跟讀練習: Why The War on Drugs Is a Huge Failure - 通過影片學習英語口語

選擇練習模式

每種模式都會開啟全屏練習室。

64 句

如果句子過短或過長，請點選 Edit 進行調整。

Over 40 years ago, US President Richard Nixon declared drug abuse public enemy number one, starting an unprecedented global campaign, the War on Drugs.

Today, the numbers are in.

The War on Drugs is a huge failure, with devastating unintended consequences.

It led to mass incarceration in the US; to corruption, political destabilization, and violence in Latin America, Asia, and Africa; to systemic human rights abuses across the world.

It negatively affected the lives of millions of people.

All of this while we waste billions of dollars every year only to create and fuel powerful drug cartels while the goal of the War on Drugs seems less achievable than ever: a world without drugs.

How could this happen?

The core strategy of the War on Drugs is “no drugs, no problems”.

So almost all of the efforts in the last few decades have been focused on eradicating the supply of drugs and incarcerating drug traffickers.

But this ignores the most fundamental of market forces, supply and demand.

If you reduce the supply of anything without reducing the demand first, its price goes up.

This might lower sales for many products, but not for drugs.

The drugs market is not price-sensitive.

Drugs will be consumed no matter what they cost.

So the effect is to encourage production of more drugs and recruitment of more traffickers, which increases availability.

This is also known as the balloon effect: even if drug production or a major supply route is destroyed, the supply for the end user is not reduced.

A perfect example of this is crystal meth.

The US Government tried to stop its production by strictly regulating the sale of chemicals used to manufacture the drug.

This forced big meth producers out of business, but the unintended consequences were that thousands of small-scale operations started all over the country, mostly in small towns and rural communities, using chemicals that weren’t regulated.

In response to this, some US states wanted to reduce the supply of home-grown meth by regulating even more chemicals, which reduced small-scale meth production drastically.

But the supply of meth still stayed the same.

Mexican drug cartels immediately took over and opened big production operations.

Their meth was even better than it was before, and they had lots of experience in smuggling.

So all these efforts made meth production more professional, the drug more potent, while supply wasn’t reduced at all.

You can’t win this war on the supply side.

Not only are drugs widely available, demand unbroken, and some drugs purer than in the past, with a budget of around $30 billion, the US Drug Enforcement Agency has an efficiency rate of less than 1% when it comes to stopping the flow of drugs into the US and inside the US.

For many minors around the world, it’s as easy to get illegal drugs as alcohol.

But it doesn’t stop here.

Prohibition may prevent a certain amount of people from taking drugs, but in the process it causes huge damage to society as a whole.

Many of the problems we associate with drug use are actually caused by the war against them.

For example, prohibition makes drugs stronger.

The more potent drugs you can store in as little space as possible, the more profit you’ll make.

It was the same during alcohol prohibition, which led to an increased consumption of strong liquor over beer.

The prohibition of drugs also led to more violence and murders around the world.

Gangs and cartels have no access to the legal system to settle disputes, so they use violence.

This led to an ever-increasing spiral of brutality.

According to some estimates, the homicide rate in the US is 25–75% higher because of the War on Drugs.

And in Mexico, the country on the frontline, an estimated 164,000 have been murdered between 2007 and 2014, more people than in the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq in the same period, combined.

But where the War on Drugs might do the most damage to society is the incarceration of non-violent drug offenders.

For example, the United States, one of the driving forces of the War on Drugs, has 5% of the world’s total population, but 25% of the world’s prison population, largely due to the harsh punishments and mandatory minimums.

Minorities suffer because of this especially.

African Americans make up 40% of all US prison inmates.

And while white kids are more likely to abuse drugs, black kids are 10 times more likely to get arrested for drug offenses.

OK, but is there actually something different we could do?

Is there a way out of this mess?

In the 1980s, Switzerland experienced a public health crisis related to heroin use.

HIV rates skyrocketed and street crime became a problem.

Swiss authorities tried a new strategy: harm reduction.

They opened free heroin maintenance centers, where addicts would be treated and stabilized.

Here, people would be given free heroin of high quality, they would get clean needles and have access to safe injection rooms, showers, beds, and medical supervision.

Social workers help them find housing and deal with other problems in their lives.

The results were a sharp drop in drug-related crime and two thirds of the people in the centers got regular jobs, because now they could focus on getting better insetad of financing their addiction.

Today, over 70% of all heroin addicts in Switzerland receive treatment.

HIV infections have dropped drastically.

Deaths from heroin overdoses have dropped by 50%.

And drug-related street sex work and crime has been reduced enormously.

So there are methods that are not only way cheaper, but also actually work, instead of creating more problems.

Drug prohibition led to a system that bulldozes human rights, costs vasts sums of money, and creates a lot of human misery, all in pursuit of an unobtainable goal.

After 40 years of fighting, it’s time to finally end the War on Drugs and move on to something better.

This video was supported by the Open Society Foundations and by viewer donations on Patreon.

If you want to learn more about how you can influence drug policy, check out the Stop the Harm campaign.

We finally have some merchandise!

If you want your own Kurzgesagt poster, T-shirt, mug, or stickers of little monsters, you can get them now at the DFTBA store!

Subtitles by the Amara.org community

下載應用

流利口語所需的一切

AI 發音評分逐句打分

音標練習掌握每個音

詞彙學習建立你的詞庫

詞彙遊戲邊玩邊學

掃碼

Download on theApp Store Get it onGoogle Play

同頻道

FOR YOU

本課的詞彙與口語要點

這段影片共有 64 個句子、1056 個單詞可供跟讀。講話部分時長為 6:26。說話人語速自然，每分鐘約 164 個詞，接近日常對話。 84% 的單詞屬於英語最常用的 3,000 詞，其餘的詞建議在練習前先學一下。

影片中的重點詞彙

影片中 15 個值得學習的單詞，附發音和釋義：

單詞	發音	釋義
prohibition 名詞	/ˌpɹoʊ(h)ɪˈbɪʃən/	禁止
heroine 名詞	/ˈhɪɹoʊɪn/	女英雄, 女主角
regulate 動詞	/ˈɹɛɡ.jə.leɪt/	調節 /調節
cartel 名詞	/kɑɹˈtɛl/	卡特爾 /卡特爾
harm 名詞	/hɑːm/	損害 /損害
estimate 名詞	/ˈɛs.tɪ.mət/	估計 /估計
consequence 名詞	/ˈkɑn.sɪ.kwəns/	後果 /後果, 結果 /結果
addict 名詞	/ˈæd.ɪkt/	上癮的人 /上癮的人
vast 形容詞	/væst/	浩大
ignore 動詞	/ɪɡˈnɔː/	無視 /無視, 忽略
sharp 形容詞	/ʃɑɹp/	銳利 /銳利, 尖銳 /尖銳
sensitive 形容詞	/ˈsɛn.sɪt.ɪv/	敏感
violent 形容詞	/ˈvaɪ.ə.lənt/	暴力, 強烈 /強烈
encourage 動詞	/ɪnˈkʌɹ.ɪd͡ʒ/	鼓勵 /鼓勵, 激勵 /激勵
suffer 動詞	/ˈsʌfɚ/	受苦, 遭受

影片中出現的短語動詞

單詞	釋義
check out 動詞	退房
go up 動詞	上昇 /上升, 上去
take over 動詞	接管, 接手

影片中的語法

說話人最常用的結構，並附上影片中的原話：

結構	影片中的用法
被動語態 be + 過去分詞 — 強調發生了什麼，而不是誰做的	will be consumed · is also known · weren't regulated
現在完成時 have/has + 過去分詞 — 過去發生但與現在仍有關聯的事	have been · have been murdered · have dropped

需要注意的發音

說話人用了 5 次縮略和弱讀形式，例如 can't, doesn't, wasn't。請按聽到的簡短形式來說。

“sh” 和 “zh” 音: prohibition /ˌpɹoʊ(h)ɪˈbɪʃən/, sharp /ʃɑɹp/, associate /əˈsoʊʃi.ət/, reduction /ɹɪˈdʌk.ʃən/, efficiency /ɪˈfɪʃ.ən.si/
長單詞——注意重音位置: prohibition /ˌpɹoʊ(h)ɪˈbɪʃən/, minority /maɪˈnɒɹ.ɪ.ti/, associate /əˈsoʊʃi.ət/, efficiency /ɪˈfɪʃ.ən.si/, fundamental /ˌfʌn.dəˈmɛn.təl/

如何用這段影片練習

先完整聽一遍影片，不要開口，記下不認識的單詞。
先用 0.75 倍速逐句跟讀，熟練之後再回到正常速度。
錄下自己的聲音並與原聲對比，特別注意 prohibition, heroine, regulate 這類單詞。

什麼是跟讀法？

跟讀法 (Shadowing) 是一種有科學依據的語言學習技巧，最初開發用於專業口譯員的培訓，並由多語言者Alexander Arguelles博士普及。這個方法簡單而強大：您在聽英語母語原聲的同時立即大聲重複——就像是一個延遲1-2秒緊跟說話者的影子。與被動聽力或語法練習不同，跟讀法強迫您的大腦和口腔肌肉同時處理並模模擬實的講話模式。研究表明它能顯著提高發音準確性，語調，節奏，連讀，聽力理解和口語流利度——使其成為雅思口語備考和真實英語交流最有效的方法之一。

影子跟讀法: 閱讀完整分步指南 →

跟讀練習: Why The War on Drugs Is a Huge Failure - 通過影片學習英語口語

選擇練習模式

下載應用

Queen Ant Clones Another Species

How Caffeine Works

Your Skeleton Is Electric

The Beginning of Everything -- The Big Bang

Could Humans Evolve Flight?

You Will Only Like Half of This Video

Would You Upload Your Mind?

Your Brain on Magic Mushrooms

Why Ebola Keeps Coming Back

Let’s Steal a New Moon

What Happens AFTER Nuclear War?

3 Reasons Why Nuclear Energy Is Awesome! 3/3

What Falling in Love Does to You

YOU Own the Moon. And Mars. And Venus.

What Is Life? Is Death Real?

How Antidepressants Work

Your Brain Peaked at Birth

We Won’t Explore the Galaxy...

Dozens of Nukes Are Missing. Why? HOW?

How ADHD Medication Works

Your Brain on Drugs: Marijuana

The Iran War Is the Biggest Strategic Blunder in US History (w/ John Mearsheimer) | TCHR

Where Did Democracy Come From, and Does It Still Work?

Unlimited Resources From Space – Asteroid Mining

Why Malaria is Winning (For Now)

Fauci Funded Wuhan Lab Leak Shocking Bioweapon Truth!

How Foreign Aid Keeps Africa Poor | 5-Minute Videos | PragerU

Lavrov’s Explosive UN Speech: Russia Declares Collapse of American Hegemony | AQ1B

What Happens When Science Clashes with the Public?: Crash Course Scientific Thinking #7

Why does every mammal get 1 billion heartbeats in their life?

Rep. AOC Slams Big Pharma for Gaming U.S. Patent System at Health Subcommittee Hearing

Who Shares The Blame for the Mental Health Epidemic? - Will Self [2014] | Intelligence Squared