There are a number of things that have annoyed me this week. One of them has actually been annoying me for a while, but came to a head on Saturday when I was selecting a book as a birthday present. It's the kind of books that actually now are so numerous that they have a special section in Asda. Yes, the 'tear jerkers'.
These are books that are written by people who have been abused as children. Now I know child abuse is a horrible and horrific thing, but it does seem to me like everyone is jumping on the literary bandwagon and spaffing out a book about their horrid existence as a child. Maybe it's therapeutic for them to re-live their most sordid moment of their lifetime, but there's no denying that it's also a massive money spinner.
What annoys me even more is the un-imaginative titles given to these books which leave nothing to the imagination, per example:
Don't tell Mummy
Ugly:The story of a loveless childhood
Not Without My Sister: The True Story of Three Girls Violated and Betrayed by Those They Trusted:
Please, Daddy, No: A Boy Betrayed
And so on and so forth. It's trite voyeurism and shouldn't be encouraged.
The other thing that's got my goat is the government's intention to reclassify cannabis.
No, I'm not one of those heavy weed smokers who claim that it makes life worth living, I just hate the way that illegal drugs have been segregated from legal ones, and the judgment that is bestowed upon them as result. The concept reeks of small-mindedness, policy over practice and of course nanny-statism (if that is a word) that every day seeks to violate our freedoms, our rights and our decisions:
Their reason for reclassification is this: Mental illness linked to the heavy and frequent use of the drug. Now, everyone knows that drugs, be they legal or illegal, are bad for you. Smoking can cause cancer, heart disease, emphysema, decreases your taste and smell sensation and makes you a social outcast (unless all your friends smoke, which means you can all die an early death together - everyone's a winner).
Drinking too much gives you a hangover. It also increases heart disease, and alcoholism makes for broken families. Oh, and drink driving can kill.
So let's look at tobacco and alcohol policy: It's bad for you. So what do the government do? They put up the tax - and hide behind the pretence that it will discourage over-indulgence. The same goes for smoking, although at least with that we know that second-hand smoke causes health problems too. Perhaps the one good thing they've done in the last five years or so.
They can't up the tax on cannabis so they reclassify it, making the prison sentence change from a 2-year to five-year sentence. My opinion: If you want to smoke weed, do it in the knowledge it might make you go a little crazy, that you might get caught, but the risk is yours. And you know that without the government spoon-feeding you all this classification nonsense that really, doesn't mean a thing to dealers or regular users.
1 comment:
Good post.
A government with any sense and imagination would legalise canabis and set up a way to import good stuff from SA and other countries. This would immediately put the dealers out of business and force the skunk growers out into the open. This provides us with a whole new industry, lots of jobs and taxes.
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