[Redway]

Originally Posted by Kizzy

It was several studies on the topic actually, as it is pointed out regularly my opinion is invalid as I am not a professional in the subject.
With respect stu neither are you.
You can begin with the insults if you wish it does not change my position, neither does it make your points anymore valid.
Do you have an opinion on the discussion here?

To be fair, you don't need to be a professional to realise that the current drug laws are simply not working and people have referred you countless times to case studies, such as Amsterdam and Portugal and it seems to be working over there.

If you genuinely support a system where people are put behind bars for doing what they want with themselves, then you really do have absolutely no knowledge about the topic and just believing what the biased media tells you. How about putting that aside for a moment and doing your own research without putting a spin on it?

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Redway

To be fair, you don't need to be a professional to realise that the current drug laws are simply not working and people have referred you countless times to case studies, such as Amsterdam and Portugal and it seems to be working over there.

If you genuinely support a system where people are put behind bars for doing what they want with themselves, then you really do have absolutely no knowledge about the topic and just believing what the biased media tells you. How about putting that aside for a moment and doing your own research without putting a spin on it?

Please stop, I don't wish to be drawn into another debate on my opinion on drug laws in the UK, US or Bali thankyou.

[Stu]

I appreciate that.

[Nedusa]

I know it's hard to appreciate the massive differences between the two countries ie Bali and Norway. To kill no one and get the death penalty versus killing over 70 people and NOT getting the death penalty.... What does this say about either country,,?

[Sticks]

Bali has drawn a line in the sand about drugs.

I believe this drug smuggler WILL be executed, to send a clear message out. My sympathies are with those blighted by drug related crimes. Where I live I have come across abandoned hypodermic needles, where children could have been.

As for Norway, that is a different subject for a different thread, so please do not hijack this thread.

[Nedusa]

Originally Posted by Sticks

Bali has drawn a line in the sand about drugs.

I believe this drug smuggler WILL be executed, to send a clear message out. My sympathies are with those blighted by drug related crimes. Where I live I have come across abandoned hypodermic needles, where children could have been.

As for Norway, that is a different subject for a different thread, so please do not hijack this thread.

I agree the Norwegian mass murder is another subject for another thread, however it does serve to highlight the vast injustice that exists in putting death penalty tariffs on crimes which do not involve the taking of life.

Originally Posted by Sticks

Bali has drawn a line in the sand about drugs.

I believe this drug smuggler WILL be executed, to send a clear message out. My sympathies are with those blighted by drug related crimes. Where I live I have come across abandoned hypodermic needles, where children could have been.

As for Norway, that is a different subject for a different thread, so please do not hijack this thread.

The thing that you continually ignore, when using your "clear example/send a message" argument, is that it fails. If you are desperate enough to smuggle drugs, the death penalty is not of great concern. Especially when a gang are threatening your family.

Using your logic, as soon as the first person in history was killed for smuggling drugs, then that should have been the end to all smuggling. Otherwise the death penalty is futile.

[Sticks]

But drugs do take lives

Some drugs kill the users, in the late 1990's somebody died of an overdose in a flat on the floor below mine, and like many the police interviewed me over a suspicious death. (I did not know the occupants of the flat)

We here tales of pensioners left for dead, by junkies on a high looking for money for their next fix.

People are killed due to those driving under the influence of drugs.

Drugs shorten lives

[Nedusa]

Drugs like Guns don't kill people, people kill people. If and when this mother is executed she will be killed by a group of people.

Smuggling drugs from point A to point B does not kill anyone . To execute someone because they increase the chances further down the line of someone overdosing on a drug or someone robbing someone to get money to buy a drug, is a horrendous over reaction and results in a "taking a life to possibly save a life".

There is now and never will be any justification for executing someone because their actions may or may not lead to someone further down the line overdosing on a drug.

By all means give them long prison sentences but imposing a death sentence on them is utterly ridiculous ....!!!!

Originally Posted by Nedusa

Drugs like Guns don't kill people, people kill people. If and when this mother is executed she will be killed by a group of people.

Smuggling drugs from point A to point B does not kill anyone . To execute someone because they increase the chances further down the line of someone overdosing on a drug or someone robbing someone to get money to buy a drug, is a horrendous over reaction and results in a "taking a life to possibly save a life".

There is now and never will be any justification for executing someone because their actions may or may not lead to someone further down the line overdosing on a drug.

By all means give them long prison sentences but imposing a death sentence on them is utterly ridiculous ....!!!!

Drugs are nothing like guns. Drugs are a civil liberties issue, but no one should have the right to own a weapon of mass destruction.

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Nedusa

Drugs like Guns don't kill people, people kill people. If and when this mother is executed she will be killed by a group of people.

Smuggling drugs from point A to point B does not kill anyone . To execute someone because they increase the chances further down the line of someone overdosing on a drug or someone robbing someone to get money to buy a drug, is a horrendous over reaction and results in a "taking a life to possibly save a life".

There is now and never will be any justification for executing someone because their actions may or may not lead to someone further down the line overdosing on a drug.

By all means give them long prison sentences but imposing a death sentence on them is utterly ridiculous ....!!!!

In the war against drugs (and yes it is a war) you have a chain of command, from the top down there are those who make it so that these substances reach our streets in whatever form, cut with whatever they choose.
This woman was one link in this chain, a weak link and one as said easily replaced.
The message now is hitting home for those who were thinking it is either an easy way to earn money, or a way to resolve serious threats to loved ones.

[Stu]

No, it's not hitting home. The drug war is receding literally on a year by year basis. Bali or not.

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Stu

No, it's not hitting home. The drug war is receding literally on a year by year basis. Bali or not.

Where is your evidence to support this?

[Stu]

Originally Posted by Kizzy

Where is your evidence to support this?

Plenty of Western countries are in the process of adopting or have adopted more progressive decriminalization/legalization based approaches to drug policy. The various grassroot movements around the world to liberalize drug laws are the loudest and most prominent they've ever been. Viral videos with everyone from respected scientists and government agents right down to cultural figures like Richard Branson and Morgan Freeman are calling for a loosening of the drug laws and are being seen by millions of people on the internet. The governments own former chair for the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs has set up an independent research body and is calling for a relaxing of drug laws. Two U.S. states have fully legalized personal possession of Cannabis with more states to follow. Comedians and actors are talking openly about the reverential, eye opening experiences they've had with LSD and DMT. Responsible recreational drug use is at it's most accepted, understood point in the prohibition age of human history.

It's all around you and it's growing every day. It's called a paradigm shift. Even the most ardent prohibitionists who are actually well read on this topic would have to begrudgingly agree that prohibition is slowly shedding it's skin.

It's a war on some people who use some drugs and it can't be won.

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Stu

Plenty of Western countries are in the process of adopting or have adopted more progressive decriminalization/legalization based approaches to drug policy. The various grassroot movements around the world to liberalize drug laws are the loudest and most prominent they've ever been. Viral videos with everyone from respected scientists and government agents right down to cultural figures like Richard Branson and Morgan Freeman are calling for a loosening of the drug laws and are being seen by millions of people on the internet. The governments own former chair for the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs has set up an independent research body and is calling for a relaxing of drug laws. Two U.S. states have fully legalized personal possession of Cannabis with more states to follow. Comedians and actors are talking openly about the reverential, eye opening experiences they've had with LSD and DMT. Responsible recreational drug use is at it's most accepted, understood point in the prohibition age of human history.

It's all around you and it's growing every day. It's called a paradigm shift. Even the most ardent prohibitionists who are actually well read on this topic would have to begrudgingly agree that prohibition is slowly shedding it's skin.

It's a war on some people who use some drugs and it can't be won.

You are fixated, this is not an issue relating to the US or cannabis.
You made a statement that said that the war on drugs was being won and figures for drug smuggling and or related crime was dropping...Where is your evidence?
Not from the US or Bali or anywhere else, here in the UK.

[Stu]

Originally Posted by Kizzy

You made a statement that said that the war on drugs was being won and figures for drug smuggling and or related crime was dropping

No I didn't. I said that the Western world is slowly pulling away from drug prohibition and more and more countries are adopting more decriminalization/legalization based approaches. I alluded to the fact that culturally recreational drug use is more open and accepted than ever and that more and more people in prominent positions of power are coming out of the closet in support of a radical rethink of drug policy.

This is all factual. I never once said figures for smuggling and crime were dropping. And I never once claimed my arguments were solely based in the country that you live in.

Read more careful and think for half a second longer. It will save you and more importantly me a lot of trouble. Or you could just do that thing where you give up and claim you're not bothered by it again. Because this really is not working out for you.

[Sticks]

Even the Dutch have begun to see the light and are clamping down, sort of

(See here from the BBC)

The famous cannabis-selling coffee shops of the Netherlands are facing new tighter restrictions.

The Dutch government is reclassifying high-strength cannabis to put it in the same category as hard drugs.

It says the amount of the main active chemical in the drug, THC, has gone up, making it far more potent than a generation ago.

It means the coffee shops will be forced to take the popular, high-strength varieties off their shelves.

Dutch politicians say high-strength cannabis, known as "skunk", is more dangerous than it was before.

In the future, anything containing more than 15% THC will be treated the same way as hard drugs, such as cocaine and ecstasy....

[Stu]

The story is two years old and any measure has yet to come into effect, much like how the proposals banning tourists from entering coffee shops were largely ignored.

Not that it is the most unreasonable suggestion in the world. I can live without 15%> THC Cannabis. The bigger problem comes from the fact that the Dutch model still does not represent true marketplace legality despite it's cliched international reputation. Cannabis is simply tolerated there. The cultivation of it is still forced into a clandestine cul de sac where the supply is dictated by often unscrupulous individuals looking to profit. It has resulted I believe in violence in some of the smaller towns in the Netherlands where outlaw suppliers wanted to be the ones to supply the coffee shops in the area and started popping each other off.

More ill effects of prohibition. There are plenty more countries in Europe that have more relaxed drug laws that people don't hear as much about. And plenty more to come. If anything the Dutch are going to fall behind. They have an incredibly outdated model.

Onwards and upwards goes the cause.

[Kizzy]

You are using baised evidence for your pro cannabis stance and unsubstantiated claims for the reduction in the war on drugs across the world. This thread deals with the trafficking of a substance that there is no question of being made legal by any country anytime soon.

[Stu]

The evidence is not biased and the claims are not unsubstantiated. You're just too lazy to actually debate them. There is a difference.

[Kizzy]

You are too blinkered to admit there is none to be found stu.
We are going waaaay off topic now and you are again getting a tad insulting.

[Stu]

There clearly is a debate to be found. Whether you want to participate in it or not is up to you but a dialogue exists across the world now more than ever. If it's good enough to be debated amongst doctors, lawyers and musicians then it's good enough for TiBB.

If you are so deeply concerned that the subject of this thread and your involvment in it sticks to the specific news story then stop engaging me in this half arsed attempt at trying to one up my more general posts on drug prohibition across the globe because it's not going to help, is it. Especially when it continually follows the routine of me posting a long, detailed argument, you disrespecting the effort by replying with no argument of your own and ignoring all of mine because you've already concluded internally that it's bollocks, and you eventually reverting back to the "but that's not what this topic is about" line when you get bored of it.

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Stu

There clearly is a debate to be found. Whether you want to participate in it or not is up to you but a dialogue exists across the world now more than ever. If it's good enough to be debated amongst doctors, lawyers and musicians then it's good enough for TiBB.

If you are so deeply concerned that the subject of this thread and your involvment in it sticks to the specific news story then stop engaging me in this half arsed attempt at trying to one up my more general posts on drug prohibition across the globe because it's not going to help, is it. Especially when it continually follows the routine of me posting a long, detailed argument, you disrespecting the effort by replying with no argument of your own and ignoring all of mine because you've already concluded internally that it's bollocks, and you eventually reverting back to the "but that's not what this topic is about" line when you get bored of it.

Your long detailed argument is nothing more than pro drugs diatribe, it has no supporting material, statistics or evidence.
There is no disrespect, after all it's a matter of opinion. And that's all I see here your opinion, it has no basis in fact.

[Redway]

Originally Posted by Kizzy

Your long detailed argument is nothing more than pro drugs diatribe, it has no supporting material, statistics or evidence.
There is no disrespect, after all it's a matter of opinion. And that's all I see here your opinion, it has no basis in fact.

To be fair, civil liberties is not a matter of opinion and there's much more evidence to point out the idiocy of this drugs war than these biased, unsupported claims that you keep banging on about.

[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Redway

To be fair, civil liberties is not a matter of opinion and there's much more evidence to point out the idiocy of this drugs war than these biased, unsupported claims that you keep banging on about.

Where redway? show me some then....Whose civil liberties are you referring to here?