War on drugs: two fronts

What’s with the attacks of conscience pro athletes are suffering from lately? U.S. sprinter Marion Jones has now admitted she was using performance enhancing drugs, Canadian cyclist Genevieve Jeanson just admitted it, so who’s next?

Yes, honesty is the best policy, but this sudden change does puzzle me. Kind of makes you wonder whether they think it was all worth it, considering the shame and destruction of their reputations. But, when you’re 18, do you really make good decisions all the time?

I don’t think Jeanson will have any criminal consequences for her lies, but Jones sure might. Because Jones lied to U.S. federal investigators, they want to fine her some ridiculous amount and send her to prison (a la Martha Stewart).

What I don’t understand is why Jones didn’t do like politicians and business leaders do all the time: either plead the fifth or say “I don’t recall.” The U.S. fifth amendment just says that you are constitutionally protected from having to say anything which might incriminate you.

I’m going to give Ms. Jones the benefit of the doubt and assume that she is a decent person who got caught up in something that she wasn’t sure how to get out of. Equating her with dishonest politicians and business people who abscond with millions of dollars and cost lives is nothing short of absurd.

This American obsession with persecuting people who have lied is rather laughable. I think they’d have to arrest every damn politician in the country! They do love the high profile ones though. Really, doesn’t everyone who has committed a crime lie about it? Isn’t it overkill to charge and convict someone of a crime and then do the same because they’ve lied? Who among us hasn’t lied about something?

Of course the people who rail the hardest against lying are the biggest liars themselves. Similarly, the biggest anti-gay crusaders are the ones who can’t accept the fact that they’re gay themselves. The names of several gay, but denying, U.S. politicians I am referring to escape me at the moment, but you get the point. It’s just hypocrisy.

I vaguely remember seeing something on TV about how children lie from a very young age. What are we going to do, imprison them too? If a lie is such a serious thing, and that’s not saying that they always are or are not, then why not charge everyone who lies? We’d have to imprison the entire human population.

I know lying to investigators isn’t the same as lying to your wife about whether that dress makes her look fat, but… So it’s okay to lie to your wife? I guess U.S. federal investigators must all be divorced if they’re that honest. Bully for them.

“Does this dress make me look fat?” “No, it’s your fat ass that makes you look fat.”

“Honey, what are you thinking about?” “I’m thinking about how your sister would look way better in that dress.”

See how lies actually can help society? The cost of divorce and imprisoning people for spousal assault could be astronomical!

I digress.

I agree that athletes should follow the rules and not use performance enhancing drugs. I think that the shame of getting caught and a lifetime of living with those consequences is punishment enough, not to mention the endorsement deals they lose as well. Compounding these consequences by sending them to jail is not only cruel, but stupid.

War on drugs: coming to Canada

This whole conversation on steroid leads nicely into a conversation on recreational drugs.

Our shortsighted ruling junta/party in Canada, the Conservatives, in their infinite wisdom, have decided to import the absurd and ineffective war on drugs to Canada.

That’s not to say that I don’t agree with the goal of eliminating the use of harmful drugs in Canada, I just don’t agree with them about how to go about doing it.

For the Conservatives’ part, it’s really a token gesture anyway. They’re going to spend another $64 million on it. Well, they make it seem like new money, but politicians love to get more mileage out of our money by reannouncing things. I guess their reasoning is that we’re getting more for our money because it travels from project to project, thus multiplying its value. Yeah, $64 million. This from politicians who typically would rather be seen to be doing something rather than actually doing something.

I vaguely recall hearing that the U.S. spends $50 billion a year on its “war.” So, if Canada was really serious about it, I guess you could use the 1/10 rule and say Canada should be spending $5 billion. Yep. Let’s imprison every pot smoker and drug user. Give them the three strikes rule and lock them up for life. It’s really constructive and solves all the problems. Just look south of our border to see how effective it is. No, wait… don’t look there.

I’m certainly not advocating drug use, because I’m not a fan of it. It does cause a lot of problems in society, and I’m not saying that we shouldn’t fight drugs.

This whole harm reduction idea is laudable, but the Conservatives are making it laughable. Locking everyone in prison (where drug use is rampant) is a complete joke. If they really want to do something, they need to look at the root causes of drug use.

One of the important aspects of drug use that is starting to be talked about is mental illness. Apparently, mentally ill people will sometimes self-medicate with alcohol or drugs. That’s not to say that all drug users are mentally ill, but some are, and don’t know it. I wrote an article a few years back about a woman who was bipolar. The research I had done, along with what she told me, really opened my eyes.

If you’re going to solve their problems, you need to treat the underlying condition rather than just saying “you’re a bad person, now stop it.”

What about the social causes of drug use? We’ve seen the effects in the native population of sexual abuse at residential schools. This, along with violence at home and drug and alcohol use have contributed to drug problems in succeeding generations. This applies to the entire population. People who use drugs are often trying to escape something.

Rather than just treating the symptoms, you need to look at the root causes. The cure won’t take effect immediately. It will take a generation or two. That’s 25 to 50 years. I do not believe any of our politicians have the vision or the spine to be able to make the decisions now that will benefit future generations.

Instead, our politicians would rather institute short-term “solutions” that solve nothing but cause further harm but make their constituency feel better about themselves because “they’ve done something about it.”

I think we need to arrest our politicians for lying to us that they’re actually accomplishing something.