On Tue, 25 Mar 2008 16:42:35 GMT, Mike_B
wrote:
>>>The fact is, parents need to protect their children from harmful
>>>substances, not the government.
>>But who will protect the parents?
> From what? Sane people in a free society should be educated as to the
>dangers of certain courses of action. That very education which
>generally causes people to choose not to drink the bleach unless they
>really want to. Same for cannabis, by all means put all the evidence of
>any harm out there for people to see, but accept that if in the face of
>that they still want to do it then the government aren't going to stop
>them.
That's the way it should be, and it's very dangerous for things to be
any other way.
But the principle that the government can prohibit its subjects from
consuming substances it deems harmful is well established and,
surprisingly, strongly supported by many who get hot under the collar
when the government does just and introduces measures to protect its
subjects from tobacco.
There is nothing more amazingly jaw dropping than listening to someone
deriding the nanny state and vehemently defending the right of free
individuals to consume tobacco, only to turn into their own exact
opposites when 'tobacco' is replaced by 'cannabis'. And not only that,
but using exactly the same arguments they were eagerly demolishing
just seconds before.
Svenne
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