François Jolivet is LREM deputy for Indre.
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Michel Houellebecq: "A civilization which legalizes euthanasia loses all rights to respect"
Whether or not to legalize cannabis, the debate deserves to be opened.
He is also an old sea serpent and is invited regularly during election periods.
Some speak rather of “decriminalizing” consumption, but it should be objectively recognized that this is only a pure semantic debate.
The sale of cannabis fuels the turnover of organized crime networks, which combine human trafficking and terrorism.
The financial sums at stake are enormous.
This trafficking locks up certain territories, rots the lives of the inhabitants and plagues part of the youth.
The authority of the State is challenged on a daily basis by the dealers who now use all means to protect their business.
Armed, they wage a cartel war to keep or conquer their market.
Faced with the observation of the violence linked to this trafficking, some see the legalization of cannabis as the cure for all ills.
Trafficking would disappear, violence too, and France would be better off.
If only it was true…
This objective paved with good intentions is an error of judgment.
In addition to the fact that this would acknowledge the state's powerlessness, the signal would be appalling.
In the end, we would only have to legalize everything that is forbidden to obtain peace.
The financial stakes are so high that those who profit from them now will never accept to lose everything.
The traffickers will come back and, like their products, they will be stronger.
Francois Jolivet
And finally, would we have peace? The example of the Netherlands is ambiguous. The "public service of cannabis" took hold after two years and consumers turned to it. The legalization of cannabis has disrupted the market and traffickers have lost significant shares. At the end of the third year, these same traffickers embarked on a strategy of recapture by selling cannabis at a lower price. These criminals, to consolidate their position, have also increased the level of THC (cannabinoid acting on the psyche by modifying the cerebral rhythm) of the products they sell. So much so that their customers have become addicted. The products of the "public service of cannabis" are no longer sold, simply because they are no longer popular. The state is in competition.
The example of Canada is also revealing.
While the cannabis market was legalized in 2018, 42% of Canadians continue to buy cannabis illegally according to a government study.
Since this legalization, and the new penal sanctions planned against the black market, traffickers have diversified to flood the streets with other drugs.
This is also the case in Spain, where cocaine and heroin use has increased among those under 15.
Will these substances also have to be legalized?
Pandora's box is open.
We must get out of naivety.
The financial stakes are so high that those who profit from them now will never accept to lose everything.
The traffickers will come back and, like their products, they will be stronger.
Is there a need to recall the deleterious effects of cannabis on health?
The National Institute for Prevention and Health Education lists the consequences of its active ingredients on consumers: impairment of perception, attention and immediate memory, relationship disorders, risks of dependence, revelation or death. aggravation of mental disorders, lung damage… Cannabis destroys health, handicaps and kills.
Let us not step back more than a millimeter on the republican order, and on the health of the French.
Each renunciation is just as much a right to disorder and ultimately protects the actors of organized crime.
Francois Jolivet
Who sincerely wishes to apply this model in France?
The legalization of cannabis would only partially bypass the networks of traffickers.
Worse, it would create even more powerful networks, and therefore more violent.
Our Country must not become a narco-state.
The year 2020 was marked by major seizures: 96 tonnes of cannabis, 13 tonnes of cocaine, 1 tonne of heroin and 1.2 million ecstasy tablets.
450 deal points have been dismantled.
These figures demonstrate the success of the intensification of pressure on the sectors.
Let us continue on this path.
Let us not step back more than a millimeter on the republican order, and on the health of the French.
Each renunciation is just as much a right to disorder and ultimately protects the actors of organized crime.
To lead the fight, we must continue to provide the police and gendarmes with staff and equipment to match this ambition.
We need a sufficiently effective and dissuasive Justice, driven by the will to participate in the security of all.
But behind, we also need political courage.
The police, on the front line, must be able to work on solid foundations and rely on a power that does not submit.
The legalization of cannabis is a deadly pipe dream.
