Pubdate: Fri, 24 May 2002
Source: Daily Telegraph (UK)
Copyright: 2002 Telegraph Group Limited
Contact:  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/114
Author: Robert Sharpe
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n960/a02.html

SAY NO TO THE INQUISITION

Sir - Both drug laws and drug education must be reality-based 
(leading article, May 22). Children who realise they've been lied to 
about cannabis often assume that harder drugs such as heroin are 
relatively harmless, too: a recipe for disaster.

The Commons Home Affairs committee recently concluded that "the harm 
caused by illegal drugs varies immensely from one drug to another. 
Since most users and potential users know this, there is no point in 
pretending otherwise." While Britain increasingly favours commonsense 
approaches to drugs, the culture wars are heating up in America. 
President Bush is now pushing "compassionate coercion" for users of 
non-traditional drugs, with America's millions of cannabis smokers 
the likely target.

Like any drug, cannabis can be harmful if abused, but arrests and 
criminal records are hardly appropriate health interventions. Unlike 
alcohol, cannabis has never been shown to cause an overdose death, 
nor does it share the addictive properties of tobacco. Unfortunately, 
cannabis represents the counterculture to misguided reactionaries 
intent on forcibly imposing their version of morality. Britain should 
just say no to the American Inquisition.

Robert Sharpe, Drug Policy Alliance, Washington DC
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MAP posted-by: Josh