Many have used the excuse that drug use is a "victimless crime" as their rationale for lighting up a joint now and then. The argument is based on the premise that drug use does not hurt anyone else. After all, people should be able to decide what goes into their own bodies, right?

On the surface, perhaps this seems like a fair statement. Well then, America, it's time to open your eyes and become a true "global citizen" for a moment and think about the effects of this so-called victimless crime from someone else's perspective.

Take Mexico, for example. The drug trade controls Mexico, its government and its police forces. Corruption, unlawful killings of civilians by security forces, and even kidnapping by police and other drug-related groups run rampant in Mexico according to the U.S. State Department. Drug lords pay off Mexican officials in a corrupt scheme that allows for the creation of a pro-narcotics oligarchy that dominates the country through an illegitimate and illicit trade. The government turns a blind eye to the drug cartels operating in Mexico because key officials are paid off.

Drugs equal power in Mexico and it has rendered the common man of Mexico helpless. No honest middle-class Mexican has a chance of prosperity in Mexico. Legitimate business cannot prosper when illegitimate and illicit business holds a dominating monopoly over the economy.

With 40 percent of Mexico's population living in poverty, it is obvious that most of the nation's wealth is being controlled by the drug lords and corrupt members of the government. As long as the government remains corrupt, all of these people in poverty stand no chance.

Logically, a large population of disgruntled illegal immigrants looking for opportunity inevitably makes its way toward the U.S. border to flee the raw deal they are getting from their own government. The sad thing is that it is the United States — and its addiction to the drugs supplied by these Mexican cartels — that is fueling the entrenchment and solidifying the power of this Mexican drug lord government.

In a nutshell, drug use in the United States is victimizing the common man in Mexico and is largely responsible for supporting the pro-drug government that exploits its own people. This exploitation leads to illegal immigration, which causes countless problems in the United States.

Furthermore, this drug culture that has been created by the United States in Mexico has made the country one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists. In fact, on Nov. 22, Robert Marcos Garcia, the editor of a local newspaper in Veracruz, was killed. Garcia was the seventh journalist killed in Mexico this year, making Mexico the second most deadly country in the world for journalists, trailing only Iraq. One thing that all of these slain journalists held in common was that their work exposed some of the rampant corruption within the government and its connection to the drug lords.

The border town of Nuevo Laredo also illustrates the side effects of America's addiction to drugs. This town, located on the U.S.-Mexican border, was the site of 10 percent of the 2,000 drug-related murders that occurred last year. Kidnappings and killings have become so commonplace that local newspapers have stopped reporting drug killings out of fear and pressure from the government and drug dealers. One police chief was killed last year and a second quit out of fear for his own safety. Three hundred police jobs cannot be filled — even with the promise of $600 per month — due to the fear of trying to stand up to the drug cartels.

And why must the residents of this town have to live in fear every day? Because their neighbor to the north needs its drug shipments, and Nuevo Laredo is one of the major shipping crossroads from Mexico to the United States.

So next time someone lights up, please remind him that not only is he hurting himself, but he is hurting members of the U.S. military, journalists, immigration officials and CIA operatives who are trying to combat the drug trade on our borders and in the media. Remind them about the Mexican families that live in fear for their safety every day in Nuevo Laredo and the 40 percent of the Mexican population that lives in poverty because of their corrupt government. Also, remind them that it is because of their selfish desire to get high that the honest, hardworking people of Mexico are unable to make a decent living in an honest line of work and are thus provoked to immigrate to the United States illegally in search of opportunity. Think about the victims of this supposedly "victimless crime" next time you get the urge to get high.

Joe Trovato ([email protected]) is a freshman majoring in journalism.