WE CREATED 'RIFF-RAFF' IN THE FIRST PLACE

THE EDITOR:

Re: 'Scaring away the riff-raff' [Times, Oct. 1].

Let's get a few things straight about our rights.

Free adults have the right to buy and sell sexual favours and to ingest any
drug, however harmful.

This story demonstrates conclusively that government and media propaganda
can persuade supposedly educated, sophisticated, "normal" people to hate a
totally innocent minority.

Let no one now say that it is difficult to understand how the German people
were persuaded to support Hitler's policies towards the Jews.

When it comes to our laws, it gets even weirder though.

The problems of street prostitution and drugs being sold in residential
areas are the direct result of the laws banning those activities.

So there we have it. Government causes the problem and then persuades the
public that things can be improved only by hating the innocent minority
being singled out for persecution in the first place.

Unless the Charter of Rights and Freedoms isn't worth the paper its written
on [a distinct possibility, I will admit], the courts will soon instruct
our sanctimonious politicians and their media sycophants that the laws
banning prostitution and drugs are null and void.

And then, hopefully, the "good neighbours" in the north McCallum area will
no longer feel the need to parade their government-induced bigotry and
ignorance for all to see.

Alan Randell Victoria