What I said was, “No, what should be banned is the public commission of that which society might willingly tolerate when performed in private”.
I assume by “drug use” you're speaking of use outside medical need. And with that I am not O.K. with legal or not.
“No, that proves only that those individuals who make both arguments are false and deceptive. Those, like me, who argue for the former and against the latter are entirely consistent.”
On what basis would you argue for differentiating the former from the latter? It is indeed the the argument that is false and deceptive as the argument for toleration or legality was privacy and the argument for not keeping private acts private was a right to recognition as a public right and legality.
“Support for medical marijuana, which has well established medical usefulness, doesn't imply support for legal recreational use - any more than support for opiate painkillers by prescription implies support for legal recreational use of those substances.”
In practice it largely does. Medical marijuana becomes legal and suddenly thousands of people have a medical condition that only marijuana will relieve.
Opiates are not treated as casually by the public as marijuana. Tell a parent their kid smoked a joint and they might be angry, tell that same parent their kid is knocking back a pint of paregoric and their reaction will almost certainly be alarm.
Then public displays of these private acts might violate the “natural rights” of the public?
“Which is why I'm not arguing for legalizing them in public”
Then by definition legalizing public displays of what is tolerated when kept private,”victimless crimes”, makes victims of the public, something I believe you called invented rights.
So you're OK with legality of private drug use?
I assume by “drug use” you're speaking of use outside medical need. And with that I am not O.K. with legal or not.
Your "legal or not" confuses me - my question was whether you're OK with legality of private drug use, not whether you're OK with private drug use itself.
No, that proves only that those individuals who make both arguments are false and deceptive. Those, like me, who argue for the former and against the latter are entirely consistent.
On what basis would you argue for differentiating the former from the latter?
Very simple: in public, some acts can infringe on the rights of others who are also in public, while in private this is not the case.
It is indeed the the argument that is false and deceptive as the argument for toleration or legality was privacy and the argument for not keeping private acts private was a right to recognition as a public right and legality.
If two different people make those two different arguments, how is either of them "deceptive"?
Support for medical marijuana, which has well established medical usefulness, doesn't imply support for legal recreational use - any more than support for opiate painkillers by prescription implies support for legal recreational use of those substances.
In practice it largely does. Medical marijuana becomes legal and suddenly thousands of people have a medical condition that only marijuana will relieve.
Straw man. Who claims that ONLY marijuana relieves those conditions? That's not a requirement of any medical marijuana statute I know of.
And even those alleged "thousands" are a small fraction of the adult population, so legal medical marijuana falls far short of full adult legalization.
Opiates are not treated as casually by the public as marijuana. Tell a parent their kid smoked a joint and they might be angry, tell that same parent their kid is knocking back a pint of paregoric and their reaction will almost certainly be alarm.
And rightly so - opiates are more addictive and more dangerous. The fact remains that support for opiate painkillers by prescription doesn't imply support for legal recreational use of those substances, and by the same token support for medical marijuana doesn't imply support for legal recreational use.
Then public displays of these private acts might violate the “natural rights” of the public?
Which is why I'm not arguing for legalizing them in public.
Then by definition legalizing public displays of what is tolerated when kept private, ”victimless crimes”, makes victims of the public, something I believe you called invented rights.
Yes, the "right" to commit perverted acts in public is an invented "right" (like your invented “right to work beside someone who is not shaking and sweating from the meth he took so he could work eighteen hours straight”). Do you think you're in some way contradicting me?
the fact that alcohol is often used to impair judgment and ability leaves you with a very thin reed on which to hang your claimed distinction from other drugs - particularly when one notes that impairment was the whole purpose of alcohol use when that mind-altering drug was illegal.
Not so, not so. Wine at meals and celebrations has been a tradition long before there was a U.S. or Prohibition.
Getting drunk dates back as far - your reed remains thin.
Did you think those people suddenly headed to a speakeasy to get drunk just because of Prohibition?
No, I know they were acting on the age-old tradition of getting drunk - your reed remains thin.