COLUMNIST MISINFORMS ON MEPHEDRONE

Dear Nexus,

I'll begin by wishing you a happy Valentine's Day, and proceed by
saying, "EW." I've been consistently annoyed by the fact that the
drug column bores me by only ever discussing marijuana, but I have
been accepting since speaking about other drugs in most any public
forum is still considered very taboo and tends to get the speaker
labeled as a menace to society/irresponsible/degenerate/etc.

However, yesterday's column was insultingly ignorant. Mephedrone is
an extremely well-known research chemical that has recently received
incredulous amounts of news coverage. One need not even venture to
the dank, shady caves of Erowid or Bluelight to become enlightened as
to the nature and effects of this chemical - a simple Google search
would suffice. Your columnist obviously couldn't be bothered to take
his bong out from between his legs to use his laptop to do so, and
his uninformed comments about "horrible hallucinations" and
"recurring psychosis" in "mild users" make this lack of knowledge and
effort painfully obvious and extremely embarrassing.

We get it: marijuana is safe, but it's illegal. This situation is
contradictory and stupid. The war on drugs is an ill-founded failure.
A sixth-grader could slap me with these gems of knowledge. Do
yourself a favor by stepping it up and employing a drug columnist who
actually uses and/or at the very least researches drugs other than cannabis.

And on a different but no less important note, it was especially
dispiriting to see your columnist use the slur "retards" right next
to his apology for the previous derogatory comments made in the
Nexus. I participate in Best Buddies and will be doing a table here
at UCSB in the next few weeks supporting the campaign against the
R-word. He should most definitely stop by and educate himself as to
the real pain and shame that this word causes in the lives of those
with mental disabilities. Thanks, and sorry if I'm shooting the messenger.

Alyssa Nader

Alyssa Nader is a second-year physiology major.