Legalize ALL Drugs?

In 2001 Portugal abolished all criminal penalties for "personal possession of drugs - including marijuana, cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine". So what has the result of this course of action been? Well of course the society has collapsed, all civil order has evaporated, and crowds of bleary eyed, AIDS-infected, psychotic and violent youths roam the streets raping old ladies and torturing animals??? Well that may be the case in the nightmares of the right-wing prohibitionists but the truth is something else entirely.
 The result of Portugal's change of philosophy has been lower rates of drug use, dramatically lower levels of infection of the HIV/AIDS virus and higher numbers of addicts in treatment. Not to mention huge monetary savings from not putting so many people in jail. The money saved has been directed toward funding the higher levels of treatment.
 It would be my prediction that in the long term the effect on the crime rate will be significant as far fewer people are having to engage in criminal activity to fund their habit. There will be fewer unplanned pregnancies and lower rates of venereal diseases. Fewer drug users will need treatment for things such as abscesses, infections and other health problems associated with injecting with poor technique, reused needles, and unhygienic or poorly lit injecting environments. Not to mention less people dying from overdose. The list of benefits is endless.
 Due to my own history I tend to focus on the issues relating to the injection of illicit narcotics. The next logical step in my mind would be to work on getting rid of another common risk to injecting drug users - unclean gear. To achieve this a legal supply network needs to be set up to supply clean, pharmaceutical grade drugs to users. This system would also go a long way to removing funding, and therefore power,  from the hands of criminal organisations.
 An interesting contrast to Portugal is the failed policies of the United States of America. With 5% of the worlds population but 25% of the worlds prisoners they show the rest of the world that having some of the world's harshest sentences for drug crime does not equate to lower use. I like this little factoid from a recent Time Magazine article on Portugal's drugs policy - "Proportionally, more Americans have used cocaine than Portuguese have used marijuana". 

 Which ever way you look at the argument it is clear that it is time to look at doing things a little differently than just punish, punish, punish, and hope it goes away.

To check out the Time article click here

Earthquakes in Godzone?

On the 22nd of February, 2011, an earthquake struck the New Zealand city of Christchurch. The quake measured 6.3 on the Richter Scale, yet because it was only a few kilometres deep and right beneath the city it was far more damaging than the 7.1 quake that struck Christchurch in September of last year.

An iconic landmark of Christchurch is the cathedral. The spire of which lies scattered on the ground with an estimated 20 people crushed beneath it. A common sentiment expressed in the wake of the quake is 'let us thank God for saving us' and I have to wonder 'what is wrong with these people'? They really didn't get saved, they just didn't get killed. And if they were saved - from a collapsed building for example - then it wasn't a god who did the saving, it was the combined work of hundreds of highly trained Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) personnel, or in many cases everyday citizens who happened to be in the right place to be able to help. To give credit to some supernatural being who in thousands of years of human civilization has never once given humanity concrete evidence of her existence is just ludicrous. By that rationale God made her own house fall down causing the deaths of 20 of her most ardent admirers not to mention making a hell of a mess on her floor. Oh, and making sure no one will be going to church for the next couple of months!

 I would question why a benevolent god would allow such things to occur. Freewill! God gave us freewill when Eve ate the forbidden fruit - at least that's the story. But if we didn't have freewill before that event then it must have been God's choice for the fruit to be eaten because Eve didn't have the freewill to make those kind of choices. Anyway that is the most common reasoning I have heard from Christians - that God doesn't make these things happen and neither does he stop them because after we gave up our freewill (that we didn't really have) then God no longer intervened in the affairs of the world, he merely oversaw things running on the divine version of auto-pilot. Looks like the plane is headed for a bit of turbulence Jesus H!

I don't think I'll be heading to Christchurch for a while. On top of the privations of a shaken up and seriously damaged city there are all these nutters running around. First the Christians, then the scumbag looters showed up (at the home of a trapped woman whose family were out standing vigil at her collapsed workplace), and now this crazy pederast fuckwit Ken Ring who is scaring a large number of frightened, fragile, albeit not very intelligent people who are living through the trauma that is their life in post-earthquake Christchurch by saying he predicted this quake and he thinks another one will hit on March 20. This guy usually sticks to predicting the weather - something most people would not be surprised to find that the forecast was wrong about - but now he is talking about people's lives. He is saying he can predict earthquakes based on the movements of the planets (particularly the moon) and the corresponding actions of the tide. I would hesitate to call what Ken Ring does pseudoscience because it would be more accurate to call it 'Lucky Sometimes Correlation Identification' or maybe just 'bullshit'. One of the first things every scientist learns is 'correlation does not equal causation'. This means that because two events happen at the same time that fact is no reason to believe that one caused the other or vice versa. For example - every morning at 8:05am when I get in my car to go to work the weather forecast is playing on the radio. If I was Ken Ring (The Moon Man) I would say that my getting in my car caused the weather forecast to play on the radio - but of course that is absolutely absurd. By claiming there will be an earthquake in Christchurch he can't help but be right because there are a lot happening every day beneath NZ (over 4500 just in the Canterbury region in February). Instead there is a far more common force at work - Greed. This sick cunt just wants to drum up some publicity to sell a few more of his books and what better way than playing off peoples fear. I'm off to pray to God for deliverance!

To Chch Residents - I will not pray for you but I am thinking of you and doing what I can to help. The things that make Chch a great place are not the buildings and the roads but the hearts of the people and the natural beauty. Those things can be hurt but they are not destroyed. You guys will get over this. For some it may mean moving to another town or city and if that is the case for you then I will fully support your decision. There is no rush. Take all the time you can to heal and recover. 

Your friend, Lucien