• There is no conflict between the rights of drug users and other citizens – the choice to take drugs is personal, and need not affect or concern anyone else.
• Human rights are universal; whether or not one is a drug user, abuse of authority harms us all. When governments utilise moral panic and fear about drugs to ride roughshod over rule-of-law and due process, the damage spreads beyond drug users. It emboldens authorities to disregard the rule of law often for their own ends.
• The illicit drug trade has created entire regions effectively governed by organised crime, whose culture of coercion and violence make human rights a distant and unrealistic concern.
• Professor David Nutt, former head of an advisory board to the UK government, memorably wrote that “there is not much difference between horse-riding and ecstasy” in terms of danger. As consenting adults, we retain the right to engage in all sorts of harmful and risky activity without government intrusion – why should drug use be any different? As a society, we can disapprove and discourage without recourse to law.
• The right to take drugs is not explicitly protected but falls under other broadly accepted human rights, such as to privacy, health and freedom of choice and belief.