Newsgroups: alt.peeves
Subject: Re: Drug testing and welfare
From: cs226a030@husky1.stmarys.ca
Date: 30 Jul 92 14:45:35 -0400
Organization: St. Mary's University, Halifax, N.S., Canada

In article <pierre.712448866@manning>, pierre@cs.UAlberta.CA (Pierre Honeyman) writes:
> cs226a030@husky1.stmarys.ca writes:
> 
>>In article <a5qkoB16w165w@mantis.co.uk>, mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk> writes:
>>> Jenni Sheehey <JMS111@psuvm.psu.edu> writes:
> 
>>[bit o' stuff deleted]
>>> 
>>>> First of all, nobody's sending anyone to prison.  They're merely giving
>>>> them a choice: enroll in drug treatment, or stop receiving handouts.
>>> 
>>> Has it occurred to you that people might want to choose to take drugs?  That
>>> they might do so occasionally, without becoming addicted?
>>> 
> 
>>The truth is, some druge are *highly* addictive (cocaine and crack) for
> 
> Not quite as addictive as nicotine thought, I guess nicotine should be illegal
> huh?

Hey, works for me ;-)

> Actually the addiction rates for cocaine and crack are not that high, wander
> over to talk.politics.drugs or alt.drugs.
> 
But they are for nicotine, a *legal* drug. Geez, *that's* something the
"legalize drugs"  people want to hear, I bet   !

>>example. And whether or not someone wants to do something illegal is
>>irrelevant. Illegal is illegal. If people choose to do drugs, they should not
>>be doing it with money given them by the government to live on. It's as simple
> 
> If they choose to spend the money they were given to live on on drugs, they 
> will die.  No problem.
> 

	It *does* sorta put a Darwinean spin on things, dosen't it?
Still, I resent my tax dollars going to fund someone's addiction (that includes
nicotine, BTW).

>>as that. If I do drugs, that's bad enough. However, at least I am using my own
>>money to do it. 
> 
>>>> only receive food stamps.  Second, there is a difference between being
>>>> *willing* to take a drug test, and having an orgasm over the prospect.
>>>> I wouldn't *like* it, but I would be happy to do it if it meant that a)
>>>> people with problems would be forced to get treatment,
>>> 
>>> If drug use weren't illegal, you'd have Drug-users Anonymous alongside
>>> Alcoholics Anonymous.  You wouldn't have to force people to get treatment,
>>> they'd walk in and ask for help of their own free will.
>>> 
> 
>>SOME would. Many would not.
> 
> Just like many alchoholics do not seek out AA.  Wake up.
> 
>>> No doubt during prohibition there were similar schemes requiring that those
>>> found to be consuming alcohol should report to rehabilitation centres or be
>>> imprisoned and forced to do so.  You look it up, it's your country's history.
>>> 
>>>>                                                       and b) I would
>>>> know that I wasn't eating on $5 a week to finance someone else's drug
>>>> habit (which I don't happen to be quite doing now, but I have done it
>>>> for considerable periods of time since I started supporting myself
>>>> after college in 1990).
>>> 
>>> Well, given that it costs more to keep addicts in jail than to give them
>>> treatment for their addiction, I'd say your big concern should be stopping
>>> the "war on drugs" and spending the money on rehabilitation centres.  Then
>>> there'd be no money wasted on jailing drug users, and everyone who wanted
>>> treatment would be able to get it.
>>> 
> 
>>While I agree that more rehabilitation centres are a good idea, I wonder if a
>>better idea wouldn't be to transfer inmates in present prisons around, so that
>>the addicts are all in one prison. Then the system could concentrate on
>>rehabilitating all the inmates in the prisons with the junkies.
> 
> Drug users shouldn't be in prison in the first place.  Not for drug use alone
> anyways.  It is absolutely insane to put people in prison for using drugs.
> This is what clogs up court systems and let's people comitting real crimes
> go free.
> 

I suppose it depends on what you mean by real crimes. Certainly I would be
amenable to reforms like drug users in mandatory rehabilitation rather than
prison. In a case like that, the punishment would better fit the crime.

>>>> Peeve: People who think that people have a *right* to indulge in illegal
>>>> activities.
>>> 
>>> Yeah.  Let's jail all those law-breakers who engage in oral sex or sex
>>> outside marriage.  They have no right to have sex, so lock 'em up.
>>> 
> 
>>Actually, here in Canada, I think both of those are legal. If they aren't,
>>then "they" DON'T have a right to have those forms of sex. Just because you
>>*think* that something should be legal, dosen't mean you have a right to do it.
>>In the same token, just because something is illegal, dosen't mean it's morally
>>wrong. It *IS* illegal, though. If you do something illegal, you risk
>>punishment. It is that simple.
> 
> You're correct, people don't have the right to break the law when they
> disagree with it.  They have a duty.  If a law is bad, and there are
> *plenty* of bad laws, the population has the duty as responsible citizens
> to disobey the law and force it to change.  Example, the civil forfeiture
> law in the US, that law is *evil* pure and simple.
> 

Ah, but therin lies the difference. A DUTY is something one is compelled to do.
a RIGHT is a guarantee that one may exercise.


>>>> ObHoney: Honey, you better not be one of those militant anti-smokers,
>>>> too.  That would just be too inconsistent.
>>> 
>>> The rule is simple and consistent.  You can smoke, snort or inject whatever
>>> the hell you want, just so long as *I* don't have to join in.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> mathew
>>> -- 
>>>
>>However, you run the risk of getting caught. You forgot that bit ;-)
> 
>>Later
>>Mike
> 
> 
> 		Pierre
Mike (again ;-))
Newsgroups: alt.peeves