ANOM sting fuels increased surveillance and prohibition

The recent global mega-bust around the ANOM app and devices is predictably being used by politicians to push for increased surveillance powers for police and spy agencies, and to justify drug prohibition.

The sting uncovered a wealth of drugs and drug money along with very welcome takedowns of people planning murder and violence. Conservatives and police have leapt on this opportunity to reinforce the old but false prohibition narrative, conflating drugs and criminal violence. 

This is essentially a circular argument because the only link between drugs and criminals is of course prohibition. In essence it reads “we need prohibition because prohibition”. The police always boast that huge drug hauls have been “taken off the market” rather than admit they are evidence prohibition has failed. The unspoken assumption is that drug use will increase under a legal, regulated framework, despite clear evidence it does not.

Another fallacy in this narrative is the lumping together of all illicit drugs. These spruikers push a moral panic around ice, heroin and cocaine and rarely mention more benign and non-addictive drugs like cannabis and MDMA.

“There is nothing social about illicit drug use in this country,” intoned a pious and triumphant Prime Minister Scott Morrison, eagerly taking some credit for this operation, while conveniently deflecting from more troublesome issues denting his popularity. He went on to appeal to Australians to stop using drugs because it fuels organised crime.

A meme alleging hypocrisy by
 Scott Morrison around
prohibition – or at the least,
cognitive dissonance.

Of course Mr Morrison’s line is a lie. He has clearly never been to a rave where ecstasy induces (strangely enough!) a kind of group ecstasy, or sat around a campfire blowing a joint with friends. Even the potentially addictive cocaine can be a great social lubricant for those who can afford it. Mr Morrison might wonder why these ‘anti-social’ drugs are in such high demand, even as he is happy to be pictured drinking beer. Alcohol does more harm than any of the illicit drugs but modern prohibitionists ignore that, content to live with cognitive dissonance, also ignoring that the only reason drugs fuel crime is prohibition itself – that circular argument again. 

They also ignore the clear success of states which have legalised or decriminalised drugs. Any clear-eyed view of those examples finds that harms have reduced – both the primary harms of drug abuse and the consequent harms of being arrested, tried and fined, jailed or executed, not to mention the humiliation of mostly unsuccessful public strip-searches.

Drug law reformers find it hard to comprehend the stubborn refusal of many politicians to recognise reality, even while understanding the self-interest of those who gain from it – typically police and alcohol interests, who always actively oppose legalisation campaigns. 

The ANOM operation may have contributed to this apparent stubbornness. Over the three years or so of the operation, it’s fair to assume Ministers would have been getting confidential briefings, if only to approve its significsnt budget – and it would be a real shame for drug law reform in the meantime to spoil the triumph of what is a brilliant piece of detective work. 

No-one has any sympathy for the greedy and violent people taken down here, but the larger point is that it’s only prohibition that creates the drug-dealing opportunities for these people. After all, we don’t see the delivery trucks of rival alcohol companies shooting it out in the streets like we did during alcohol prohibition in the 1930s. No, these days they sort out any differences in courts and parliaments. That’s much more civilised. 

Australian Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw unwittingly admitted this problem in the same media conference at which Mr Morrison spoke, saying "...there's no doubt going to be some tension within the whole system about who owes what drug debt and so on." In other words, we can expect more violence among criminals when they start arguing about who owes what to whom now their stocks of drugs and cash have been confiscated. Anyone who bought on credit now has a big problem, as does anyone who paid in advance of delivery.

Meanwhile if the ANOM sting is used to justify increased surveillance, you can be sure those powers will be used against non-violent dissidents, possibly including drug law reformers. In that sense, prohibition is anti-democratic.