The recent extradition of alleged drug dealer Christopher Coke from Jamaica to America on charges related to marijuana, cocaine (no pun ever intended, I’d think), and firearms demonstrates most aptly the madness and counterproductive nature of the American “War on Drugs.”
Coke, revered by a large segment of the Jamaican population, has used a large portion of the proceeds from the alleged sale of these products to distribute food to the needy, send children to school, and build hospitals in his homeland. Some locals even equate Coke to figures such as Robin Hood or Jesus. While this may be a bit overblown to some, it does not extinguish the fact that these are private efforts – in spite of what Coke’s real motivations may or may not be – to supplant both inadequate and confiscatory government action with voluntary independent welfare. It is simply being supposedly financed by the sale of items of which governments disapprove of altogether (drugs), or seek to severely restrict (guns). Governments everywhere, after all, feel their monopoly on violent coercive force is threatened when it cannot tax that which it wishes to demonize, and when non-governmental individuals are capable of defending themselves.
It runs deeper, however: Consider that in order for the Jamaican State to affect Coke’s initial arrest, 76 people in and around Kingston had to die. Coke’s supporters must’ve had some reason to risk life and limb in order to prevent his kidnapping by government agents – some reason to consider Coke more valuable to them than the State. Would these people have ever fired on police with their weapons if Coke had simply been left alone? Would 76 people have died from cannabis or cocaine use in the same time period? Was the public danger of narcotics and gun possession so great, that it justified this kind of aggressive slaughter initiated by the Jamaican government – obviously under tremendous political pressure from the American one to do so?
I’m not trying to say, necessarily, that Chris Coke was or is a saint. I’m simply pointing out that when any rational person examines the net effect of the entire tableau, it is far better in any long run to tolerate people ingesting certain substances into their bodies as they see fit, owning whatever weapons they prefer to defend themselves, and leaving be those who choose to be agoristic entrepreneurs by buying and selling such items. That, compared to the violent intrusion of government, financed on a compulsory basis by taxation applied almost universally to everyone. Jamaicans were forced to finance the slaughter of those 76 people by their own government, while they will now lose Coke’s philanthropy. Americans, by proxy, also financed it, and will now foot the bill for Coke’s transportation to the U.S., his trial, his support and upkeep while in custody – and, if he is found “guilty” – his subsequent imprisonment in an American federal gulag.
Don’t even try to convince me that this is a more agreeable situation than the aforementioned. I’m an anarchist, and so too used to utilizing my powers of logic: Something governments are not, and never will be, predicated upon.
