On Mon, 7 Dec 1998 22:34:35 -0000, [log in to unmask] wrote:
>If tobacco products were not available ... [snip]
I have been following this debate about drugs, legal, illegal,
recreational and the outlawing or inlawing of them.
I have been wondering too that every civilisation I know of since we
lost a rib (only teasing!) has had to have its own kind of addiction.
On a slightly different track, in some parts of the world, for example,
cocaine is the only drug available to treat *everything* with and there
is a drug rep with a bundle of shiny broooshooores for a 1000 miles.
It seems to me that humans *need* a 'drug' of some description. If you
look back through history, this holds true for every human age. Almost
all drugs of addiction are to be found in abundance in nature at large.
It seems to me that this (western civilisation) has decided that
alcohol is going to be the socially acceptable addiction reliever (on
the whole); with tiny sections of society deciding to rely on other
forms of relief that the rest of us have decided to outlaw
(arbitarily).
Where does that leave things? Well, to my mind, leave things as they
are. In a couple thousand years, there will be another form of drug
addiction and the rest will be outlawed.
"If tobacco products were not available", we would've invented or
discovered something.
Ahmad
---------------------------------
Dr Ahmad Risk
Editor Health Informatics Europe
http://hi-europe.co.uk
Tel: +44 1273 321805
Fax: +44 1273 774614
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