STRONG LANGUAGE WON'T SOLVE DRUG ABUSE

What a master propagandist Tom Fletcher is.

For instance Mr. Fletcher rails against harm reduction as a questionable
bit social engineering"without considering that drug prohibition is not
exactly the natural state of affairs.

Mr. Fletcher alerts us to theOrwellian lesson that to control language is
to control mankind, then proceeds to use strong control words himself.

For instance, the notions of hard/soft drug problem," junkies"and
superficial perception" is using language Orwell himself would identify as
political.

Hard and soft are moral judgments, not chemical properties. Moral judgment
is based on a feminization scale not scientific fact. Junkies is a
stigmatizing term, not a descriptive term.

And speaking of superficial perceptions, is that not exactly what the drug
problem" is in the first place.

The drug problem boils down to the fact that some people want to use drugs
that other people don't want them to use. Over time and cultures the name
of the substance changes.

Ceremonial and ritual drug use is as old as humanity is itself.

Opium and cannabis are the ceremonial and ritual substances of Asian
cultures, coca is used in native South American cultures for the same
reasons. Alcohol is the ceremonial drink of the Anglo Saxons.It is wine in
the priest's goblet.

What Mr. Fletcher needs is a good dose of Jeffersonian wisdom to clear up
any muddled thinking.

Political correctness did not exist when Thomas Jefferson wrote that it was
his observation that in order for the state to control the diet or
medicines of the people, the state must also control the ideas the people
have about those substances. Jefferson mentions that free people who have
their thoughts shaped or controlled by the state are not free.

In a free country, it is not the duty of the state to help people get off
drugs." It was never the duty of the state to lie or control the language
of the debate, substance abuse" indeed.

I was once offered the opportunity to save my railroading career by
attending treatment after being arrested for a cannabis offense. I knew
that to be forced religious and political conversion but I did not know how
to make the intellectual arguments.

I know how now. Classic liberalism and the notion of individual
responsibility is the trump card.

Jefferson enlightened me. Truth stands on its own and the state lies
enshrined in the immoral policy of prohibition will look like laughable
lies once the history books are written.

Who are the aggressors is what history will want to know. The
prohibitionist, the legislators, the courts that uphold these lies as
constitutional and the politicians who set the social construct are the
criminals.

Chris Buors, Winnipeg