Where to Invade Next Page #7

in drug-related crimes as a result of...

No. If there's less people using,

there will be less people

causing troubles

because they are using.

Okay, wait a minute.

You're saying that

by decriminalizing all drugs,

not throwing people in jail,

drug usage went down, not up?

Mm-hmm.

Um...

When you think about drug users,

everybody thinks about those

small 10% that are causing problems.

People don't think about

the 90% of people

that are not causing

any troubles

although they are using

illicit substances.

People that are using drugs

might be causing harm...

Causing harm to themselves,

but not necessarily to others.

...but not necessarily to others.

I mean, they may be bringing sadness

to their marriage or their family or...

So? So does Facebook.

Are we going to illegalize it?

See, we think of it the other way.

By identifying those

who are using and doing drugs,

we can weed them out.

- We use that as the crime--

- Is it working?

Well, actually, it is.

It's probably just a coincidence,

but in the 1950s and '60s,

the Negroes of the United States,

after 400 years of oppression,

got all uppity and started

demanding their civil rights.

And they started

to assert their power.

Our people want an end

to the living hell

that drug-pushing has spawned.

In order to fight

and defeat this enemy,

it is necessary to wage

a new, all-out offensive.

- Down.

- On the ground.

On the ground, man.

On the ground.

This is one area where

we cannot have budget cuts.

Drugs are menacing

our society.

They're threatening our values

and undercutting our institutions.

Here's how I think

the history books

will record all of this

100 years from now.

"Around the time that the blacks

began to rise up,

coincidentally, new laws were passed

imposing harsher sentences

on the drugs that were created

for the 'urban' demographic"...

See this cute little vial here?

It's crack, rock cocaine.

This is crack cocaine.

..."while the drugs used

in the white community

resulted in lesser punishments."

So help me God.

I experimented with marijuana

a time or two and I didn't like it,

and didn't inhale,

and never tried it again.

"Their leaders assassinated,

the uprising grew quiet,

and over the next four decades,

the police coincidentally rounded up

millions upon millions of black men,

stripping from all of them

their right to vote,

with 35 states

not even letting them vote

after they get out of prison.

Which means that in states

like Florida and Virginia,

one in three black men

cannot vote."

When we fight drugs,

we fight the war on terror.

"And the way you get the states

with the largest percentage

of terrorists

to become red states

is by taking away

their right to vote."

Yes, white America

had inadvertently

figured out a way

to bring back slavery.

And master knew

that the way to get rich

was having all that free labor.

Today's masters

have found our prisons

to be the perfect places

to make their products

for as little as 23 cents an hour.

Yes, that burger you're eating,

that airline reservation you've made,

the software you're using to watch

the pirated copy of this movie,

your child's backpack

with its five hours of homework.

I always wondered

what Victoria's secret was.

And now I know.

It's one of many companies

that have used 21st century slaves.

It was an act of pure,

mad genius.

So, what do you do

with your black people here?

- Do you have black people here?

- Yep.

And you don't-- you don't have

drug laws to put them in prison.

No, no.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

You're telling me that if you arrested

someone who was black

for usage of drugs,

they wouldn't go to prison?

They wouldn't be arrested

in the first place.

The usage of drugs

is not an excuse

to arrest anyone in Portugal,

regardless of their color.

Right, but it's a way

to help control the population,

if you understand what I'm saying.

- In the US, we have millions...

- I know.

...of black, mostly men...

With a criminal record,

and it's--

Even though they're out of prison.

And they can't ever vote again.

Our prisoners actually vote first.

I'm here right now

to steal your great idea.

I'm gonna take it back

to the United States.

The thing is it won't work

if you just take it there and pfft.

If you just go there and you just

decriminalize drug usage,

that's not going to work.

You have to steal some other good ideas

that we had before.

Yeah?

Like what?

A health care system

that is universal and free for all.

That will increase

the accessibility to treatment.

So, what you're saying is

it's not just taking back

the criminalization

part of drugs,

I am also gonna have

to convince the United States

to increase treatment,

basically take the stick out of our ass,

and help people.

Exactly.

As we were packing up to leave,

the Lisbon cops asked

if they could say something directly

to law enforcement

in the United States.

- Is against that dignity?

- Yeah.

And you guys are cops

and this is how you feel?

I don't know what to say.

A lot of work to be done, yeah.

- Thank you.

- Thank you very much.

And I think in general...

Yeah.

Yeah.

Welcome to the Norwegian

prison system,

based on the principle

of rehabilitation, not revenge.

I want to meet prisoners.

- Yeah, you wanna meet prisoners?

- Yeah.

You're meeting one now.

You're-- you're a prisoner,

dressed like this?

Yes.

So, this is the house

and in here is the living room.

It's a nice, okay view.

And this is my room.

It's pretty okay.

Yeah, so, this is your cell.

Yes.

Do they lock you in at night?

No. I am the only one

that has the key for it, so...

We watch TV,

we can play basketball.

- Bicycle or running, swimming.

- Fishing.

Wait a minute.

What do you mean swimming?

You can swim

to the other side?

That is not allowed.

From another side,

you can swim here,

but you cannot swim from here

to another side.

Because they call escape.

- You're in prison for murder.

- Yeah.

- You killed somebody.

- Yeah.

I can't help but notice

that right behind you

are a whole bunch

of very sharp knives.

Yeah.

Yes.

- Nobody here is worried about that?

- No, no.

- Should I be worried about that?

- No.

- You're not worried about it.

- I'm not worried about it.

- I love this.

- Yeah.

If I could get one of these

to take home,

I would have ketchup

on everything.

That is, like, the cool--

look at it, it's still going.

Yeah.

In the weekend,

it's four guards at work

in another building.

- That's it?

- Yeah, that's it.

And how many of you

are there here?

- 115.

- 115 and four guards?

- Yeah.

- Wow.

Warden, where's the punishment?

Where is the punishment?

The main idea is we're just supposed

to take away their freedom.

That's the only punishment

we're actually giving them.

They miss their family,

they miss their friends.

Right, right.

But also I think and I hope

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