Dear Editor:
Re: Legalization not the answer, Letters to the Editor, The Record, Oct. 10.
I respect Mr. Wormald's opinion but I think it is quite uninformed.
Legalization is the only answer.
Conclusion of the Senate Report on Cannabis-2002 (you know, the report even the NDP hates): "This final section sets out the main conclusions drawn from all this information and presents the resulting recommendations derived from the thesis we have developed namely: in a free and democratic society, which recognizes fundamentally, but not exclusively, the rule of law as the source of normative rules and in which government must promote autonomy as far as possible and therefore make only sparing use of the instruments of constraint, public policy on psychoactive substances must be structured around guiding principles respecting the life, health, security and rights and freedoms of individuals, who, naturally and legitimately, seek their own well-being and development and can recognize the presence, difference and equality of others."
There is only a philosophical dilemma if you assume you (via the government) have the authority to make someone else's choice(s). In terms of protecting citizens from each other, this is justice. If we attempt to protect people from themselves, we are usurping their choices. I would point out that cannabis was made illegal in Canada with no debate, mired in racism and misinformation, and as it turns out, the prohibition is far more harmful to society on many levels than cannabis could ever be.
I find it disingenuous to compare cannabis and alcohol (or tobacco) in terms of harm, as if they were even close to each other in toxicity, yet ignore the comparison with the 1920s prohibition of alcohol. All the crime and violence that was associated with alcohol prohibition exists today with drug prohibition. Criminals are the biggest beneficiary of the current system.
The suggestion that the law dissuades people from using is evidently not true. It may stop some, but humans are inherently curious and as soon as someone says no, many want that forbidden object/activity even more. The forbidden fruit tastes twice as sweet.
What B.C. mayors have done is send a strong message to the federal government whose new mandatory minimum laws will increase violence, costs, and problems associated maintaining cannabis prohibition. After all, it will be the local governments who will be paying for the Conservatives punitive policies.
Health Canada has always made getting exemptions difficult, doctors do not want to be gateways to substances that are not normalized into clinical dosages, so many people chose not to undergo the process of getting legal cannabis and just use it anyways. The Health Canada rules have been repeatedly shown to be unconstitutional and this government wants to deny personal grower exemptions to drive up the cost for sick and dying people to maintain the prohibition on recreational usage of cannabis.
Mr. Wormald also has no problem denying other peoples rights to a peaceful life of freedom because they use cannabis over a beer. Further, he goes on to assume he knows what individuals need or don't need to enjoy their lives. It's just not my business what you do in the privacy of your home if its all consenting adults making their own choices.
For some people, life is full of suffering that they seek to escape. For some of those people, cannabis is a preferred option. Right or wrong, this won't change. Prohibition marginalizes and seeks to eliminate this sub-group in society. It borders on genocide. In some places, they kill people over drugs yet never seem to run out of people to kill. I do not condone the states use of violence upon its citizens for consuming a plant. There is a magic cure, it's "live and let live."
