On Amy Winehouse

In all honesty, I never really listened to the music of Amy Winehouse. Back in the day when two addicts played out their problems across the front pages of the nation’s newspapers, I tended to be more in the Pete Doherty camp. This doesn’t mean, of course, that I can’t see the tragedy in her death. Another talented musician dies at 27. Another talented musician to join what Kurt Cobain’s mother once referred to as the “stupid club”.

Now, the response to Winehouse’s death has shown that many would concur that there was something deeply stupid about Winehouse – just as there is about any addict. And while I would agree that there is something terribly and tragically predictable about Winehouse dying young, I do think that a lot of people miss the crucial point about addiction. Yeah, people can choose to get over that addiction. However, such a view runs the risk of making that choice – and its implications – sound very easy. In fact, overcoming an addiction to drink or drugs (and Winehouse apparently had addictions to both) is a massive and incredibly difficult thing to do. Making the choice to fight an addiction is only the start of the process – and that process is something that lasts for the rest of that addict’s life. Furthermore, for anyone who has ever (over-)indulged in drink or drugs, there’s probably the faint feeling of “there but for the grace of God…”

Of course, this won’t stop the small-minded tutting to themselves and muttering that they saw this coming and that Winehouse, as a drunken junkie, got what she deserved. That such thoughts are grossly inappropriate in the wake of an untimely death won’t matter to them. But for those of us who don’t sit in gilded towers of social conservatism, looking down in disdain at the people below, we can see Amy Winehouse’s death for what it is – a tragedy for her fans and, in particular, for her family. And we can also see how messy both life and death can be, at the same time as noting just how easy it is for some to lose control of their lives.

A Radical Way to Reduce the Prison Population

It is a curious thing when you have a Tory calling for a reduced prison population and a former Labour Home Secretary - in The Daily Mail of all places - arguing that prison works. I guess, if nothing else, that this just goes to show how lost the Labour party has become: some of its leading lights are now on the right of the incumbent Con-Dem government. But hey ho - that's Labour's problem, not mine.

But since this is now clearly on the agenda, I have an idea that could substantially reduce the prison population. It is a radical (if you are deeply unimaginative or an unthinking reader of tabloid newspapers) policy, and one many people won't like. But it is this - reduce the prison population by legalising drugs.

From that point on, you are going to be sending fewer people to prison - users, addicts and pushers. If drugs cease to be criminal, then those involved with them cease to automatically be seen as criminal as well. So fewer people will end up going to prison.

And, of course, there are other benefits as well. The Treasury would make more money through taxing drugs. Addicts might be more willing to come forward and seek treatment since admitting to a drug problem would no longer be the same as admitting to criminal activity. Drug related crime would also fall. Furthermore, we wouldn't be in the ludicrous position as we are now where we send drug addicts into confinement in places rife with drugs - namely, prisons. So to Ken Clarke - and any other politician who wants to reduce the prison population - I say do it. Legalise drugs, and then not only will the numbers of those in prison start going down very quickly, but a whole host of other good things could happen as well.

Of course, this won't happen; no professional politician would dare. But one of the reasons why drugs remain such an emotive topic in this country is because of the media inspired frenzy around them, which provokes an unthinking level of rage and fear in many people as soon as the topic of drugs comes up. But that is something that politicians could rectify if they were courageous enough. There are clear benefits to legalising drugs - now all we need is a politician with the backbone to start making the case for legalisation.

The Daily Mail Tendency: Deadly Scientists and their Evil Drugs

Another day, another extraordinarily ignorant article from everyone's favourite hate rag. In this article, the broad class of "scientists" gets a trademarked Mail bashing. And all for one government advisor taking a stance on drugs that does not match the reactionary position of The Daily Hate.

Now you could argue that this article is part of a post-positivist approach to life. It isn't, though. It is more of a luddite response. From the type of people who would probably like to burn scientists for being witches. If you don't believe me, read the article all the way through. We see scientists being protrayed as amoral experimenters who would be right at home in the Nazi and/or Stalinist regimes. We also get the hints that we are seeing an incipient coup, with a nightmarish dystopia of rule by scientists hoving into view on the horizon. And various other jaw-droppingly ignorant statements designed to create a culture of fear around scientists because they happen to have (factual) opinions that The Daily Mail doesn't agree with. The article stands as a sound explanation of why supposedly intelligent politicians such as Brown and Johnson would fly in the face of scientific fact when it comes to drug classification - if they appear to be completely hysterical and irrational tough when it comes to drugs, then The Daily Mail will treat them as the most inspirational leaders since Churchill.

Maybe someone with more patience than me would be able to do some good work fisking the article; unfortunately I cannot work up the appetite to take apart the whole sorry thing. Instead, I'll just make some quick comments on the final paragraph:

And to every one who thinks otherwise, I would ask them to carry out a simple experiment. Put a drug, bought casually on the street corner, and a glass of red wine on the table when your teenager comes home from school. Which of them, in all honesty, would you prefer him to try?

I wonder why the author thinks that everyone has a teenager, and that said teenager's gender is male? Personally, I find the concept of worrying about a teenage boy who doesn't exist and is never likely to exist utterly pointless. Rather than eye-opening and terrifying, as the author no doubt intends.

Still, it is the comparison that is so problematic. Put simply, it is loaded so you can only choose the glass of wine. So let's try and even it up a bit. What would you choose if it was a choice between a legal drug such as cannabis, made in safe and healthy conditions in a factory, that is actually safer than that glass of wine? Or how would you feel if it was a choice between a drug and alcohol both bought on a street corner? Or how would you feel if it was a choice between dope and a 100% proof spirit?

Poor journalism and biased reporting/comment is typical of The Daily Mail, and this article is no exception. However it does indicate one of the biggest problems we have in this country as we look towards having an intelligent debate about drugs. Across the board, from politicians through to journalists, the message is sent out that drugs are bad. That they are abnormal. The scientific data, of course, would suggest otherwise. But those who point this out and dare to suggest anything other than the hysterical misinformation about drugs currently being circulated are at best, amoral, and most probably evil people who want to corrupt your kids and turn them into junkies. That is, of course, palpable nonsense - but until the tone of the debate around drugs changes in this country, ignorance and the propagation of unscientific myth are still going to be the order of the day.

Gordon Brown, Drugs and the Absence of Reality

Nothing like taking the advice of experts now, is there? Unless, of course, you happen to be the incumbent Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. In which case scientifcally backed advice is only welcome if it agree with your own desperate attempts to please tabloids by being tough on drugs. Witness the Professor Nutt debacle. Sacked because his scientifically backed opinions do not match with those of the PM. In Nutt's own words:

"Until Gordon Brown took office there has never been a recommendation about drug classification from the council that has been rejected by government," he said.

"Gordon Brown comes into office and soon after that he starts saying absurd things like cannabis is lethal... it has to be a Class B drug. He has made his mind up.

"We went back, we looked at the evidence, we said, 'No, no, there is no extra evidence of harm, it's still a Class C drug.'

"He said, 'Tough, it's going to be Class B.'"

Terrific stuff. Against scientific advice and common sense, the witless Gordon Brown decides Cannibas is lethal. What a moronic think to say. If Cannabis was lethal, then this country would have a substantially smaller population and universities would have next to no students in them. Besides, Brown as worked with Cabinet Ministers (and indeed, employed them to work in his Cabinet) who have taken Cannabis and lived to tell the tale. Surely he has noticed that, well, his colleagues aren't dead, despite having had the occasional toke? Cannabis lethal? Just what the fuck is the Prime Minister on?

Of course, this is all about political expediency, and it is the sort of thing that happens all the time in politics. The Tories won't be immune to a bit of posturing on drugs when they take over, and cracking down on drugs is always a sure fire way of getting the tabloids on side. I guess this is what Gordon meant when he said that he was a conviction politician - he follows his convictions just so long as they appeal to the readership of the Daily Mail and even if they aren't, in any way, backed up in reality. Which means another way of defining Brown's idea of a"conviction politician" would be "media driven, delusional wankstain."

The Tories, Britain and The Wire

So, a Tory has created a whole bag of controversy by trying to be a bit hip and referencing highly acclaimed US TV programme The Wire. LabourList asks whether anyone's street really resembles The Wire. I'm guessing that Mr Grayling's street probably doesn't, what with him being an MP and all. As for my street, well, I can't comment on whether it resembles The Wire or not. I would say that sometimes it resembles The Shield. Albeit without the *aggressive* policing.

You can make what you will of this storm in a crackpipe teacup. Old Holborn points out that parts of Britain are worse than Baltimore, which is where The Wire is set. And Guido does something that politicians of both parties seem reluctant to do - actually offer a solution. And his idea - decriminalising drugs - would actually do a great deal to make our streets less like The Wire and more like... oh, I don't know, I don't watch enough US TV to make a valid comparison. But the sort of place where people don't get shot in the face owing to drug-related crime.

The Government's Got Its Banning Hat On!

Now, if I wanted to suggest an increase in government efficiency and a decrease in the number of ministers, I'd strongly argue for centralising all the government departments responsible for banning stuff. Seriously, you could really thin down the Cabinet and make it more efficient. You could have the Prime Minister, the Chancellor, a Defence Secretary, an Education Secretary and the Minister for Banning Stuff. Your one stop shop Minister for all of your banning needs. It would be a busy ministry, though. Particularly since the Labour government now seems to have abandoned any pretence towards having a legislative agenda, and instead is mistaking the implementation of bans as being the sign of an activist government.

Today sees the announcement of the banning of legal highs (guess the manufacturers will have to think of a new category for their products now). Clearly the rip-roaring success of drugs prohibition has encouraged them to add more drugs to the roster of illegal substances. But, like a lot of the government's knee jerk banning, there is a sob story behind this. Listen to the words of the mother of someone who died from one of these soon to be illegal highs:

"I'm delighted. I think the Home Office is moving in the right direction.

"We need to tell people that GBL plus alcohol can equal death. Hester hadn't had that much alcohol and then later on that evening an old friend of hers gave her half a dose of GBL which he said was safe.

"So the two mixed together just sent her into a coma and she didn't wake up.

"She was studying molecular medicine but she was clearly unaware that it was dangerous and I think that is the key message to get across to young people, just because it's legal doesn't mean it's safe."

It is obvious that Hester's mother has suffered an appalling tragedy. But that doesn't mean that her opinion - which, quite naturally, will be anything other than objective under the circumstances - holds any more weight that any other citizen's opinion in this country. It doesn't give her specialist knowledge about GBL. Plus, her assertion that this will raise awareness about the dangers of mixing booze and GBL seems an irrelevance since it has now been made illegal. And finally, lots of stuff is less safe after you've had some booze. Including going up the stairs. Yet no-one is calling for a ban on going upstairs after a few beers.

What is really at the heart of this - and why I object so strongly to the banning of a substance I have never used and never plan to use - is the assumption that adults can't look after themselves and the mistaken idea that banning something is the same as educating people about it. Read these words from the Home Secretary - a man who is, lest we forget, an expert in nothing and is effectively just an over-promoted post man:

"Legal highs are an emerging threat, particularly to young people, and we have a duty to educate them about the dangers.

"There is a perception that many of the so-called legal highs are harmless, however in some cases people can be ingesting dangerous industrial fluids or smoking chemicals that can be even more harmful than cannabis."

These legal highs may be dangerous. They may be more dangerous than dope. And maybe you can make a case for educating people about them. But by banning something, you are not educating people about it. Education should allow people to make an educated choice. You remove that choice when you ban something.

That's what I can't stand, and that is what everyone in this country should be protesting about. It isn't just about the banning of these legal highs. It is about the government assumption that prohibition is the same as education, and deciding what the private individuals in this country should and shouldn't have a choice about. All these sort of decisions mean is that someone like Alan Johnson knows better about what is good for you that you do. And I am not dumb or bovine enough to allow such decisions to pass by without some sort of comment and protest. No longer does nanny know best; this modern state presupposes that a government minister - the most temporary of appointments based more on loyalty than competency - knows what is right for you. And such an idea makes me feel utterly sick.

Changing the Tone of Key Debates

Recently, we've seen big debates about the NHS and about drugs. What has struck me most about these debates is the irrational, emotional responses of some to those two issues. The NHS is seen by so many as a "good thing" - a benign entity - whilst drugs are bad. Really bad. 

Go ask someone what the NHS means to them. They might say that the NHS is all about all those doctors or nurses working hard to make others better. It might be about the healthcare offered by the NHS to themselves or their family members. What shines through is that emotional connection to the good work that the NHS does. Which misses - completely - the point of what the NHS is. The NHS is merely the bureaucratic means by which healthcare is distributed in this country. The NHS is simply a manmade institution. You don't have to have the NHS to get hard work from health workers, and you don't have to have it to get healthcare. You can tell; other countries don't have the NHS, yet they still have functioning, effective healthcare systems.

Likewise, go ask people what they think about drugs. A lot will tell you that drugs are evil. That they destroy lives, families and whole communities. Which just isn't true. Drug-related crime does all that; drugs themselves don't. You can tell. See, drugs tend to be inanimate objects. They are chemicals, in powder or pill format. They can't mug a granny. They can't destroy a community. They can't do anything other than be ingested by human beings. Rather like the paracetamol in your medicine cabinet. You can rage against drugs as much as you like. But you'd be raging against the wrong things, my friends. 

We need to remove the emotion attached to these inanimate objects and institutions if we are ever going to have a real debate  on them. This may sound like pure semantics, but it is actually crucial. Just look at the hysterical response to Hannan's comment that he wouldn't wish the NHS on anyone. Look at what he said and, more importantly, what he didn't say. At no point did he say that that he didn't want people to have access to good, affordable healthcare. And at no point does his comment diss any of those healthcare professionals who work within the NHS. Yet Hannan has been painted as some sort of demented demagogue who doesn't want to have healthcare and who is, unpatriotically, doing down one of our greatest national achievements. The detachment from reality of this response to Hannan should be obvious to everyone who has had any interaction with the NHS in this country. Yet because of the confusion of what we mean when we talk about reform of the NHS, people assume we are talking about the abolition of healthcare in this country. Rather than asking for reform to a grossly inefficient bureaucratic system that is restricting healthcare professionals in this country. 

If we do want less hysterical debates on this, then we need to be more precise in the what we say. Rather than dismissing the NHS, we need to talk about how we want to improve affordable healthcare in this country through minimising bureaucracy. We're not banning the NHS and closing hospitals; we are cutting red tape and improving frontline medical care for people. Likewise, we aren't talking about decriminalising drugs. We are talking about reducing drug related crime by liberalising the legislation around drug use. 

Is this spin? Sure. Of course it is. And, unfortunately, spin is necessary in this day and age if you want to have any sort of impact on the national debate. Because look at how quick the defenders of the status quo are to fall back on their tried and tested spin techniques. If you criticise the NHS you are unpatriotic. Rather than having to defend our comments in the face of such accusations, those who would consider more radical solutions to our country's problems that simple maintenance of the status quo need to take control of the debate. We need to be challenging the likes of Andy Burnham to explain why they oppose reform to an often dangerous and sometimes fatal system of healthcare provision. And we need to be asking the forces of knee-jerk reaction in this country why they oppose potential solutions to drug-related crimes outright without even considering them. 

Hyperbole of the Day

From George Monbiot in an article where he ferociously attacks casual cocaine users then pleads for help for addicts:

Every year cocaine causes some 20,000 deaths in Colombia and displaces several hundred thousand people from their homes. Children are blown up by landmines; indigenous people are enslaved; villagers are tortured and killed; rainforests are razed. You'd cause less human suffering if instead of discreetly retiring to the toilet at a media drinks party, you went into the street and mugged someone. But the counter-cultural association appears to insulate people from ethical questions. If commissioning murder, torture, slavery, civil war, corruption and deforestation is not a crime, what is?

Let's take this wonderful paragraph bit by bit. Now, where does the figure of 20,000 people come from? And are those deaths directly linked to cocaine? How? Fine, if it can be proved that they are directly the results of cocaine I'll believe it. But the article - along with the claims of slavery, landmines, torture and killing - fails to offer any evidence to really back up the hysterical claims, leaving it not so much a fact as a factoid. Cocaine has negative implications both at home and abroad, but when dramatic numbers and other wild claims are thrown around it is always best to reference where they come from.

The second part of the paragraph is my favourite. I have this wonderful image of media types, of bankers, of sales people, all leaving parties halfway through, then going out and smashing the living fuck out of a poor passer-by for their wallet. Brilliant! Mind you, might disrupt the party/drinks event a bit. But more seriously, I'm not entirely sure that the mass muggings proposed by Monbiot actually would be better than having a toot in the toilet. 

Then we have the claim that it is the counter-cultural associations with cocaine that makes people ignore the ethical questions. My observations are that a lot of those people taking coke* aren't thinking about the ethical questions or the counter-cultural associations of the drug. Rather, they are thinking about getting loaded and having a good time. 

Then, finally, we have the idea that those buying coke commissioning heinous crimes. I'm pretty sure that those buying coke from dealers aren't throwing in an extra twenty in return for a bit of murder and civil war in another country. And whilst I understand that the purchase of coke has consequences on a global level, the argument that it is effectively the commissioning of torture and slavery is the sort of leap in logic that would have most sane people shaking their head and wondering what Monbiot is on. And whether they can have some of it as well.

No doubt Monbiot believes he is making a strong ethical case for people to stop using cocaine. Unfortunately, the likely result of his shrill tone and insane claims is that people will ignore him rather than coke. Something that will be compounded by his staggeringly stupid sign-off:

Until that happens, Costa's opinions on this issue are worth as much as mine or anyone else's: nothing at all.

Your opinion is worth nothing at all. You said it, George, not me...

*I don't use it myself. Can't stand the stuff. Makes me edgy and paranoid. And I'm already edgy and paranoid. I don't need to pay for white powder to help me with that. Besides, it tends to make people self-absorbed and arrogant. And people don't need too much help with that either...

The Queen Takes Cocaine

But, of course, she doesn't take cocaine. It is actually a comment by an actor who played the Queen. But fucking hell, let's not let a good headline get in the way of the actual story. The likes of The Daily Star certainly aren't.

However, how does this actually constitute a story? An actor takes cocaine? Someone in media takes cocaine? How many times a day do you think this story is repeated over and over again, just with a different person sticking Uncle Charlie up their nose? People take drugs. They always have done. They always will do. Why this interest in people snorting a bit of coke?

I know that many people think that if you take drugs, you are instantly on a downward spiral towards addiction, prostitution and death. Except that is blatantly absolute bollocks. Helen Mirren actually shows that! Look at her. A successful, Oscar winning actress. She's not a junkie scumbag; she actually just used drugs a bit and gave up. And just look at the reason why she gave up:

“I loved coke – never a lot, just a little bit at parties. But what ended it for me was when they caught Klaus Barbie, the Butcher of Lyon, in the early 80s... He was hiding in South America and living the life of a cocaine baron. Then I saw how my little sniff of cocaine had an absolute direct route to this f*****g horrible man in South America."

Right, so let's be very clear on this - Mirren did not give up drugs because she thought that she was an addict or for any of the other reasons that the media likes to associate with the *evils* of drug taking. In fact, she gave up because of the ethical issues of coke funding a evil man. But we don't really see that sort of rhetoric in the media; oh no. It is all the talk about how drugs = addiction, and then screaming about any celebrities who may have taken drugs hysterically.

But, I hear you say, drugs are illegal. They are bad. The laws say so. Which is true. Drugs are illegal. But thousands of people are breaking the drug laws every week. Just as thousands are committing other acts that the law says are wrong. Like, say, speeding in a car. Speeding is illegal, thousands of people do it. Drug taking is illegal, thousands of people do it.

Now you could go on to argue that the media is right to carp on about drugs rather than speeding, because the consequences of drug abuse are far worse than speeding. I'd counter that by saying that overdosing and drug related crime can have just as devastating consequences as a massive car accident caused by someone speeding. Neither course of action is without potential problems, which is why the government feels the need to legislate on both of them. But this media focus on drug use is hysterical and banal.

Particularly when you focus on something else that Mirren said in her interview - and something that was not reported by the likes of The Daily Star:

"I was [date-raped], yes. A couple of times. Not with excessive violence, or being hit, but rather being locked in a room and made to have sex against my will."

So there you have it; the focus of the media is on whether consenting adults take drugs. The topic of date rape should be swept under the carpet or mentioned as an aside, once the drugs issue has been dealt with in a fuck of a lot of detail.

Whenever I think about how fucked our country is, I tend to lay the blame at the door of the government. And I stand by that - they are largely responsible. But the skewed, almost insane priorities of the media, should take some of the blame as well.

The Drugs don't work. Nor does prison...

A little while back DK suggested, with customary use of base, vitriolic English, that prison may not be the best place to put tedious, scabby, wasted *rocker* Pete "Pissing my talent up against the wall with crack" Doherty. What with prisons being awash with junk and drugs and all.

And here, from the Sun of all places, we have proof that he was right. Not least because Doherty is sharing a cell with a dealer...

Mark Speight, kids TV presenter, has been found dead near/in Paddington station. Cue a thousand and one slack-jawed idiots saying "oooo, this is what happens when you take drugs."

Now, his fiancée did die after a drink and drugs bender. In fact, she did die in a pretty fucking horrific way after a drink and drugs bender. To die of heart failure after getting into a scalding bath (and getting burns on 60% of your body) is an awful way to go. I’m not of the opinion that any way of dying is particularly nice, but her death is one hell of a lot different than passing away in your sleep, surrounded by your loved ones.

Had she not taken the drugs, she might have survived. Equally, had she not taken the drugs and been really drunk, she might have still had this accident. Likewise, people binge on drink and drugs all the time, and don’t die in the bath. This was a tragic accident. That led (or so it appears) to the tragic death of Speight. This is not an example of how drugs can destroy you – this is an example of what can happen if you are not compos mentis.

A tragic accident, and a probable suicide, destroyed two lives. This is a time for their families to greive - it is not a fucking agenda to bang on about how evil drugs are.