One measure of a good society is whether individuals are free to do as they choose on matters that principally concern only them. The debate about heroin, cocaine and marijuana touches precisely on this. A society in which such substances are legal and available is good not because drugs are in themselves good, but because it respects the autonomy of those who wish to use them.
Logically there is no difference between legal and currently illegal drugs. Both are used for pleasure, relief from stress or anxiety and ”holidaying” from normal life, and both are dangerous to health. Given this, consistent policy must either criminalise the use of nicotine and alcohol, or legalise currently illegal substances.
On civil-liberties grounds the latter is preferable because there is no justification for policing behaviour unless, in the form of rape or murder, it is intrinsically damaging to the social fabric and harms unwilling third parties.
Bad law tries to coerce people into behaving according to norms chosen by people who claim to know better. Let the disapprovers argue and exhort; giving them the power to coerce and punish is unacceptable.
Almost everyone who wishes to try drugs, does so. Opponents say legalisation will lead to unrestrained use and abuse. Yet the evidence is that where laws have been relaxed there is little variation in use.
The classic example is Prohibition in the United States during the 1920s, which created a huge criminal industry as criminals began supplying outlawed substances.
If drugs were legally and safely available through chemist shops, and if their use was governed by the same provisions as govern alcohol purchase and consumption, the main platform for organised crime would be removed.
It would also remove much petty crime, through which many users fund their habit. If addiction to drugs were treated as a medical rather than criminal matter, so that addicts could get safe, regular supplies on prescription, the crime rate would drop dramatically, as argued recently by certain police chiefs.
The safety issue is a simple one. Paracetemol is more dangerous than heroin. Taking double the standard dose of paracetemol can be dangerous. Taking double the medical dose of heroin (diamorphine) causes sleepiness and no lasting effects.
The place of drugs in the good society is not about the drugs as such, but the value to individuals and their society of openness to experimentation and alternative lifestyles. The good society is permissive, seeking to protect third parties from harm but not presuming to regulate people on what is in their own good.