Posts by james cairney
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"seat belts" what? I thought this was about criminalisation? 'Not legal' is not the same as 'criminal'. BZP has been *criminalised*.
And, I support heavy 'regulation' of BZP, on the grounds of *harm to self*.
"personally I think he is to old to be making these sorts of decisions anymore."
I completely agree, yet go further in that I believe his tragic personal experience should disqualify him from decision making for his patent lack of objectivity.
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Another point, you state: "That's assuming of course that the purpose of GST and income tax is to offset the harm caused by the item they relate to."
What? You do not need to assume anything to know that without those figures then you cannot claim to have shown net financial or resource loss so as to prove your point re harm to others being made out. It is not that simple. And, unfortunately the argument never entered that realm, as regulation would dominate criminalisation if it was really about harm reduction.
All Anderton and co relied on for justification were their subjective morals. That is not good enough in my opinion.
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"the 'no harm' principle doesn't stand up, which is again separate from the 'but it kinda pays for itself, or at least it could' principle".
The principle does 'stand up'. My point about costs is that stretching the definition of harm to include secondary and non-quantified (quantifiable) harm in order to bring it within the principle is artificial. When an action clearly fits the harm principle, such as say assault, then the argument for criminalisation is halfway made out. The argument is not made out by stretching the harm principle and ignoring or omitting variables such as tax. You could make a spurious argument that anything can be harmful in some abstract and disconnected way (to the soul even, as I mention above), but it does not follow that the principle falls. It is not perfect but it is simply the best principle for criminalising any action and should be the first port of call.
But importantly Damian, BZP was not primarily argued to fall within the 'harm to others' category. I wish it had been. It was argued that it should be criminalised because of harm to self, and that is an insufficient premise for the criminalisation of anything. Or do you think otherwise?
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Firstly, the harm principle is not an absolute, nor is it perfect, I accept that. However the harm principle is a great starting point for justifying criminalisation.
When the 'harm' starts getting more abstract, such as say, tax dollars for remedies, then you are out on a limb. Can you tell me how mush money was taken in GSt and income tax from BZP sales in the last year? No, you cant. Can you tell me how much more tax would have been taken had there been an excise tax on it? No, you can't. We can however safely state that it would be in the tens of millions.
"BZP cases ARE costing taxpayers money and stretching already quite stretched health resources. That's harmful."
The other obvious point is that criminalising it will cost a fortune. Criminal justice is bloody expensive.
Think the 'ounce of weed' Hansen argument all the way to the Supreme Court, how many million did that stash of pot cost us? And that was one case! Could that money have been better spent? Hell yes, I'd start by spending money trying to end sexual violence, but hey, maybe my priorities are all screwy.
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"He did wait for research, and his own medical advistory committee recommended a ban"
How on earth does a medical advisory committee have the expertise to recommend the *legal* status of anything at all? Unless we accept as gospel that anything dangerous or risky to health must be brought under the criminal law?
Anderton's entire thinking is contradictory, inconsistent and flawed.
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"It's about stopping people from getting high, while not upsetting the various powerful lobby groups and 'mainstream' NZers. Are we really that surprised?"
Yes, as it will not in any way stop people 'getting high'.
The only thing we have learned from our past is that we learn nothing from our past.
I do not accept that Anderton et al think that this or any other related measure will 'stop people getting high'. It is about imposing their subjective paternalistic morals on the next generation, and nothing else (and using the cubersome, ineffective and ridiculously expensive criminal justice system to achieve it).
Anderton will decide what you do on a Friday night thank you very much. He knows best. What's next, church on Sunday as not going is bad for us thus should be illegal?
What I do is my choice. If what I choose harms another person, then the state is justified in interfering. Anderton is not justified in interfering with my choice when the only harm that is even remotely possible is to me myself.
Anderton can sod off with his subjective morality and his use of the criminal law to enforce it.
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Hi Damian,
There is nothing wrong with the comparative argument against prohibition, using alcohol etc.
It forces those promoting prohibition to justify criminalisation on the grounds of harm to the individual using, as opposed to harm to another. If harm to the individual through using/doing/thinking or saying the prohibited thing is justification for criminalising that thing, then they (those promoting prohibition) must be forced to concede that they would support the criminalisation of, well, everything from alcohol to KFC to rugby league.
These paternalistic "we know best" fuckers in Wellington cannot justify criminalising party pills or any other thing on the basis of harm to the individual.
And you are right that the inevitable black market for BZp is unlikely to be large, and the several million party pills used in the last few years are going to be replaced by god knows what. People will not stop getting high. Anderton's thinking that this will eliminate an amount of substance use is stunningly naive.
And a question for all those who have used drugs and have given up; did the criminal status of that drug have anything at all to do with the decision to quit?
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THE problem is that that horrible little Howard views 'the problem' as poor polling with an election round the corner.
And the 'solution' to that problem is to come down hard on brown people in the name of 'helping kids' in order to win support from a racist electorate, without being overtly racist in any way.
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This is perhaps the most disturbing of all Howard's dog whistles to date.
Is the problem 'child abuse', or is the problem despair through years of second class citizenship and persecution?
If the Federal Government wants to look at solutions to 'the problem' then they need to take a long hard look at their own actions to identify what the problem actually is.
THE problem is that that horrible little Howard views 'the problem' as poor polling with an election round the corner.
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If we actually want young people to take an interest then a good start is to actually include them.
Intellect, hormonal stability, knowledge, and political interest are not pre-requisites for voting, thus they have little relevance to whether 16 year olds should get to vote.
They have an interest, so they should have a say. It is irrelevant that their views may be moronic.