Top 10 Countries Where Drugs are Legal

Upon growing up, you probably have been taught that drugs are bad stuff that you should stay away from as long as you want to keep troubles at bay. You have also been taught that drug abuse is a one-way ticket to jail; that is one of the so many reasons that our countries are full of criminals and a lot of violent acts because these drug abusers are most likely to be high and totally unaware of most of the actions that they commit. You cannot be blamed for believing so, for actually, this is what more than half, if not most, of the world, believe; but to our surprise, some governments have actually imposed new laws that state that drugs are legal to use while other countries are still imposing those laws that state that drug abuse leads to severe punishments and, sometimes, it can lead you to death penalty.

It seems like the planet has been separated into two parties; one believes that the strict laws are the best method to keep the drug use at the least possible for fearing the punishment while the other one believes that giving the freedom to use drugs will not make them as demandable as they are. The latter seems to believe in reverse psychology, meaning that as long as drugs are being illegal, they will be desirable and the other way around, thus, the rate of crimes resulted due to drug abuse will, consequently, be reduced. Surprisingly, the validity of drugs has become a controversial issue that keeps getting more ambiguous with time. Here, in this list, you will be introduced to the top 10 countries where people are allowed to smoke joints without the fear of getting in trouble.

10 Croatia

Croatia is one of the countries where people are allowed to use drugs; as a result, people, aging from 15 up till 40, use a lot of marijuana. These sloppy laws that decriminalized the use of drugs may have made the personal possession of this stuff legal, but they still catch those who sell drugs. In other words, you can use drugs in Croatia as much as you want as long as you are not selling them, but people actually take this fact the wrong way, believing that if they ever get caught with drugs, they will safely go home as if nothing happened, but the truth is; it does not work that way. Drugs are being decriminalized means that being caught with them will not send you to prison, but it actually may send you rehabilitation or a community service while in some other cases, you might pay a fine.

9 Ecuador

Ecuador is one of the Latin American Countries which means it is one of the countries that tolerated the impact of the “War on Drugs” that the United States declared during the 80s, but Ecuador is also known to be one of those affected countries that are trying to resist the demolition that was caused. However; in 2008, the government of Ecuador has legalized the use of drugs, giving the citizens the freedom to keep them in small amounts, but still, selling them are illegal, just like in Croatia. The amounts which the citizens are allowed to keep depends on the type of drugs, for example; the maximum possession of soft drugs, like marijuana, should not exceed 10 grams while the hard drugs should be kept at minimum; the citizen is only allowed to keep from 80 to 100 milligrams of heroin or MDMA. If these amounts are exceeded, the users may get in serious trouble.

8 Jamaica

Remember the Rastafari movement? Well, if you are not sure what we are talking about; it is a movement that supports a spiritual way of living where the use of marijuana was involved and the pop star, Bob Marley, was known to be one of the most prominent members. This movement highly aided in changing the policy of drugs, making it legal to be used; besides, the execution was deemed to be merciful, so it seems like the Jamaican government never took the use of marijuana seriously in the first place.

7 Argentina

Argentina is another Latin American country that highly believes that adults are mature enough and have the right to make their own decision, so drugs became legal and the users do not get punished for it. Besides, they do not only believe that adults have the right to make their own decisions, but they also believe that negative actions, like drug abuse, are legal as long as they are not harming those who are around you; thus, persecuting of the drug users is considered to be immoral and awful.

6 Uruguay

In Uruguay, the use of drugs has never been considered a crime; besides, it has been legal since 2012 that even the government began selling marijuana. The country is trying so hard to make the usage of drug seem like any other personal decision that the government should not intervene in and it hopes that all the other countries around the world would follow the same concept of giving the citizen the absolute freedom to use drugs.

5 Czech Republic

The Czech Republic is not considered to be one of the countries where drugs are legal, but they still have different and laid back laws when it comes to this point. If anyone ever got caught with drugs, they will not simply get away with it, but their punishment will be as harmless as a smack on your hand but do not you worry, you will never be sentenced to prison like other countries do. However, the citizens of the Czech Republic are allowed to enjoy very small amounts of drugs.

4 Mexico

Mexico is widely known as one of the countries where drug abuse is relatively high, but when the government realized that black market and the drug cartels had been causing a substantial destruction where they led to a great number of deaths, they decided to decriminalize many drugs in 2009 and a lot of these legalized drugs are deemed to be from the hard ones, including heroin and cocaine. The government has done so, hoping that the decriminalization would help in making Mexico a safer place.

3 The Netherlands

Amsterdam, the capital of the Netherlands, is one of the most notorious cities for drug tourism all around the world; as a result, the Netherlands is definitely expected to be featured on that list. In that country, buying marijuana from coffee shops is legal if it is bought in a small amount, but the laws seem to be actually a little bit unclear, for they do not permit the coffee shops to buy the drugs from the growers, but you are still allowed to enjoy drugs without getting caught.

2 Portugal

Portugal is the first European country to ever decriminalize drugs, for the drug use is regarded as a health issue rather than a criminal activity; consequently, the government believes that the drug abusers should not be sent to prison, but they actually should be sent to rehabilitation and therapy sessions instead. The government is being more merciful and forgiving with its citizens and that overlapped with a noticed reduction in the drug use right after the decriminalization. Not sure whether it was a coincidence or the people have gotten more aware.

1 Cambodia

Cambodia is one of the countries where drugs are used publicly and legally, but actually, not like all of the previously stated countries, for it is actually considered the most country with freedom when it comes to drugs. This is not only because the weed is widely spread among all the citizens, but Cambodia also has diners labeled as the Happy Restaurants; they are places where food can be cooked with drugs like marijuana.

The world cannot seem to stop surprising us, but whether the decriminalization of drugs will spread to the rest of the planet or not, we are all hoping that one day the violent acts, crimes and drug abuse will vanish forever, no matter what the way to achieve so is.