Gore Vidal Essay Response

6 Pages 1569 Words

“The American people are as devoted to the idea of sin and its punishment as they are to making money- and fighting drugs is nearly as big a business as pushing them.”

-Gore Vidal


Would there be any crime if there was no crime to commit? That seems to be the

question one would ask of Gore Vidal. In his essay Drugs, Vidal explains that the drug

problem of the United States could be solved simply by legalizing the drugs which are

the base cause of our problem. Gore Vidal gives examples which he believes are the

reasons why we should, and why we will not allow drugs to be legalized within

the United States.

One would think that legalization of drugs in the United States would be tough. On the contrary, Mr. Vidal believes that such an effort is simple. He states that legalized drugs can be labeled with a precise description of the effects that the user will experience. According to Mr. Vidal, by listing both the positive and negative effects, there should be no surprises in store for the drug user. The first problem with such an idea, however, is that it has been known that different drugs will have varied effects depending on the person who takes them. Therefore, the effects that are labeled on the drugs would not always be entirely accurate. Some of these varied and negative effects, though, could be curtailed by the fact that legalization of drugs would mean more pure forms of the narcotics in question, with less harmful additives. But overall, drugs as we know them are extremely unstable and have different effects with each case. Vidal also states that, in addition to labeling the results usage of a certain drug may have, it must also be made clear which results it will not ...