C.E.P.T.A.
The CAMPAIGN for EFFECTIVE PREVENTION and TREATMENT of ADDICTION.
8. WHAT ARE LIBERALISATION AND LEGALISATION
REALLY ABOUT?
LIBERALISATION is generally defined as the willingness and / or desire to permit everybody the liberty to exercise the rightful urge to escape from oppressive and restrictive laws. The intention being to achieve real freedom of choice for everybody in all things. However, in our societies, this liberty is usually logically curtailed to the degree necessary to ensure that its exercise does not rob others of their power of choice or otherwise harm them.
But in a society controlled and monitored by the overt propaganda and covert activities of powerful and wealthy vested interests, is freedom of choice actually available to us in any great measure?
Much of the activities of
non-government organisations such as the psycho-pharmaceutical lobby (in
And theirs is not just a war of words.
Such lobbies take both direct and indirect economic and even physical action to eliminate competition or to hide their own shortcomings. They thus distort those factors which are able to influence our preferences, so that, at times . . . . even rule by a benevolent dictator could be a better choice!
But in any event, ‘addiction’ is essentially the sacrifice of an individual’s power of choice to the overwhelming urge to consume a given drug. As a result, those who control the supply of that ‘must-have’ substance start to control that individual, so that all semblance of that person’s freedom of choice disappear.
When we wish to avoid having a baby burn or electrocute itself, we actually stop the child from putting its hand on the red hot stove or putting its fingers into the power socket. We totally over-ride his (or her) power of choice, based on what we know which he doesn’t or cannot know until he has injured or killed himself. The justification is clear. It is the combination of our and the child’s desire to ensure he is comfortably surviving without pain or injury and in a position to go on exercising his power of choice in as wide a sphere of operation as possible.
IF, in the interests of permitting him his power of choice, we had let him electrocute himself or badly burn his hand and so lose a finger, how could he in future ever choose to play the guitar, the piano or the violin as well as other musicians. In fact, he might have totally lost the choice of going on living!
So how do we define the liberalisation of drugs?
Apparently, it is the freedom of choice an individual should be allowed to enjoy, without let or hindrance, to personally possess and / or use drugs at any time at his or her sole discretion?
But conversely it is also the freedom to lose one’s power of choice to a drug for long as one continues as an addict to that drug.
BUT HOLD ON.
John Stuart Mill is acknowledged by many authorities as the originator of true Liberal thinking, and in his famous book 'On Liberty' said:
"The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others"
So consider the following:
* Drug users cause the most accidents at work.
* Users mug old people and rob people's homes.
* Users & drunks cause most road accidents.
* Users bankrupt businesses & destroy jobs.
* Users commit the majority of crimes, and,
* Increasingly, Drug Users are today's main source of harm to others
and their future . . .
Daily proven by experience, the use of drugs of all types and classes is the activity most likely to bring harm to others, so that, encouraging drug usage by advocating a policy of liberalisation is a crime against society and against beliefs central to Liberal philosophy.
Liberal mindedly encouraging individuals to feel free to use drugs is probably the most selfishly illogical and damaging philosophical or political stance which any person can adopt. And becoming an addict is clearly also overwhelmingly selfish and damaging to family, friends and the whole community.
LIBERALISATION is really all about moving our political policy-makers towards LEGALISATION of currently illicit drugs with only the psycho-pharmacological fraternity licensed to produce, prescribe and distribute them.
(Well, you don’t think legalised ‘grass’ (the vegetable: cannabis) will be sold by the local greengrocer, or by coffee-shops like Starbucks – do you?)
DRUG LEGALISATION is the political decision which renders the possession and use of a given drug a legal right for some or all of the population of a country.
Legalisation can be applied without restrictions of any sort, or can be controlled by some form of licensing, prescription, consumer age, strength of substance, time of day, taxation or pricing policy, etc.
The best examples we have of licensed drugs are of course alcohol and tobacco, and one has only to read the health warnings on cigarette packets or consider the violence, accidents, family breakdowns and criminality which surround alcohol to recognise that a legalised drug is not necessarily the best thing to inflict on any society.
Experience in various countries proves that the main effect of legalising any drug is to markedly increase its consumption. Because government must keep drug prices low enough to discourage illegal suppliers, legal users find supplies more easily and at lower cost and so buy more. Previously non-using individuals are less afraid of a legalised drug mistakenly believing it would not be legalised if it were harmful, and so a lot of new users are created by legalisation.
In addition, where legalisation is restricted to certain minimum age groups, as with tobacco and alcohol, the widely increased availability developed by legalisation leads inevitably to a large increase in illegal usage amongst the excluded youngsters – mainly because of the range of problems concerned with policing legal substances both inside and outside people’s places of residence.
It is, of course, because of the inevitable increase in demand and consumption which arises from legalisation that the pharmaceutical drug producers take every opportunity to coax government policy in the direction of legalisation of drugs.
Not only does psycho-pharmaceutical turnover and profit benefit from the increased usage, but those vested interests also have the advantage of seeing the illicit drug providers put out of business, ensuring that all their billions of turnover and profit will come into the hands of the psycho-pharmaceutical fraternity.
Legalisation campaigns designed to manipulate public opinion are both overt and covert.
The PR campaign to change from Illicit Drug Usage to Legal Usage starts with: SYMPATHISE, then TRIVIALISE, followed by NORMALISE, LIBERALISE, DE-PENALISE, DE-CRIMINALISE and then LEGALISE.
‘Sympathise’ brings in the cannabis medical lobby arguing that smoking dope is of great relief to a range of disorders. “No, no. They don’t want the active pain- killing THC content in a pill. No, they want to be able to smoke it, and some even want to smoke it on the National Health”!
‘Trivialise’ tells us that cannabis is “no worse than coffee, tea or chocolate”. But has anyone ever seen a coffee, tea or chocolate addict arrested for being in charge of a motor vehicle?
‘Normalise’ tells us quite blatantly that “everybody’s doing it”, “its normal”, when in fact the majority are not using drugs.
De-Penalise and De-Criminalise claim that the law is actually ‘making criminals’ out of these poor kids whose only crime is to be having a bit of fun with a “harmless substance”. But its not harmless fun when car drivers on drugs kill and maim others and move themselves towards psychosis and early death.
All this posturing and positioning is intended only to move the society in one direction – LEGALISATION – but seldom do you see or hear the psycho-pharmaceutical people campaigning on their own. No. Their whole strategy is directed towards giving the impression that the ‘demand’ for legalisation is a grass-roots movement. So they encourage and support individuals with libertarian opinions to speak out. They quietly sponsor user groups to create a fuss in as wide a variety of ways as possible, including mounting costly conferences.
But, can the huge professional lobby pushing so hard to legalise drugs really be run by that lethargic minority of 'stoned' citizens who daily use illegal substances? Encouraging other people and groups to campaign for legalisation is good business tactics for certain vested interests!
So 'think' . . . . WHO is it who will be producing, stocking and supplying cannabis, heroin, cocaine and crack if they go on legal sale alongside methadone and the benzodiazepines etc ?
Make no mistake. Legalisation
has nothing to do with personal freedom but is all about turnover and profit at
any cost. And because of the way that drugs put users under the control
of their suppliers, even more sinister ‘power’ motives are regularly attributed
to those who seek drug legalisation. (Right now for instance, they
control
LEGALISATION is really all about setting up monopolistic control of all drugs, including those currently illicit or illegal, with only the psycho-pharmacological fraternity licensed to produce, prescribe and distribute them.
© Copyright C.E..P.T.A. and E. Kenneth Eckersley, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 & 2005. All World Rights Reserved
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