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Ian Bone 
Weak broadcast, sorry. No real argument for legalisation is presented other than everyone should be able to do what they want, so long as they don’t exploit others. (Zzzzz!) Bit of a copout to leave talking about heroin for later. It’s not politicians or even judges who decide there should be prohibition. What about alcohol being banned in some Zapatista and Australian aborigine communities? Are they a load of oppressive cunts? What about the social wreckage contributed to by the easy availability of heroin on many many working class estates in Britain? There’s no engagement with the other side of the argument here. I knew Martin when he never used to say things like “as anarchists,…” and “anarchists believe in…”
I think your point about aborigine communities is a piece of what aboutery. westerners have over time devoloped a genetic make up to cope with booze,native americans and austrailan aborginies have not , and combined with colonization it caused havoc in their communties. So if collectively they ban alcohol then good but what has that got to do with Martins point about the imprisionment of people and subsequent ruining of thier lives for the pocession of a drug in the Uk ? Especially if they black .
Who decided on prohibtion in the UK ?
In victorian times there was no prohibition andc annabis heroin , cocaine etc could be purchased from the chemist. There no no problem at such
Judging by most of the commnets ot Martin post alot of readers of this blog appear to be puritans
Good attack on the pharmaceuticals-pushing medical priesthood, though. Glad Martin sorted out some pain relief when suffering from cancer. Frankincense is supposed to be a useful herbal treatment of cancer too – not just of the pain caused. Worth checking out, if anyone’s reading this who suffers from that illness.
“As anarchists”, would people support an immediate end to all restrictions on gun ownership?
If not, why not?
Or an end to driving licences?
In many poor areas in Britain, most shit that working class people do to other working class people – except inside the family – is mediated by drug addiction. Sure, it’s not the drugs that do the burglary and stabbing and terrorising, but guns don’t discharge themselves either.
‘Working class rule for working class areas’ – i.e. gang rule – ranks right up there with ‘be nice to ISIS’ in being completely off the wall and out of touch with reality. The Belfast punk band Stiff Little Fingers got it right, in the lyrics to ‘Wasted Life’.
Come down to earth!
Its quite obvious from this that Martin has never smoked weed, snorted powder or dropped a pill. -or taken heroin for that matter
if you listened Martin says he took cannabis when recovering ( i hope ) from cancer.
b – perhaps you’re not getting it. The best way to get a column at the Spectator is to say you’re a libertarian.
I agreed with everything he said, but when he said the drugs trade is the only free market I winced. It’s not. you couldn’t be more wrong. Massive cannabis factories in the UK are run by Vietnamese gangs using imported slave labour. Turkish intelligence has long been big in the Middle East heroin trade. CIA had it’s golden triangle operations. Mexican special forces run the cocaine trade at the behest of bent elected officials. Mega banks like HSBC cream off trillions laundering. Arms to Iran anyone ?
If you grow some plants in your loft, then you’re free, but that’s like a drop in the ocean.
The drugs trade is the worst advert for free market or anarchy that you could possibly have, and just highlights the problems everyone gives about human nature making any sort of peaceful anarchic existence unfeasible.
Whether it’s cartel enforcers or law enforcers, or both at once, running the show – it’s not anarchy.
Isn’t that completely fucking obvious ?
Let’s compare legal and non legal drug enforcement regimes :-
Legal – punishment deployed after long consideration of case. Evidence presented, jury based, care taken to prosecute correct party. Strong element of rationality and impartiality. Mitigating circumstances taken into consideration. Sometimes corrupt or incompetent. Compensation for incorrect judgements.
Legal punishments – fines, jail terms, stigma, black mark on character
Gang/extra legal – punishment deployed on basis of suspicion, machiavellian rivalry, turf feud, irrational, personal, not evidence based, corruption, political, autocratic, no jury.
Gang/extra legal punishment – rape, imprisonment, murder, kidnapping, torture, fines, taxes, intimidation, beating, beheading, mass graves, enslavement, abuse, thrill kill, sadism.
Markets inevitably lead to centralisation and concentration of capitalist power. Marx was right. Proudhon wasn’t.
A century of propaganda in the US has built up this stupid idea about a capitalism based on ‘the little man’ without the juggernaut power of big business. Got to ask what planet people are living on. I know several decent people in the US, people who use their critical powers with lucidity and willpower, and with whom I agree about most things, but who just can’t reach the realisation that if you’ve got a market then you’re going to get Rockefellerism, because markets inevitably lead to monopoly.
(I’m not coming from bourgeois firms-and-households economics here. Monopoly, oligopoly, same difference. Non-human legal persons aren’t people. ‘Gods’ such as Tesco and Redrow don’t do anything; or more precisely, they’re vehicles. Talk about polytheism. But I digress.)
As for capitalism minus the barriers to a free-for-all, hear that and shudder. No bloody thanks!
And leaving heroin and crack cocaine for later…do us a favour.
OK I’m concentrating on negative things here, which isn’t what I like to do much nowadays, but while I’m here…the Class War sticker saying buy your fags and booze on the black market was a stinker. When I first saw it, I suspected it was maybe something to do with a nightclub or musical venture pushing ‘attitude’, criminal swagger, that had almost zero connection with the CW of the 1980s.
So that’s settled then. You anarchists will be going into the nearest drug baron’s den and declaring “we appropriate all this so-called private property for the people”, and take all his big bundles of notes and redistribute them among the local working class.
Then once you’ve sorted the small fry out you can move on to bringing down the state. No problem !
I look forward to reading about it (should you survive the gunfire).
Ta.
again another strange illogical post that does not reflect what Martin was getting at,. WTF is going on today people is every one on drugs or something ( thats sarcasm in case you did nt’ quite get it)
The state does not provide freedoms without a price. Be warned of those who demand that the state legalizes drugs. It will not be a matter of the Government telling the plod not to arrest drug takers. There will be more. The Government will want it controlled; Licences will be offered to companies who will produce and market the drugs at great profit, and these will be awarded to companies who donate to the party in government. Selling or using unlicensed drugs will be illegal, so you will still be prosecuted for growing cannabis in your loft. It will be taxed, and to sell this tax politicians will appear on the media explaining how the tax will be spent on good things like cancer treatment, NHS top ups etc. But the money will go to the Treasury and probably finance a few military adventures. In fact there is no end to the bright ideas the state will introduce alongside the legalization of drugs. Government and anarchist objectives do not sit well together. Having said this, I recognize that government control might be preferable to criminal control, as mentioned in the above comments.
I can see Starbucks supplying customers with drugs and protesters outside chanting ‘Pay your taxes’ .
what better than cannabis. evidence please