"Dude I'm from England, there's more morons than responsible people here overall. Let alone drug users."
I agree with you man. I think that's the case in most of the 'developed' countries. But hey, I could be wrong. I'm just saying that legalizing illicit drugs would hurt more people (even if they do it to themselves) than it would benefit. No government in the world would want to have the families of people who've overdosed or ruined their lives through drug abuse suing them around the clock. There would be an uproar in the community and the drugs would be made illegal again to save the hassles. The point I'm making is that the majority of the population wouldn't be responsible enough to handle legalizing illicit drugs. At least that's the case now, who knows what could happen in the future.
The fact is though, drugs being illegal obviously doesn't stop people from using them. The people who want to use them are going to do so whether or not it's legal, and the people who don't want to use them won't. Simply making them legal will not make all of society druggies. The main reason drugs do so much damage is because they're so expensive and hard to come by... Drug dealers charge an arm and a leg for their wares, hence addicts are encouraged to steal to get money. It causes all kinds of problems... More than the drugs themselves would if they were legal.
I agree, but both approaches are flawed in my opinion. Legal or illegal you will have problems. I don't think legalizing them would cause a society of drug addicts, but you would have many more abusive, uneducated users. People would still commit crimes to support their habit or while under the influence. I just don't think any countries government would go for legalizing drugs. Apart from the risk involved and the money/time they've spent fighting drugs, they would also lose a lot of support from conservative voters. I don't favor either course of action, nor do I really care as I don't use drugs or plan to. I'm just saying that countries like the US, UK or Australia are not going to make illicit drugs legal in this day and age for those reasons.