Cannabis in the Netherlands, good or bad?

There has been a bit of a debate in the South African section about whether legalising cannabis could help in cutting crime and provide a sustainable income and encourage tourism. The Dutch model is the obvious one to follow, if not the only one. What do the Dutch think about this? Jullie Nederlands wat denken jullie? I know that ALL Dutch people do not smoke and I would appreciate serious socio-economic answers.

Well, as Dutch we are quite proud of the way we do things and we always love to tell other countries that our system would work great for them, but, we're talking about South Africa. I think it's very hard to compare South Africa with The Netherlands. Probably the only similarity we have is in het Afrikaans. Our people and social system/social problems are very different from yours, at least that's what I make out of what I get from the media. I have absolutely no idea what would happen in South Africa if they legalized drugs, but I'm pretty sure that it would be quite different from what we have here in The Netherlands now. The Dutch system works well for us Dutchies because we are Dutch, if you imposed some South African way of life on us, I don't think it would work well, I can imagine it's the same the other way round...

bad weed makes you a paranoid idiot
and very often leads to harder stuff
like it did with my x ans some shcool mates too

I think Switzerlands attitude towards Class c's is probably a better example to follow.

As long as the coffeeshop owners and operaters cooperate with the police in keeping the soft drugs trade away from the hard drugs trade, they should be alright. It's not easy though.

jennings does it effect your spelling aswell

Dude , I aint real sure about the laws in your country concerning Marijuana , but here in the United States . It's all controled by the Government . Yes , I know the government will deny this , but facts are facts . This is my personal belief and I of course can't proove anything. But , Here in the United States , back in the 60's our government declared war on drugs(Joke). Since that time , or rather , during that time , drugs ( marijuana ) was only found in the larger cities and by only a few . Today , since war has been declared , drugs are in EVERY town and village and city in America. Now , we're supposedly ( according to our government ) at war on drugs. But since the so called war started , our country has gone from very little drugs to drugs everywhere. Think about this for a second . With all our so-called security , there is enough drugs coming into this country to supply the whole country every day . Man , that's a lot of drugs. A LOT . How in the world does that much drugs come in every day to supply the entire country every day ? Simple answer , The government supplies it or allows it . They make so much money from it that it would be stupid on their part to legalize it . If it was legal and packaged and sold in stores , the price would drop drastically and they would lose money. Our conutry supports the drug trade even though they would never admit it. And also , if they made it legal , everyone would grow their own and then they ( the government ) would lose billions of dollars. They are not going to let that happen. Too much money involved. Our government don't want to stop the drug flow , they just want to control it . As long as they can control it , they make the money from it . For that reason and unfortunately for those of us who do smoke , it will never be legalized . That Sucks .

It's legal in Nederland and they sell it in Cafes and pubs.
There worser things then cannabis.
If Cannabis would be available everywhere there would not be so much trouble about it and people who suffer of very bad pain could buy it then instead of very expensive unhealthy medicines, then a natural product like Cannabis.