🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <vpRb2.1915$961....@server1.news.adelphia.net>,
  tabmok99....@damnspaz.com (]{0MBAT) wrote:

> Knives are meant to be used to cut things.  Drugs are meant to hurt, and kill.

Now that really is a stupid comment.  Isn't a person a "thing" aswell?  Drugs
are generally meant as recreation, not hurt/death.  You see, on the first one
you're looking at the desired function, and with the second one you're looking
at the results.  Either you compare it like this: knives are used to cut food,
drugs are used for recreation; or you compare it like this: knives destroy
whatever they cut, drugs kill whoever uses them.

> There are more drug users than boxers though.

That is *not the point*.  I'm not trying to say that more deaths/brain
damage/hurt/whatever is caused by other things than by drugs, just that these
things do happen with other things, and drugs shouldn't be considered any
different.

> I would never in my life do
> something like become an amateur/proffesional boxer.  Most people here
> wouldn't.

And what do you know, boxing is legal.

> If someone has money, then spends it all on drugs and has to move out of his
> house and live on the street, it hurts them.

No it doesn't.  It's self inflicted.  If i bought 5 CDs this week i would have
no money for rent.  If i bought 5 CDs in two weeks time i would get kicked out
for not paying rent in time.  Then what?  I can't say "oh i'm hurting so much
that i was thrown out" because it was my fault that it happenned anyway.

> For the time being.  Look at the 45-year-old people with emphyzema who are
> suing the tobacco companies.  Yeah, these people are idiots.  They shouldn't
> have started smoking in the first place.  It's like slitting your throat with
> a knife, "I think I'll try it."  Half a second later, "Oh, can't stop now."
> Another half a second later, "Wait, wait!  I'll sue the people that made this
> knife!" and they drop dead.

Well yeah, exactly :)

> Such painful situations wouldn't even exist in a world without cigarettes,
> alcohol, and drugs.
>
What's so painful about them?  It's only "painful" in the sense that they're
wasting our legal system's time with these lawsuits when something more useful
could be being tried.

> > And if they're not happy, than they can quit.
> You think you could quit?  You who admit that taking drugs and causing
> yourself brain damage (which is evident in some parts of your posts :P) is
> becoming routine, like eating Corn Flakes for breakfast?

Hey, i never said i took drugs that way - i don't.  I am currently on my
second week of having quit smoking.  I don't have any plans to take it up
again any time soon (it's too damn expensive).	In the last two months the
only drug i've taken apart from smoking (which i'm quitting) was a half
bottle of vodka. That's IT.  I really only occasionally use drugs, and only
very occasionally illicit drugs.  If all the illicit drugs in the world
suddenly disappeared i wouldn't really miss anything.  But that is obviously
not going to happen, so this is an issue, and an issue which i really think
should be dealt with an a progressive and liberal manner.  Not because i am a
junkie and want to be able to get the cops off my ass, but because i think
it's the Right Thing To Do.

> > or they die.
> Which could have been prevented if there were no drugs in the first place.
> I'm not just talking about one life, either.
>

I've said it before and i'll say it again: if someone dies because they've
used drugs irresponsibly, that's their own fault.  You can't say they
shouldn't have died because they should have.  They chose to take the risk. 
They gambled and lost.	They can't complain, you can't complain.  C'est la
vie.

> > I don't know, i've had a pretty liberal upbringing, so...
> Yeah, I can see what it's done to you.

Somehow i knew you were going to make a cheapshot out of that.	I have had
problems with my upbringing (probably the same sort of problems everyone has)
but i think it's probably the best i could have asked for, and if i ever have
kids (unlikely, but still) i'll do things more or less the same way.  I'm not
fucked up, i don't have any weird habits, i'm not antisocial, i'm not overly
withdrawn, i'm not violent...  I think i've come out a very well-balanced
person compared to people who were stuck in their nazi families till they
were 18.

It's interesting that most people who go crazy on drugs are people who are
reacting to their Christian or other overbearing parents.  Just walk round a
raver or goth gathering and chat to a few people.  It's amazing how many come
from controlling families and who are all trying to rebel.  I never had a
"rebel" stage, and that's the way it should be.

> > > > What abortion issue?
> > > The pro-life/pro-choice issue.
> > I was being silly.
> Kinda hard to say...  there's pretty much no more smileys and the argument is
> getting more serious than when it started out.

That always happens in drug discussion.  I think that's why the few other
people on agmk who i've touched on about it before just quit before it went
anywhere.

Look at this thread.  This was one of the many drug discussions on
alt.music.techno

http://x4.dejanews.com/dnquery.xp?search=thread&svcclass=dnserver&threaded=1&ST=
PS&CONTEXT=913337435.1849360386&HIT_CONTEXT=913337435.1849360386&HIT_NUM=17&recn
um=%3c01b8b538$1d3e3220$141a84a9@jim%3e%231/1

and also:

http://x4.dejanews.com/dnquery.xp?search=thread&svcclass=dnserver&threaded=1&ST=
PS&CONTEXT=913337435.1849360386&HIT_CONTEXT=913337435.1849360386&HIT_NUM=93&recn
um=%3c01b8ab48$fa21c200$1d1a84a9@jim%3e%231/1

Quite possibly a candidate for Longest Thread Ever.  Lot of abuse being thrown
around there - you ain't seen nuttin' yet.  It actually started as something
completely different, but you know how these things go.  Especially read the
posts by a Mr H. West.  You and him would probably get along real well.

> > I don't think so.  Conservatism is necessary because humans need time to
> > adjust to the current level before continuing, but i don't think an
> > indefinite conservatism is a Good Thing for us at all.
> If EVERYONE were liberal, eventually nothing would be legal and everything
> would turn to chaos.

That's why i said this line: "conservatism is necessary because humans need
time to adjust to the current level before continuing".

> By the way, are you pro-life or pro-choice?

Pro-choice of course.

> It's not like that at all.  They don't suffer because they choose.  After all
> this crap I heard about how gay people don't choose to e gay...

Being gay is a sexual preference.  It's hard-wired, it's quite likely genetic.
Being sad in general can be a mental disorder - hard-wired and quite likely
genetic.  Being sad about specific things is a choice.

> What about killing someone else?  That's a choice that shouldn't be made.

Didn't i just say "all choices which affect only the person making the
choice"?  (Not exactly but i can't remember because i just snipped it by
accident)  I'd say that killing someone else is doing a little more than just
affecting yourself.

> > Ever heard these ones?  "The best way to learn is by experience" and
"survival
> > of the fittest".
> If EVERYONE except you commited suicide, then would you still say that suicide
> was a valid choice?  Or would you see then what a mistake it was and how it
> affected the whole human race?

If everyone except me committed suicide i'd go "fuck".  Then i'd try find
some way to reintroduce females to the species - maybe at some IVF lab
somewhere.  But i wouldn't be bitter.  If 4,999,999,999 people are all stupid
enough to commit suicide given half a chance, they should just get it over and
done with and let humankind evolve from there with sensible people instead.

> > Now that was a line worthy of Jerry Springer ;)  Still, who says you're
> > "supposed" to not eat meat?
> Whoever said that, don't listen to 'em.  Eatnig meat is fine.

That depends on how you define "fine".	From a health point of view it is
better not to eat meat, or at most to only eat it in very small amounts. 
>From an ethical point of view it is better not to eat meat because we
shouldn't have the right to just kill animals the way we do.  There are in
fact no positive arguments for eating meat other than "i like it".  Eating
meat is even less defensible than taking drugs.

> > You do realize some drugs just grow in the ground and it's just a case of
> > picking them and eating them, same as any fruit or vegetable?
> Of course, usually in a mushroom or grass form.  But eating apples and oranges
> won't change you the way drugs do.

Says who?  Maybe when Adam ate the first apple he got really high, but then
it became such a staple food that humankind have built up a resistance to it.
 You don't know.  The active ingredient in many drugs is present in other
plants and foods, just in less high quantities.  Theoretically if our
tolerance were low enough we could get high off of eating fruit just from the
SUGAR let alone anything else.

> > > There's also a difference between a risk of something bad happening and
> > > something bad actually happening.  Smoking one cigarette *will* dirty your
> > > lungs, going 5 or 10 mph past the speed limit is barely a risk.
> > But along the same lines taking LSD *will not* affect your body in any way
> > after a few days,
> It will in the long run.

No it won't, that's my point.  LSD will not affect a person in any long-term
way - it is completely flushed from the body after 2-3 days.  Nothing
remains. You're exactly the same person, physically, as you were before.

> > whereas eating peanuts *will* start a cadmium buildup in your body which can
> > never be broken down.  Where can you draw the line?
> Oh, didn't know that.

No, i just saw it on the news the other day and thought "now there's an
interesting titbit" :)

> Well candy and cookies will rot your teeth too.  But
> not make you die.
>
Cadmium *will* make you die though.  Once it builds up enough, a cancer will
very likely eventuate.  Exactly the same as tar on your lungs.

> But it's not worth it, just so the current drug users get a certain
> status of legitamacy and can relax more.

Okay, question is, would you rather have 10000 average people, 9900 unhappy
drug users and 100 dead drug users, or 19800 happy drug users and 200 dead
drug users?  The may be more deaths, but there is also alot more happiness
and contentness.

> Another reason why people shouldn't be taking drugs!  It just makes em feel
> worse.  Again, apples and oranges won't do that to you.

Dunno bout you, but when i find half a worm in my apple i don't feel all that
good.  But seriously.  If you're feeling like shit, most things will only
make it worse.	Playing a game and then you lose and you feel even more like
shit. Watching a movie and the character you had pegged as a hero gets killed
and you feel even more like shit.  When you feel like shit, everything else
is going to make it worse.  We shouldn't be taking away everything else, we
should be removing the feeling in the first place.

> > It could happen.  Don't you think it's worth working towards?
> It can't happen, no one's perfect and no one's ever going to be perfect.

150 years ago someone said "man, flying?  can't happen" too.  Anything is
possible.  Even if we don't sprout wings and fly, we can do the next best
thing - get in a plane and fly.  Even if we don't eliminate all
murderers/rapists/thieves etc in the future we can try do the next best thing
and get rid of MOST of them.

> Hmm...  If you're gonna throw me off with an analogy like that... OK,
> we're still assembling the fishing rod.  Let's just keep giving him fish till
> we're done taking out all the hitches, that way his family won't starve in the
> meantime.
>
The point is, we already have the fishing rod - we're just scared to give it.

> I always thought they were saying "It's not my fault I can't get any, I'm just
> doing what I have to, to get laid."

Nah, then they could've gone to a prostitute.  They wanted that sexual power
over the person.  Remember we talked about this on agmk a few months ago. 
But the feeling of having sexual power over someone would be greatly reduced
if everyone walked round naked and sex was simply a matter of saying "you
feel like some?  yup?  *thrust thrust*	thanks, i'll seeya".

> Yeah, but who can afford to take care of them?

Alot of people can.  Most people don't.

> Those who can, don't.  Those
> who can't, well some of them might but not a whole majority.  I mean, look at
> Bill Gates.  Probably richer than most kings in Europe.  If he took care of
> the poor, that might be a great way to get the DOJ of his back, and it would
> take care of the poor.  But it's not going to happen.

You see, you're doing what everyone does when it comes to supporting the
poor. "It's not my responsibility - look at X he earns more money than me." 
If you can afford to buy MK4, if you can afford to buy a CD, if you can
afford to eat original Kellogs cornflakes instead of Noname Brand then you
can afford to help the poor.

Now my stance on this is that, well, "fuck 'em" ;)  Capitalism baby.  If
someone's born poor they can work for it.  But i'm not going to make a big
deal about people who steal - i know they're getting a bad deal and stealing
is probably the best way to improve that.  If someone stole my PC i'd be
mighty fucked off, but if i knew it was going to someone who was just trying
to feed their kids i'd be more annoyed at the government for not providing
good welfare than at the thief themself.

> > > Drugs are just another crime.
> > Yes drugs are a crime.  The question is, should they be a crime?
> You could say that about any crime.

Yes we could.  And we SHOULD.  It's important to look at things which are
considered crimes regularly, because it's important to know whether or not
they are still valid in our society.  If we didn't look at the law regularly
to assess its worth, we would still be living in a country where homosexual
sex was punishable by a jail sentence, where non-Christians would be burnt at
the stake, where the Native peoples were just part of the local fauna, or
whatever.

> The people trying to make everything legal which will
> ultimately ruin society are called liberals.

The people who are just stupid fuckheads are called Republicans ;)

> I knew most of this, I had to take morphine when I had a broken arm.  I even
> said that marijuana cures anorexia and the like.  But that doesn't warrant
> over the counter sale.

What about prescription sale?  I believe California currently does that, as
do some European countries.  I could live with prescription sale of most
drugs.	It wouldn't be ideal, but it would be a good compromise.

> > These are medical facts, they're not just things pulled out of the air.
> > It's interesting that the drugs everyone wants to get rid of can actually be
> > used to improve the human mental and physical condition.
> Yeah, if taken in small doses.  Trusting people to not take too much is
> stupid.  It's like leaving a bucket of candy out on Halloween because you went
> somewhere, and leaving a note that says "We're not here tonight - please only
> take one."  You know someone's going to just take the whole bucket.  And not
> just one person, either.

Yeah, and those people who take the whole bucket are called "greedy
bastards". "Inconsiderate bastards".  "Selfish bastards".  They're not Nice
People.  If someone chooses not to be Nice there's absolutely nothing we can
do about it, but we should at least give them the benefit of the doubt. 
Because somewhere inside when the person takes the whole bucket they know
what they did was wrong, and eventually (maybe not even in their lifetime)
that will come through.  If we don't give people responsibility, they can't
take it!

Alex
--
   -= electronic love =-         -- kombat --
http://sturm.huizen.dds.nl/   http://surf.to/kkc

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