DOPE WEEK TWO: ACTUALLY, DAN IS A TOP

EDITOR: What the fuck is this world coming to? A man grows pot in his house
where he raises his kids, he gets turned in by his oldest son, and you
fucking idiots get pissed at the kid? What the fuck is wrong with you
people? ["Dope," Dan Savage, May 16.]

This man has a responsibility to his kids (if he didn't want that
responsibility, he should have kept his dick in his pants, then he could
smoke all the dope he wanted). That selfish bastard only thought of his
habit, and fuck the kids. Hey, whatever happened to being a role model to
your kids? Then you wonder why kids turn out all fucked up?

I can't believe you people let Dan Savage write that piece. Dan must of had
a dick up his ass and so he couldn't think straight. He calls the kid a
selfish little bastard because he only thought of himself and not his
siblings, and who the fuck did the old man think of? I suppose if the old
man was sexually abusing the kids, Dan would get bent out of shape if one
of the kids turned him in, right?

Dan Savage, you need to start thinking about morals, and less about dick.

Armando Rebelo, via e-mail

DOPE WEEK TWO: THE WEED CAN BE DAMAGING

EDITOR: Savage's article "Dope" seemed to be saying two different things:
first of all, that pot isn't dangerous, and second, that it's less
dangerous than alcohol. The second I agree with, but the first is
ridiculous. We've all known potheads--people who smoke up on a daily
basis--and it doesn't take medical studies to show that they're damaging
themselves. They have memory loss, emotional problems, and they never
really grow up. And sure, pot isn't physically addictive, but it is
emotionally. When chronic, daily pot-smokers try to quit, they experience
severe depression, frequently attempting suicide. Using marijuana on a
regular basis is dangerous. And while that doesn't mean that it should be
illegal, or even that there's anything wrong with using it occasionally--I
use drugs about as much as Dan does, and I don't think they're hurting
me--it also bothers me when those claiming to be "more objective than
mainstream news sources" give up objectivity for liberal biases.

Anonymous, via e-mail

DOPE WEEK TWO: THIS IS BRILLIANT

EDITOR: So I finally got around to reading Dan's article from last week and
all I want to know is, where can I buy a T-shirt that says, "D.A.R.E.: I
Turned in My Parents and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt"?

Thanks for the article, Dan.

Jason, via e-mail

DOPE WEEK TWO: OUI OR NON ON THAT WHOLE HOMOPHOBE THING?

EDITOR: Pretty lame of you to play the homophobe card over the word
"aberrated." [Letters, May 23.] I think it is clear to your readers that
the aberrated behavior the letter refers to isn't homosexuality, but the
altered way that people who smoke pot tend to behave toward each other.
"Aberrated manners" is one thing; "Aberrated manners by which to express
intimacy" is another thing entirely.

If pot didn't make things different, why would we bother? Stoned love is
aberrated love. Mr. Kapelner doesn't believe that stoned affection,
sexuality aside, is a good example for children. Right or wrong, he had
some interesting points in his letter, all of which you chose to nullify
with your little headline. Poor judgment on your part.

Jeremy Johnson, via e-mail

DOPE WEEK TWO: THIS GUY APPEARS TO REALLY LIKE US

EDITOR: Dan Savage's article "Dope" is one of the finest-crafted criticisms
against drug laws to date. You hit upon many correct points I knew, and
many I did not. This is more than just another example of how The Stranger
always brings all the news that matters to me (read: monorail, TDO); this
is straight truth, boiled down to a few precisely formed pages of dank
journalism. My only frustration is all the letters you are sure to get
denouncing your stance, a bold stance at that. A stance not many will take.
(The Weekly? Pfft! Tablet? Maybe, but thanks to too many masturbatory
"popular girls" articles and circumstantial-evidence-ridden tales from the
grassy knolls, I will never find out. They only support their friends'
bands, anyways. No need to mention the dailies here.)

I also appreciate the stance against D.A.R.E. Personally, the lesson
D.A.R.E. taught me was that if adults are wrong about herb, maybe they are
wrong about other things. This essentially killed any moral lesson I was
supposed to take away. In the 21st century, I would expect adults to be
more supportive of just delivering straight, honest facts to kids. It sucks
to have such blunt statements directed toward Trevor, but it sucks even
more to have your family torn apart by an outdated political position.

Mason, via e-mail

DOPE WEEK TWO: AN ALTERNATIVE MODEL

EDITOR: Thank you for joining the chorus of criticism of the War on Drugs.
Particularly appreciated is your insight on the "mainstream" media's
reluctance, or refusal, to report objectively on issues related to drugs.

It is important to recognize, however, that not everyone in the
"mainstream" is towing the line on our current drug policies. Here in
Washington state, at least, many in the "establishment" have awakened to
the need to treat rather than incarcerate people with drug problems, and to
provide our children with honest and complete information about drugs
rather than disinformation through scare tactics.

For the last year and a half, the King County Bar Association has been
leading an informal coalition of professional groups, including the state
bar, medical and pharmacy associations, in a critical examination of the
War on Drugs and, through a series of multidisciplinary task forces, has
published reports (available online at www.kcba.org) on treatment,
prevention, and the use of criminal sanctions related to drugs. The task
forces found that addiction treatment is available only to one in five who
need it, that anti-drug messages in schools have been counterproductive (as
the D.A.R.E. program, for instance, has been associated with increased drug
use among suburban adolescents), and that the War on Drugs has not only
failed to reduce drug abuse, crime related to drugs and the public costs
related to each, but has also promoted more crime, undermined public
health, clogged the courts, eroded civil rights, disproportionately harmed
minorities and the poor, fostered corruption and helped to destabilize
foreign governments.

Unfortunately, none of this information is news. It is easy to criticize
and complain about the War on Drugs. However, the coalition led by the King
County Bar is currently moving on to a much more difficult phase of
work--an attempt to devise an alternative model of drug control, one that
will enhance public safety and reduce crime, improve public health, better
protect our children and use scarce public resources more effectively. The
guiding principles behind this effort are: to reduce harm (both from drug
abuse and from the War on Drugs); to address the underlying causes of drug
abuse rather than drug use itself; and to limit the use of criminal
sanctions to cases where one person directly harms others (where the
evidence is clear that punishment does not deter people from harming
themselves). We don't yet know what the answers are, but we hope to fashion
a workable model that could serve as an example for other states to follow.

Roger Goodman, Director, Drug Policy Project,

King County Bar Association