Why isn't alcohol treated like a class A drug?

[treacleturkey]

It makes people drunk and violent, many people become alcoholics/unable to function without drink, it causes liver failure and alcohol poisoning on some occasions.
Yet it's perfectly fine compared to stick drugs like MDMA (I'm not talking heroin or cocaine here) under the Class A category when they don't cause nearly as much harm.......

Culturally and historically, weak alcohol being safer to drink than water.

The real question is why are any drugs banned instead of being legalised and taxed. Instead of finding items to add to the banned list, we should be doing away with it entirely. The State needs the cash and, since suicide is not illegal, why should anyone be concerned if you do it quickly or slowly.

because of the horrendous consequences for crime, the NHS and the benefit system.

I don't know that the vast majority of people enjoy alcohol safely and in a manner that is good for their health. 2-3 units is what women should drink in a single sitting according to experts. That is not a lot of alcohol and I do not know anyone who drinks who would stop at that in a single sitting without having a reason. I agree that if it were discovered tomorrow it would be either illegal of heavily regulated thank God it is ancient

Those recommended limits are made up nonsense. The so called experts are on the whole neo prohibitionist control freaks.

I don't understand your comment about no one who drinks would stop at 2-3 units? Of course people do, most people I know would. You must know much heavier drinkers than I do.

Another one for the legalisation and taxation of everything too!

I also don't understand people who are say that cannabis is dangerous, but see no problem in drinking excessively. I'd much rather be around a group of people who are stoned than drunk!

overthehill, not met many people living with alcoholic brain damage, or dying of alcoholic liver failure, have you. Believe me, it is not pretty.

Well, Jane, for one think, the alcohol probably wasn't produced by people trafficked into the country and forced into slave labour.

People who die through over consumption of alcohol drink a heck of a lot more than 2-3 units a day.

not necessarily. People who die of alcohol poisoning do.

toby many 'drugs' are licenced medicines (ketamine for example) = available legally on prescription. they are for prescription because they can cause a lot of harm if not used correctly.

Caronaim - You can grow it yourself you know!

Jane Fonda Mostly people don't though, mostly it is bought from people traffickers.

Alcohol is so 'acceptable' isn't it. Just looking on facebook reading a load of comments from some mums I know about what time they got home and how bad their hangovers were after a night out (only at another mums's house).

Imagine how 'funny' other people would find it if they were saying 'bloody hell, massive come down from the E we were taking last night, staggered in to sleep it off 3am, hope the kids don't wake me up in the morning' etc.

It's just so acceptable still to get pissed up on booze into your 40's when by this stage most of us have grown out of taking stuff to alter our mental states and look down our noses at those who haven't.

I agree with those of you who say it is down to history which has made alcohol the acceptable drug (for lack of a better word) of choice. In my job I see the effects of alcohol and drugs on people's lives. Though drugs can be catastrophic, we see far, far more lives destroyed by the 'safe' and 'acceptable' alcohol.

Caronaim - So surely the answer to that would be to legalise it, so there would be no more human trafficking for that purpose, and the government can raise more money from taxes.

How people source something doesn't mean that it is dangerous, or indeed that it should be illegal. Plenty of people buy clothes made by essentially slaves in factories, and the diamond business is awful as well. Those aren't illegal though.

I don't understand your comment about no one who drinks would stop at 2-3 units

I did not say no one does. I said not one I know anyone who does. 2-3 units is between one standard and one large glass of wine. I think if I went to dinner with DH we would be likely to share a bottle of wine for example. My friends would all do the same.

I look forward to reading your paper on the mortality rates associated with alcohol consumption. Because those I know of show that drinking the 'recommended' limit is associated with lower mortality than not drinking. It isn't until you get to nearly twice these limits that mortality rates are worse than being teetotal.

I said I do not know anyone who does even. Gah phone fails all around tonight thank God I have not had wine.

I think that yabu to expect the law governing use of intoxicants to have a rational basis, it's such an emotive subject!

We could probably make an argument that a desire for intoxication is a basic part of human nature.
But, even if we can concede that point how we should respond to it is a complex matter.

Somewhere in between total prohibition of all mind altering substances and total freedom to use what you like.

But what point in that spectrum??
Everyone will have a different opinion!

Historical/cultural but yes hypocritical.

Caro - that's symptomatic of the legality though - remove the illegality part of your argument then look at the drugs side by side.

If they weren't illegal then the trafficking side would not exist as it does - there will always be a black market as there is with booze and fags.

It doesn't make me violent. I talk bollocks for a bit, then fall asleep.

It's a shame it doesn't do that to more people.

It is in some places, Saudia Arabia for instance. You could go and live there, perhaps it's a nice, safe, tolerant, non-violent society to live in. Oh, wait...