Let’s get it straight. Alcohol is about the hardest drug that is commonly used recreationally (and yes, I am aware that there are people who snort cocaine recreationally).
In other recent threads, and in real life, I meet people who believe that because they only indulge in binge drinking they are on a moral high ground as opposed to people who experiment with the non-tax drugs. I don’t care if you drink. Hell, sometimes I drink too. But you are not better than me. OK?
Just drop the attitude and admit it, alcohol is some hardcore shit.
I’m a drinker and a drug taker(hash/pot mostly) with no qualms or hang-ups about either.
Drinking is legal. Smoking dope is not. Drinking even to excess(falling over drunk) is basically socially acceptable and legal in Ireland although the government are trying to make it less accepted.
So I can understand someone taking a morally superior position because they only drink.
Not saying it’s right but it’s understandable. They’re not breaking the law even if they are possibly doing themselves damage.
Yeah, civil disobedience is a sure sign of immorality. Rosa Parks should have stayed in the back of the bus. I can understand why law abiding people considered her to be so uppity. And don’t even get me started on that Thoreau guy.
As for me, I’m more likely to give up my bus seat when I’m smashed, seeing as how I’m using the bathroom every five minutes. Of course, I’m not reading Walden when I’m in there so I’m pretty quick about draining the 'ole dragon, but I try to reserve the bathroom for Gandhi. All that fasting and then the guy scarfes down Indian Food? Trust me on this - You do NOT want to go to the bathroom after that guy.
I rarely take part in pit discussions. Usually I don’t feel a strong enough sense of outrage to bother. However, you have lost a lot of my respect by comparing what Rosa Parks did to people trying to legalise recreational drugs. There is a world of difference, and if you don’t recognize that you diminish what Ms. Parks did, the stance she took, the courage she had. Not every act of civil disobedience is worthy of admiration, not every worthy act of civil disobedience is courageous.
Legalise pot or not, I don’t feel strongly about that, but lets diminish the truly noble acts.
Um, usually I guess I’d snarl at Libertarian for hijacking the thread into something that the OP wasn’t talking about. In this case, however, I won’t. It’d be a quite reasonable argument that there’s a huge number of people sitting in jail in the US because of recreational drug use. Getting them out, and stopping the practice of jailing recreational drug users, is directly comparable to what Rosa Parks did.
In other words, I think you’re talking out of your ass.
So we’re saying that refusing to accept one’s status as a second-class citizen (third-class, really, considering black women were pretty much bottom of the heap) by committing a rather risky act of civil disobedience…
You are mistaken. Rosa Parks took a stand on a matter of race. Being born to any race is not a matter of choice. Choosing to break the law, whether or not you agree with the law, IS a matter of choice. They can’t be compared on an equal level and it is you who are talking out your ass. If, by being born into a race, your rights are restricted, that is unjust. If you don’t see the difference, you are also a fool.
Desmo may be many things, but fool is not one of them. Drug laws are most oppressive of people who happen to be born into a race, especially a black or hispanic one. The prison population is overwhelmingly black and hispanic, and a significant number of those are victims of the War on Americans I Mean Drugs. Rosa Parks was not thinking about her race when she refused to move; she was thinking about her dignity. You are the one who demeans what she did by trivializing her actions into a play of the race card.
[QUOTE=Libertarian]
Rosa Parks was not thinking about her race when she refused to move; she was thinking about her dignity. QUOTE]
The problem I have with this comparison is that it assumes that Ms. Parks was just a black woman that got fed up and did something heroic. That may be the case, but she is also a woman that had long been an activist for civil rights, and was part of a larger comprehensive plan to smash Jim Crow in the South. She was just one of several cases that the NAACP considered as the one that they would bring to court. Hers was a very calculated move in a grander strategy, and frankly, that’s why I respect her as much as I do.
If I got the impression that illicit drug users were similarly motivated and organized, I might respect them more as a group, though I’d likely still diagree with their position.
I think it’s impoortant to understand that not all criminal acts are acts of civil disobedience.
Yeah, I can’t think of any non-hallucinogenic drug that will fuck you up more than alcohol. Alcohol is the substance I’ve been on that has most altered my state of consciousness, and not in a good way, either. (I’ve never done hallucinogens, and I don’t want to, either.)
The inmates may be black or hispanic, but that does not mean that they were choiceless when they chose to break the law. As far as Ms. Parks not thinking about race, you are mistaken. Ms. Parks was a long-time NAACP activist when she chose to take the stand she did. Further, she also chose to allow the trial to move forward to break down segregation:
Site Her actions were about making the races equal. To site history does not equal playing the race card; nor does willingly breaking a law you don’t agree with a noble person.
[quote] snip Here’s the view from Mississippi, Michegan snip
[quote]
Michigan. MichIgan. Thank you.
[/sh]
To the OP, I agree. I’ve been around drunk people. I’ve been around stoned people. I’d much rather be around a bunch of stoned people. The worst they’ll do is try to eat your couch.
