drug addiction is a tendency of utilizing one or more psychologically active substances that are liable to enhance a mental or physical (and at times both) dependency. This phenomenon is characterized by repeated and uncontrolled use of addictive drugs. The most commonly used addictive drugs in the world include cannabis, heroin, meth, alcohol, and cigarettes among others.

The historical evolution of drug addiction is important. It helps to seek to establish appropriate redress to mitigate the underlying misconception and myths that demonize drug addiction.

Factors that cause drug addiction are equally significant and therefore should be understood. This study also seeks to examine the advantages and disadvantages of drug addiction and thereafter establish a solid convincing position about drug addiction.

Disadvantages and Advantages of Drug Addiction: Essay Main Body

Drug addiction casualties may experience tolerance or withdrawal symptoms when they cease utilizing the substance. Tolerance symptoms refer to a situation developed after attaining a specific amount of addictive substance over some time to satisfy the desired effect. While withdrawal is another part of addiction symptoms that is reflected by unpleasant physical reactions as a result of decreased or termination of the use of drugs. Withdrawal effects range from nausea, muscle aches, fever, concentration problems, insomnia, anxiety, and unpleasant dreams among others. (Drug Rehab 2002)

The utilization of addictive drugs is dated back from time immemorial. Man used to have the desire, still have the desire, and will continue to have a desire to drink or eat substances that make them stimulated, relaxed, and euphoric. The use of wine can be associated with the early Egyptians, while the origin of narcotic use is believed to be as early as 4000 BC. In 2327 BC in China Marijuana was used for medical purposes, as time advanced the use of drugs diversified. The means of consumption during the olden days were through eating, drinking, rubbing on the skin, or inhalation to achieve the desired result. These means of consumption are still used to date with new methods of consumption such as injection being introduced.

Several early discoveries of drug-bearing plants by South American Indians were a boost in the use of addictive substances. Some of the discoveries contained alkaloids of worldwide importance. This has become a modern drug. It included cocaine and quinine. Cocaine is believed to have a higher potential for addiction.

The cocaine addict, therefore, increased rapidly during this time. Between 1856-1939, it is documented that an Austrian psychoanalyst – Sigmund Freud – treated many deeply disturbed cocaine addicts (Drug Rahad 2002) Thereafter, pharmacologists like Carl Koller, paid tribute to the fact and crowned it by introducing cocaine as a local anesthetic into surgical procedures.

In the 19th century, particularly during the American Civil war, the use of substances such as morphine, laudanum, cocaine was not regulated or controlled. They were widely prescribed by physicians for numerous kinds of ailments.

The drugs were sold as a patent medicine.

These types of drugs were commonly used in the United States of America. In Asian Continent, recreational drugs such as opium were widely consumed. During this period there was a noticeable spread of drug consumption in the west. It is reported that by the early 19th century; there were 250,000 drug addicts in the United States of America (Drug Rehab 2002)

The utilization of drugs has faced some challenges. Culturally the use of drugs such as marijuana was no widely accepted. However, drugs like alcohol were widely used during the cultural celebration. This is evident, particularly in the African continent.

Caffeine is also widely accepted by many communities. Even though marijuana is termed illegal by many cultures, it has continued to sail in historical popularity.

The use of drugs has faced the strong arm of the law. In 1875, there was an increased abuse of drugs in the United States of America. To address this problem, legal measures were institutionalized to ensure control of the use of addictive drugs. This led to outlawing the use of opium particularly in San Francisco. The first law on drugs was the pure food and Drug Act of 1906. This law required companies to appropriately label the patent medicines containing opium and other drugs. Formulation of drug-related regulation continued. In 1914, Harrison Narcotic Act was formulated. This restricted the sale of substances such as opiates or cocaine to licensed practitioners only. This was followed by a total ban on heroin (Drug Rehab 2002)

The development of these regulations has adversely affected the historical advancement of the utilization of addictive drugs. It has continued to suffer major blows especially in the corridors of justice.

Judges in supreme courts have subsequently outlawed any prescription of any narcotic to addicts. To make the matters worse, many doctors who violated the Supreme Court decision were jailed. By the 1920s, the use of narcotics and cocaine declined drastically.

Other than culture and government regulation, religion has also hindered the development and spread of the addictive drug. Many faith-based organizations term the use of drugs particularly those taken for pleasure like marijuana as a sin. Man is highly affiliated with a religion. He always desires and aspires to be righteous before God.

The confession against drug abuse in church condemns many. Others have opted to withdraw their commitment to the church since they find it difficult to cease using addictive drugs. For example, Christian perceives drug addicts as morally irresponsible and thus a disgrace to God. They are therefore unacceptable in the house of God.

These religious actions that demonize the use of drugs hinder its wide consumption.

Drug addiction is attributed to many factors. Even though culture condemns the use of certain types of drugs, it is widely believed that it has influenced its members to use drugs. All over the world, culture sets an environment that leads to use adoption of behavioral attitudes. For instance, the use of alcohol is embedded in most cultures.

Culture is authoritative it, therefore, dictates the prevailing attitude in the community. For example, “American culture in general views ethanol-containing beverages as sexy, mature, sophisticated, facilitating socializing and enhancing status” (Hanson, Venturi & Annette 2005, p, 228). In Italy and France, alcohol is viewed as a virtual component during celebrations. Thus alcohol drinking occurs frequently while eating with members of a family.

Culture is categorical in promoting the use of certain drugs. It sets regulation that governs drinking and also provides meaning for use of addictive drugs within the community. These aspects that culture serves promote the use of such addictive drugs. For instance, the traditional culture of Italian and Jews accepts moderate drinking in the family during meals. Thus Italian use wine as food, while the Jew uses a ritual attachment on the use of alcohol.

In Scandinavian, Nations are considerably separated from work. Culture continues to permit the drinking lifestyle by providing meaning to drinking.

“The first notable work on ceremonial use and ethnic drinking practices was undertaken by Bales in 1946 who attempted to explain the different rates of drinking between Jews (low) and Irish (high) in terms of symbolic and ceremonial meanings. For Jews, drinking had familiar and sacramental significance, whereas for the Irish it represented male convivial bonding. “(Hanson, Venturi & Annette 2005) Currently, the Irish, have continued with the culture of heavy drinking to live and continue their stereotype of heavy drinking culture.

All over the world, many people believe that drug is management support over life’s serious emotional, medical and physical problems. Medications are critical to the treatment of diseases.

However, excessive use of such drugs is dangerous. For example, drug addiction originates from such unrealistic expectations. It is not always addicting. Also, it is not a guarantee that an individual who follows a doctor’s prescription to the letter, will always avoid being addicted to drugs. Apart from medicinal drugs other forms of drugs are meant to serve social and psychological reasons or Euphoria.

People, therefore, continue to utilize drugs for a search of pleasure and maintain of good feeling: relieve stress and anxiety; helps individual to forget the problems and avoid or postpone worries; for relation; fulfill religious or mystical occurrences and to relieve pain and some symptoms of illness (Hanson, Venturi & Annette 2005 p, 37)

Peer influence is a major cause of drug addiction, particularly among the youths.

Many persons have turned to drugs since they want to fit within the social identity of their peers. It is believed that peer pressure is always powerful during the early age of adolescence and the late stage.

Consequently, these individuals do perceive taking drugs as a rite of passage from childhood to adulthood.

Alcohol use and other drug consumption levels among students are on the rise. It is estimated that college students drink approximately 4 billion cans of beer annually. (Hanson, Venturi & Annette 2005)

Drug addiction is linked to the demand of the brain. Human addiction constitutes of substances such as the neurotransmitter dopamine whose levels increase rapidly with continuous intake of nicotine. This results in a pleasurable sensational feeling experienced by many smokers thus keeping their desire for more tobacco. High Nicotine pharmacokinetic properties also enhance the potential of addiction.

Tobacco utilization produces a rapid distribution of nicotine to the brain with drug levels peaking within 10 seconds of inhalation. However, the acute effect of nicotine dissipates in few minutes as do the associated feeling reward which causes the pleasant, pleasurable effect and prevents withdrawal. Other tobacco ingredients apart from nicotine react with monoamine oxidize (MAO) enzyme responsible for the breakdown of dopamine. A low level of MAO in the body may lead to an increased level of dopamine, thus increasing smoking desire. Recently, the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) has shown that acetaldehyde – tobacco production – reinforces nicotine properties, particularly to adolescent age structures thereby increasing the desire for more.

Effects of drug addiction are diverse. Many people in the world suffer due to the dangers of smoking by being passive or active smokers. Cigarette smoking has massive effects on the life of pregnant women. It has been reported that many mothers have lost their pregnancies as a result of smoking. Smokers experience health complications. Tobacco contains carcinogen which damages important genes that control the growth of cells thus causing abnormal growth. Carbon monoxide in drugs particularly cigarettes combines with hemoglobin in red blood cells. This adversely affects the oxygen circulation in the body and may result in suffocation.

Global warming is also attributed to the increased use of tobacco in the world.

The human body is vulnerable to the detritus effects of drug addiction. Heavy consumption of drugs alters the functional processes of the body. This is because drugs contain chemical compositions that are harmful to the harmonious functioning of the body organs. For example, alcohol alters the health normative through the following mechanisms: effect of alcohol oxidation on intermediary metabolism; effects mediated by toxic breakdown products such as acetaldehydes; effects due to coexistent malnutrition; and that are secondary consequences of alcohol-induced organ injury per se (Ammerman et al 1999) this health problem ranges from liver complication, pancreas effects, heart problems gastrointestinal effects and respiratory complication among others.

The world’s population survival is being threatened by the wide impact of drug abuse.

Drub abuse has claimed a greater number of individuals through deaths and physical deformities. It is approximated that during the coming decades about 60 million premature deaths will have been caused by smoking.

According to Peto et al 1994, “The worldwide annual mortality attributed to smoking alone will increase from 2 million a year to 10 million a year by 2010. “ (Ammerman et all 1999)

The use of drugs affects young children within a household. Children in most instances look to their parents as the best role model. They will always desire and aspire to be a duplicate of their parents. The young generation, therefore, does inherit the habit of drug utilization from their parent at a very tender age. Having developed this culture from their childhood, withdrawing at a later date is never easy. “The positive modeling of drugs and active encouragement of siblings to initiate drug use is part of the dynamic that leads other siblings into using drugs.” (Bernard, 2006, p, 135) These children who are addicted to drugs early always behave violently and very aggressively.

Other than child abuse, addiction to drugs affects individual mental functioning.

The person cannot, therefore, make rational decisions concerning their life. This has encouraged a promiscuous lifestyle and victims have ended up contracting deadly diseases such as HIV/Aids. Others have failed to undertake their family responsibility. Consequently, their families have continued to sleep with an empty stomach, poor clothing and health condition and worse their children dropping out of school.

These impacts are disheartened.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Drugs: Essay Conclusion

Drug addiction is not necessarily bad as its effects reflect. The problem is that many people have taken to irresponsible and immoral approaches to drinking and therefore have continued to cause havoc to the moral principles of drinking. The result they are after is fun and joy. However, we do appreciate that drug addiction affects human health.

The individual should therefore cease excessive drinking. They should therefore adopt responsible means of drinking for us to maximize the potential benefit such as pleasure that comes from the use of drugs. The government thus has a role to promote healthy means of utilizing addictive drugs.

Ammerman, Robert T. Ammerman, Pegy J, & Ott Ralph B. Tarter (1999) Prevention and social impact of Drug and alcohol Rotledge.

Bernard Marina (2006) Drug Addiction and families: The impact of drugs. Jessica Kingsley.

Cigarette Addiction. Web.

Drug addiction Definition: Web.

Glen R. Hanson, Peter J. Ventruri, Annette (2005), Drug and Society. Jones & Bartlett. Web.

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The Crackdown on Student Protesters

Columbia university is at the center of a growing showdown over the war in gaza and the limits of free speech..

This transcript was created using speech recognition software. While it has been reviewed by human transcribers, it may contain errors. Please review the episode audio before quoting from this transcript and email [email protected] with any questions.

[TRAIN SCREECHING]

Well, you can hear the helicopter circling. This is Asthaa Chaturvedi. I’m a producer with “The Daily.” Just walked out of the 116 Street Station. It’s the main station for Columbia’s Morningside Heights campus. And it’s day seven of the Gaza solidarity encampment, where a hundred students were arrested last Thursday.

So on one side of Broadway, you see camera crews. You see NYPD officers all lined up. There’s barricades, steel barricades, caution tape. This is normally a completely open campus. And I’m able to — all members of the public, you’re able to walk through.

[NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

Looks like international media is here.

Have your IDs out. Have your IDs out.

Students lining up to swipe in to get access to the University. ID required for entry.

Swipe your ID, please.

Hi, how are you, officer? We’re journalists with “The New York Times.”

You’re not going to get in, all right? I’m sorry.

Hi. Can I help please?

Yeah, it’s total lockdown here at Columbia.

Please have your IDs out ready to swipe.

From “The New York Times,” I’m Michael Barbaro. This is “The Daily.” Today, the story of how Columbia University has become the epicenter of a growing showdown between student protesters, college administrators, and Congress over the war in Gaza and the limits of free speech. I spoke with my colleague, Nick Fandos.

[UPBEAT MUSIC]

It’s Thursday, April 25.

Nick, if we rewind the clock a few months, we end up at a moment where students at several of the country’s best known universities are protesting Israel’s response to the October 7 attacks, its approach to a war in Gaza. At times, those protests are happening peacefully, at times with rhetoric that is inflammatory. And the result is that the leaders of those universities land before Congress. But the president of Columbia University, which is the subject we’re going to be talking about today, is not one of the leaders who shows up for that testimony.

That’s right. So the House Education Committee has been watching all these protests on campus. And the Republican Chairwoman decides, I’m going to open an investigation, look at how these administrations are handling it, because it doesn’t look good from where I sit. And the House last winter invites the leaders of several of these elite schools, Harvard, Penn, MIT, and Columbia, to come and testify in Washington on Capitol Hill before Congress.

Now, the President of Columbia has what turns out to be a very well-timed, pre-planned trip to go overseas and speak at an international climate conference. So Minouche Shafik isn’t going to be there. So instead, the presidents of Harvard, and Penn, and MIT show up. And it turned out to be a disaster for these universities.

They were asked very pointed questions about the kind of speech taking place on their campuses, and they gave really convoluted academic answers back that just baffled the committee. But there was one question that really embodied the kind of disconnect between the Committee — And it wasn’t just Republicans, Republicans and Democrats on the Committee — and these college presidents. And that’s when they were asked a hypothetical.

Does calling for the genocide of Jews violate Penn’s rules or code of conduct? Yes or no?

If the speech turns into conduct, it can be harassment.

And two of the presidents, Claudine Gay of Harvard and Elizabeth Magill of the University of Pennsylvania, they’re unwilling to say in this really kind of intense back and forth that this speech would constitute a violation of their rules.

It can be, depending on the context.

What’s the context?

Targeted at an individual. Is it pervasive?

It’s targeted at Jewish students, Jewish individuals. Do you understand your testimony is dehumanizing them?

And it sets off a firestorm.

It does not depend on the context. The answer is yes. And this is why you should resign. These are unacceptable answers across the board.

Members of Congress start calling for their resignations. Alumni are really, really ticked off. Trustees of the University start to wonder, I don’t know that these leaders really have got this under control. And eventually, both of them lose their jobs in a really high profile way.

Right. And as you’ve hinted at, for somewhat peculiar scheduling reasons, Columbia’s President escapes this disaster of a hearing in what has to be regarded as the best timing in the history of the American Academy.

Yeah, exactly. And Columbia is watching all this play out. And I think their first response was relief that she was not in that chair, but also a recognition that, sooner or later, their turn was going to come back around and they were going to have to sit before Congress.

Why were they so certain that they would probably end up before Congress and that this wasn’t a case of completely dodging a bullet?

Well, they remain under investigation by the committee. But also, as the winter wears on, all the same intense protests just continue unabated. So in many ways, Columbia’s like these other campuses. But in some ways, it’s even more intense. This is a university that has both one of the largest Jewish student populations of any of its peers. But it also has a large Arab and Muslim student population, a big Middle Eastern studies program. It has a dual degree program in Tel Aviv.

And it’s a university on top of all that that has a real history of activism dating back to the 1960s. So when students are recruited or choose to come to Columbia, they’re actively opting into a campus that prides itself on being an activist community. It’s in the middle of New York City. It’s a global place. They consider the city and the world, really, like a classroom to Columbia.

In other words, if any campus was going to be a hotbed of protest and debate over this conflict, it was going to be Columbia University.

Exactly. And when this spring rolls around, the stars finally align. And the same congressional committee issues another invitation to Minouche Shafik, Columbia’s President, to come and testify. And this time, she has no excuse to say no.

But presumably, she is well aware of exactly what testifying before this committee entails and is highly prepared.

Columbia knew this moment was coming. They spent months preparing for this hearing. They brought in outside consultants, crisis communicators, experts on anti-Semitism. The weekend before the hearing, she actually travels down to Washington to hole up in a war room, where she starts preparing her testimony with mock questioners and testy exchanges to prep her for this. And she’s very clear on what she wants to try to do.

Where her counterparts had gone before the committee a few months before and looked aloof, she wanted to project humility and competence, to say, I know that there’s an issue on my campus right now with some of these protests veering off into anti-Semitic incidents. But I’m getting that under control. I’m taking steps in good faith to make sure that we restore order to this campus, while allowing people to express themselves freely as well.

So then the day of her actual testimony arrives. And just walk us through how it goes.

The Committee on Education and Workforce will come to order. I note that —

So Wednesday morning rolls around. And President Shafik sits at the witness stand with two of her trustees and the head of Columbia’s new anti-Semitism task force.

Columbia stands guilty of gross negligence at best and at worst has become a platform for those supporting terrorism and violence against the Jewish people.

And right off the bat, they’re put through a pretty humbling litany of some of the worst hits of what’s been happening on campus.

For example, just four days after the harrowing October 7 attack, a former Columbia undergraduate beat an Israeli student with a stick.

The Republican Chairwoman of the Committee, Virginia Foxx, starts reminding her that there was a student who was actually hit with a stick on campus. There was another gathering more recently glorifying Hamas and other terrorist organizations, and the kind of chants that have become an everyday chorus on campus, which many Jewish students see as threatening. But when the questioning starts, President Shafik is ready. One of the first ones she gets is the one that tripped up her colleagues.

Does calling for the genocide of Jews violate Columbia’s code of conduct, Mr. Greenwald?

And she answers unequivocally.

Dr. Shafik?

Yes, it does.

And, Professor —

That would be a violation of Columbia’s rules. They would be punished.

As President of Columbia, what is it like when you hear chants like, by any means necessary or Intifada Revolution?

I find those chants incredibly distressing. And I wish profoundly that people would not use them on our campus.

And in some of the most interesting exchanges of the hearing, President Shafik actually opens Columbia’s disciplinary books.

We have already suspended 15 students from Columbia. We have six on disciplinary probation. These are more disciplinary actions that have been taken probably in the last decade at Columbia. And —

She talks about the number of students that have been suspended, but also the number of faculty that she’s had removed from the classroom that are being investigated for comments that either violate some of Columbia’s rules or make students uncomfortable. One case in particular really underscores this.

And that’s of a Middle Eastern studies professor named Joseph Massad. He wrote an essay not long after Hamas invaded Israel and killed 1,200 people, according to the Israeli government, where he described that attack with adjectives like awesome. Now, he said they’ve been misinterpreted, but a lot of people have taken offense to those comments.

Ms. Stefanik, you’re recognized for five minutes.

Thank you, Chairwoman. I want to follow up on my colleague, Rep Walberg’s question regarding Professor Joseph Massad. So let me be clear, President —

And so Representative Elise Stefanik, the same Republican who had tripped up Claudine Gay of Harvard and others in the last hearing, really starts digging in to President Shafik about these things at Columbia.

He is still Chair on the website. So has he been terminated as Chair?

Congresswoman, I —

And Shafik’s answers are maybe a little surprising.

— before getting back to you. I can confirm —

I know you confirmed that he was under investigation.

Yes, I can confirm that. But I —

Did you confirm he was still the Chair?

He says that Columbia is taking his case seriously. In fact, he’s under investigation right now.

Well, let me ask you this.

I need to check.

Will you make the commitment to remove him as Chair?

And when Stefanik presses her to commit to removing him from a campus leadership position —

I think that would be — I think — I would — yes. Let me come back with yes. But I think I — I just want to confirm his current status before I write —

We’ll take that as a yes, that you will confirm that he will no longer be chair.

Shafik seems to pause and think and then agree to it on the spot, almost like she is making administrative decisions with or in front of Congress.

Now, we did some reporting after the fact. And it turns out the Professor didn’t even realize he was under investigation. So he’s learning about this from the hearing too. So what this all adds up to, I think, is a performance so in line with what the lawmakers themselves wanted to hear, that at certain points, these Republicans didn’t quite know what to do with it. They were like the dog that caught the car.

Columbia beats Harvard and UPenn.

One of them, a Republican from Florida, I think at one point even marvelled, well, you beat Harvard and Penn.

Y’all all have done something that they weren’t able to do. You’ve been able to condemn anti-Semitism without using the phrase, it depends on the context. But the —

So Columbia’s president has passed this test before this committee.

Yeah, this big moment that tripped up her predecessors and cost them their jobs, it seems like she has cleared that hurdle and dispatched with the Congressional committee that could have been one of the biggest threats to her presidency.

Without objection, there being no further business, the committee stands adjourned. [BANGS GAVEL]

But back on campus, some of the students and faculty who had been watching the hearing came away with a very different set of conclusions. They saw a president who was so eager to please Republicans in Congress that she was willing to sell out some of the University’s students and faculty and trample on cherished ideas like academic freedom and freedom of expression that have been a bedrock of American higher education for a really long time.

And there was no clearer embodiment of that than what had happened that morning just as President Shafik was going to testify before Congress. A group of students before dawn set up tents in the middle of Columbia’s campus and declared themselves a pro-Palestinian encampment in open defiance of the very rules that Dr. Shafik had put in place to try and get these protests under control.

So these students in real-time are beginning to test some of the things that Columbia’s president has just said before Congress.

Exactly. And so instead of going to celebrate her successful appearance before Congress, Shafik walks out of the hearing room and gets in a black SUV to go right back to that war room, where she’s immediately confronted with a major dilemma. It basically boils down to this, she had just gone before Congress and told them, I’m going to get tough on these protests. And here they were. So either she gets tough and risks inflaming tension on campus or she holds back and does nothing and her words before Congress immediately look hollow.

And what does she decide?

So for the next 24 hours, she tries to negotiate off ramps. She consults with her Deans and the New York Police Department. And it all builds towards an incredibly consequential decision. And that is, for the first time in decades, to call the New York City Police Department onto campus in riot gear and break this thing up, suspend the students involved, and then arrest them.

To essentially eliminate this encampment.

Eliminate the encampment and send a message, this is not going to be tolerated. But in trying to quell the unrest, Shafik actually feeds it. She ends up leaving student protesters and the faculty who support them feeling betrayed and pushes a campus that was already on edge into a full blown crisis.

[SLOW TEMPO MUSIC]

After the break, what all of this has looked like to a student on Columbia’s campus. We’ll be right back.

[PHONE RINGS]

Is this Isabella?

Yes, this is she.

Hi, Isabella. It’s Michael Barbaro from “The Daily.”

Hi. Nice to meet you.

Earlier this week, we called Isabella Ramírez, the Editor in Chief of Columbia’s undergraduate newspaper, “The Columbia Daily Spectator,” which has been closely tracking both the protests and the University’s response to them since October 7.

So, I mean, in your mind, how do we get to this point? I wonder if you can just briefly describe the key moments that bring us to where we are right now.

Sure. Since October 7, there has certainly been constant escalation in terms of tension on campus. And there have been a variety of moves that I believe have distanced the student body, the faculty, from the University and its administration, specifically the suspension of Columbia’s chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace. And that became a huge moment in what was characterized as suppression of pro-Palestinian activism on campus, effectively rendering those groups, quote, unquote, unauthorized.

What was the college’s explanation for that?

They had cited in that suspension a policy which states that a demonstration must be approved within a certain window, and that there must be an advance notice, and that there’s a process for getting an authorized demonstration. But the primary point was this policy that they were referring to, which we later reported, was changed before the suspension.

So it felt a little ad hoc to people?

Yes, it certainly came as a surprise, especially at “Spectator.” We’re nerds of the University in the sense that we are familiar with faculty and University governance. But even to us, we had no idea where this policy was coming from. And this suspension was really the first time that it entered most students’ sphere.

Columbia’s campus is so known for its activism. And so in my time of being a reporter, of being an editor, I’ve overseen several protests. And I’ve never seen Columbia penalize a group for, quote, unquote, not authorizing a protest. So that was certainly, in our minds, unprecedented.

And I believe part of the justification there was, well, this is a different time. And I think that is a reasonable thing to say. But I think a lot of students, they felt it was particularly one-sided, that it was targeting a specific type of speech or a specific type of viewpoint. Although, the University, of course, in its explicit policies, did not outline, and was actually very explicit about not targeting specific viewpoints —

So just to be super clear, it felt to students — and it sounds like, journalistically, it felt to you — that the University was coming down in a uniquely one-sided way against students who were supporting Palestinian rights and may have expressed some frustrations with Israel in that moment.

Yes. Certainly —

Isabella says that this was just the beginning of a really tense period between student protesters and the University. After those two student groups were suspended, campus protests continued. Students made a variety of demands. They asked that the University divest from businesses that profit from Israel’s military operations in Gaza. But instead of making any progress, the protests are met with further crackdown by the University.

And so as Isabella and her colleagues at the college newspaper see it, there’s this overall chilling effect that occurs. Some students become fearful that if they participate in any demonstrations, they’re going to face disciplinary action. So fast forward now to April, when these student protesters learned that President Shafik is headed to Washington for her congressional testimony. It’s at this moment that they set out to build their encampment.

I think there was obviously a lot of intention in timing those two things. I think it’s inherently a critique on a political pressure and this congressional pressure that we saw build up against, of course, Claudine Gay at Harvard and Magill at UPenn. So I think a lot of students and faculty have been frustrated at this idea that there are not only powers at the University that are dictating what’s happening, but there are perhaps external powers that are also guiding the way here in terms of what the University feels like it must do or has to do.

And I think that timing was super crucial. Having the encampment happen on the Wednesday morning of the hearing was an incredible, in some senses, interesting strategy to direct eyes to different places.

All eyes were going to be on Shafik in DC. But now a lot of eyes are on New York. The encampment is set up in the middle of the night slash morning, prior to the hearing. And so what effectively happens is they caught Shafik when she wasn’t on campus, when a lot of senior administration had their resources dedicated to supporting Shafik in DC.

And you have all of those people not necessarily out of commission, but with their focus elsewhere. So the encampment is met with very little resistance at the beginning. There were public safety officers floating around and watching. But at the very beginning hours, I think there was a sense of, we did it.

[CHANTING]: Disclose! Divest! We will not stop! We will not rest. Disclose! Divest! We will not stop!

It would be quite surprising to anybody and an administrator to now suddenly see dozens of tents on this lawn in a way that I think very purposely puts an imagery of, we’re here to stay. As the morning evolved and congressional hearings continued —

Minouche Shafik, open your eyes! Use of force, genocide!

Then we started seeing University delegates that were coming to the encampment saying, you may face disciplinary action for continuing to be here. I think that started around almost — like 9:00 or 10:00 AM, they started handing out these code of conduct violation notices.

Hell no! Hell no! Hell no!

Then there started to be more public safety action and presence. So they started barricading the entrances. The day progressed, there was more threat of discipline. The students became informed that if they continue to stay, they will face potential academic sanctions, potential suspension.

The more they try to silence us, the louder we will be! The more they —

I think a lot of people were like, OK, you’re threatening us with suspension. But so what?

This is about these systems that Minouche Shafik, that the Board of Trustees, that Columbia University is complicit in.

What are you going to do to try to get us out of here? And that was, obviously, promptly answered.

This is the New York State Police Department.

We will not stop!

You are attempting participate in an unauthorized encampment. You will be arrested and charged with trespassing.

My phone blew up, obviously, from the reporters, from the editors, of saying, oh my god, the NYPD is on our campus. And as soon as I saw that, I came out. And I saw a huge crowd of students and affiliates on campus watching the lawns. And as I circled around that crowd, I saw the last end of the New York Police Department pulling away protesters and clearing out the last of the encampment.

[CHANTING]: We love you! We will get justice for you! We see you! We love you! We will get justice for you! We see you! We love you! We will get justice for you! We see you! We love you! We will get justice for you!

It was something truly unimaginable, over 100 students slash other individuals are arrested from our campus, forcefully removed. And although they were suspended, there was a feeling of traumatic event that has just happened to these students, but also this sense of like, OK, the worst of the worst that could have happened to us just happened.

And for those students who maybe couldn’t go back to — into campus, now all of their peers, who were supporters or are in solidarity, are — in some sense, it’s further emboldened. They’re now not just sitting on the lawns for a pro-Palestinian cause, but also for the students, who have endured quite a lot.

So the crackdown, sought by the president and enforced by the NYPD, ends up, you’re saying, becoming a galvanizing force for a broader group of Columbia students than were originally drawn to the idea of ever showing up on the center of campus and protesting?

Yeah, I can certainly speak to the fact that I’ve seen my own peers, friends, or even acquaintances, who weren’t necessarily previously very involved in activism and organizing efforts, suddenly finding themselves involved.

Can I — I just have a question for you, which is all journalism, student journalism or not student journalism, is a first draft of history. And I wonder if we think of this as a historic moment for Columbia, how you imagine it’s going to be remembered.

Yeah, there is no doubt in my mind that this will be a historic moment for Colombia.

I think that this will be remembered as a moment in which the fractures were laid bare. Really, we got to see some of the disunity of the community in ways that I have never really seen it before. And what we’ll be looking to is, where do we go from here? How does Colombia repair? How do we heal from all of this? so That is the big question in terms of what will happen.

Nick, Isabella Ramírez just walked us through what this has all looked like from the perspective of a Columbia student. And from what she could tell, the crackdown ordered by President Shafik did not quell much of anything. It seemed, instead, to really intensify everything on campus. I’m curious what this has looked like for Shafik.

It’s not just the students who are upset. You have faculty, including professors, who are not necessarily sympathetic to the protesters’ view of the war, who are really outraged about what Shafik has done here. They feel that she’s crossed a boundary that hasn’t been crossed on Columbia’s campus in a really long time.

And so you start to hear things by the end of last week like censure, no confidence votes, questions from her own professors about whether or not she can stay in power. So this creates a whole new front for her. And on top of it all, as this is going on, the encampment itself starts to reform tent-by-tent —

— almost in the same place that it was. And Shafik decides that the most important thing she could do is to try and take the temperature down, which means letting the encampment stand. Or in other words, leaning in the other direction. This time, we’re going to let the protesters have their say for a little while longer.

The problem with that is that, over the weekend, a series of images start to emerge from on campus and just off of it of some really troubling anti-Semitic episodes. In one case, a guy holds up a poster in the middle of campus and points it towards a group of Jewish students who are counter protesting. And it says, I’m paraphrasing here, Hamas’ next targets.

I saw an image of that. What it seemed to evoke was the message that Hamas should murder those Jewish students. That’s the way the Jewish students interpreted it.

It’s a pretty straightforward and jarring statement. At the same time, just outside of Columbia’s closed gates —

Stop killing children!

— protestors are showing up from across New York City. It’s hard to tell who’s affiliated with Columbia, who’s not.

Go back to Poland! Go back to Poland!

There’s a video that goes viral of one of them shouting at Jewish students, go back to Poland, go back to Europe.

In other words, a clear message, you’re not welcome here.

Right. In fact, go back to the places where the Holocaust was committed.

Exactly. And this is not representative of the vast majority of the protesters in the encampment, who mostly had been peaceful. They would later hold a Seder, actually, with some of the pro-Palestinian Jewish protesters in their ranks. But those videos are reaching members of Congress, the very same Republicans that Shafik had testified in front of just a few days before. And now they’re looking and saying, you have lost control of your campus, you’ve turned back on your word to us, and you need to resign.

They call for her outright resignation over this.

That’s right. Republicans in New York and across the country began to call for her to step down from her position as president of Columbia.

So Shafik’s dilemma here is pretty extraordinary. She has set up this dynamic where pleasing these members of Congress would probably mean calling in the NYPD all over again to sweep out this encampment, which would mean further alienating and inflaming students and faculty, who are still very upset over the first crackdown. And now both ends of this spectrum, lawmakers in Washington, folks on the Columbia campus, are saying she can’t lead the University over this situation before she’s even made any fateful decision about what to do with this second encampment. Not a good situation.

No. She’s besieged on all sides. For a while, the only thing that she can come up with to offer is for classes to go hybrid for the remainder of the semester.

So students who aren’t feeling safe in this protest environment don’t necessarily have to go to class.

Right. And I think if we zoom out for a second, it’s worth bearing in mind that she tried to choose a different path here than her counterparts at Harvard or Penn. And after all of this, she’s kind of ended up in the exact same thicket, with people calling for her job with the White House, the Mayor of New York City, and others. These are Democrats. Maybe not calling on her to resign quite yet, but saying, I don’t know what’s going on your campus. This does not look good.

That reality, that taking a different tack that was supposed to be full of learnings and lessons from the stumbles of her peers, the fact that didn’t really work suggests that there’s something really intractable going on here. And I wonder how you’re thinking about this intractable situation that’s now arrived on these college campuses.

Well, I don’t think it’s just limited to college campuses. We have seen intense feelings about this conflict play out in Hollywood. We’ve seen them in our politics in all kinds of interesting ways.

In our media.

We’ve seen it in the media. But college campuses, at least in their most idealized form, are something special. They’re a place where students get to go for four years to think in big ways about moral questions, and political questions, and ideas that help shape the world they’re going to spend the rest of their lives in.

And so when you have a question that feels as urgent as this war does for a lot of people, I think it reverberates in an incredibly intense way on those campuses. And there’s something like — I don’t know if it’s quite a contradiction of terms, but there’s a collision of different values at stake. So universities thrive on the ability of students to follow their minds and their voices where they go, to maybe even experiment a little bit and find those things.

But there are also communities that rely on people being able to trust each other and being able to carry out their classes and their academic endeavors as a collective so they can learn from one another. So in this case, that’s all getting scrambled. Students who feel strongly about the Palestinian cause feel like the point is disruption, that something so big, and immediate, and urgent is happening that they need to get in the faces of their professors, and their administrators, and their fellow students.

Right. And set up an encampment in the middle of campus, no matter what the rules say.

Right. And from the administration’s perspective, they say, well, yeah, you can say that and you can think that. And that’s an important process. But maybe there’s some bad apples in your ranks. Or though you may have good intentions, you’re saying things that you don’t realize the implications of. And they’re making this environment unsafe for others. Or they’re grinding our classes to a halt and we’re not able to function as a University.

So the only way we’re going to be able to move forward is if you will respect our rules and we’ll respect your point of view. The problem is that’s just not happening. Something is not connecting with those two points of view. And as if that’s not hard enough, you then have Congress and the political system with its own agenda coming in and putting its thumb on a scale of an already very difficult situation.

Right. And at this very moment, what we know is that the forces that you just outlined have created a dilemma, an uncertainty of how to proceed, not just for President Shafik and the students and faculty at Columbia, but for a growing number of colleges and universities across the country. And by that, I mean, this thing that seemed to start at Columbia is literally spreading.

Absolutely. We’re talking on a Wednesday afternoon. And these encampments have now started cropping up at universities from coast-to-coast, at Harvard and Yale, but also at University of California, at the University of Texas, at smaller campuses in between. And at each of these institutions, there’s presidents and deans, just like President Shafik at Columbia, who are facing a really difficult set of choices. Do they call in the police? The University of Texas in Austin this afternoon, we saw protesters physically clashing with police.

Do they hold back, like at Harvard, where there were dramatic videos of students literally running into Harvard yard with tents. They were popping up in real-time. And so Columbia, really, I think, at the end of the day, may have kicked off some of this. But they are now in league with a whole bunch of other universities that are struggling with the same set of questions. And it’s a set of questions that they’ve had since this war broke out.

And now these schools only have a week or two left of classes. But we don’t know when these standoffs are going to end. We don’t know if students are going to leave campus for the summer. We don’t know if they’re going to come back in the fall and start protesting right away, or if this year is going to turn out to have been an aberration that was a response to a really awful, bloody war, or if we’re at the beginning of a bigger shift on college campuses that will long outlast this war in the Middle East.

Well, Nick, thank you very much. Thanks for having me, Michael.

We’ll be right back.

Here’s what else you need to know today. The United Nations is calling for an independent investigation into two mass graves found after Israeli forces withdrew from hospitals in Gaza. Officials in Gaza said that some of the bodies found in the graves were Palestinians who had been handcuffed or shot in the head and accused Israel of killing and burying them. In response, Israel said that its soldiers had exhumed bodies in one of the graves as part of an effort to locate Israeli hostages.

And on Wednesday, Hamas released a video of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an Israeli-American dual citizen, whom Hamas has held hostage since October 7. It was the first time that he has been shown alive since his captivity began. His kidnapping was the subject of a “Daily” episode in October that featured his mother, Rachel. In response to Hamas’s video, Rachel issued a video of her own, in which she spoke directly to her son.

And, Hersh, if you can hear this, we heard your voice today for the first time in 201 days. And if you can hear us, I am telling you, we are telling you, we love you. Stay strong. Survive.

Today’s episode was produced by Sydney Harper, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Olivia Natt, Nina Feldman, and Summer Thomad, with help from Michael Simon Johnson. It was edited by Devon Taylor and Lisa Chow, contains research help by Susan Lee, original music by Marion Lozano and Dan Powell, and was engineered by Chris Wood. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly. That’s it for “The Daily.” I’m Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.

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Hosted by Michael Barbaro

Featuring Nicholas Fandos

Produced by Sydney Harper ,  Asthaa Chaturvedi ,  Olivia Natt ,  Nina Feldman and Summer Thomad

With Michael Simon Johnson

Edited by Devon Taylor and Lisa Chow

Original music by Marion Lozano and Dan Powell

Engineered by Chris Wood

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Columbia University has become the epicenter of a growing showdown between student protesters, college administrators and Congress over the war in Gaza and the limits of free speech.

Nicholas Fandos, who covers New York politics and government for The Times, walks us through the intense week at the university. And Isabella Ramírez, the editor in chief of Columbia’s undergraduate newspaper, explains what it has all looked like to a student on campus.

On today’s episode

Nicholas Fandos , who covers New York politics and government for The New York Times

Isabella Ramírez , editor in chief of The Columbia Daily Spectator

Background reading

Inside the week that shook Columbia University .

The protests at the university continued after more than 100 arrests.

There are a lot of ways to listen to The Daily. Here’s how.

We aim to make transcripts available the next workday after an episode’s publication. You can find them at the top of the page.

Research help by Susan Lee .

The Daily is made by Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, Sydney Harper, Mike Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Rachelle Bonja, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Corey Schreppel, Rob Szypko, Elisheba Ittoop, Mooj Zadie, Patricia Willens, Rowan Niemisto, Jody Becker, Rikki Novetsky, John Ketchum, Nina Feldman, Will Reid, Carlos Prieto, Ben Calhoun, Susan Lee, Lexie Diao, Mary Wilson, Alex Stern, Dan Farrell, Sophia Lanman, Shannon Lin, Diane Wong, Devon Taylor, Alyssa Moxley, Summer Thomad, Olivia Natt, Daniel Ramirez and Brendan Klinkenberg.

Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly. Special thanks to Sam Dolnick, Paula Szuchman, Lisa Tobin, Larissa Anderson, Julia Simon, Sofia Milan, Mahima Chablani, Elizabeth Davis-Moorer, Jeffrey Miranda, Renan Borelli, Maddy Masiello, Isabella Anderson and Nina Lassam.

Nicholas Fandos is a Times reporter covering New York politics and government. More about Nicholas Fandos

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The government therefore started imposing prohibitions on the use of and trade in these drugs. In 1914, the Harrison Administration passed the Harrison Narcotics Act, which imposed greater restrictions on psychotropic drug trade. However, the most significant government action in response to drug use occurred under the Nixon administration, when a war on drugs was declared.

The modern war on drugs in the US can trace its beginning to the Nixon administration. On June 17, 1971, President Richard Nixon declared that drug abuse was “a national emergency” and he proceeded to rank it “public enemy number one” (872). He declared a “war on drugs” and dedicated significant federal resources to this task. A number of notable events led to the start of this war. While drugs had always been a part of American popular culture, trends in drug use during the 1960s led to the need for a war on drugs.

During the 1960s, the US witnessed a spike in drug use among middle-class white youth (Benavie 34). The prevalent drug use among this class led to drugs losing some of their stigmatization and this increased drug consumption. The government came up with radical policies to solve the drug problems in the country. This commitment to fight drug abuse has remained strong in each US president since that time.

In its history, which spans over four decades, the war on drugs has had a number of significant moments. The first major moment in the war was in 1973 when the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) was formed. This agency was tasked with reducing the availability of illegal drugs in the US.

It set out to accomplish this task by curtailing the supply of drugs, especially from the international market. Another key moment was in 1981 during the Reagan administration. The President called for touch actions against drug users since he saw this as a more effective method than trying to cut the supply of the drugs. During this period, the US adopted a “zero tolerance” policy against users of illegal drugs. This “tough on drugs” policy has continued to characterize the approach used by successive administrations.

A significant benefit of the war on drugs is that it led to a sharp decline in the production and distribution of illicit drugs. Due to the punitive penalties attached to dealing in illegal drugs, people were dissuaded from engaging in these activities. The overall quantity of illicit drugs available in the country therefore decreased.

The war increased awareness of the negative effects of drugs among Americans. The government earmarked millions of dollars for education programs that were meant to empower the community. These programs highlighted the destructive nature of drugs and urged Americans to stay away from drugs.

A major demerit of the war on drugs is that it prevented the government from engaging in action to address the causes of drug abuse among most US citizens. Niesen notes that by positioning drug abuse as a problem to be dealt with by individuals and families, successive US administrations have avoided resolving the possible root causes of drug abuse, such as poverty and unemployment (872). Another significant demerit of the war is that it contributed to the large systematic corruption in the criminal justice system. By criminalizing drugs, the government created a situation where many individuals were in violation of the law and eligible to criminal penalties (Nicholson 305). To avoid these penalties, many detained drug users bribe law enforcement officials or criminal justice personnel.

Effects on Media, Economic, Policy, and Public Opinion

The mass media was significantly affected by the war on drugs. To begin with, the Nixon administration made extensive use of mass media to advise the public on the dangers of drug use. Niesen documents that the media was advised to give regular reports on the rise in drug-related deaths and print research findings that would help deter drug experimentation (875). The media endorsed sensationalism as a strategy to provoke public interest on the topic of drug abuse.

Public opinion concerning recreational drug use was affected by the war on drugs. Before this war, moderate drug use was normative behavior among youths and many middle class Americans.

The “war on drugs” led to the public view that all drug users were addicts. When declaring drug abuse “public enemy number one”, the Nixon administration did not distinguish between drug addicts and social users. Nicholson et al. note that the “war on drugs” approach promoted the perception that any drug use is abuse where illicit drugs are concerned (305).

Economically, the war on drugs led to an increase in government expenditure. The prohibition of drug use increased government spending on drug prevention. From the onset, the government dedicated significant resources to wage the war.

Specifically, law enforcement and criminal justice resources were used to deter illegal drug use and punish individuals who violated the law. On the other hand, the “war on drugs” greatly benefited drug dealers. Nicholson confirms that the “war on drugs” approach has contributed to the sustenance of a profitable black market in drugs for decades (305).

The US has been involved in an intensive “war against drugs” for over four decades. The war has led to an increase in the number of inmates in American prisons. Drug offenders make up a significant portion of the prisoners in US penitentiaries (Jones 492). The Bureau of Justice Statistics reveals that over 50% of federal convicts are imprisoned on drug related charges (Sledge par. 4). Most of these drug offenders are social users who do not have criminal records.

The War led to the emergence of a huge black market that deals in illicit drugs. Williams reveals that criminalization of drugs destroys the legal economy and an underground economy emerges to satisfy the demand (326). As such, the “war on drugs” has led to the growth of a powerful black market that dealt in the illicit drugs. This black market enjoyed great profits since it could inflate the price of the drugs and obtain a large profit margin.

The war on drugs has failed to mitigate drug use among Americans. Millions of Americans continue to use illicit drugs in spite of the aggressive government efforts to stop illegal drug use. As of 2000, the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse reported that an estimated 11 million Americans were regular users of illicit drugs (Block and Obioha 108).

In reaction to the fact that the traditional war on drugs has been hugely ineffective, there have been notable shifts in how the government and the community view the problem of drug use. Some policy makers have recognized that recreational drug use is an integral part of the American culture.

Promoting a drug-free life is therefore unrealistic. They have therefore called for the decriminalization of some drugs. Marijuana is one drug that has been legalized in some states in an attempt to deal with the drug problem. Block and Obioha note that legalization does not imply that the government is advocating the use of addictive drugs such as heroin and cocaine (108). Legalization means that it is not a criminal act to use, sell, or buy drugs.

Another trend has been in the emergence of preventive programmes that aim at harm reduction without preaching and propaganda. Such programs acknowledge that drug taking is a fact of life and aim to prevent drug abuse, which causes detrimental outcomes.

In addition to this, there has been a move towards viewing drug abusers as individuals in need of medical assistance instead of viewing them as criminals. Research shows that regardless of how successful criminal penalties are in reducing drug use among people, treatment is more effective.

Drugs remain to be an important issue affecting the American community. This war costs the government billions of dollars per year and the lives of many people are disrupted as they are subjected to criminal penalties for using or dealing in drugs.

In spite of these significant economic and social costs, the war on drugs has proved largely ineffective. There is no possibility that it will lead to the eradication of the drug problem faced by the country entirely. The US government should therefore consider alternative approaches to deal with the drug problems faced by its citizens.

Benavie, Arthur. Drugs: America’s Holy War . NY: Routledge, 2012. Print.

Block, Walter and Violet Obioha. “War on Black Men: Arguments for the Legalization of Drug.” Criminal Justice Ethics 31.2 (2012): 106-120. Web.

Jones, Michael. “Prison overcrowding: the sentencing judge as social worker”. Widener Law Journal 18.1 (2009): 491-498. Web. Web.

Nicholson, Thomas, David Duncan, John White and Cecilia Watkins. “Focusing on abuse, not use: A proposed new direction for US drug policy.” Drugs: Education, Prevention & Policy 19.4 (2012): 303-308. Print.

Niesen, Molly. “Public Enemy Number One: The US Advertising Council’s First Drug Abuse Prevention Campaign.” Substance Use & Misuse 46.7 (2011): 872-881. Print.

Sledge, Matt. “ The Drug War and Mass Incarceration by the Numbers .” The Huffington Post . 2013. Web.

Williams, Daniel. “The war on drugs.” Contemporary Review 294.17(2012): 324-329. Web.

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Bibliography

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Unprecedented wave of narco-violence stuns Argentina city

A prison guard sits in a watchtower at the Pinero jail in Pinero, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. President Javier Milei has called for harsher penalties against drug traffickers and military intervention. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

A chain lock reinforces the locked door of a gas station that started closing shop at night after the killing of a worker at a nearby station a few weeks before, in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. The order to kill came from inside Ezeiza Prison from gang leaders who hired a 15-year-old hitman to kill gas station worker Bruno Bussanich on March 9. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

A mural of soccer player Lionel Messi covers a building in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. The birthplace of Messi and revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara morphed about a decade ago into the country’s drug trafficking hub, as regional crackdowns pushed the trade south. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

A child rides a bicycle past a mural of Gabriel Ignacio Romero, a resident who was murdered on the sidewalk outside his home the previous year, in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. For the past decade, the 1.3 million residents of Rosario have watched warily as presidents and their promises come and go. What endures, they say, is violence. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Police officer Georgina Wilke drives her patrol car in Rosario, Argentina, late Monday, April 8, 2024. Agents fanned out across hardscrabble areas, spending hours logging neighborhood activity and setting up checkpoints on major thoroughfares. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

People hang out at a park in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. The birthplace of Lionel Messi and revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara morphed about a decade ago into the country’s drug trafficking hub, as regional crackdowns pushed the trade south. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

A resident who did not want to be identified shows the gun she keeps at her home for self-defense as she poses for a photo in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. The homicide rate is five times the national average in Rosario. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

A mural of Claudio Ariel Cantero covers a wall alongside a supportive message of him written by his family, in Rosario, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. Cantero, known as “El Pajaro,” or The Bird, was the leader of the criminal organization called “Los Monos,” or The Monkeys, and was shot to death at a bowling alley on May 26, 2013 in Santa Fe. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Police patrol the streets of Rosario, Argentina, as a family that collects disposed cardboard to resell pushes their children in a shopping cart, late Monday, April 8, 2024. Agents fanned out across hardscrabble areas, spending hours logging neighborhood activity and setting up checkpoints on major thoroughfares. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Geronima Benitez holds a photograph of her son Victor Emanuel, 17, who was murdered by drug traffickers who were never arrested two years ago, at her home in Rosario, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. Benítez said her son’s killer still lives down her street and is not convinced a prison sentence would make a difference. “We, on the outside, live in prison,” she said. “Those inside have everything.” (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Geronima Benitez wipes her eyes as she speaks about her son Victor Emanuel, 17, who was murdered by drug traffickers who were never arrested two years ago, during an interview at her home in Rosario, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. Benítez said her son’s killer still lives down her street and is not convinced a prison sentence would make a difference. “We, on the outside, live in prison,” she said. “Those inside have everything.” (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

A banner hangs over a bus stop asking for justice regarding the murder of bus driver Cesar Roldan in Rosario, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Prison guards stand behind the entrance to Pinero jail in Pinero, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. Authorities have ramped up prison raids, seized thousands of smuggled cellphones and restricted visits. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

A police officer stands guard on a street in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. President Javier Milei has promised to prosecute gang members as terrorists and change the law to allow the army into crime-ridden streets for the first time since Argentina’s brutal military dictatorship ended in 1983. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

The Pinero jail complex stands in Pinero, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. President Javier Milei’s tough-on-crime message has empowered hardline governor Maximiliano Pullaro’s efforts to clamp down on incarcerated criminal groups, which he said planned 80% of shootings in Rosario last year. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Inmates play soccer at Pinero jail in Pinero, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. Authorities have ramped up prison raids, seized thousands of smuggled cellphones and restricted visits. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

An inmate looks out from a window at Pinero jail in Pinero, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. Authorities have ramped up prison raids, seized thousands of smuggled cellphones and restricted visits. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Prison guards stand inside the Pinero jail complex in Pinero, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. President Javier Milei has called for harsher penalties against drug traffickers and military intervention. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

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ROSARIO, Argentina (AP) — The order to kill came from inside a federal prison near Argentina’s capital. Unwitting authorities patched a call from drug traffickers tied to one of the country’s most notorious gangs to collaborators on the outside. Hiring a 15-year-old hit man, they sealed the fate of a young father they didn’t even know.

At a service station on March 9 in Rosario, the picturesque hometown of soccer star Lionel Messi, 25-year-old employee Bruno Bussanich was whistling to himself and checking the day’s earnings just before he was shot three times from less than a foot away, surveillance footage shows. The assailant fled without taking a peso.

It was the fourth gang-related fatal shooting in Rosario in almost as many days. Authorities called it an unprecedented rampage in Argentina, which had never witnessed the extremes of drug cartel violence afflicting some other Latin American countries.

A handwritten letter was found near Bussanich’s body, addressed to officials who want to curb the power drug kingpins wield from behind bars. “We don’t want to negotiate anything. We want our rights,” it says. “We will kill more innocent people.”

Shaken residents interviewed by The Associated Press across Rosario described a sense of dread taking hold.

“Every time I go to work, I say goodbye to my father as if it were the last time,” said 21-year-old Celeste Núñez, who also works at a gas station.

The string of killings offer an early test to the security agenda of populist President Javier Milei, who has tethered his political success to saving Argentina’s tanking economy and eradicating narco-trafficking violence.

A police officer stands guard on a street in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Since taking office Dec. 10, the right-wing leader has promised to prosecute gang members as terrorists and change the law to allow the army into crime-ridden streets for the first time since Argentina’s brutal military dictatorship ended in 1983.

His law-and-order message has empowered the hardline governor of Santa Fe province, which includes Rosario, to clamp down on incarcerated criminal gangs that authorities say orchestrated 80% of shootings last year. Under the orders of Governor Maximiliano Pullaro, police have ramped up prison raids, seized thousands of smuggled cellphones and restricted visits.

“We are facing a group of narco-terrorists desperate to maintain power and impunity,” Milei said after Bussanich was killed, announcing the deployment of federal forces in Rosario. “We will lock them up, isolate them, take back the streets.”

A mural of Claudio Ariel Cantero covers a wall alongside a supportive message of him written by his family, in Rosario, Argentina, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

Milei won 56% of the vote in Rosario, where residents praise his focus on a problem largely neglected by his predecessors. But some worry the government’s combative approach traps them in the line of fire.

Gangs started their deadly retaliations just hours after Pullaro’s security minister shared photos showing Argentine prisoners crammed together on the floor, heads pressed against each other’s bare backs — a scene reminiscent of El Salvador President Nayib Bukele’s harsh anti-gang crackdown.

“It’s a war between the state and the drug traffickers,” said Ezequiel, a 30-year-old employee at the gas station where Bussanich was killed. Ezequiel, who gave only his first name for fear of reprisals, said his mother has since begged him to quit. “We’re the ones paying the price.”

Even Milei’s supporters have mixed feelings about the crackdown, including Germán Bussanich, the father of the slain gas station worker.

“They’re putting on a show and we’re facing the consequences,” Bussanich told reporters.

A leafy city 300 kilometers (180 miles) northwest of Buenos Aires, Rosario is where revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara was born, Messi first kicked a soccer ball and the Argentine flag was first raised in 1812. But it most recently won notoriety because its homicide numbers are five times the national average.

Tucked into a bend in the Paraná River, Rosario’s port morphed into Argentina’s drug trafficking hub as regional crackdowns pushed the narcotics trade south and criminals started squirreling away cocaine in shipping containers spirited down the river to markets abroad. Although Rosario never suffered the car bombs and police assassinations gripping Mexico , Colombia and most recently Ecuador , the splintering of street gangs has fueled bloodshed.

“It’s not close to the violence in Mexico because we still have the deterrence capacity of the government in Argentina,” said Marcelo Bergman, a social scientist at the National University of Tres de Febrero in Argentina. “But we need to keep an eye on Rosario because the major threats come not so much from big cartels but when these groups proliferate and diversify.”

Drug traffickers keep a tight grip over Rosario’s poor neighborhoods full of young men vulnerable to recruitment. One of them was Víctor Emanuel, a 17-year-old killed two years ago by rival gangsters in an area where street murals pay tribute to slain criminal leaders. No one was arrested.

“My neighbors know who’s responsible,” his mother, Gerónima Benítez, told the AP, her eyes shiny with tears. “I looked for help everywhere, I knocked on the doors of the judiciary, the government. No one answered.”

A fearful existence is all Benítez has ever known. But now, for the first time in Argentina, warring drug traffickers are banding together and terrorizing parts of the city previously considered safe.

Imprisoned gang leaders in Latin America have long run criminal enterprises remotely with the help of corrupt guards. But according to an indictment unveiled last week , incarcerated gang bosses in Argentina have been passing instructions on how to kill random civilians via family visits and video calls.

Court documents say the bosses paid underage hit men up to $450 to target four of the recent victims in Argentina’s third-largest city. The killing of Bussanich, two taxi drivers and a bus driver in less than a week in March, federal prosecutors say, “shattered the peace of an entire society.”

Street emptied. Schools closed. Bus drivers picketed. People were too terrified to leave their homes.

“This violence is on another level,” 20-year-old Rodrigo Dominguez said from an intersection where a dangling banner demanded justice for another bus driver slain there weeks earlier. “You can’t go outside.”

Panic was still palpable in Rosario last week, as police swarmed the streets and normally bustling bars closed early for lack of customers. A diner managed by Messi’s family, a draw for fans, reported quiet nights and less profit. Women in one neighborhood said they carry 22‐caliber pistols. Analía Manso, 37, said she was too scared to send her children to school.

Pope Francis last month said he was praying for his countrymen in Rosario.

Assaults and public threats continue. This month, a sign appeared on a highway overpass warning Argentine Security Minister Patricia Bullrich that gangs would extend their offensive to Buenos Aires if the government doesn’t back down.

Authorities have sought to reassure the public by sending hundreds of federal agents into Rosario. The AP spent a night with police last week as officers patrolled neighborhoods logging suspicious activity and setting up checkpoints.

Georgina Wilke, a 45-year-old Rosario officer in the explosives squad, said she welcomes federal intervention, including the military, to get crime under control. “We’ve been hit very hard,” Wilke said.

Omar Pereira, the provincial secretary of public security, promised the efforts represent a shift from failed tactics of the past.

“There were always pacts, implicit or explicit, between the state and criminals,” Pereira said, describing how authorities long looked the other way. “What’s the idea of this government? There is no pact.”

A child rides a bicycle past a mural of Gabriel Ignacio Romero, a resident who was murdered on the sidewalk outside his home the previous year, in Rosario, Argentina, Monday, April 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)

But experts are skeptical a tough-on-crime approach will stop drug traffickers from buying control over Argentina’s police and prisons.

“Unless the government fixes its problems with corruption, the crackdown on prisons is unlikely to have any long-term effect,” said Christopher Newton, an investigator at Colombia-based research organization InSight Crime.

For years, Rosario’s 1.3 million residents have watched warily as presidents and their promises come and go while the violence endures.

“It’s like a cancer that grows and grows,” said Benítez from her home, its windows protected by wrought-iron bars.

“We, on the outside, live in prison,” she said. “Those inside have everything.”