|
Post by Amadan on Nov 3, 2018 10:32:26 GMT -5
Nice factual rebuttals, at least. Interesting how I've gone from an intelligent, thoughtful participant to nothing but a pot head in one thread. That marijuana reefer I smoked with that black jazz musician must have destroyed my logic circuits.
What is there to factually rebut about claiming that banning pot is a crime against humanity equivalent to the Holocaust? Seriously?
You want us to dive into all your cause-and-effect links meant to "support" that claim, like plastics in the ocean and all the other marvelous world-changing technologies we'd supposedly have if hemp hadn't been outlawed? Those are, at best, hypotheticals, and trying to construct a "Holocaust" from that with actuarial projections is exceedingly disingenuous. That is the worst form of argumentation and you should know better.
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 3, 2018 10:35:35 GMT -5
But one thing I really DON'T get is the knee-jerk reaction to automatically diss anyone who has some passion on a subject and reject, disregard, or ignore the substance of what they are saying merely because they have emotion about it. They are emotional or angry; ergo, they are wrong and may be safely dismissed and ignored. Their emotion becomes the topic. And never mind if perhaps there is some justification for their emotion or anger (even if it seems disproportionate, from our point of view).
Me and rob both said, very clearly, that we agree with Don that the war on drugs is stupid and that pot should be legalized. So how did we ignore the substance of what he said?
The form of what he said, which was a hyperbolic and offensive statement, provoked irritation, yes, but that does not mean we ignored the substance.
I think your accusation is unfounded.
|
|
|
Post by mikey on Nov 3, 2018 11:02:19 GMT -5
Damn, Don got crucified for resurrecting a word that a vociferous part of society feel they alone have a monopoly on? A stoning would have been better than a crucifixion.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Nov 3, 2018 11:11:04 GMT -5
It's not just this thread where I think this is happening. It's a lot of threads. I know I at least am feeling quite passionately about a lot of things lately (which I feel is justified), and I feel that often my points are dismissed because of that. I raised it here because I wasn't part of whatever happened to this thread -- I didn't react to Don's post the way you two did, despite agreeing with you on the hyperbole. It struck me that, now, somehow, the entire thread is about the hyperbole. That happens often, it seems to me.
Be that as it may, I think discussing politics at the moment is making me feel worse. I'll see you all after the midterms.
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 3, 2018 11:15:43 GMT -5
Damn, Don got crucified for resurrecting a word that a vociferous part of society feel they alone have a monopoly on? A stoning would have been better than a crucifixion.
If he'd used the words "genocide" or "mass murder" it would still be bullshit and he'd have been called on it.
|
|
|
Post by robeiae on Nov 3, 2018 11:42:32 GMT -5
Nice factual rebuttals, at least. Interesting how I've gone from an intelligent, thoughtful participant to nothing but a pot head in one thread. That marijuana reefer I smoked with that black jazz musician must have destroyed my logic circuits. Factual rebuttals of what? Claiming that the war on drugs is equivalent to the Holocaust? You don't have a factual proposition to rebut. I don't think you're a pot head at all, Don. And as I said, I'm okay with legalizing marijuana. I have been for quite some time. But the fact of the matter is marijuana's use as a recreational drug is why there has been an illegal drug trade in it, just like cocaine and heroin. And the fact of the matter is that there wouldn't be an illegal drug trade if people weren't willing to break the law just to get high. The War on Drugs has wasted a lot of resources, it is true. And there's plenty of death and misery that can be associated with the illegal drug trade and with the War on Drugs. But again, all of that is because people want to get high badly enough that they really don't care--or don't think, actually--about all of the unintended consequences. And you want to compare those unintended consequences to a bunch of master race merchants forcing people into cattle cars, shipping them to concentration camps, then gassing them en masse? Really?
|
|
|
Post by Don on Nov 4, 2018 8:30:40 GMT -5
@cassandraw I agree that people get passionate. And when people get passionate they research and share that information, in hopes of getting people to see what they've discovered. That's what you've been doing with Trump, and it's what I do with the War on Cannabis, and nt does with racism and journalism. I see both of you as experts in your respective fields of interest, and I try hard to listen. While I may disagree with your position, and argue against it, I seldom doubt the facts you present. I learn something new every day. OTOH, I realize there are a lot of facts about the War on Cannabis that most people may not know, and that I haven't shared. The War on Cannabis is a very deep rabbit hole, and it leads to myriad caves that are just starting to be explored. I'll concede one point. If you believe that intentions matter, and you believe the U.S. government's intentions were good when they launched the War on Cannabis as a component of the War on (Some) Drugs, but the German leaders were pure evil, with only evil intent, then the Holocaust would naturally be seen as far worse than the War on Cannabis. OTOH, if you believe every individual life is precious, and a life destroyed is a life destroyed, regardless of good intentions, then there have been a number of equivalent, or arguably worse, acts perpetrated on the world. Among those would be the virtual extermination of the American Indian, the 100 million murdered by communist regimes, and, yes, the War on Cannabis. And just like the Holocaust, each of these required a populace willing to let their "leaders" make immoral decisions and commit immoral acts for the "greater good." Personally, I consider immoral acts like destroying the lives, the communities, or the livelihood of innocent people wrong, don't support or venerate the "leadership" that committed any of those acts, and would like to see those acts universally recognized as immoral. But, if leaders get a pass for good intentions, let's talk about the good intentions of those who launched and perpetuated the War on Cannabis. This CBS piece makes it clear that Harry Anslinger almost single-handedly launched the War on Drugs, and that the sub-war on Cannabis had nothing to do with good intentions. (Well, not all drugs. The American people had already told him decisively to keep his hands off alcohol, and the massive donations of Big Tobacco and Big Pharma protected tobacco and pharmaceuticals, respectively.) The article goes on with lots of juicy details. It's worth a read. One thing they failed to mention is that the FBN was created to give Harry a new job, since his post as Assistant Commissioner of Prohibition was going away. Pure patronage. Nor do they mention that the use of the term marihuana instead of cannabis in the tax act had racist origins, or that many doctors were surprised to learn that the cannibis they had been using for medicinal purposes had been outlawed under a new name. So Harry was a worthless human being more concerned with his power and his paycheck than the countless lives he nonchalantly decided to destroy in pursuit of his career. Good intentions? Bullshit. But wait! That was almost 100 years ago! Surely our government has become more enlightened over the decades, and President Nixon had more current information that proved just what a destructive drug Cannabis was. Nope.Oh, and I should probably point out that science has never agreed with the prohibitionists. Harry Anslinger found one doctor to support him out of 30 he consulted. Nixon ignored his own Shafer Commission's call for decriminalization. They both knew the facts, and the facts didn't matter. Notice any parallels here between this view of the anti-war left and black people, and Hitler's demonization of Jews? This was perhaps even more evil; it was claimed it was about what they did, when it reality it was about who they were. But it served the same purpose; these evil drug users deserved what happened to them for breaking the law, and the people could feel righteous about their destruction at the hands of the state. There's simply no excuse for buying the "good intentions" bullshit. This is getting a little long, so I'll just point out that in addition to the damage to inner cities, race relations and the lower class, who suffer the brunt of the war, there's lots more to learn about. The conflation of cannabis and hemp at the behest of DuPont and others to prevent competition with the petrochemical industry, which led to medicinal petroleum, petro-food, non-biodegradable plastics, the widespread use of non-renewable petroleum products to solve problems that could have been addressed by renewable hemp products (Ford's hemp-fueled car with some hemp plastic components, for example), and the deforestation caused by using long-term renewable trees for paper products that could be produced by rapidly-renewable hemp. These are all destructive societal choices that can be laid directly at the feet of Harry Anslinger, Richard Nixon, and a host of other politicians and true believers who enabled this destruction. Cannabinoids and Health: There are over 100 cannabinoids, only a few of which cause a "high." The fairly recent discovery of cannabinoid receptors in the body, illustrate that cannabis is a natural part of the food chain. Theories are arising that mankind has historically gotten traces of cannabinoids from consuming animals that grazed on cannabis among other weeds. Combined with research showing that cannabinoids are proving very successful in treating a wide variety of diseases, it looks like the War on Cannabis may have had unintended health consequences we may not understand for decades. There are even theories that the lack of natural ingestion of cannabinoids may contribute to mental conditions that lead to other drug addictions. We'd know much more if research hadn't been all but forbidden for almost 100 years, an anti-science position I find criminal in intent. We've still not looked at all the evidence, but if all that doesn't convince you that the War on Cannabis was an unspeakable evil for which it's perpetrators should be condemned, I don't know what else to say... except keep watching, the damage and death toll will continue to increase.
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 4, 2018 9:11:17 GMT -5
It's not about "good intentions," Don. Sure, the people who started and perpetuate the War on Drugs are often self-serving bureaucrats, not people who genuinely believe they are saving children from the evil demon weed.
I linked to that old PBS series Connections for a reason. It's quite fascinating (though I admit I have not watched it in many, many years, so I can't absolutely vouch for how well it's held up over time). As a child, it blew my mind by pointing out that history isn't a simple linear cause and effect: "Borders look like this because of this war. This law was passed because of this event." Etc. Rather, decisions made five hundred years ago can shape the way an empire develops in ways never intended or foreseen. One technology in a little city in Rome results in a much more important technology two hundred years later. Right now, we're looking at climate change and what's likely to result from a lot of decisions made over the past century.
The point being, you have constructed an interesting Connections-like narrative that assigns the deaths of literally millions of people to... outlawing cannabis. And maybe you're even correct. But you could find many, many such actions that have probably had just as significant an impact. Hating the government as much as you do, I'm sure you could make a hobby of it. I mean, let's start with the auto industry and how city planners in Los Angeles and auto makers collaborated to ensure a sprawling mess of highways, and turn America into a "car culture" that would eschew mass transit. I'd love to see someone tally up the total damage from that.
But calling it a Holocaust is still assigning not just intent in spirit, but intent in action. It's simplistic to call the Nazis "pure evil" because obviously, they had reasons that made sense to them (though at some point they crossed the moral event horizon - there is no rational way you could justify death camps as actually improving anyone's life). But regardless of their motivations, there is no question that they set out to kill millions of people. That was their end-goal. People who want cannabis criminalized, or who prefer highways to subways, or who opposed green energy, are not trying to kill millions of people. Maybe one can trace a network of cause-and-effect and say that that's what resulted, but saying that criminalizing cannabis or selling SUVs makes you guilty of a Holocaust is hyperbole meant to stir emotions, not present a reasoned argument. You know "Holocaust" is an emotive word, and rather than conveying your passion on the subject, it just makes you sound like a loon who's gone completely off the rails in your outrage at being hindered in your efforts to toke.
|
|
|
Post by Don on Nov 4, 2018 9:13:51 GMT -5
But the fact of the matter is marijuana's use as a recreational drug is why there has been an illegal drug trade in it, just like cocaine and heroin. And the fact of the matter is that there wouldn't be an illegal drug trade if people weren't willing to break the law just to get high. The War on Drugs has wasted a lot of resources, it is true. And there's plenty of death and misery that can be associated with the illegal drug trade and with the War on Drugs. But again, all of that is because people want to get high badly enough that they really don't care--or don't think, actually--about all of the unintended consequences. And you want to compare those unintended consequences to a bunch of master race merchants forcing people into cattle cars, shipping them to concentration camps, then gassing them en masse? Really? You're ignoring first causes here, Rob, and conflating two wars. The War on Cannabis was a ginned-up, unscientific anti-scientific, addition to the War on Drugs, created to build Anslinger's empire and satisfy his racist and classist predilections. It's been used by every administration since as a bogeyman and tool, as illustrated by the Nixon administration, Clinton's crack cocaine crackdown and Reagan's "just say no" rabble-rouser. Massive death and destruction have occurred as a direct result, for decades. There has never, in all that time, been a legitimate reason for the war. Indeed, science has stood against it from the beginning. To me, that's a massive crime against humanity.
Given what happened during alcohol prohibition, and that we've discovered receptors in the body for not only recreational but medicinal purposes, is it really a surprise that some would violate the law and answer their bodies instead? Is it even possible that Anslinger and those who came after him were smart enough to know that and use it to their advantage? And let's not forget that the War on Cannabis has been a total war, not just against recreational users. Non-psychoactive hemp, a tremendous renewable resource, and medicinal research has been all but forbidden as well. The damage done by those two non-scientific policies are also responsible for tremendous societal and environmental damage. ETA: Since the discussion has focused on the crime against humanity part, I think the bolded is a pretty good encapsulation of my reasoning.
|
|
|
Post by robeiae on Nov 4, 2018 9:42:39 GMT -5
Well again, I'm all for legalizing marijuana. And I'd agree that legalizing it for medicinal purposes should have been a no-brainer a long time ago. But when it comes to "first causes," that begins and ends with people who use drugs for recreational purposes. You can argue that everyone should be allowed to do this because it's their body, and I'll even agree with you to some extent.*
But what I won't agree with is the idea that the criminalizing of recreational drugs represents some sort of monstrously evil assault on freedom. Can't fire up a joint because it's illegal? Fine. Watch a movie. Read a book. Hell, organize and keep trying to make it legal. In the meantime, get over it. Gonna fire one up anyway, even though it's illegal. Fine, take the risk. But understand the consequences of feeding an illegal trade.
* For the record, no one is gonna to convince me that heroin, opium, crack, and meth should be legal. The government has a duty to protect the citizenry and in my view, that can and should mean protecting it from highly addictive and dangerous substances like these.
|
|
|
Post by Don on Nov 4, 2018 12:54:52 GMT -5
Read the whole thread again, robeiae . If this was about criminalizing recreational drugs, why did Anslinger ignore 29 doctors and focus on the one kook who met his requirements? If this was about criminalizing recreational drugs, why did Nixon ignore the Schafer Commission that called for decriminalization? Why the total prevention of research and the total destruction of the industrial hemp market? The people should have apparently rolled over when alcohol prohibition was instituted, according to your theory. Thank the scofflaws next time you have a drink. Which reminds me; if alcohol took an amendment, why not Cannabis? This was about power, fear, and control, a transparent replacement when the people said "screw you" to alcohol prohibition. Cannabis was simply a convenient scapegoat, and all scientific and medical advice was ignored when the war was launched. They were even smart enough not to do it with an amendment that the people could have overturned; they did it with legislation beyond the reach of the people. You and I obviously see the criminals as very different groups of people. If persecuting whole classes of people, having the highest incarceration rate in the world, and destroying the inner cities by ignoring science and medicine and lying to the entire country to maintain the charade is ok with you, so be it. It's not ok with me. I consider it criminal, to say the least. And please note that I separate the War on (Some) Drugs from the War on Cannabis, and made that very clear a couple of posts ago. It's clear from the CBS article that Harry Anslinger knew that Cannabis did not belong under the same umbrella as heroin, opium, crack, and meth; it's inclusion was purely political in nature. Those who followed in his footsteps have had acccess to the same information, and chose to ignore it for their own gain. Pure deceit, pure evil. There was absolutely no "greater good" involved here. Even consequentialists should no longer be willing to cut the War on Cannibis and it's perpetrators any slack. It was based entirely on lies and contributed only negatively to the "greater good." Not to mention the damage it's done to respect for the rule of law.
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 4, 2018 19:26:25 GMT -5
You and I obviously see the criminals as very different groups of people. If persecuting whole classes of people, having the highest incarceration rate in the world, and destroying the inner cities by ignoring science and medicine and lying to the entire country to maintain the charade is ok with you, so be it. It's not ok with me. I consider it criminal, to say the least. And please note that I separate the War on (Some) Drugs from the War on Cannabis, and made that very clear a couple of posts ago. It's clear from the CBS article that Harry Anslinger knew that Cannabis did not belong under the same umbrella as heroin, opium, crack, and meth; it's inclusion was purely political in nature. Those who followed in his footsteps have had acccess to the same information, and chose to ignore it for their own gain. Pure deceit, pure evil. There was absolutely no "greater good" involved here. Even consequentialists should no longer be willing to cut the War on Cannibis and it's perpetrators any slack. It was based entirely on lies and contributed only negatively to the "greater good." Not to mention the damage it's done to respect for the rule of law.
This entire line of argumentation, from "is ok with you" to "should no longer be willing to cut the War on Cannibis and it's perpetrators any slack" is uncharitable, bad faith, and disingenuous. It's exactly the style of argumentation I hate when used by other persons.
No one said they "are okay" with the war on cannabis, and as for "cutting them slack," let's talk about what you're really saying here: would you literally line up Anslinger and everyone else who has supported criminalizing cannabis, try them with crimes against humanity, and execute them? Because if that is literally what you want to do to people who write bad government policy, even with self-interested motives, you appear to be in favor of a purge that would do Stalin proud.
What me and rob are literally saying is that comparing people who criminalize drugs, even if it was for bureaucratically self-interested reasons, is not the same as rounding people up and shipping them to death camps for the purpose of slaughtering them. If you literally do not see any difference between a bureaucrat who wanted to expand his office and so pushed for criminalizing a bunch of drugs, and a bureaucrat who wanted to exterminate Jews and so pushed for sending Jews to death camps, then you have completely lost any sense of proportion or nuance here, and that's why I keep making sarcastic comments about how much you love your weed. As much as you rail against the gummint here, there, and everywhere, and talk about all the manifold evils of federal power, I know of no other topic that gets you up on such a high horse that you are literally arguing that lawmakers and law enforcers rank with Nazis in their crimes against humanity. If this weren't such a personal hotbutton for you, you could surely find much greater damage in our oil policies, our foreign policies, our monetary policies, or just about anything else. But no, all those things you think are bad, but it's making pot illegal that makes you want to hold Nuremberg II hearings.
|
|
|
Post by Don on Nov 4, 2018 20:14:01 GMT -5
How about a bureaucrat who wanted to eliminate blacks and anti-war protesters, but hid his desire behind wholesale lies that he knew were lies to get the people to go along with warfare in their communities and attacks on "undesirable" individuals?
That describes Nixon. That describes Harry Anslinger. They weren't simply bureaucrats expanding their offices. They were bureaucrats who deliberately launched physical aggression against whole races and classes of people, indeed whole neighborhoods, and got the public to go along for decades by concealing scientific and medical evidence and testimony and by lying about their purpose.
I don't see how racism and sending police to destroy neighborhoods, families and individuals who resist as somehow less horrific than someone with the open desire to destroy a race. Disguising it as "for the common good" to get the people to go along with it adds a special level of horror, IMO. It was far easier for the world to recognize Hitler for the madman he was and put a rapid end to his efforts. Anslinger and Nixon's efforts are ongoing and supported by "right-thinking" people. People's lives are still being destroyed today, long after the real truth has been uncovered. The crime is still being perpetuated and defended.
|
|
|
Post by Amadan on Nov 4, 2018 20:25:18 GMT -5
Well, I'll tell you what - if you could dig up Nixon or Anslinger from the grave and bring them to trial with evidence that it was actually their end goal to commit genocide against black people, sure, I'd be up for trying them.
I doubt very much that you could actually make a case for that, however. It's much more likely that Anslinger's motivation was "Drugs are bad, including weed, and making them a federal issue will give me more power, and fuck black people anyway." Yeah, he ignored scientific evidence that contradicted his world view and his own self-interest. This is unfortunately something people in government do quite often, which is one of the reasons you're always on about how the government is evil.
None of that is noble and all of it deserves our contempt, but you're still barking mad saying he's literally equivalent to Hitler, and even from a consequentialist point of view, you still have a weak case that he's personally responsible for millions of deaths.
|
|
|
Post by Don on Nov 4, 2018 20:38:39 GMT -5
No reason to guess at Anslinger's motivation, since it was described earlier with this quote from CBS. He was on record doing a 180 on Cannabis after his appointment, having previously considered Cannabis no big deal. Then he ginned up the whole "Reefer Madness" business, every bit built on lies. He didn't just ignore the scientific evidence, he manufactured false evidence and stories wholesale. He out-trumped Trump with his house of cards, and people are still buying it today.
The CBS article documents it thoroughly. I'd say a self-serving decision to equate a plant he had previously considered harmless with cocaine and heroin lays every death, every bit of destruction, every medicinal death that could have been prevented, every incarceration from the War on Cannabis squarely at his feet. No inclusion, no War on Cannabis. And thanks to America's "leadership" role, that War spread around the world. There have been executions and beheadings because of that decision. Sometimes it really is that direct a connection.
|
|