Monday, November 23, 2015

The War on Drugs



The House I Live In really opened my eyes to the affects that "the war on drugs" has had on our country.  Prior to watching this documentary, I did not realize that the system that was designed to diminish the impact drugs have on our country not only failed beyond measure, but actually seems to have worsened the problem.


I believe the manner in which this documentary was put together was extremely effective.  Both the lawbreakers and their families and the law enforcement officials all seem to have a collective opinion that the war on drugs has failed.  I would have to agree with them.


However, I was so blown away by how drastically wrong everything went that I nearly overlooked the victims, besides the criminals.  I am certain they were left out as part of a strategy, to make the government the only responsible party for the drug problem in America and I don’t discount that the hold a lot of culpability.  But if I were filming this documentary, I would include the real casualties to the war on drugs.  Those are the ones who have died at the hands of the dealers and the users.  Not only those who have overdosed, but those who may have lost their lives due to the violence behind drugs.  They talked about the children who became drug dealers because it’s all they knew, but they failed to address the ones who never made it that far.


Doing illegal drugs IS a crime and it does impact innocent people’s lives.  The documentary failed to address a crucial point as they did not discuss or interview people whose children lost their lives because of another person’s involvement in drugs.  This would add more truth to the documentary.  Seeing not just the deterioration of life as a result of dealing drugs or doing drugs, but instead, seeing the bigger problem behind drugs and that is the loss of innocent lives and families destroyed. 


So although I can see the point behind the story, there is more to be said on the war on drugs. 

No comments:

Post a Comment