this post was submitted on 07 Oct 2024
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The mayor of a Mexican city plagued by drug violence has been murdered less than a week after taking office.

Alejandro Arcos was found dead on Sunday in Chilpancingo, a city of around 280,000 people in the southwestern state of Guerrero. He had been mayor for six days.

Evelyn Salgado, the state governor, said the city was in mourning over a murder that "fills us with indignation". His death came three days after the city government's new secretary, Francisco Tapia, was shot dead.

Authorities have not released details of the investigation, or suspects. However, Guerrero is one of the worst-affected states for drug violence and drug cartels have murdered dozens of politicians across the country.

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[–] [email protected] 154 points 1 month ago (4 children)

If there wasn't such a strong black market for illegal drugs in the US, these cartels wouldn't have this much power/money.

[–] ChicoSuave 75 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Cartels sell more than drugs these days. They learned in the 90s that diversifying into different products gave them more stability against drug enforcement. Avocados have turned into legal profit. Logging in another business. Neither of these things will be affected by someone quitting drugs. Stop building houses and stop eating avocado now.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 month ago (2 children)

They might be only able to do those other things since they are able to pay an army to terrorize, intimidate and bribe local and state government's into allowing them to exist and set up these protection racquets. It takes a lot of money to be able to be more powerful then a government, I don't think selling avocados or logging could generate that much

[–] Delta_V 19 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Avocados and logging also don't need to worry about getting shut down by the law like the cocaine and heroin business does.

Legalize the coke and dope, and the incentive to resort to violence to avoid criminal penalties goes away.

[–] Mango 3 points 1 month ago

Selling anything necessary can generate a lot of you're making sure you can't have competition. That's the whole trick of the protection racket. It's what police do here. They're dressed up more, but do the same.

[–] Dasus 6 points 1 month ago

Neither of these things will be affected by someone quitting drugs. Stop building houses and stop eating avocado now.

"The cartels won't be affected if their major source of income gets cut off."

Yes, sure, they've diversified. But those legal operations aren't their largest sources od income, not enough to sustain their current operations if it was just the legal ones. Most of the legal ones are used to clean some of the income from drugs.

And besides, I'm pretty sure the cartels are doing this for the money. Sure, it's not all it's about, but I'm sure it's the largest motivator. If drugs we're legal and the easiest ways for the cartels to keep in business was to do it legitimately, and they were actually allowed to, they could use the legal systems to actually enforce deals and debts, so the enforcement methods they use now would be obsolete and even counterproductive to profits.

People won't stop using drugs. Just like they didn't stop drinking during prohibition. But we can take the trade away from the gangsters and put it in legal markets and regulate the product and business to make it safer for users.

[–] Mango 3 points 1 month ago

Are you telling me they're doing the same shit as our actual government now? We may as well consider them a country at this rate.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Muh avocado toast!

[–] assassinatedbyCIA 31 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I think I heard from somewhere that while that might have worked decades ago the cartels have diversified their ‘business’ to the point where drug legalisation wouldn’t kill them. We should still legalise drugs but I doubt they’ll fix the cartel issue.

[–] P00ptart 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It wouldn't end them ENTIRELY, as there were ruthless organizations before drugs, too. What it would do is make it much less profitable. Meaning less to kill someone over.

[–] Dasus 0 points 1 month ago

as there were ruthless organizations before drugs, too

What were these organisations before drugs were illegal?

[–] InverseParallax 20 points 1 month ago (6 children)

So, I don't disagree, but we legalized weed in the civilized parts of the country and it had little effect, I'm not sure I want to legalize cocaine, it's much better at killing people.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Little effect in what regard?

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I think they're saying that legalizing weed hasnt done anything to reduce Mexican cartel influence or violence.

[–] [email protected] 49 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Why would it? It’s the bulkiest, smelliest, lowest cost drug there is. Mexican weed sucked ass too. Moving cocaine or especially ultra high strength opiate analogs is significantly more lucrative.

Making things illegal doesn’t work. Not alcohol, not drugs, not abortion. It needs to be addressed by education. The current just say no abstinence approach leaves people ill prepared for when they encounter drugs. Our relationship with drugs is fucked, currently. Altering our state of consciousness with drugs is a fundamental part of being human.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Portugal set the standard years ago. Legalize it and divert all the money that would go to incarceration to inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation for drug addiction.

[–] Ghostalmedia 17 points 1 month ago

Minor clarification -Technically it was decriminalized, not legalized. Distribution will send you to jail and, after 2 or more possession offenses, you’re forced into a treatment program.

And sadly, things have started to get worse again in Portugal. Lately they’ve been sending fewer people to treatment, and surprise surprise, usage and deaths have gone up.

[–] Gammelfisch 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I believe Switzerland was the first country to establish centers where drug addicts would receive a controlled dosage for "free." Of course paid for by taxes. The Suisse found out crime decreased, the parks were cleaner and emergency rooms saw fewer overdose patients. Basically a win across the board.

[–] rottingleaf 2 points 1 month ago

That happens when much of citizenry can be characterized as "rich blokes who will take coke at some point with no shadow of doubt". When everyone involved knows that, including the voters, it's an easy decision.

However, in many other countries the general population mostly forms their opinion on drugs, weapons and even political freedoms based on fear of what will happen.

They don't look at all this critically, thus don't understand that the worst things happening because of the current state of things they don't know anything about, because information is not and will never be as available as their thought process requires.

That involves said current state of things funding things like cartels, criminal groups in governments involved in drug trade (it's much more profitable when you ban all the competition), creating a vector of control over addicted people. These all have ugly consequences - violence abroad, strong (and rich) mafia groups in governments.

The correct thought process would be comparing abstract mechanisms. In abstract no consumable substance should be illegal, provided the buyer knows its contents and effects.

BTW, in abstract the right policy about weapons ownership would be opt out, not opt in, - mandatory mental examination of every adult citizen, but also mandatory weapons ownership for those who pass it! Perhaps except felons. With other exceptions being a process involving some justification being filed - as in pacifist views, religious reasons, bad atmosphere in family thus inability to keep it secure, something like that. It's not about "good guy with a gun", it's about distributing real power. People who should own weapons are not the same people who want to own weapons generally. Thus mandatory.

[–] Buddahriffic 11 points 1 month ago

I think legalizing weed didn't make that much of a difference because the whole claim that buying random weed from a random dealer put money in cartel or terrorist pockets was a lie.

Not that there weren't any large weed organizations, they just weren't murdering people at the scale the cartels are or doing it to fund violence.

They'd also rely a lot on temporary workers since trimming was really the only labour intensive step, and then it would be sent out into a distribution network that wasn't so much an organization as it was a collection of independent or small scale distributors. Which in some locations might have been gangs, but I'd guess was mostly normal people looking to make some extra money.

[–] Ghostalmedia 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)

We don’t need to legalize. If we decriminalized, then took the money for jailing and funded mandatory treatment, we could do what Portugal did in the early 00’s.

[–] InverseParallax 1 points 1 month ago

I'm actually fine with decriminalizing consumption so long as distribution (real distribution, not piddly shit) stays illegal, at least without proper licensing, etc.

I'm not thrilled about it but I'm open so long as cocaine and heroin aren't fully legalized.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

I am sure. Legalize all of it. Legalize it, regulate it, tax it, use half of the new income for prevention and education, one quarter for medical support for addicts and the rest fills the coffers. You take away the power from the criminal gangs, while at the same time increasing your tax revenue, adding new legal avenues of business and minimizing the health impact considerably.

[–] _wizard 3 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Still waiting for legal grass.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Assuming you’re in the US:

It’s called THCa and is the same weed you’ve been smoking your whole life. You can get ounces to your door in the mail 100% legally thanks to a poorly written Farm Bill.

The farm bill only states a certain % of THC is illegal. Well, THC isn’t on the plants in large quantities - that only exists once you heat the cannabis to isomerize it from THCa to THC. It’s not delta 8 or some weird synthetic cannabinoid, weed has always been THCa before it’s heated.

There are dispensaries all over Texas these days selling great weed with this loophole. Texas, of all places.

[–] _wizard 2 points 1 month ago

Good to know. I moved out over a year ago. Going back EOM for a family visit. Hate landing anywhere dry, so I'll probably check these out.

[–] HootinNHollerin 2 points 1 month ago

California announced they’ll be opening cannabis cafes

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Come do some smoking tourism in BC!

[–] InverseParallax 0 points 1 month ago

As I said, the civilized parts of the country.

[–] Dasus 7 points 1 month ago

Exactly.

All of the most common drugs have to be legalised. It's the only way to get rid of the black markets, which can not be regulated.

Just like with alcohol, prohibition simply does not work.