Opinion

Tackling a taboo
By Ralph McClean

BESIDES the occasional political handshake or two nothing can be guaranteed
to whip up the public into a righteous fury of outrage quite as effectively
as the threat of a good healthy debate on the pros and cons of soft drugs.

Should you ever find yourself trapped in a cultured little social gathering
so dull it almost hurts, simply kick start a conversation on the issue of
recreational drug use for example and just watch those collective jawbones
hit the floor in disgust. Nothing will clear a room quicker. It never fails.

The very suggestion of the word "drugs" is enough to send most of us
scampering for our coats. To many it remains a resolutely taboo subject.

While every form of substance abuse and reliance is equally repellent to
every right thinking member of society, there is a very real sense of
hypocrisy in the air once again. While I certainly don't seek to
underestimate our problems with drugs in this country, consider for a
moment our atrocious record as a nation of habitual tobacco puffers.

The numbers of users are rising and getting progressively younger every
year. Our tradition as natural born drinkers hell bent on full scale liver
destruction is equally strong and speaks for itself.

If we can condone these forms of addiction, are we in any position to
deride other habit forming vices? Perhaps the real problem lies on a much
deeper level. There was a time, after all, when the very mention of the
problem in polite society was enough to get you bull whipped at dawn. In
fact there seems to be something intrinsic in our culture that renders most
of us paralytic with fear at the very mention of the dreaded "D" world. In
the past this fear has traditionally been reflected in the media coverage
of all things narcotic. With the reassuring assumption that the only real
dope is the one who buys or sells it still ringing in our ears from years
of rightly stern anti drugs coverage comes as no small surprise that many
within the media are now revising their opinions and reassessing their
perceptions with every passing day.

The findings of a record MORI poll stated that two out of three members of
the public now want a full debate on the decriminalisation of cannabis and
suddenly yesterday's scandal is today's news story.

Traditionally the hackneyed habit of the ageing hippie, lentil crunching
student and bleary eyed arty types in general the secretive jazz cigarette,
as it was once fancifully referred to, has recently been trying to shake
off its all too seedy subterranean image.

Talk of medical benefit and other beneficial properties have replaced the
horror stories of crime and corruption that thrives at the very core of the
drug industry. In the last week alone a series of busts across the province
only serve to show how huge the problem remains. The rush to reappraise our
attitude continues on regardless.

It's not long since President Bill Clinton admitted to huffing and puffing
at the demon weed in the past only to qualify his comments by reassuring
his public and right wing campaigners alike that he never once inhaled.
Maybe in a few years time such economies with the truth will be rendered
obsolete forever.

Whatever the outcome of this latest concerted campaign, let's just hope
that the very real issues at stake don't get lost in a sea of
misinformation or preconceptions.

It would be a shame to see the whole debate go up in a metaphorical puff of
smoke before it had even begun.