According to "China: Drunk power plant boss 'causes blackout'", following other acts of violence as a result of anger and a desire for revenge, "half a county [in China] was plunged into darkness" (2014, para. 1) when the alcohol intoxicated boss of a local power plant ordered it shut down.
I am sure that the Chinese electricity authority employees just wanted to have a good time when they went on their drinking spree. But that is also likely true of husbands who get drunk then bash their wives and children, of office workers, lawyers and engineers who enjoy a drink or two with mates after work before getting in a car and then killing someone's mother, father, son or daughter. And anyone who has been to a few nightclubs has surely seen the drunks who, full of the addictive drug alcohol, are rude and looking for a fight. Then there are the statistics for hospital admissions as a result of accidents where alcohol was a contributing factor. And might remember the awful crime on a Thai train a few months ago where an employee who was drunk, having been drinking beer with a mate, raped and murdered a 13 year old girl: alcohol is a common causal factor in such sex crimes. As the experts report, "alcohol is more harmful than heroin or crack" ("Scoring Drugs", 2010).
So, if the the evidence plainly shows that alcohol is far more harmful, in particular, that alcohol causes far more harm to society than any other popularly used drug of addiction, it is puzzling why so many politicians, police and other "good" people say that alcohol should be legal whilst the less socially harmful drugs are illegal! Worse, the very serious problems caused by drug use are made worse when the drugs are illegal. Making drugs illegal encourages corruption among officials, especially police and judges, it increases the cost of drugs which in turn increases drug related theft and other crimes, it makes massive profits for mafia groups, it destroys families when decent people are thrown into prison for having fun, and of course it makes it much harder for drug users to ask for and receive help with their health and other problems. All of these results of current drug policy in Thailand and many other countries are bad for society.
The popular drug policy in many countries seems both deeply irrational and seriously immoral.
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References
Scoring drugs: Drugs that cause most harm. (2010, November 2). The Economist. Retrieved from http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2010/11/drugs_cause_most_harm (The Economist is reporting on and cites an article published in the academic medical journal The Lancet, here.)
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