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- Molecular Biologist Explains How THC Completely Kills Cancer
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Showing posts with label War on some drugs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label War on some drugs. Show all posts
Thursday, September 8, 2016
Some evidence for Cannabis cures:
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
Three unwise men: The War on Drugs and Terror and Culture
"The report, 'Afghanistan Opium
Survey 2015', by Afghanistan Ministry of
CounterNarcotics and
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)
put opium production
in 2015 at
3,300 tons,
a drop of 48% from
the 2014 level of
6,400 tons.
But 3,300 tons is still enough
to feed a substantial
number of opiate addicts
across the globe.
The report estimates that about
180 tons of export quality heroin
was potentially sent out
of Afghanistan
in 2015."
Read more at:
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/50611645.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst
Saturday, March 16, 2013
The Tide is turning on the war on some drugs
Life after cannabis prohibition: The city announces its ambitions
March 15, 2013 - 22:53
The Copenhagen Model will see the production, sale and consumption of cannabis legalised, but many questions remain
The
conference was the latest attempt by mayor Frank Jensen
(Socialdemokraterne), centre, to legalise cannabis in Copenhagen for a
trial period (Photo: Peter Stanners)
READ ON HERE
Thursday, April 19, 2012
The War on some drugs meets Virgin Google U.N and wikileaks
The War on some drugs meets Virgin Google U.N and wikileaks
I was about to start a piece about the proposed Dutch changes in laws concerning their famous cannabis coffee shops, due to the fact that today, April 18th 2012, my employers and some representatives from other Dutch Coffee Shops lodged a court injunction against the Dutch Government and their plans to implement the ‘weed pass’ nationwide, not only in the problematic southern (boarder) states.
However, I was interrupted by discovering a short excerpt from a video interview with Wikileaks mastermind Julian Assange in which he speaks about Marijuana, the so called ‘war on drugs’ and cognitive liberty in an intelligent, witty and precise manner. The entire debate, the first of a new series developed by Google called ‘Versus War On Drugs’
It has been a part of my fantasy writings over the last three years since Wikileaks burst onto the global scene, that they might eventually highlight the crooked ‘war on drugs’ along with their long list of unfairly secretive business transactions and government/corporate corruption. After all, the ‘war on some drugs’ spans the globe, wastes Trillions of Dollars and brings terror and torture into the lives of Billions.
Although provoked by the questioner, Assange throws down his libertarian wisdom and sense of individualist anarchism, in my view, all over the ‘war on some drugs’, which leads to a much clearer view of the current Dutch coffee shop debacle, and the sense of discrimination applied further to the neurological realm.
The similarities between the fights for digital freedoms and the fights for cognitive freedoms seem to be converging at an ever increasing, exponential rate. As Douglas Rushkoff has put it ‘program or be programmed’ implying we have the means to program ourselves and our environment if we choose to engage. But engage with what?
Some brave and noble folk are perpetually fighting the digital baddies, or those government think tanks, those lawyers and those entertainment industry cry-babies, by challenging their draconian proposed measures and new laws and terror scenarios with superior information, scientific and balanced feedback, and most importantly a decentralized network philosophy. The EFF, Wikileaks, and boing boing contributors exhibit these positive attributes and almost singlehandedly threaten any proposed ‘new world order’ once again by obsoleting the opposition with superior methodology, intelligence and strategy.
We the cannabis culture, or we the collective of self-owning ones who enjoy cannabis and its many benefits (health, speech, thought, economy) welcome the intelligent decentralized strategies performed by example by these defenders of ‘equalibrium’ and ‘fairness’ with a particular fondness of going after the biggest, baddest sons of bitches out there, the so called ‘intelligence services’ and private ‘spy agencies’, the military industrial complex and surveillance industries, and of course, lets not forget the limp and mostly empty ‘mainstream media’ that apparently could not and today cannot compare with even 5 % of Wikileaks, or Boingboing for that matter, based on information content (based on predictability of story and coverage of events). Try it, go on. Go to BBC website, and then to Wikileaks, then the daily mail, and then boingboing. Now, anything surprise you? I recall the saying "an empty vessel sounds loudest'
May I attempt to further suppose that the key to keeping the ‘coffee-shop’ scene and industry (that I personally work in) alive and kicking is.... surprise or unpredictability in the face of the easily guessed at(that which is low in information) the same old game and the same old tactics which often involve bullying, meaningless statements plus the arts and crafts of ‘disinformation’. Superior experimental intelligence cuts through these centrist authoritarian/totalitarian games like a warm knife through soft hash.
After watching the full Google versus debate I feel like I have ingested a few grams of some psychedelic compound, when listening to the crazy prohibitionists and corporate military propagandists repeat their 'rhetoric' I started having hallucinations that Julian Assange was in the debate, and Russel Brand too, who for me, were the only characters who added any spice and anything approaching a representation of the 'drug culture' but no MUSIC, no ART, no LITERATURE or COMEDY was presented as evidence, no mention of Terence Mckenna, Timothy Leary, Robert Anton Wilson, Sasha Shulgin, Aldous Huxley, Ken Kessey, no, not a trace.
Whereas, for me, these are the individual thinkers and writers who dedicated their lives to coming to understand the question of 'alchemically mediated consciousness' and so then, by default the major blockage and 'befuddlement' factor: the age old inquisition, the prohibition and the wars against altered states of consciousness, and it's current incarnation: the global war on SOME drugs.
And please, lets not forget the terminology used to disrupt the thinking process, once more, 'the war on drugs' actually functions as a 'war on SOME drugs' and the lack of definitions in this particular area, being that it involves complex chemical neurological and environmental factors, remains a consistant strategy employed by the prohibitionists and inquisitors world wide. Beware of the FNORDS!
Watch for yourself here:
Steven 'fly agaric 23' Pratt. 18th April 2012.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=gSrN2zIRwN8
I get my pot absolutely free from the Women's Alliance for medical marijuana which doesn't charge, its a cooperative and we do what we can to keep it going, now they have been raided we're gonna have to do more, we're gonna have to decentralize even further, decentralize the production, the making of the tinctures, the cookies, the brownies and whatever forms we wanna take it in that's best for our condition, some people still smoke it, and were gonna have to decentralize the growth and production and distribution.--Robert Anton Wilson, 2002, Santa Cruz CA.
I was about to start a piece about the proposed Dutch changes in laws concerning their famous cannabis coffee shops, due to the fact that today, April 18th 2012, my employers and some representatives from other Dutch Coffee Shops lodged a court injunction against the Dutch Government and their plans to implement the ‘weed pass’ nationwide, not only in the problematic southern (boarder) states.
However, I was interrupted by discovering a short excerpt from a video interview with Wikileaks mastermind Julian Assange in which he speaks about Marijuana, the so called ‘war on drugs’ and cognitive liberty in an intelligent, witty and precise manner. The entire debate, the first of a new series developed by Google called ‘Versus War On Drugs’
It has been a part of my fantasy writings over the last three years since Wikileaks burst onto the global scene, that they might eventually highlight the crooked ‘war on drugs’ along with their long list of unfairly secretive business transactions and government/corporate corruption. After all, the ‘war on some drugs’ spans the globe, wastes Trillions of Dollars and brings terror and torture into the lives of Billions.
Although provoked by the questioner, Assange throws down his libertarian wisdom and sense of individualist anarchism, in my view, all over the ‘war on some drugs’, which leads to a much clearer view of the current Dutch coffee shop debacle, and the sense of discrimination applied further to the neurological realm.
The similarities between the fights for digital freedoms and the fights for cognitive freedoms seem to be converging at an ever increasing, exponential rate. As Douglas Rushkoff has put it ‘program or be programmed’ implying we have the means to program ourselves and our environment if we choose to engage. But engage with what?
Some brave and noble folk are perpetually fighting the digital baddies, or those government think tanks, those lawyers and those entertainment industry cry-babies, by challenging their draconian proposed measures and new laws and terror scenarios with superior information, scientific and balanced feedback, and most importantly a decentralized network philosophy. The EFF, Wikileaks, and boing boing contributors exhibit these positive attributes and almost singlehandedly threaten any proposed ‘new world order’ once again by obsoleting the opposition with superior methodology, intelligence and strategy.
We the cannabis culture, or we the collective of self-owning ones who enjoy cannabis and its many benefits (health, speech, thought, economy) welcome the intelligent decentralized strategies performed by example by these defenders of ‘equalibrium’ and ‘fairness’ with a particular fondness of going after the biggest, baddest sons of bitches out there, the so called ‘intelligence services’ and private ‘spy agencies’, the military industrial complex and surveillance industries, and of course, lets not forget the limp and mostly empty ‘mainstream media’ that apparently could not and today cannot compare with even 5 % of Wikileaks, or Boingboing for that matter, based on information content (based on predictability of story and coverage of events). Try it, go on. Go to BBC website, and then to Wikileaks, then the daily mail, and then boingboing. Now, anything surprise you? I recall the saying "an empty vessel sounds loudest'
May I attempt to further suppose that the key to keeping the ‘coffee-shop’ scene and industry (that I personally work in) alive and kicking is.... surprise or unpredictability in the face of the easily guessed at(that which is low in information) the same old game and the same old tactics which often involve bullying, meaningless statements plus the arts and crafts of ‘disinformation’. Superior experimental intelligence cuts through these centrist authoritarian/totalitarian games like a warm knife through soft hash.
After watching the full Google versus debate I feel like I have ingested a few grams of some psychedelic compound, when listening to the crazy prohibitionists and corporate military propagandists repeat their 'rhetoric' I started having hallucinations that Julian Assange was in the debate, and Russel Brand too, who for me, were the only characters who added any spice and anything approaching a representation of the 'drug culture' but no MUSIC, no ART, no LITERATURE or COMEDY was presented as evidence, no mention of Terence Mckenna, Timothy Leary, Robert Anton Wilson, Sasha Shulgin, Aldous Huxley, Ken Kessey, no, not a trace.
Whereas, for me, these are the individual thinkers and writers who dedicated their lives to coming to understand the question of 'alchemically mediated consciousness' and so then, by default the major blockage and 'befuddlement' factor: the age old inquisition, the prohibition and the wars against altered states of consciousness, and it's current incarnation: the global war on SOME drugs.
And please, lets not forget the terminology used to disrupt the thinking process, once more, 'the war on drugs' actually functions as a 'war on SOME drugs' and the lack of definitions in this particular area, being that it involves complex chemical neurological and environmental factors, remains a consistant strategy employed by the prohibitionists and inquisitors world wide. Beware of the FNORDS!
"There's more of everything, the more they fight it the more drugs appear, it's like Lao Tzu said "The more laws they pass the more criminals they create and the more weapons they create the more terror stalks the land" - the more clearer the explanations the more frogs fall out of the sky.--Robert Anton Wilson, 2002, Santa Cruz CA.
Watch for yourself here:
Steven 'fly agaric 23' Pratt. 18th April 2012.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=gSrN2zIRwN8
Monday, April 2, 2012
Trying to take high out of holidays (Cannabis Refugee's)
From The International Herald Tribune:
BY DAVID JOLLY
AMSTERDAM — The scene at the 420 Cafe on a recent Friday was typical of what many travelers have come to associate with Amsterdam. Behind the bar, Janne Svensson, 34, a self-described ‘‘cannabis refugee’’ from Norway, weighed out small quantities of marijuana and hashish for her customers, many from foreign countries. They sat quietly, smoking and sipping coffee, as familiar strains of Jimi Hendrix drifted softly from the stereo and giant manta rays cavorted in a nature video on a big-screen television.
While there are many attractions that draw visitors to the Netherlands — including the friendly and straightforward people, world-class museums, charming architecture and elegant canal scenes — nearly a quarter of this city’s more than four million foreign tourists a year will visit its world-famous ‘‘coffeeshops,’’ where the sale of small quantities of cannabis, though not alcohol, is tolerated.
But Amsterdam’s days as a destination for hazy holidays may be numbered. Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s rightist coalition is pushing to restrict the operations of the coffeeshops sharply and to bar them from selling to foreigners. If the measures survive a court challenge and the opposition of local officials, the first phase would begin May 1.
‘‘I think that by the end of next year, there will be no drug tourism in the Netherlands,’’ Ard van der Steur, a member of Parliament who is a spokesman for Mr. Rutte’s People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy, said in an interview in The Hague. ‘‘We have created an incredible criminal industry that we need to get rid of.’’
Strictly speaking, the sale of marijuana and hashish (a resin extracted from the cannabis plant) is illegal. But a longstanding policy of tolerance — essentially a set of instructions from the Justice Ministry to the police — means that licensed coffeeshop operators are not prosecuted so long as they deal in limited quantities and keep hard drugs and minors out. The Dutch are also allowed to cultivate up to five marijuana plants each for personal use.
In some respects, tolerance appears to have been successful: despite the easy availability, the Dutch are less likely than Americans or many other Europeans to smoke marijuana, U.N. data show. Alex Stevens, a drug policy expert at the University of Kent, argues that the tolerance policy has reduced the harm caused by prohibition, in part by separating the markets for hard drugs like heroin from the market for marijuana, and by getting cannabis dealers off the street and into a regulated environment.
The impetus for changing the policy originated with, of all things, a parking shortage. In Maastricht, a southern city sandwiched between the German and Belgian borders, hundreds of drug tourists drive in daily from elsewhere in Europe to purchase marijuana, creating an infuriating traffic nuisance.
Spotting an opportunity, clandestine dealers have begun offering foreign drivers the option of buying their cannabis without ever leaving their cars. Even local residents who support the coffeeshops are unhappy that drugs are back on the streets.
Mr. Rutte’s justice minister, Ivo Opstelten, has said that, as of May 1, coffeeshops in the southern provinces are to be turned into members-only clubs, limited to 2,000 Dutch clients each. They are to maintain a registry and check IDs. Coffeeshop owners who break the law will face criminal prosecution. The remainder of the coffeeshops are to follow suit on Jan. 1.
Mr. van der Steur said the main problem with the current policy was that marijuana production had led to the creation of an expansive black market. No one knows the exact value of Dutch cannabis exports, he said, but they are thought to be greater than the annual flower exports, worth $6.6 billion.
‘‘We now function as a supplier of drugs for the rest of Europe,’’ he said. ‘‘We never intended to become one of the major exporters of cannabis to the world.’’
Additionally, almost all the hashish in the coffeeshops is imported, illegally, from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lebanon or Morocco, rankling the government.
Mr. van der Steur said the government would begin treating high-potency marijuana as a hard drug, in the same category as heroin and cocaine, prohibiting its sale in coffeeshops. Growers now cultivate marijuana that is almost three times stronger than it was a few decades ago, he said. ‘‘The product changed totally, but the policy didn’t,’’ he said.
In theory, Mr. Rutte’s coalition with the Christian Democrats and their parliamentary ally, the far-right Freedom Party of Geert Wilders, have the votes to push through the changes: 83 of the 150 seats in the lower house. But the change is not assured.
Coffeeshop owners have so far failed in court to overturn the ban on sales to foreigners, but another lawsuit is being brought by the Cannabis Retailers Association, which represents the country’s 680 coffeeshops. It should be heard within the next few weeks.
Parliament is also wary of treading on the prerogative of local officials, who worry that it will bring a return to street dealing and crime. Others argue that the Netherlands, which is struggling to reduce its budget deficit in a time of austerity, cannot afford to alienate tourists.
Eberhard van der Laan, the mayor of Amsterdam, opposes the change on safety and health grounds, even though he supports the goal of reducing soft-drug use, said Tahira Limon, a spokeswoman for the city. Ms. Limon said the mayor was talking with the national government about other approaches.
Coffeeshops are not really an issue for Amsterdam, she said. ‘‘The problems we have with substance abuse are almost always related to alcohol,’’ she said. ‘‘That concerns Dutch people as much as foreigners.’’
Michael Veling, 56, owner of the 420 Café and the spokesman for the Cannabis Retailers Association, said he was skeptical that the government would get its way. More likely, he said, the policy change will be struck down in court or the issue will be left up to municipal councils. But if the law changes, he said, he would not go along.
‘‘I’m not going to build a register,’’ he said. ‘‘I’m not going to discriminate on the basis of nationality. I’ve only ever discriminated on the basis of behavior. I’ll go back to selling alcohol and go back to selling bags of weed under the counter.’’
His customers were dubious as well. Kenny and Sean, American students on a tour of Europe while studying abroad, acknowledged that the availability of marijuana was part of the reason they decided to visit Amsterdam. (The two asked not to be further identified so as to protect their future job prospects.)
‘‘We wanted to try Amsterdam because our friends all said it was awesome,’’ Sean said.
Kenny agreed. ‘‘If you smoke weed, you have to go to Amsterdam before you die,’’ he said, adding: ‘‘This place would die if they changed the weed laws. We know that. We’re business students.’’ ◼
Trying to take high out of holidays
BY DAVID JOLLY
AMSTERDAM — The scene at the 420 Cafe on a recent Friday was typical of what many travelers have come to associate with Amsterdam. Behind the bar, Janne Svensson, 34, a self-described ‘‘cannabis refugee’’ from Norway, weighed out small quantities of marijuana and hashish for her customers, many from foreign countries. They sat quietly, smoking and sipping coffee, as familiar strains of Jimi Hendrix drifted softly from the stereo and giant manta rays cavorted in a nature video on a big-screen television.
While there are many attractions that draw visitors to the Netherlands — including the friendly and straightforward people, world-class museums, charming architecture and elegant canal scenes — nearly a quarter of this city’s more than four million foreign tourists a year will visit its world-famous ‘‘coffeeshops,’’ where the sale of small quantities of cannabis, though not alcohol, is tolerated.
But Amsterdam’s days as a destination for hazy holidays may be numbered. Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s rightist coalition is pushing to restrict the operations of the coffeeshops sharply and to bar them from selling to foreigners. If the measures survive a court challenge and the opposition of local officials, the first phase would begin May 1.
‘‘I think that by the end of next year, there will be no drug tourism in the Netherlands,’’ Ard van der Steur, a member of Parliament who is a spokesman for Mr. Rutte’s People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy, said in an interview in The Hague. ‘‘We have created an incredible criminal industry that we need to get rid of.’’
Strictly speaking, the sale of marijuana and hashish (a resin extracted from the cannabis plant) is illegal. But a longstanding policy of tolerance — essentially a set of instructions from the Justice Ministry to the police — means that licensed coffeeshop operators are not prosecuted so long as they deal in limited quantities and keep hard drugs and minors out. The Dutch are also allowed to cultivate up to five marijuana plants each for personal use.
In some respects, tolerance appears to have been successful: despite the easy availability, the Dutch are less likely than Americans or many other Europeans to smoke marijuana, U.N. data show. Alex Stevens, a drug policy expert at the University of Kent, argues that the tolerance policy has reduced the harm caused by prohibition, in part by separating the markets for hard drugs like heroin from the market for marijuana, and by getting cannabis dealers off the street and into a regulated environment.
The impetus for changing the policy originated with, of all things, a parking shortage. In Maastricht, a southern city sandwiched between the German and Belgian borders, hundreds of drug tourists drive in daily from elsewhere in Europe to purchase marijuana, creating an infuriating traffic nuisance.
Spotting an opportunity, clandestine dealers have begun offering foreign drivers the option of buying their cannabis without ever leaving their cars. Even local residents who support the coffeeshops are unhappy that drugs are back on the streets.
Mr. Rutte’s justice minister, Ivo Opstelten, has said that, as of May 1, coffeeshops in the southern provinces are to be turned into members-only clubs, limited to 2,000 Dutch clients each. They are to maintain a registry and check IDs. Coffeeshop owners who break the law will face criminal prosecution. The remainder of the coffeeshops are to follow suit on Jan. 1.
Mr. van der Steur said the main problem with the current policy was that marijuana production had led to the creation of an expansive black market. No one knows the exact value of Dutch cannabis exports, he said, but they are thought to be greater than the annual flower exports, worth $6.6 billion.
‘‘We now function as a supplier of drugs for the rest of Europe,’’ he said. ‘‘We never intended to become one of the major exporters of cannabis to the world.’’
Additionally, almost all the hashish in the coffeeshops is imported, illegally, from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lebanon or Morocco, rankling the government.
Mr. van der Steur said the government would begin treating high-potency marijuana as a hard drug, in the same category as heroin and cocaine, prohibiting its sale in coffeeshops. Growers now cultivate marijuana that is almost three times stronger than it was a few decades ago, he said. ‘‘The product changed totally, but the policy didn’t,’’ he said.
In theory, Mr. Rutte’s coalition with the Christian Democrats and their parliamentary ally, the far-right Freedom Party of Geert Wilders, have the votes to push through the changes: 83 of the 150 seats in the lower house. But the change is not assured.
Coffeeshop owners have so far failed in court to overturn the ban on sales to foreigners, but another lawsuit is being brought by the Cannabis Retailers Association, which represents the country’s 680 coffeeshops. It should be heard within the next few weeks.
Parliament is also wary of treading on the prerogative of local officials, who worry that it will bring a return to street dealing and crime. Others argue that the Netherlands, which is struggling to reduce its budget deficit in a time of austerity, cannot afford to alienate tourists.
Eberhard van der Laan, the mayor of Amsterdam, opposes the change on safety and health grounds, even though he supports the goal of reducing soft-drug use, said Tahira Limon, a spokeswoman for the city. Ms. Limon said the mayor was talking with the national government about other approaches.
Coffeeshops are not really an issue for Amsterdam, she said. ‘‘The problems we have with substance abuse are almost always related to alcohol,’’ she said. ‘‘That concerns Dutch people as much as foreigners.’’
Michael Veling, 56, owner of the 420 Café and the spokesman for the Cannabis Retailers Association, said he was skeptical that the government would get its way. More likely, he said, the policy change will be struck down in court or the issue will be left up to municipal councils. But if the law changes, he said, he would not go along.
‘‘I’m not going to build a register,’’ he said. ‘‘I’m not going to discriminate on the basis of nationality. I’ve only ever discriminated on the basis of behavior. I’ll go back to selling alcohol and go back to selling bags of weed under the counter.’’
His customers were dubious as well. Kenny and Sean, American students on a tour of Europe while studying abroad, acknowledged that the availability of marijuana was part of the reason they decided to visit Amsterdam. (The two asked not to be further identified so as to protect their future job prospects.)
‘‘We wanted to try Amsterdam because our friends all said it was awesome,’’ Sean said.
Kenny agreed. ‘‘If you smoke weed, you have to go to Amsterdam before you die,’’ he said, adding: ‘‘This place would die if they changed the weed laws. We know that. We’re business students.’’ ◼
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
My response to "UN: drug gangs controlling parts of British cities"
HI, greetings readers. Once in a while I read one or two articles from a newspaper and get overwhelmed by the sense of inbalance. A lack of fairness, comprehensive thinking and alternative views on whatever issue they choose to make NEWS.
Here we have an example of 'soundbites' and 'quotes' from the INCB (International Narcotics Control Board) 2011 report, that from the off, seems flawed to me, in its inability to entertain the possibility of legalization as a strategy for Global harm reduction, let alone the medical and industrial uses of Cannabis and hemp in particular, the masses of new jobs, new cultural awareness etc.
So I'll add my comments to the article in BOLD CAPITALS. Please excuse my ranting tone, it's just stooping the level of sillyness I see in these arguments and statements made, so funny eh.
--Steven Pratt.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/9110374/UN-drug-gangs-controlling-parts-of-British-cities.html
Here we have an example of 'soundbites' and 'quotes' from the INCB (International Narcotics Control Board) 2011 report, that from the off, seems flawed to me, in its inability to entertain the possibility of legalization as a strategy for Global harm reduction, let alone the medical and industrial uses of Cannabis and hemp in particular, the masses of new jobs, new cultural awareness etc.
So I'll add my comments to the article in BOLD CAPITALS. Please excuse my ranting tone, it's just stooping the level of sillyness I see in these arguments and statements made, so funny eh.
--Steven Pratt.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/9110374/UN-drug-gangs-controlling-parts-of-British-cities.html
UN: drug gangs controlling parts of British cities
Parts of British cities are becoming no-go areas where drugs gangs are
effectively in control, a United Nations drugs chief said today.
(DRUGS GANGS? DOES SUPERDRUG AND BOOTS QUALIFY AS 'DRUGS GANGS?' PLEASE, DEFINE YOUR TERMS!)
Image 1 of 2
Police officer arrests a suspected drug dealer Photo: Getty Images
10:00AM GMT 28 Feb 2012
720 Comments
(SUSPECTED DRUG DEALER? WELL, IF HE TURNS OUT TO BE INNOCENT YOU MIGHT CONSIDER GIVING HIM SOMETHING IN RETURN FOR THE USE OF HIS PHOTO. ALL IN GOOD SPIRITS)
Professor Hamid Ghodse, president of the UN's International Narcotics Control
Board (INCB), said there was ''a vicious cycle of social exclusion and drugs
problems and fractured communities'' in cities such as Birmingham, Liverpool
and Manchester.
(DRUGS PROBLEMS AND FRACTURED COMMUNITIES, VICIOUS CYCLES... YES, DUE TO PROHIBITION, AND THE WAR ON DRUGS, AND MONEY SPENT ON FOREIGN WARS AND SWINDLED BY LOCAL AND NATIONAL POLITICIANS, BANKERS AND CORPORATIONS, IMHO)
(DRUGS PROBLEMS AND FRACTURED COMMUNITIES, VICIOUS CYCLES... YES, DUE TO PROHIBITION, AND THE WAR ON DRUGS, AND MONEY SPENT ON FOREIGN WARS AND SWINDLED BY LOCAL AND NATIONAL POLITICIANS, BANKERS AND CORPORATIONS, IMHO)
The development of ''no-go areas'' was being fuelled by threats such as social
inequality, migration and celebrities normalising drug abuse, he warned.
(WHAT? CELEBRITIES NORMALIZING DRUG ABUSE! WELL, YOUR A CELEBRITY NOW MR GHODSE, BUSY DE-NORMALIZING DRUG-ABUSE NO DOUBT. WHAT DO YOU MEAN? WHAT DRUGS, WHAT DO YOU VIEW AS ABUSE? EH?
MIGRATION? MIGRATION OF SOULS?
OH, I GET IT, YOU MEAN NON-WHITE, LOWER MIDDLE CLASS JOBLESS 'CELEBRITIES'.
(WHAT? CELEBRITIES NORMALIZING DRUG ABUSE! WELL, YOUR A CELEBRITY NOW MR GHODSE, BUSY DE-NORMALIZING DRUG-ABUSE NO DOUBT. WHAT DO YOU MEAN? WHAT DRUGS, WHAT DO YOU VIEW AS ABUSE? EH?
MIGRATION? MIGRATION OF SOULS?
OH, I GET IT, YOU MEAN NON-WHITE, LOWER MIDDLE CLASS JOBLESS 'CELEBRITIES'.
Helping marginalised communities with drugs problems ''must be a priority'',
he said.
''We are looking at social cohesion, the social disintegration and illegal
drugs.
''In many societies around the world, whether developed or developing, there
are communities within the societies which develop which become no-go areas.
''Drug traffickers, organised crime, drug users, they take over. They will get the sort of governance of those areas.
''Examples are in Brazil, Mexico, in the United States, in the UK, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, and therefore it is no good to have only law enforcement, which always shows it does not succeed.''
(OK, I AGREE, AND PRESENT FULL LEGALIZATION OF ALL DRUGS AS THE SOLUTION, WAKE UP YOU MORON!)
Prof Ghodse called for such communities to be offered drug abuse prevention programmes, treatment and rehabilitation services, and the same levels of educational, employment and recreational opportunities as in the wider society.
(THATS A VERY WIDE RANGE OF OLD IDEAS, PEPPERED WITH IDEALISTIC SWEET TALK ABOUT EQUALITY AND WORK. MY THOUGHTS DRIFT TO BANKING ABUSE PREVENTION PROGRAMMES, PONZI SCHEME TREATMENT AND FINANCIAL BAIL-OUT REHABILITATION SERVICES. IT MIGHT LOOK GRIM UP NORTH BUDDY, BUT MOST THE REAL PSYCHOPATHS AND SOCIAL PARIAHS ARE AROUND LONDON, WHERE ALL THE GLOBAL CORPORATE ACTION TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HUGE PHARMA BORGS, THE BANKS AND THE MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX, SPREADING CARNIEGE AND DESTRUCTION AND MAYHEM ACROSS THE UK AND THE WORLD. AND YET, SOME WEED SMOKING GANGSTERS WHO REALLY JUST LOVE TO PLAY X-BOX AND SURF THE NET IN VARIOUS ALTERED STATES POSE SUCH A MASSIVE THREAT TO SOCIETY?)
''Youth of these communities must have similar chances to those in the wide society and have a right to be protected from drug abuse and drug dependence,'' he said.
(OH YEAH, I FORGOT, THE TAX PAYERS PAY FOR THIS KIND OF PROTECTION AND TREATMENT ALREADY, THE POLICE ENFORCE YOUR PROHIBITION IN THE UK WITHOUT MERCY. LIKE ANY OTHER CRIME. AND NOW WITH THE ADDED EXCUSE OF PROVIDING EQUAL CHANCES IN THE WIDER COMMUNITY, BY PROTECTING FROM DRUG DEPENDENCE. BULLSHIT! WAKE UP. I SAY.)
''It is crucial that the needs of communities experiencing social disintegration are urgently tackled before the tipping point is reached, beyond which effective action becomes impossible.
''The consequences of failure are too high for society and should be avoided at all cost.''
The INCB's annual report for 2011 found persistent social inequality, migration, emerging cultures of excess and a shift in traditional values were some of the key threats to social cohesion.
(THE TIPPING POINT EH? WHAT TIPPING POINT, WHAT POINT, WHAT PIVOT? AND FROM WHICH AFTER EFFECTIVE ACTION BECOMES IMPOSSIBLE? WHAT? WHEN IS THAT? LEGALIZATION AND DECRIMINALIZATION COULD DO THAT, ACTUALLY, SEE PORTUGAL AND THE NETHERLANDS ON THIS ISSUE. PLEASE. LOOK AND READ FREDERICK POLLACK. THANKS.)
As the gap between rich and poor widens, and ''faced with a future with limited opportunities, individuals within these communities may increasingly become disengaged from the wider society and become involved in a range of personally and socially harmful behaviours, including drug abuse and drug dealing,'' it said.
(LIKE A BAD TRIP HE JUST GOES AROUND AND AROUND SAYING NOTHING MUCH BUT PARANOID STERETYPICAL SOUNDBITES. BULLSHIT. MOST CREATIVE PEOPLE I KNOW SMOKE POT AND HAVE TRIPPED BALLS AT LEAST A FEW TIMES IN A RESPECTFUL AND DILIGENT WAY. YOU, MR GHODSE HAVE OBVIOUSLY NEVER TRIED ANY OF THE DRUGS YOU SO HEARTILY EXPONGE. WAKE UP YOU DICK-HEAD AND PULL THAT INCB FINGER OUT YOUR ASS-HOLE. WHAT ABUSE? HOW MUCH, HOW OFTEN? AND WHAT DEALING? HOW MUCH, HOW OFTEN, WHAT ABOUT THE UK AND US GOV. DRUG DEALING? HAVE YOU EVER ADDRESSED THAT, AND THE DOUBLE STANDARDS, AND THE PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECT THIS CAN HAVE ON SOME WHO MAY FIGURE YOUR A FRONT FOR THE COPS AND ROBBERS, DUE TO YOUR DARK PARANOID VISIONS AND DIATRIBE.)
The report added: ''While migration offers many positive benefits to the migrant and to society at large, it can create a sense of dislocation from the surrounding community and a sense of vulnerability on the part of those who are displaced.
''Where migrating social groups have travelled from areas associated with illicit drug production and drug abuse, there is a greater likelihood of individuals engaging in forms of drug misuse as a way of coping with such a sense of dislocation.''
(SIMPLY, BOLLOCKS MR GHODSE. BOLLOCKS. YOUR WORDS ARE EMPTY AND MEANINGLESS, AND THE REPORTING HERE ALSO STINKS FOR IT'S CHOICE OF QUOTES AND LACK OF BALANCED ARGUMENT.)
Celebrities' use of illicit drugs may also ''contribute to a growing normalisation of certain forms of drug misuse within the wider society and in turn can lead to the undermining of social cohesion''.
But the INCB warned none of the factors ''should be seen as leading individuals inevitably into a lifestyle of drug abuse and criminality''.
''Whatever the social processes and social pressures at hand, human beings still have the capacity to exercise some element of choice in what they do and what they refrain from doing,'' it said.
(EH, SOME ELEMENT OF CHOICE? WELL NOT IF THAT INVOLVES A LITTLE MEDICAL MARIJUANA, OR A TRIPPY WHIPPY, OR SOME REICHEAN THEARAPY OR NLP COURSES IN MOST PLACES. WHAT SANCTAMONIOUS BULLSHIT THE INCB SPOUTS. AS I SAID, BUNCH OF MORONS.
A Home Office spokesman said: ''The Ending Gang and Youth Violence report published by the Government in 2011 sets out a comprehensive strategy for supporting local areas to reduce the effects of gang violence.
''We want to stop young people from joining gangs in the first place through intervention and support to children and families at risk of gang violence.
''This will be matched with tough and intensive enforcement action to bring perpetrators to justice.''
(NICE ENDING! BOOM, BE WARNED, SO TO SPEAK. WELL I DISAGREE TOTALLY WITH THE INBALANCED VIEWS OF THIS ARTICLE, THE BAD PICTURE OF THE SUSPECTED DRUG DEALER, THE BAD QUOTES FROM MR GHODSE JUST REPEATING THE SAME SHIT. NO STATISTICS, NO HYPERLINKS, JUST ONE RAY OF HOPE, ONE.....
THE VOTING DEVICE WHICH INCLUDES THE PROPOSAL TO LEGALIZE AS A STRATEGY TO DEFEAT ORGANIZED CRIME AND CRIMINAL GANG DEALINGS. AS OF TODAY IT HAS THE MOST VOTES. I REST MY CASE. HEY, MAYBE FOLLOW UP THIS ARTICLE WITH A PRO-LEGALIZATION AND/OR DECRIMINALIZATION PIECE, FEATURING A SMART AND INTELLIGENT SCIENTIST REFUTING EVERY POINT MR GHODSE, THE HOME OFFICE AND THE INCB MAKE.
YOURS SINCERELY,
--STEVE FLY AGARIC 23.
''Drug traffickers, organised crime, drug users, they take over. They will get the sort of governance of those areas.
''Examples are in Brazil, Mexico, in the United States, in the UK, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, and therefore it is no good to have only law enforcement, which always shows it does not succeed.''
(OK, I AGREE, AND PRESENT FULL LEGALIZATION OF ALL DRUGS AS THE SOLUTION, WAKE UP YOU MORON!)
Prof Ghodse called for such communities to be offered drug abuse prevention programmes, treatment and rehabilitation services, and the same levels of educational, employment and recreational opportunities as in the wider society.
(THATS A VERY WIDE RANGE OF OLD IDEAS, PEPPERED WITH IDEALISTIC SWEET TALK ABOUT EQUALITY AND WORK. MY THOUGHTS DRIFT TO BANKING ABUSE PREVENTION PROGRAMMES, PONZI SCHEME TREATMENT AND FINANCIAL BAIL-OUT REHABILITATION SERVICES. IT MIGHT LOOK GRIM UP NORTH BUDDY, BUT MOST THE REAL PSYCHOPATHS AND SOCIAL PARIAHS ARE AROUND LONDON, WHERE ALL THE GLOBAL CORPORATE ACTION TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HUGE PHARMA BORGS, THE BANKS AND THE MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX, SPREADING CARNIEGE AND DESTRUCTION AND MAYHEM ACROSS THE UK AND THE WORLD. AND YET, SOME WEED SMOKING GANGSTERS WHO REALLY JUST LOVE TO PLAY X-BOX AND SURF THE NET IN VARIOUS ALTERED STATES POSE SUCH A MASSIVE THREAT TO SOCIETY?)
''Youth of these communities must have similar chances to those in the wide society and have a right to be protected from drug abuse and drug dependence,'' he said.
(OH YEAH, I FORGOT, THE TAX PAYERS PAY FOR THIS KIND OF PROTECTION AND TREATMENT ALREADY, THE POLICE ENFORCE YOUR PROHIBITION IN THE UK WITHOUT MERCY. LIKE ANY OTHER CRIME. AND NOW WITH THE ADDED EXCUSE OF PROVIDING EQUAL CHANCES IN THE WIDER COMMUNITY, BY PROTECTING FROM DRUG DEPENDENCE. BULLSHIT! WAKE UP. I SAY.)
''It is crucial that the needs of communities experiencing social disintegration are urgently tackled before the tipping point is reached, beyond which effective action becomes impossible.
''The consequences of failure are too high for society and should be avoided at all cost.''
The INCB's annual report for 2011 found persistent social inequality, migration, emerging cultures of excess and a shift in traditional values were some of the key threats to social cohesion.
(THE TIPPING POINT EH? WHAT TIPPING POINT, WHAT POINT, WHAT PIVOT? AND FROM WHICH AFTER EFFECTIVE ACTION BECOMES IMPOSSIBLE? WHAT? WHEN IS THAT? LEGALIZATION AND DECRIMINALIZATION COULD DO THAT, ACTUALLY, SEE PORTUGAL AND THE NETHERLANDS ON THIS ISSUE. PLEASE. LOOK AND READ FREDERICK POLLACK. THANKS.)
As the gap between rich and poor widens, and ''faced with a future with limited opportunities, individuals within these communities may increasingly become disengaged from the wider society and become involved in a range of personally and socially harmful behaviours, including drug abuse and drug dealing,'' it said.
(LIKE A BAD TRIP HE JUST GOES AROUND AND AROUND SAYING NOTHING MUCH BUT PARANOID STERETYPICAL SOUNDBITES. BULLSHIT. MOST CREATIVE PEOPLE I KNOW SMOKE POT AND HAVE TRIPPED BALLS AT LEAST A FEW TIMES IN A RESPECTFUL AND DILIGENT WAY. YOU, MR GHODSE HAVE OBVIOUSLY NEVER TRIED ANY OF THE DRUGS YOU SO HEARTILY EXPONGE. WAKE UP YOU DICK-HEAD AND PULL THAT INCB FINGER OUT YOUR ASS-HOLE. WHAT ABUSE? HOW MUCH, HOW OFTEN? AND WHAT DEALING? HOW MUCH, HOW OFTEN, WHAT ABOUT THE UK AND US GOV. DRUG DEALING? HAVE YOU EVER ADDRESSED THAT, AND THE DOUBLE STANDARDS, AND THE PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECT THIS CAN HAVE ON SOME WHO MAY FIGURE YOUR A FRONT FOR THE COPS AND ROBBERS, DUE TO YOUR DARK PARANOID VISIONS AND DIATRIBE.)
The report added: ''While migration offers many positive benefits to the migrant and to society at large, it can create a sense of dislocation from the surrounding community and a sense of vulnerability on the part of those who are displaced.
''Where migrating social groups have travelled from areas associated with illicit drug production and drug abuse, there is a greater likelihood of individuals engaging in forms of drug misuse as a way of coping with such a sense of dislocation.''
(SIMPLY, BOLLOCKS MR GHODSE. BOLLOCKS. YOUR WORDS ARE EMPTY AND MEANINGLESS, AND THE REPORTING HERE ALSO STINKS FOR IT'S CHOICE OF QUOTES AND LACK OF BALANCED ARGUMENT.)
Celebrities' use of illicit drugs may also ''contribute to a growing normalisation of certain forms of drug misuse within the wider society and in turn can lead to the undermining of social cohesion''.
But the INCB warned none of the factors ''should be seen as leading individuals inevitably into a lifestyle of drug abuse and criminality''.
''Whatever the social processes and social pressures at hand, human beings still have the capacity to exercise some element of choice in what they do and what they refrain from doing,'' it said.
(EH, SOME ELEMENT OF CHOICE? WELL NOT IF THAT INVOLVES A LITTLE MEDICAL MARIJUANA, OR A TRIPPY WHIPPY, OR SOME REICHEAN THEARAPY OR NLP COURSES IN MOST PLACES. WHAT SANCTAMONIOUS BULLSHIT THE INCB SPOUTS. AS I SAID, BUNCH OF MORONS.
A Home Office spokesman said: ''The Ending Gang and Youth Violence report published by the Government in 2011 sets out a comprehensive strategy for supporting local areas to reduce the effects of gang violence.
''We want to stop young people from joining gangs in the first place through intervention and support to children and families at risk of gang violence.
''This will be matched with tough and intensive enforcement action to bring perpetrators to justice.''
(NICE ENDING! BOOM, BE WARNED, SO TO SPEAK. WELL I DISAGREE TOTALLY WITH THE INBALANCED VIEWS OF THIS ARTICLE, THE BAD PICTURE OF THE SUSPECTED DRUG DEALER, THE BAD QUOTES FROM MR GHODSE JUST REPEATING THE SAME SHIT. NO STATISTICS, NO HYPERLINKS, JUST ONE RAY OF HOPE, ONE.....
THE VOTING DEVICE WHICH INCLUDES THE PROPOSAL TO LEGALIZE AS A STRATEGY TO DEFEAT ORGANIZED CRIME AND CRIMINAL GANG DEALINGS. AS OF TODAY IT HAS THE MOST VOTES. I REST MY CASE. HEY, MAYBE FOLLOW UP THIS ARTICLE WITH A PRO-LEGALIZATION AND/OR DECRIMINALIZATION PIECE, FEATURING A SMART AND INTELLIGENT SCIENTIST REFUTING EVERY POINT MR GHODSE, THE HOME OFFICE AND THE INCB MAKE.
YOURS SINCERELY,
--STEVE FLY AGARIC 23.
Friday, August 19, 2011
MDMA interview with Dr. A. Shulgin
News has broke around the world (Aug. 19th 2011) that a new modified form of MDMA has proved helpful in fighting some forms of cancer, specifically those cancers associated with blood. Great News. But the news articles are very brief and without the depth I expected.
So here's a sober minded interview with Alexander Shulgin, a very wise and tuned in gentleman.
Love, steve fly
http://www.mdma.net/alexander-shulgin/mdma.html
Q. Is there any chance of that actually changing for MDMA?
A. Might the law change in the area of MDMA? Only with difficulty. Unfortunately, the whole legal system as it addresses the drug and drug-use situation has moved away from what originally was a medical or a public health concern. Now it embraces not only power and control, but money. I'm trying to estimate the size of the industry - that is, the 'war on drugs' industry - that has been built up, that is associated with, connected to, and benefits from this particular war. Now that we've lost communism as an enemy, what do we do with our large military? We find ways for it to be used in socially responsible enforcement of law. You have seizure laws. Property can be seized if that property is somehow associated with drug use. You have industries like the prison industry. I've heard that in California alone, four billion dollars a year is invested in the prison industry, in some 30 or 40 prisons. This is a big industry and it's growing. You have people who make spectrophotometers that are back ordered. Fifty-thousand dollar spectrophotometers are back ordered because the demand for testing urine samples is so great, that they can't supply them fast enough to the analytical laboratories where they're hiring chemists to run these assays. This is a big industry! You have the investment of the State Department which now can enter countries more and more - South American countries, European countries, because they are the sources of drugs. And therefore, it can enter and influence the politics of those countries. And the vehicle for getting into foreign politics is 'the drug' and 'the drug war'. http://www.mdma.net/alexander-shulgin/mdma.html
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Double-dutch Coffeeshop news-speak and Global news ambiguity.
Double-dutch Coffeeshop news-speak and Global news ambiguity.
I don't know about you dear reader, but I don't get my information (news) from the mainstream newspaper any longer, I get it from individual experienced bloggers (from many fields) from wikipedia, and mostly I get my news from my network of friends.
Friends often provide the extra turn of phrase or primary observation that make the information being communicated fluid, plus the fact that often you can smell your friends and see their facial expression, gestures and human imperfections.
During the months of May and June this year (2011) I have been repeatedly asked the question (will the coffeesshops be closing to foreign tourists?) while at work behind the 'weed counter' at coffeeshop 420, Amsterdam. My answer has always been an optimistic 'NO' due to my interpretation of events which results in the possible adoption of the 'weed pass' (private 'Dutch' members only card) in some of the Dutch boarder towns such as Mastricht, but not here in Amsterdam.
The International newswire, however, contrary to my own thoughts on the matter, tends to paint a cut and dried answer to the questions surrounding the new 'weed pass' proposal by imploying meaningless and ambiguous terminology (drug tourism, drugs, organized crime), and then repeating them over and over again across the global newswire, as if the editors at these useless 'disinformation' operations (news media corporations) are in fact nothing more than Zombie's, infected with the beaureacratic stench of the tabloid press and only capable of producing redundant predictable! communications. (see AP, Newscorp, Reuters, CNN etc,. BBC?)
I have noticed a serious inbalance and unfair interpretation in most but not all news stories concerning 'some drugs' (i.e Cannabis, LSD, magic mushrooms, DMT) but mostly surrounding Cannabis. This media imbalance strikes me between the eyes almost every day as the fact of living and working in a place where almost everybody smokes Cannabis on a regular basis and lives a trouble free and happy life, whereas if you turn to the newspapers and the Government sanctioned reports about Cannabis, especially in Europe these days (America seems to be on a somewhat upward spiral toward intelligent Cannabis liberation) then, if taken literally you may go seek immediate medical help after buying a bullet proof vest.
For me, living here in Amsterdam and working within the Cannabis culture for over four years I have grown to be very sceptical and critical of the news-media, but decided to generally ignore them and their stories and just get on with my own thing, me, my friends and the Global Village, but now I feel an urge to respond and in doing so entertain some new ideas I have about information.
Information equals surprise, predictability leads to less information. I believe this equation is the final call for the corporate controlled news media and their henchment, if they do not change their redundant methods of communication they will die a fast heat death in the entropic vapours of the digital age. Excuse me, they evapourated already, we are now living in the age of wikileaks and anonymous, upon a new playing field or battle field where surprise = information.
In the context of Dutch coffeeshops and international news then, I will simply quote some of the articles to give examples of how almost everything proposed in the 'is' state, on deeper thinking and research into the process, in fact, is not. And LO! begins the Punch and Judy show, right up front at the media circus. A RAW source once stated the fact that the 'war on drugs' cannot be a war on drugs, if it were they would be busting in the doors of every phamacy and drug store in town, therefore to remove a line of semantic distortion we should more correctly refer to 'the war on some drugs'. As simple and as easy as this seems (to just add the word 'some') hardly any news journalists pay tribute and continue with the 'cut and dry' either/or (two valued logic) that went out of style with Hitler.
There are then at least two areas of focus. The first is the actual situations and events or speech associated with the news item, the second is the language or language-trappings associated with the communication of the news item. The message and the media.
In the continued 'war on some people who use some drugs' and the 'culture wars' waged around the globe, language seems to me the first instrument of counter-attack. Artists and poets and musicians emerge for the sport of it all, to put life and love and liberty into a vortex and create something new, to help combat the redundant forces of fixed-stereotypes and the mass medicrity permeating every aspect of modern city life.
The Hermetic forces that have helped shape the modern information explosion are still with every one of us who chooses to tune them in. And since the innovation of general relativity, general semantics and information theory, (also tied to many Hermetic principles and methodologies, somewhat Pagan in spirit, if you will) the misuse and abuse of language by mediocrities and corporate fraudsters and spooks will cease to hold it's spell over the minds of a culture. The chains of law have been broken, follow the link...
So although I like to consider myself an activist for drug peace and tolerance, I am trying to distance myself here from the content or the 'message' itself, and target the corrupted 'medium' (i.e phrases like 'drugs-tourism' and 'war on drugs') and show that the whole field of 'some drugs related' journalism seems infected with a distinct lack of relative terminology and a distinct amplification of semantic distortions. If the medium is the message then the message has also been corrupted by obsolete.
--Steve 'fly agaric 23'
Amsterdam, July 2nd, 2011.
"The only solution to get rid of the cannabis tourism in our border areas would be the introduction of cannabis outlets in Germany, Belgium, France and the UK, so they do not have to come to Dutch coffeeshops any more. --http://pr.cannazine.co.uk/201106201481/green/eco-news/dutch-cannabis-exclusion-zone-doomed-says-coffee-shop-owner.html
"Dutch to ban foreigners from pot shops.
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/06/07/amsterdam.pot.shops.ban/
"However the Dutch government is keen to crack down on this kind of "drugs tourism." The Dutch executive announced earlier this year that they wanted coffee shops to become private members clubs, only open to the local market. This would mean only Dutch nationals could become members and legally purchase cannabis.
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,15194412,00.html
I don't know about you dear reader, but I don't get my information (news) from the mainstream newspaper any longer, I get it from individual experienced bloggers (from many fields) from wikipedia, and mostly I get my news from my network of friends.
Friends often provide the extra turn of phrase or primary observation that make the information being communicated fluid, plus the fact that often you can smell your friends and see their facial expression, gestures and human imperfections.
During the months of May and June this year (2011) I have been repeatedly asked the question (will the coffeesshops be closing to foreign tourists?) while at work behind the 'weed counter' at coffeeshop 420, Amsterdam. My answer has always been an optimistic 'NO' due to my interpretation of events which results in the possible adoption of the 'weed pass' (private 'Dutch' members only card) in some of the Dutch boarder towns such as Mastricht, but not here in Amsterdam.
The International newswire, however, contrary to my own thoughts on the matter, tends to paint a cut and dried answer to the questions surrounding the new 'weed pass' proposal by imploying meaningless and ambiguous terminology (drug tourism, drugs, organized crime), and then repeating them over and over again across the global newswire, as if the editors at these useless 'disinformation' operations (news media corporations) are in fact nothing more than Zombie's, infected with the beaureacratic stench of the tabloid press and only capable of producing redundant predictable! communications. (see AP, Newscorp, Reuters, CNN etc,. BBC?)
I have noticed a serious inbalance and unfair interpretation in most but not all news stories concerning 'some drugs' (i.e Cannabis, LSD, magic mushrooms, DMT) but mostly surrounding Cannabis. This media imbalance strikes me between the eyes almost every day as the fact of living and working in a place where almost everybody smokes Cannabis on a regular basis and lives a trouble free and happy life, whereas if you turn to the newspapers and the Government sanctioned reports about Cannabis, especially in Europe these days (America seems to be on a somewhat upward spiral toward intelligent Cannabis liberation) then, if taken literally you may go seek immediate medical help after buying a bullet proof vest.
For me, living here in Amsterdam and working within the Cannabis culture for over four years I have grown to be very sceptical and critical of the news-media, but decided to generally ignore them and their stories and just get on with my own thing, me, my friends and the Global Village, but now I feel an urge to respond and in doing so entertain some new ideas I have about information.
Information equals surprise, predictability leads to less information. I believe this equation is the final call for the corporate controlled news media and their henchment, if they do not change their redundant methods of communication they will die a fast heat death in the entropic vapours of the digital age. Excuse me, they evapourated already, we are now living in the age of wikileaks and anonymous, upon a new playing field or battle field where surprise = information.
In the context of Dutch coffeeshops and international news then, I will simply quote some of the articles to give examples of how almost everything proposed in the 'is' state, on deeper thinking and research into the process, in fact, is not. And LO! begins the Punch and Judy show, right up front at the media circus. A RAW source once stated the fact that the 'war on drugs' cannot be a war on drugs, if it were they would be busting in the doors of every phamacy and drug store in town, therefore to remove a line of semantic distortion we should more correctly refer to 'the war on some drugs'. As simple and as easy as this seems (to just add the word 'some') hardly any news journalists pay tribute and continue with the 'cut and dry' either/or (two valued logic) that went out of style with Hitler.
There are then at least two areas of focus. The first is the actual situations and events or speech associated with the news item, the second is the language or language-trappings associated with the communication of the news item. The message and the media.
In the continued 'war on some people who use some drugs' and the 'culture wars' waged around the globe, language seems to me the first instrument of counter-attack. Artists and poets and musicians emerge for the sport of it all, to put life and love and liberty into a vortex and create something new, to help combat the redundant forces of fixed-stereotypes and the mass medicrity permeating every aspect of modern city life.
The Hermetic forces that have helped shape the modern information explosion are still with every one of us who chooses to tune them in. And since the innovation of general relativity, general semantics and information theory, (also tied to many Hermetic principles and methodologies, somewhat Pagan in spirit, if you will) the misuse and abuse of language by mediocrities and corporate fraudsters and spooks will cease to hold it's spell over the minds of a culture. The chains of law have been broken, follow the link...
So although I like to consider myself an activist for drug peace and tolerance, I am trying to distance myself here from the content or the 'message' itself, and target the corrupted 'medium' (i.e phrases like 'drugs-tourism' and 'war on drugs') and show that the whole field of 'some drugs related' journalism seems infected with a distinct lack of relative terminology and a distinct amplification of semantic distortions. If the medium is the message then the message has also been corrupted by obsolete.
--Steve 'fly agaric 23'
Amsterdam, July 2nd, 2011.
"The only solution to get rid of the cannabis tourism in our border areas would be the introduction of cannabis outlets in Germany, Belgium, France and the UK, so they do not have to come to Dutch coffeeshops any more. --http://pr.cannazine.co.uk/201106201481/green/eco-news/dutch-cannabis-exclusion-zone-doomed-says-coffee-shop-owner.html
"Dutch to ban foreigners from pot shops.
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/06/07/amsterdam.pot.shops.ban/
"However the Dutch government is keen to crack down on this kind of "drugs tourism." The Dutch executive announced earlier this year that they wanted coffee shops to become private members clubs, only open to the local market. This would mean only Dutch nationals could become members and legally purchase cannabis.
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,15194412,00.html
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Over 20,000 Studies Conducted on Marijuana
US News & World Report recently probed the subject of cannabis science, publishing a pair of stories on the subject here and here.
Neither story particularly breaks any new ground, though the first provides some valuable — if inadvertent — insight into the prohibitionist (or at the very least, statist) mindset.
Quoted in the story is Columbia University researcher Margaret Haney. I’ve written about Haney’s clinical work with cannabis before. In particular, Haney was the lead author of a 2007 clinical trial concluding that inhaled cannabis increased daily caloric intake and body weight in HIV-positive patients in a manner that was far superior to the effects of oral THC (Marinol aka Dronabinol). The study further reported that subjects’ use of marijuana was well tolerated, and did not impair their cognitive performance.
Yet Haney’s comments in US News & World Report ring tepid at best. Here’s an excerpt from the article:
“’I am not anti-marijuana, I’m not pro-marijuana. I want to understand it.’ Haney expresses frustration at what she considers wrongheaded efforts by states to legalize medical marijuana. There is too much, she says, that scientists do not know.”
Haney’s refrain is a common one, and at first glance it appears to make sense. After all, who among us doesn’t want to better understand the interactions between the marijuana plant and the human body? Yet placed in proper context this sentiment appears to be little more than a red herring. Here’s why.
Marijuana is already the most studied plant on Earth, and is arguably one of the most investigated therapeutically active substances known to man. To date, there are now over 20,000 published studies or reviews in the scientific literature pertaining to marijuana and its active compounds. That total includes over 2,700 separate papers published on cannabis in 2009 and another 900 published just this year alone (according to a key word search on the search engine PubMed).
And what have we learned from these 20,000+ studies? Not surprisingly, quite a lot. For starters, we know that cannabis and its active constituents are uniquely safe and effective as therapeutic compounds. Unlike most prescription or over-the-counter medications, cannabinoids are virtually non-toxic to health cells or organs, and they are incapable of causing the user to experience a fatal overdose. Unlike opiates, cannabinoids do not depress the central nervous system, and as a result they possess a virtually unparalleled safety profile. In fact, a 2008 meta-analysis published in the Journal of the Canadian Medical Association (CMAJ) reported that cannabis-based drugs were associated with virtually no serious adverse side effects in over 30 years of investigative use.
We also know that the cannabis plant contains in excess of 60 active compounds that likely possess distinctive therapeutic properties. These include THC, THCV, CBD, THCA, CBC, and CBG, among others. In fact, a recent review by Israel’s Raphael Mechoulam of Hebrew University and colleagues identifies nearly 30 separate therapeutic effects — including anti-cancer properties, anti-diabetic properties, neuroprotection, and anti-stroke properties — in cannabinoids other than THC. Most recently, a review by researchers in Germany reported that since 2005 there have been 37 controlled studies assessing the safety and efficacy of cannabinoids, involved a total of 2,563 subjects. By contrast, most FDA-approved drugs go through far fewer trials involving far fewer subjects.
Finally, we know that Western civilization has been using cannabis as a therapeutic agent or recreational intoxicant for thousands of years with relatively few adverse consequences — either to the individual user or to society. In fact, no less than the World Health Organization commissioned a team of experts to compare the health and societal consequences of marijuana use compared to other drugs, including alcohol, nicotine, and opiates. After quantifying the harms associated with both drugs, the researchers concluded: “Overall, most of these risks (associated with marijuana) are small to moderate in size. In aggregate they are unlikely to produce public health problems comparable in scale to those currently produced by alcohol and tobacco. On existing patterns of use, cannabis poses a much less serious public health problem than is currently posed by alcohol and tobacco in Western societies.”
That, in a nutshell, is what we ‘know’ about cannabis. I’d say that it’s ample enough information to, at the very least, cease the practice arresting people, and seriously ill patients in particular, who possess it. As for what else Dr. Haney and others of a similar mindset would still like to know — and how many additional studies would it take to provide them with that information — well, that’s anybody’s guess.
Neither story particularly breaks any new ground, though the first provides some valuable — if inadvertent — insight into the prohibitionist (or at the very least, statist) mindset.
Quoted in the story is Columbia University researcher Margaret Haney. I’ve written about Haney’s clinical work with cannabis before. In particular, Haney was the lead author of a 2007 clinical trial concluding that inhaled cannabis increased daily caloric intake and body weight in HIV-positive patients in a manner that was far superior to the effects of oral THC (Marinol aka Dronabinol). The study further reported that subjects’ use of marijuana was well tolerated, and did not impair their cognitive performance.
Yet Haney’s comments in US News & World Report ring tepid at best. Here’s an excerpt from the article:
“’I am not anti-marijuana, I’m not pro-marijuana. I want to understand it.’ Haney expresses frustration at what she considers wrongheaded efforts by states to legalize medical marijuana. There is too much, she says, that scientists do not know.”
Haney’s refrain is a common one, and at first glance it appears to make sense. After all, who among us doesn’t want to better understand the interactions between the marijuana plant and the human body? Yet placed in proper context this sentiment appears to be little more than a red herring. Here’s why.
Marijuana is already the most studied plant on Earth, and is arguably one of the most investigated therapeutically active substances known to man. To date, there are now over 20,000 published studies or reviews in the scientific literature pertaining to marijuana and its active compounds. That total includes over 2,700 separate papers published on cannabis in 2009 and another 900 published just this year alone (according to a key word search on the search engine PubMed).
And what have we learned from these 20,000+ studies? Not surprisingly, quite a lot. For starters, we know that cannabis and its active constituents are uniquely safe and effective as therapeutic compounds. Unlike most prescription or over-the-counter medications, cannabinoids are virtually non-toxic to health cells or organs, and they are incapable of causing the user to experience a fatal overdose. Unlike opiates, cannabinoids do not depress the central nervous system, and as a result they possess a virtually unparalleled safety profile. In fact, a 2008 meta-analysis published in the Journal of the Canadian Medical Association (CMAJ) reported that cannabis-based drugs were associated with virtually no serious adverse side effects in over 30 years of investigative use.
We also know that the cannabis plant contains in excess of 60 active compounds that likely possess distinctive therapeutic properties. These include THC, THCV, CBD, THCA, CBC, and CBG, among others. In fact, a recent review by Israel’s Raphael Mechoulam of Hebrew University and colleagues identifies nearly 30 separate therapeutic effects — including anti-cancer properties, anti-diabetic properties, neuroprotection, and anti-stroke properties — in cannabinoids other than THC. Most recently, a review by researchers in Germany reported that since 2005 there have been 37 controlled studies assessing the safety and efficacy of cannabinoids, involved a total of 2,563 subjects. By contrast, most FDA-approved drugs go through far fewer trials involving far fewer subjects.
Finally, we know that Western civilization has been using cannabis as a therapeutic agent or recreational intoxicant for thousands of years with relatively few adverse consequences — either to the individual user or to society. In fact, no less than the World Health Organization commissioned a team of experts to compare the health and societal consequences of marijuana use compared to other drugs, including alcohol, nicotine, and opiates. After quantifying the harms associated with both drugs, the researchers concluded: “Overall, most of these risks (associated with marijuana) are small to moderate in size. In aggregate they are unlikely to produce public health problems comparable in scale to those currently produced by alcohol and tobacco. On existing patterns of use, cannabis poses a much less serious public health problem than is currently posed by alcohol and tobacco in Western societies.”
That, in a nutshell, is what we ‘know’ about cannabis. I’d say that it’s ample enough information to, at the very least, cease the practice arresting people, and seriously ill patients in particular, who possess it. As for what else Dr. Haney and others of a similar mindset would still like to know — and how many additional studies would it take to provide them with that information — well, that’s anybody’s guess.
Paul Armentano is the Deputy Director of NORML and the NORML Foundation.
http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/07/06/theres-been-over-20000-studies-on-marijuana-what-is-it-that-scientists-do-not-yet-know/
http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/07/06/theres-been-over-20000-studies-on-marijuana-what-is-it-that-scientists-do-not-yet-know/
Monday, July 5, 2010
Politics of Psychopharmacology By Timothy Leary
Politics of Psychopharmacology
By Timothy Leary
Without ritalin: a natural approach to ADD
By Samuel A. Berne
By Timothy Leary
Without ritalin: a natural approach to ADD
By Samuel A. Berne
Sexs, Drugs & Magick by Robert Anton Wilson (Preface to the 2000 Edition)
Sexs, Drugs & Magick
PREFACE TO THE 2000 EDITION
And the Beast said:
"By their pee shall ye judge them,
and by thy pee shall ye be judged.
And all will be divided by their pee.
And in the snow shall their names be written."
- The Book of Urinomics 1
Around the time he wrote this book, Robert Anton Wilson had passed the age of 40, lost the rigid right/wrong ideology he had picked up during the anti-war and anti-segregation movements of the 1960s and thought he had outgrown the dogmatic follies of his youth, achieving a middle-aged and mellow agnosticism about everything. Ten years later, as Ronald Reagan sat in the White House, Wilson reached 50 and, looking back, felt astonished at how much folly had persisted even in his 40s. As he approached 60 a few years ago, he began to realize that he still had his share of human idiocy even in his 50s. Today at 66+ (beginning to merge with him now), I can only wonder how much of the current Robert Anton Wilson literary output of palaver will embarrass me when I reach 75-80...
Nonetheless, I don't feel particularly disgraced by another printing of this book. Some of it still makes a lot of sense to me, after corrections, and I see that in the semi-fictionalized- "case histories" I have accidentally provided a son of "ideogrammic" history of the 1960s—still the most controversial decade of the century, and well worth looking at again, to learn what we can from both its wisdom and its blunders.
The major blunder I acquired from the 1960s counterculture was the notion that the Enemy (with a capital E), was ignorance and that this could be cured by education. I now feel more inclined to accept R. Buckminster Fuller's description of the four major problems confronting the world as "ignorance, fear, greed, and zoning laws." Being untypically brave (like most fools), I always underestimated the role of fear in human affairs; having simple desires, I underestimated greed; and not being an architect, I never grasped the perfidious nature of zoning laws. Above all, I failed to realize the extent to which the synergy of ignorance-fear-greed-zoning laws in maintaining the tyranny that Fuller calls MMAO (Machiavelli, Mafia, Atoms and Oil) - the banks, the mob, and the energy cartels.)
My current thinking about MMAO derives from Fuller and, in relation to the topics of this book, even more from the Sub- Genius Foundation of Dallas, TX, which refers to MMAO as "the Con."
Many think the Con is just a joke or a parody of other conspiracy theories. To such doubters, the Sub-Genius Foundation says that this is "the Time of Pee"—the time foretold, when people would be judged not by works, nor by family, nor even by looks, but by their urine.
They listen to you through your telephone without its even being off the hook, and record you through satellites that can peer down any street, anywhere...
They kick your door in any time they want to. All they have to yell is "DRUGS!" and your spouse is in jail, your kids are farmed out to the state, your car and house are suddenly theirs...
Nobody up there is a friend of yours; nobody up there wants you to have what you would call freedom. The purpose of "government" is to produce consumers and workers who will keep the cost of labor down, and the profits high for the owners...
For this has become so crooked and perverse a nation that your precious bodily fluids are no longer your own, and not even your bladder or bloodstream are private. There is no place where they may not watch.
The 1973 author of this book never could have imagined a State so crazily totalitarian, or a population so brainwashed into sheep-like submissiveness, that such absurdities could occur. But then, only Kafka and Orwell in their most eerie satires on bureaucracy-gone-bonkers could imagine an obscenity like our Piss Police. The State in which we live can only accurately be called Urine Nation.
How can this happen in a once-free Republic where searches of the person are forbidden except by court order after probable cause has been shown? Urine Nation, posing as the representatives of you and me, is engaged in an alleged "War on Drugs." That justifies trashing the Constitution.
Now this is, on the face of it, absurd.
1. Wars on drugs or other insensible things (objects, sub-stances) can only be carried on by lunatics. The Con cannot be accused of insanity: of ignorance, yes, and of fear, greed and zoning laws, but not of being batshit crazy. They are not making war on chemicals—or on the laws of physics, or anything of that sort. They are making war on the American people—on all of us, although only a few of us know that yet.
For instance, as you may read in Pissing Away the American Dream (Pissing Away the American Dream, edited by David Ross, Digit Press), on January 1989 the Minneapolis police smashed down the door of the home of an elderly Black couple, using "flash bang" grenades which accidentally set the house on fire and killed both old people.
The cops were looking for "drugs," but never found any. The chief of police justified the murders of two innocent citizens (and the total violation of the Fourth Amendment) by saying, "This is war."
The war is being waged against people, not chemicals, and it is people who get killed.
2. Even within the off-kilter logic of its own rhetoric, the "War on Drugs" is nonsense.
If you go out your door and drive a few blocks, they say, you will find at least one store boldly declaring that they sell DRUGS, although some say PHARMACY, which can only be deciphered by those who know Greek roots; and in these stores, hundreds of drugs are available. Nearby is a supermarket where you can buy cigarettes, containing nicotine, a drug more addictive than heroin according to former Surgeon General Koop. Next door is a BAR where you can buy dozens of varieties of C2H30H, a heavily addictive substance, statistically linked to wife and child battering, divorce and violent crime.
Urine Nation, thus, is not making war on all drugs, or drug- users, but only on some. The government asserts that the drugs on their taboo list are the worst ones; skeptics like me say they are merely the ones that are either (a) cheap and effective, like herbal medicines, and/or (b) not easy to monopolize, like marijuana or (c) better than the higher priced drugs manufactured by the large pharmaceutical corporations that financially support both political parties.
The only people literally "at war" with drugs—all drugs—are the Christian Scientists. Eight of them are currently appealing their convictions for refusing to give their children the drugs ordained from on high by the Con/MMAO.
As Count Bismarck once said, "Laws are like sausages: you have much more respect for them if you haven't actually seen how they're made."
Many of the chemicals and herbs forbidden by the Con are not only harmless, but are widely believed to be beneficial. The war against the users of these substances is just as vicious as the wars against all other substances on the taboo list.
Over the past 10 years, the Food and Drug Administration has engaged in raids on alternative health companies - companies operating openly and, they thought, legally - that more and more tend toward the violence of DEA raids on suspected crack dealers. In every case, the companies were selling vitamins and herbs that a growing minority of the medical profession approves but which MMAO and the FDA do not approve.
For instance, in 1990, the FDA raided the offices of Dr. Jonathan Wright, a fully qualified physician with an M.D. from the University of Michigan Medical School, terrorized the staff with drawn guns, and seized all the vitamins and herbs they could find. They never did file criminal charges against Dr. Wright for the heresy of giving his patients cheap medicines instead of expensive ones, but this raid was only one of hundreds of similar Gestapo-style operations, creating what libertarians call "a chilling effect" on scientific freedom.
As the Life Extension Foundation wrote:
. . . The FDA's strong-arm tactics are used to intimidate and terrorize Americans into toeing their police state party line on healthcare and medicine. The FDA's purpose is not just to destroy the business and lives of their targets, but also to spread fear and terror throughout the land so that others who may be tempted to rebel against the agency will remain meek and submissive.
In the 1980s, a Fundamentalist couple named Randy and Vicki Weaver fled to a mountain top in Idaho, to get as far as possible from the U.S. government, which they considered a Zionist conspiracy. However goofy that idea was, it was the only "offense" of which the Weavers were guilty. They didn't annoy their neighbors and they didn't plot an insurrection against the government: they just tried to avoid and evade it. This alone was too much for the Feds. They sent in an informant to make friends with Randy and eventually entrap him into selling a shotgun. With that excuse, the FBI and ATF made war on the Weaver family, killing Vicki while she stood holding her baby in her arms, killing the older son, and even killing the family dog.
Please visit: http://www.rawilson.com/sexdrugs.html
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Sharing drugs as 'atoms' and sharing drugs as 'bits'
As I have said before, I feel that the new rulings on file sharing and digital rights in Britain reflect the same zero-tollerance and uniformed 'fascist' dictatorial methods of making responsible, informed policy based up the best and most up to date research in our Zero sum game.
Preferably data gained using human subjects and social data fields, reaching back to the long history of human drug interfacing, not results from tests on Rats and a small groups of test-subjects from Oxford and Cambridge breeding programs.
The Digital Economy Bill has defined another 'war' with the culture of 'self owning ones' by threatening to punish shared digitalis.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_K._Dick
Preferably data gained using human subjects and social data fields, reaching back to the long history of human drug interfacing, not results from tests on Rats and a small groups of test-subjects from Oxford and Cambridge breeding programs.
The Digital Economy Bill has defined another 'war' with the culture of 'self owning ones' by threatening to punish shared digitalis.
My major preoccupation is the question, 'What is reality?' Many of my stories and novels deal with psychotic states or drug-induced states by which I can present the concept of a multiverse rather than a universe. Music and sociology are themes in my novels, also radical political trends; in particular I've written about fascism and my fear of it.
- Statement of 1975 quoted in the Dictionary of Literary Biography (1981) vol. 8, part 1
"Philip Kindred Dick (December 16, 1928 – March 2, 1982) was an American novelist, short story writer, and essayist whose published work during his lifetime was almost entirely in the science fiction genre. Dick explored sociological, political and metaphysical themes in novels dominated by monopolistic corporations, authoritarian governments, and altered states. In his later works, Dick's thematic focus strongly reflected his personal interest in metaphysics and theology. He often drew upon his own life experiences and addressed the nature of drug abuse, paranoia and schizophrenia, and transcendental experiences in novels such as A Scanner Darkly and VALIS.[4]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_K._Dick
New rules on illegal filesharing: three strikes and you're blacklisted
Persistant filesharers now run the risk of being added to a 'copyright infringement' blacklist, under new rules being put into place by Ofcom following the Digital Economy Act.
Now that the Digital Economy Bill (as was) has passed into law, and the new coalition government has announced that it has no plans to repeal it, the responsibility rests with Ofcom to draft a code of practice enforcing it. The code of practice will be subject to consultation before being finalised, but at present Ofcom is working on a proposal which would force ISPs to keep records of people accused of illegal filesharing. After three such accusations, details of that user will be placed on a blacklist. Once blacklisted, user identities can then be applied for via court order by any copyright holder making a piracy allegation; allowing legal proceedings to be launched against the accused.
Each accusation of filesharing will result in a warning letter being sent out, and Ofcom is hoping that these letters will be sufficient to 'significantly reduce' copyright infringement; although if after a year no significant reduction is seen the regulator will consider more stringent measures such as temporary disconnection.
ISPs will have to keep details of filesharing accusations for a period of one year from the time that they are made, so that three accusations in a twelve month period will trigger the blacklisting. There is also a procedure for anyone believing they have been falsely accused to contest the accusation anonymously via a tribunal; which could result in rights holders and ISPs being forced to pay damages.
At present the requirement to keep tabs on filesharing accusations won't apply to ISPs with fewer than 400,000 customers, or mobile broadband providers.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Why can’t our politicians come clean on drugs?
| Why can’t our politicians come clean on drugs? |
Heavy, man: half of Californians wanted cannabis taxed to relieve the state deficit
What is the single most curable evil afflicting community life in London? The answer is the criminalisation of drug use under the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act.
Needless to say, not one party in the current General Election is prepared to discuss it. As a result, London is about to be taught a lesson in social policy by, of all places, America.
contin....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misuse_of_Drugs_Act_1971
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_UK_election
Friday, April 16, 2010
Wikipedia and understanding the WAR ON SOME DRUGS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_on_concepts
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_Enforcement_Against_Prohibition
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Drug_Control_Programme
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_National_Drug_Control_Policy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_On_Some_Drugs
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_Enforcement_Against_Prohibition
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Drug_Control_Programme
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_National_Drug_Control_Policy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_On_Some_Drugs
Early drug laws
Perhaps the earliest recorded example is the prohibition of the use of alcohol under Islamic law (Sharia), which is usually attributed to passages in the Qur'an dating from the 7th century. Like other Sharia laws, alcohol prohibition is enforced by Mutaween, the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice. Some Muslim scholars[who?] assert that this prohibition actually addresses only the abuse of alcohol, but they do not have sufficient numbers or authority to override the familiar total prohibition. Although Islamic law is often interpreted as prohibiting all intoxicants (not only alcohol), the ancient practice of hashish smoking has continued throughout the history of Islam, against varying degrees of resistance. A major campaign against hashish-eating Sufis was conducted in Egypt in the 11th and 12th centuries resulting among other things in the burning of fields of cannabis.
Though the prohibition of illegal drugs was established under Islamic law, particularly against the use of hashish as a recreational drug, classical jurists of medieval Islamic jurisprudencemedicinal and therapeutic purposes, and agreed that its "medical use, even if it leads to mental derangement, remains exempt" from punishment. In the 14th century, the Islamic scholar Az-Zarkashi spoke of "the permissibility of its use for medical purposes if it is established that it is beneficial."[1] According to Mary Lynn Mathre, "In this legal distinction between the intoxicant and the medical uses of cannabis, medieval Muslim theologians were far ahead of present-day American law."[1] accepted the use of hashish for
Religious intolerance was a motivation for drug prohibition in Christian Europe. In a move interpreted as support for the efforts of the Spanish Inquisition against the Arabs, in a 1484 fiat Pope Innocent VIII banned the use of cannabis. The persecution of heretics in the form of witch hunts also gathered momentum around this time, and frequently targeted users of medicinal and hallucinogenic herbs. The Inquisition proceeded apace in Meso-America and South America, where peyote (péyotl), ololiúqui, toloáche, teonanácatl and other sacred plants of the Mexicandevil. culture were prohibited as works of the
In Northern Europe, the Protestants were also responsible for passing drug laws motivated by religious intolerance, according to Stephen Harrod Buhner. Buhner argues that the 1516 Reinheitsgebot, which stipulates that beer may only contain water, barley and hops was a "reflection of Protestant irritation about 'drugs' and the Catholic Church". Unlike the typically nuts blends widely used at the time (e.g. gruit), hops cause sedation and reduce libido. The exclusive use of hops had been compulsory in France since 1268.
A serious gap in Buhner's approach, though, is that Protestant Reformation was—largely involuntarily—kickstarted by Martin Luther in 1517, that is the year after the ReinheitsgebotCatholic Church, merely focusing on Indulgences turned into a full-scale revolt against Papal power from 1521 on (after the Diet of Worms) because he was unexpectedly backed by German princes such as Frederick III, Elector of Saxony who strongly objected to the Catholic Church meddling in their affairs and finances. Those princes had been seeking ways to undermine Papal Rome's influence and fundraising on their territories for quite some time when the Reformation actually started. Local monopolies on gruit being a cash cow for many a monastic community, they were an obvious target to undermine their financial power. Which means edicts to impose hops instead of gruit in beer were probably politically motivated, and also explains why many of those edicts did indeed come long before the Reformation even started. edict (for one year only, and in a part of Germany that never switched to Protestantism), and two centuries and a half after hops became compulsory in France. Besides the religious motivation there was also a political one: Martin Luther's criticism of the
Coffee almost followed the same fate as cannabis as its use spread from Ethiopia through the Middle East to Europe. Coffee, regarded as a Muslim drink, was prohibited to Orthodox Christians in its native Ethiopia until as late as 1889; it is now considered a national drink of Ethiopia for people of all faiths. In the Ottoman Empire, Murad IV attempted to prohibit coffee drinking to Muslims as haraam, arguing that it was an intoxicant, but this ruling was soon overturned after his death.[2] The introduction of coffee in Europe from Muslim TurkeyPope Clement VIII sanctioned its use in 1600, declaring that it was "so delicious that it would be a pity to let the infidels have exclusive use of it." Its early association in Europe with rebellious political activities led to its banning in England, among other places.[3] prompted calls for it to be banned as the devil's work, though
In late Qing Imperial China, opium imported by the British East India Company was vastly consumed by all social classes in Southern China. Between 1821 and 1837 imports of the drug increased fivefold. The Chinese government attempted to end this trade, on public healthFirst Opium War). China was defeated and the war ended with the Treaty of Nanking, which protected foreign opium traders from Chinese law. A related American treaty promised to end the smuggling of opium by Americans. It took until the next Opium War for the trade to be legalized. The resulting trade purportedly set into motion a chain of events that would lead to the massive Taiping Rebellion. grounds. The effort was initially successful with the destruction of all British opium stock in May 1839. However, to protect this trade, the British declared war on China ( --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_On_Some_Drugs
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