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Cheers Warren,

[quote]Alcohol is actually very frequently fatal in incredibly small amounts. That is why it is illegal to drink and drive over a very small limit.[/quote]

Agreed, although I was talking of death through intoxication/overdose, rather than death through a 3rd source, like an accident of some kind, due to the mental/physical impairments or bad mental judgements the drug causes.

[quote]The motoring laws analogy does not really work, because it is obvious that some vehicles and driving routes (pavements vs. motorways!) are safer than others. Drugs are more complex, and a lot depends on the users' propensity to abuse, rather than the drugs propensity to BE abused.[/quote]

Maybe it was a poor analogy........ok not so fast though. The illegality of a 50cc moped on a motorway would then come into doubt using your 'propensity to abuse' argument! A driver a Mercedes would come come under scrutiny about his/her propensity to slow down upon coming within 200 metres of a moped on a motorway. The moped rider is discriminated from riding on a motorway due to other drivers abusing their speed advantage and their propensity to carry on zooming past the moped rider at 70pmh. A car driver can travel on the motorway at 70mph or 50pmh quite legally and driving at 50mph wouldn't really put a moped rider in any more danger than he's be on a busy road or dual carriageway. So since some drivers have a propensity to slow down around mopeds, while some favour sticking to the speed limit -regardless of the dangers to the moped rider- we have an analogy which is nearer to the 'propensity to abuse drugs' argument. Have I wormed my way out of my poor analogy yet? !laugh!

So should we condemn all moped riders because some car drivers abuse safety measures around mopeds on motorways?

[quote]Referring to traditional use of alcohol by US population in the Prohibition era, in multicultural Britain, then we should allow for cultural acceptance of e.g. hash (Morocco, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Caribbean, East Africa - Ethiopia in particular! - all have traditions of using this), heroin (Afghanistan, Pakistan, China), Coca/cocaine (South America) unless you want to discriminate against people who do not have a tradition of using alcohol, but do have one in favour of other drugs. [Racist trolls: Saying they should not come here then, is not a good argument, because they ARE here, and in many cases were invited here in the 1950s - especially those from India and the Caribbean.][/quote]

Tricky. Do we accept the cultural differences of immigrants to Britain, or do they accept they may need to give up some cultural habits upon migrating to a land that may have different morals, cultural habits and laws? I wouldn't go to Saudi Arabia to start a new life, and bring up my daughters to wear low cut tops, and short skirts, whilst letting them drink alcohol. Yes immigrants are here in Britain, and may come from countries where hash is part of their culture, and if we marched them onto ships against their will -ala slavery period- to come and live/work here, it indeed would be our problem to accept their cultural differences. Since no one forced them to live here, and to become UK citizens then the tolerance of cultural difference lies mainly with them.

Please bare with me, for I'll quote Socrates regarding his argument with Crito upon escaping prison, and thus escaping his unjust death. The moral point applies to Britons who's ancestry is also mainly British.

[quote]'Consider, then, Socrates,' the Laws would probably continue, 'whether it is also true for us to claim that what you are trying to do to us is not just. Although we have brought you into the world and reared you and educated you, and given you and all your fellow-citizens a share in all the good things at our disposal, nevertheless by the very fact of granting our permission we openly proclaim this principle: that any Athenian, on attaining to manhood and seeing for himself the political organisation of the State and us its Laws, is permitted, if he is not satisfied with us, to take his property and go away wherever he likes. If any one of you chooses to go to one of our colonies, supposing that he should not be satisfied with us and the State, or to emigrate to any other country, not one of us Laws hinders or prevents him from going away wherever he likes, without any loss of property. On the other hand, if any one of you stands his ground when he can see how we administer justice and the rest of our public organisation, we hold that by so doing he has in fact undertaken to do anything that we tell him; and we maintain that anyone who disobeys is guilty of doing wrong on three separate accounts: first because we brought him into this world, and secondly because we reared him; and thirdly because, after promising obedience, he is neither obeying us nor persuading us to change our decision if we are at fault in any way; and although we set a choice before him and do not issue savage commands, giving him the choice of either persuading us or doing what we say, he is actually doing neither.[/quote]

Basically Socrates tried to persuade the Athenian court that they were unjust in executing him, yet because he failed he had to die. If he disagreed with Athenian ways of law he was free to migrate elsewhere. Staying put meant he was bound morally to accept their judgement regardless of whether he agreed or not.

So a user that breaks the law, in the land he lives, is morally wrong because he is free to move to a place where -heroin/hash in this instance- is legal. Assumptions that immigrants should respect UK law and customs shouldn't become a racial issue.

The Socratic quote above was taken from 'The Last Days of Socrates' by Plato.

[quote]Sugar is not a drug, it is purely a dietary necessary foodstuff, so is irrelevant to this discussion.[/quote]

It's still a chemical that the body becomes addicted to. It gives you a 'high' followed up by a 'crash' and you can get withdrawal symptoms. It can cause harm when administered to children (i.e. hyperactivity in class which leads to disruption and short attention spans, which spoil their learning as well as other children's education time). It also costs society money through NHS treatment of diabetes and contributes to obesity which in itself is a 'huge burden' -pun intended!- on NHS time & money; so I included it as a troublesome chemical.

Note: My ex-girlfriend was a teacher at a primary school. Lots of kids had prostitutes and junkies for mums and they were very disturbed kids. First thing the school did was ban sugared food & drink within school time. It worked better than alternative teaching methods.

[quote]I would be more impressed by your will power and lack of susceptibility to peer pressure if you had either tried all drugs and just picked the ones you liked (or none) to continue with, or tried none at all, including alcohol. I am lucky enough to know that I can take or leave all the drugs I have used - you will never know![/quote]

Lol! I 'know' I'm not the least bit interested in trying!

[quote]I am sure you do not really see yourself as superior to anyone - you don't come across like that, but if you do, I think "hubris" is the word that most applies -[/quote]

Ha! Yes, pride may become my downfall! On a serious note, I was talking of my superiority when it came to 'giving in' to peer pressure, not superiority over people who take illegal substances. I'll keep my feet on the ground though......just in case. !wink!

[quote]BTW, thanks for your kind words on another thread regarding my occupation and the unlikelihood of my learning from you...on that subject, learning is always a two-way thing. Good teachers also learn a lot from their pupils. So, I may come across as a teacher on this forum, but I also try to be a learner.[/quote]

No problem Warren. Like I said, my ex was also a teacher and in actual fact I was once considering that line of work, but decided against it as patience isn't a strong point of mine.......not when it comes to cheeky kids anyway!

[quote]Still not sure r.e. the motoring stuff. Surely it is just common sense - putting slow moving vehicles on a motorway is dangerous for ALL users, hence horses and carts, mopeds and tractors not being allowed.[/quote]

What are the limits on motorways? 50-70mph? Slowing down to 50mph around mopeds shouldn't cause dangerous conditions when most mopeds easily reach these speeds. So common sense tells me that the government don't want mopeds on the motorway because they don't trust car drivers to slow down to 50mph around mopeds. Hence moped riders suffer due to car drivers propensities to drive at 70mph regardless, just like responsible 'drug users' suffer through UK law because of other 'drug users' propensity to abuse those same chemicals. Never mentioned horses, carts or tractors though Warren, I hope you're not trying to put words in my mouth? !wink!

[quote]I did mention that Caribbean immigrants were invited and indeed often subsidised in an effort to bring them here in the 1950's, as were Indians and Pakistanis, although they were not actually forced. Additionally, at the time many were technically British citizens in the first place as their countries had not yet been given independence for the Empire (e.g. Caribbean nations) So given that both groups contain people who traditionally use hash and heroin, surely we should legalise both.[/quote]

They still weren't forced though, and they're not forced to stay so they have 2 options which seem reasonable. Stay and try to change the law, or leave to where the law suits them better. Whichever they choose, breaking the law is wrong.

[quote]If I was invited to work in Saudia Arabia, I would ensure that I was allowed to follow my lack of religion, allowed to drink, and allowed to wear my traditional dress of jeans and t-shirt![/quote]

True, true, but I doubt the Jamaican, Pakistani & Indians that were invited in the 50's were promised legal use of heroin/hash upon reaching the UK! They came and didn't go back so the laws seemed reasonable enough to them. If you're in a country where the laws are morally wrong -in your view- then staying just means you don't regard your morals highly enough to move. Other legal issues that don't have much to do with morality still need to be respected - or changed.

Also wasn't it Socrates that said "The only true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing."?

We should never stop learning.

[quote]Following on from the Socrates quote...

What about an immigrant, who arrives in Britain and signs up for citizenship in 1965, or indeed an indigineous resident.

He is all for LSD and chomps down many a blotter. In 1966, it is criminalised.

Is he supposed to leave, with all the financial and emotional upset that would entail? And if it is decriminalised a year later, will the government refund his moving costs?[/quote]

He follows the law of the land in which he wants to live, get health care from and wants his kids educated. If he leaves and the law changes again then it's his decision on whether to return or stay away.

[quote]The Athenian court assumed laws were static things, but actually, morality is pretty static while legislation rarely stops changing. For someone to decide where to live (Socrates or me or you!) permanently would mean that all laws worldwide would have to be frozen forever.[/quote]

As long as the laws stayed static long enough to commit the offence then I don't think it matters. Athenian courts gave the accused a day to persuade they were either innocent or the laws were unjust so I guess laws weren't as static as we believe. Since we can freely migrate faster than what laws can change, then though there may be sympathy and understanding, there's no excuse for repeated law breaking.

Socrates' thinking was that to escape death would be immoral as he'd had 70 years in which to move away if he disagreed with the laws and punishments given out through Athenian courts. His very presence is a statement that he agrees with Athenian custom, law and everything else. He had to die, even though his punishment was unjust because to defy the law that everyone else has to obey is a selfish act and would have made a mockery of his 70 years of residency in Athens. It was only right that if he was born in Athens, educated in Athens, married in Athens, had children in Athens, and lived all his life in Athens, that he lived by the law of Athens.

You do not become a butcher when you're a vegan, and then refuse to work with meat because it goes against your principles.