Hard News: Cabinet and the Reeferendum
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linger, in reply to
I wouldn’t want to deny anyone their faith, nor to disrespect anyone’s reasons for avoiding alcohol. But it was unsettling to realise that the label showing the impurity level was not helping. My student would have been more comfortable with a product label that didn’t mention the possibility of any ethanol being included, because that would have allowed room for a more pragmatic approach, rather than a strict reading. Given a choice between a low-end vinegar with 0.1% ethanol, a high-end vinegar with 0.005% ethanol,, and a cheap product with nobody-knows-and-nobody’s-saying-how-much ethanol … as she saw it, she’d have to choose the *last* of those.
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Two new television opinion polls seem to show opposition to decriminalisation of cannabis for personal use (unsurprisingly, particularly amongst National voters and 55+ voters): https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/113377450/new-polls-show-more-kiwis-against-legalising-recreational-cannabis
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andin, in reply to
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Whats dangerous about heroin is the risk of addiction, which won’t do any physical damage. The damage from addiction would be more psychic.
Dont kid yourself any drug from herbal tea to H has physical effects on neural tissues(the brain) and addiction is physical damage/changes to the neural transmitters and receptors in the brain. It is all physical damage in some form. There is no physical/mental duality its all physical. It just gives the appearance of being separate realities, its an appearance that many have exploited over the ages including religions.
Thats how they fill followers heads with all kinds of stupidity, the illusion of freewill. Or this or that is bad for you and may affect your chance of getting into that illusionary place where your dead relatives live with their figures of worship. And if they get them young enough it may take a lifetime to rid oneself of these fictions, if ever.
YES the brain is where ones consciousness resides but it is not a separate entity and it will die when you die and very much subject to what you put into your body. All manner of external factors affect it, they are all physical and have physical outcomes. Reading a book is a physical act and has physical outcomes, even if its just making you sleepy.If the doctor doesn’t prescribe it I don’t use it.
You do know that very fallible people who were doctors started the opiod crisis. And used to prescribe opium.
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Okay, in plain english then. Heroin addiction is unlikely to cause brain damage. But heroin addiction could leave you socially isolated and/or in prison.
Unlike say meth addiction, which is likely to cause brain damage, make you socially isolated and you could wind up in jail.
Alcohol addiction, could also cause brain damage – make you socially isolated and you could wind up in jail.
Notice, social isolation is kind of like an external force, brother.
You do know that very fallible people who were doctors started the opiod crisis. And used to prescribe opium.
Get outa here:-)
It's a moot point. I’m reporting my doctor and getting a proper one, if they try prescribing heroin to me.
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Neil, in reply to
Unlike say meth addiction, which is likely to cause brain damage, make you socially isolated and you could wind up in jail.
One of the many tragedies of meth will be the legacy of a cohort young people with meth related brain damage moving through the education and health services. For many it will be on top of other social and psychological vulnerabilities.
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steven crawford, in reply to
One of the many tragedies of meth will be the legacy of a cohort young people with meth related brain damage
Are you talking about young people who have used truck loads of meth? And when I just so you know, I'm not saying that people who have a meth addiction are irreparably munted. They just might suffer more depressive illness than general.
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Neil, in reply to
Yes, plus a smaller number exposed to meth while in the womb. There’s still not much support for fetal alcohol alcohol syndrome let alone meth.
Although often lots of compounding factors and I generally get to see those with lots of severe compounding factors but there is a degree of permanent brain damage.
Not so much depressive as anti-social, poor impulse control. But there’s often a learnt component as well if they’re from a violent family background and been to prison.
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linger, in reply to
And also (almost inseparably tangled up with "learnt", but persisting into the next generation regardless of environment), an epigenetic contribution further limiting impulse control and increasing base anxiety levels.
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steven crawford, in reply to
Although often lots of compounding factors and I generally get to see those with lots of severe compounding factors but there is a degree of permanent brain damage.
do you have any actual studies you can point to which might seperate out the “compounding factors” from what the chemistry is possibly doing?
That might be a helpful way to avoid being misunderstood.
There’s still not much support for fetal alcohol alcohol syndrome let alone meth.
You are talking about two completely different things here. Entire family’s have been evicted from their homes on the flimsiest of suspicions someone might have smoked meth in the family home. That just goes to shows just how much political support there is for using the word “meth” exclamation mark!
Foetal alcohol syndrome isn’t well supported by the food and grocery council, who are better known for supporting dirty politics people,
This isn’t the correct thread for that last link. The dirty politics thread is.
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andin, in reply to
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if they try prescribing heroin
Its usually in the form of morphine and the best way to alleviate suffering at end of life situations. Say no to that if you want, I wont be.
Heroin addiction is unlikely to cause brain damage. But heroin addiction could leave you socially isolated
Addiction is a form of brain damage, but yeah heroin users can be very adept at hiding it, until they run out of money and resort to all manner of cajoling to get money for the next fix. That can bring on social isolation, then its stealing to get the money. The downward spiral can go pretty deep.
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steven crawford, in reply to
I’m starting to realise that the Public Address System party is over. And that I’m one of the drunken idiots thats left drinking half empty dregs of beer, and occasionally I have to spit out a cigaret but.
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Great response, Russell, to Mike Hosking's deceitful behaviour in the form of his "reporting" on this issue;
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12239675
He really is an idiot.
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Moz, in reply to
the Public Address System party is over
Yep. I believe all the cool kids have taken to twitter or other antisocial media and I just can't be bothered. There's just no place for reflection let alone research, and even the better twits either vomit hundreds of tweets a month or retweet all sorts of stuff that I don't care about. Instagram is worse, believe it or not.
Sadly I have to use twitter for work, because some of the tools I use are only supported via twitter. Which is a whole different problem.
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andin, in reply to
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twits either vomit hundreds of tweets a month or retweet all sorts of stuff
Its certainly quantity over quality, offensiveness generating outrage is a seller too.The downward spiral goes on
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Moz, in reply to
It's as much that there's no useful tagging or threading, so I can't just follow, say, "Russell Brown's considered public posts", or "discussion of {post on Public Address}", I have to accept "everything Russell posts" or "anything tagged public address" and good luck with that.
It doesn't scale. I could in theory follow one or two people who tweet multiple times a day, but I have roughly 500 RSS feeds... multiplying that by even 10 twitter posts each turns it to garbage. Setting twitter to "only show posts, no replies or mentions" barely helps.
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We're currently preparing a letter to counter Family First's misrepresentation of the evidence around cannabis and psychosis (which they want to link to violent behaviour). I'll keep you all posted.
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Moz, in reply to
Family Fist is concerned about violent behaviour? Talk about the worm turning, whatever happened to "god given right to punch children in the face"?
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Joe Boden, in reply to
Family Fist is concerned about violent behaviour? Talk about the worm turning, whatever happened to “god given right to punch children in the face”?
See, that's ok, so long as you are not high. :D
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linger, in reply to
Just high and mighty?
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Moz, in reply to
Only the self-righteous may enter the kingdom of heaven?
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Yep. It’s precisely why Canada opted for legalisation: because prohibition deprived them of any tools for curbing youth use.
Well I know that everyone is on Twitter timelines now, but I’m practicing to become a full on luddite when I reach retirement age.
Going back to the beginning of this thread, to pick up on this argument I’m saying that we are not Canada.
A similar argument was used when the liberalisation and lowering of the drinking age was working its way thru. Variations of an argument that the French teach their children to drink responsibly by feeding them alcohol where used. And that regulation would reduce underage drinking at any rate. The truth is that we are a nation who drink heavily and we pay an enormous price for that.
The way we currently deal with underage drinking is crude and it is – prohibition.
I do wonder how the regulation being designed to reduce harm is going to work.
I wonder how long its going to take for it to be liberalised so that it’s allowed to be advertised to be to be an essential ingredient of grocery shopping, in the same way alcohol is.
And among other things, I wonder how exactly the regulation is going to stop children from smoking dope. Will it be more or less a cut and paste of the regulation currently in place to reduce alcohol harm on children?
And what about the addicts, will there be any advertising campaigns to help the general public understand?
This is important for me because I take things way too seriously.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
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This is important for me because I take things way too seriously.
I find the simplest panacea is the old maxim;
'Trust in Allah,
but tie up your camel' -
steven crawford, in reply to
Thats an uncanny coincidence you saying that. My aluminium dingy, which I build with my own bare hands – I did have welding gloves, but made from ancient technology…
My dingy was yesterday recover from the sea bed after almost a year since it untied, flipped and sunk itself during a dark and stormy night. And to add to the over all, almost biblical nature of the drama, a southern right whale visited. And the shore line was crowded with worshipers.
So next time I’ll be trusting the bowline over the sheet bend and two half hitches.
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