WHY CAN'T WE HAVE CANNABIS CAFES HERE?

Imagine if we lived in a society where drugs weren't just lurking in the
background, but one where our entire social life, from celebrations to
wakes, from sporting events to eating out, from entertaining at home to
oiling the wheels of industry, were all structured and organised around the
consumption of drugs.

And imagine if it wasn't just the consumption of any old drugs, but the
consumption of a single drug whose use is so integral to our daily lives
that even the dominant religion of that society has adopted it and
sanctified it as its official drug of choice.

No prizes for guessing that we are talking about alcohol. It's a drug which
lubricates many a good night out but which also drags a trail of unwanted
social chaos in its wake. Nor is it to everyone's taste.

Now, imagine a scenario where a large section of that very same society
would prefer, at least for a part of their social life, to have an
alternative to the use of alcohol. These are likely to be people who
believe in democracy and choice, who believe in the toleration of other
people's views, but are fed up with the aggression, violence, crime and
stupidity associated with alcohol abuse.

What happens then? What happens if these generally law-abiding persons dare
to suggest that they would prefer to relax and socialise using an
alternative to alcohol, using a drug which causes relatively few problems,
relieves stress, is pleasurable without being addictive, and which leaves
the user fit for work the next day?

The stark reality is that those who want to relax with cannabis can either
go to the Netherlands to enjoy their pastime - in one of the 900 cannabis
coffee shops opened there specially for the purpose - or they can stay at
home in alcohol-soaked Scotland and have the full weight of hypocritical
laws come down on them until they either give up their use of cannabis
(highly unlikely) or are driven underground and into criminality (like the
100,000 cannabis offenders busted every year).

Either way, it's a terrible situation to put people into for committing a
crime that has no victims.

The government must be crazy to think that such a state of affairs could go
unchallenged indefinitely. And it looks now as if the day of reckoning is
drawing near. An incipient United Kingdom cannabis coffee-shop movement has
begun to develop, which is prepared to spearhead this new stage in the
cannabis legalisation debate.

The UK's first cannabis coffee shop opened in Stockport on 15 September
last year, and in spite of three police raids, it is still opening its
doors daily, staffed by dedicated activists who are prepared to defy the
law and show in practice that the open and regulated sale of cannabis is of
no threat to anyone - except perhaps the profits of the alcohol industry
and the black market criminal gangs. And why not? Why should anyone be
afraid of the proposed cannabis coffee shops opening up in cities like
Dundee and Edinburgh?

In spite of the deliberately misleading attacks on them, the famous
Amsterdam coffee shops are identified primarily with an atmosphere of
tolerance and good-natured fun from which the whole city reaps benefits.

The coffee shops attract peaceable good-humoured tourists to the city,
bringing much-appreciated trade to hoteliers, shopkeepers, museums and many
other sectors of the local economy.

It is worth comparing Amsterdam's herbal tourist trade with Edinburgh's
new-found status as the Stag and Hen Night capital of Britain - a dubious
honour bestowed on the Scottish capital ever since the bars in Dublin
starting barring these drunken, vomiting, fighting pests from their
famously hospitable Temple Bar District.

Edinburgh already has a vibrant gay scene around the city's Broughton
Street area, it has implemented a harm-reduction policy towards
prostitution, the city has fantastic late-night dance clubs and bars, and
multi-cultural festivals like the Mela. It also has, of course,
internationally recognised theatre, music, film, literary and Hogmanay
festivals.

All of these enhance Edinburgh's reputation as an exciting, dynamic place
where different cultures and lifestyles are not only accepted but celebrated.

Licensed cannabis coffee-shops would only add to the city's already
cosmopolitan reputation, which, in turn, would add to the allure of the
city as a potential holiday destination - as Edinburgh's Hogmanay supremo,
Pete Irvine, recently acknowledged - and he's a man who spends more time
than most listening to what foreign visitors think of Edinburgh.

The benefits to the local citi-zenry would be just as enticing. The sale of
cannabis could be taken out of residential areas - where it is often sold
alongside harder drugs like heroin. And, for users, it would end years of
unjust persecution which wastes police and court time.

Recent studies have indicated that UK tax revenue raised by legalising
cannabis could be in the excess of UKP 1.75 billion. This could be used to
help treat individuals damaged by the effects of heroin and alcohol abuse
for example, or to pay for its prescription to sufferers of illnesses like MS.

Licensing the sale of cannabis is such a pragmatic idea, with so many
positive aspects to it, that when it finally happens most people will
wonder what all the fuss was about in the first place.

Kevin Williamson is writer and publisher of Rebel Inc!