New Zealanders likely to vote against cannabis legalisation – 1 NEWS Colmar Brunton Poll
Support for legalising euthanasia dips, but majority still in favour – poll
What does it say about us as a people where we will legalise Euthanasia to put you out of your misery, but we won’t legalise cannabis to alleviate that pain?
Why are we such a damaged, uptight and deeply repressed people?
Our under funded social infrastructure, our ‘me first’ consumerism, our 30 years of neoliberal mythology, our disconnection from one another, our untreated pain, our lack of hope from grinding poverty in a first world country, our damaged masculinity, the intergenerational consequences of colonialism, our unspoken rage culture, our inability to express emotion beyond anger and our skyrocketing suicide rates have all combined to create a confused and hurt people too frightened to smoke a joint and chill the fuck out.
In a society that has no religious faith and all the cultural maturity of a can of coke, the bonds which keep us attached are frail and disconnected. In our fetishisation of individualism we have lost the central part of the human condition – connection.
We have traded in our interwoven threads of whanau, friendship and kin for a rat race where no one wins.
We are a nation of angry alcoholics who recoil from the herb because it might actually open us up to the suffering we work so hard to repress.
I will fight tirelessly to get cannabis reform in this nation not just because prohibition is a failure, not just because locking people up doesn’t work, not just because it provides economic progress, but because I also believe we as a people need desperately to get stoned.
That we would prefer to legally kill ourselves in pain rather than smoke a joint to release the pressure of that pain are the emotional knee jerks of a hurt and frightened people.
Well said Mon…
It is a tough world out there alright and I try and be nice to young people in particular when the chance presents. Student loans, all round exploitation and neo lib hyper individualism are just some of their burdens in this “dog eat dog” society we have created.
I opposed Rogernomics from the start–and got a lot of flack from some of the usual suspects–until the coins dropped for many part way through Ruthanasia with hospital closures, benefits slashed, beneficiaries demonised and market rents for state houses etc.
Bring on the Cannabis confectionary!
I seem to remember Labour promising to undertake reforms but that’s happening at a snails pace and I suspect they wish it would just “go away”. Big pharma I imagine have no enthusiasm for this either which might also explain the glacial pace at which the whole process is moving.
That said people voted for this change just as they voted against the TPPA so if anyone is uptight and repressed or more likely just insincere its the political establishment in NZ not the average Kiwi voter.
It says “we” as a people don’t f*cking exist, Wokester… wake up! how close are you to Gary Lin? “We” what a bloody joke…
I’m all for your freedom to be bong lords as long as we can limit access for kids.
Decriminalizing some drugs will also disempower gangs which is huge.
Perhaps it says more about the methods and effectiveness of the respective politicians behind each move?
The gun law was going to make us safer but that has been shown to be wrong and the arguement that legalising marajuana will hurt the gangs seem as fanciful. Alcohol is harmful but because it is legal is that a reason to introduce another harmful drug to effect our young people.
I am not against allowing medical marajuana but it’s benifits are very debatable however what does not harm you cannot hurt you but who is going to pay for a medically unproven drug
in Aotearoa/NZ there is , alcohol abuse , violence , a meth epidemic , fraud , drug cartel-profiteering .. there’s not a lot of moral high ground or time right now to take on legalising marijuana. persons using home grown marijuana , are then not , using meth or other illicit substances for consumption – it’s a counter measure.
and is pressure off police and society.
gangs may have to look for an alternative legal means of income ..
If they wanted to be legal there are a heap of jobs waiting to be filled but that would mean getting up early being drug free and taking direction.You think making marajuana legal will do this
Bang on Bomber!
Cannabis without the prohibition is a civilised drug.
It fits right into the receptors in our Endocannabinoid system built into our bodies over millennia.
If fights harm. It is prohibition that causes the harm.
There is evidence that it fights many illnesses including cancer.
The rabid right want us to stay fearful and repressed claiming it causes psychosis.
Its the reverse. Cannabis helps to relieve some of the anxiety and depression that turns into paranoia and suicide.
It is even helpful in the treatment of schizophrenia.
The evidence of a causal link between cannabis and psychosis doesn’t exist.
Ask Prof Carl Hart on his blog site Where Drug myths come to die*
The war on drugs is the war on the people.
It is the opium of the masses until the masses say they don’t need it.
And that can’t be before capitalism is gone and we can live in peace.
The masses need to get off their asses and mobilise, speak, campaign, fight, and throw the authoritarian, fascist little bastards who get off on others’ people’s misery into the garbage.
* Carl Hart – get the pdf
https://drcarlhart.com/cannabis-psychosis-critical-overview-relationship-charles-ksir-carl-l-hart/
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/02/new-poll-shows-support-for-both-recreational-cannabis-and-euthanasia-dropping.html
It’s not going to happen. Kiwis dont support decriminalization of cannabis.
Poll results going backwards because the govt wont do anything about the religious lobby group – Family First.
When is this thing against misinformation meant to kick in?
By the time that happens the public would have made up their mind thanks to Family First!
Kids nowadays can watch violent porn, search how to kill themselves and how to get thin on line but people can’t smoke pot more double standards
Well, perhaps they can go and smoke put and do all those other things at the same time?
‘Why are we such a damaged, uptight and deeply repressed people?’
Richard Alpert aka Ram Dass said
‘Police create hippies, hippies create police.’
I’d say the ‘roots’ of NZ wowser cylture go back to colonial victorian christians looking down their noses at the proclivaties of ‘heathen’ Maori.
Like surfing being banned in Hawaii due to Hawaiians going out in the water half naked, much of NZ’s Ohio-like moral righeousness is a product of a clash of two distinct cultures, galvanising the winning side into an uptight moral righteousness that it imposes on the loser.
In the end the winning side pays an equal and reciprocal like price in terms of being neurotic gate keepers, constantly worried and in protective mode. The brain chemicals released when they enforce their addiction create a dopamine loop reinforcement. No chance for adaptation, learned moderation and the learning of balanced and harmonious habits.
Looks as though Bomber loses on issues.
Me, I come out winning one and losing the other.
Sightly disappointing because I would want both reforms to pass. But the less important reform can wait, its time will come.
….the first country to not legalise…..
thats going to look good innit?
Don’t complain, you have your work cut out, go and convince the public, so the trend of opponents is reversed, perhaps.
I wonder how many landlords in this country of fast growing renters will be happy with their tenants being allowed to smoke pot? If they can refuse tenants have a dog, maybe they can also refuse to have them consume marihuana?
Or maybe landlords should just mind their own bloody business?
Thing is, it’s not just about getting stoned, some of us rely on this plant as the only means of pain treatment & for that we are criminals!!
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