[Vision2020] "Please do not continue to confuse people with facts."

[Ted Moffett]

Just the "facts"... whatever a "fact" is... There is often disagreement on
this basic issue, of course, from philosophers, theologians, politicians,
economists... It seems scientists have a better handle on the nature of
facts... Unlike apologists for religious superstition and irrationality who
suggest theology is equal or superior to science as a method for attaining
knowledge of the external world.

Amazing how disagreement among scientists is declared a reason to question
their legitimacy and credibility, according to some religious
fundamentalists, yet the blatant disagreement among theologians about the
nature of God, and interpreting revelation of absolute truth in religious
texts, is discounted as a reason for caution in espousing religious
dogmatism

But is it morally justifiable or attainable or even desirable to undermine
humanity's illusions?  Humanity needs illusions, don't you think?  Cultures
need scapegoats to blame their problems on, just as they need myths to deal
with the grief and finality of death, to explain the mysteries of the
natural world, and to scare people into obeying moral laws (hell).

Illusions cushion hard realities of life that cause psychological
suffering.  Some of humanity's illusions might be viewed as intellectual or
ideological anti-depressants.  Also, take away scapegoats and myths and
people can't be controlled as easily by leaders using fear and blame.  Can't
have that, now can we?  Do we want society to degenerate into anarchy?

Scapegoats abound, depending on your point of view: Communists, Jihadists,
homosexuals, socialists, feminists, humanist atheists, right-wing religious
extremists, left-wing academics, colonial capitalists, eco-extremists,
Hispanics or African-Americans, evil drug users and foreign drug cartels et.
al., even Canadians and their nationalized health care, which is now being
exploited in the media as an example of the disaster that will happen with
Obama's health care reform.

Orwell was correct.  Endless wars (war on drugs, for example) and
scapegoats are useful for social control.

Mainstream drug addicts using tobacco and alcohol and medically
"sanctioned" pharmaceuticals (Rush Limbaugh, and his hired help on the
streets for contraband Oxycontin), can blame those evil cocaine, cannabis,
heroin and meth users et. al. for crime and moral decay.  Colombian cocaine
drug cartels, Mexican cannabis and meth, and Afghanistan poppy is foreign
evil, spreading drug addiction and terrorism.

So what if alcohol is associated with more violent crime (domestic violence,
rape, battery, etc.) than any other drug, and domestic tobacco causes the
premature death of hundreds of thousands annually?  Forget these facts!  The
US tobacco cartels and Jack Daniels are red, white and blue!  And Joe Camel
was a cartoon for our entertainment, not an appalling ad campaign to sell
the addictive drug tobacco to children.

Law enforcement needs to focus on serious crime, not trying to lower the
death rate from the number one cause of premature death, tobacco addiction!
Illusions, indeed!  Serious crime? Billions spent in Columbia on the cocaine
drug war, while US tobacco cartels deal their drug in every US city.  Facts?

So what if bar workers allegedly end up with heart disease or lung cancer
from exposure to tobacco on the job; there could be numerous causes for
this.

There are tobacco scientists that claim that tobacco is not that bad.  As
long as you can find one scientist that questions something, we just can't
know for sure, like that politicized propaganda about humans altering
climate... Scientific consensus?  Just politics and conformism.  Divine
revelation is absolute.  Just ask the tens of millions in the US who believe
the Bible is literal certain truth.  The Earth is a few thousand years old,
evolution is false, gays are evil, and so forth... Harmless beliefs that
deny facts?  Or?

And if tobacco does make bar workers sick, they made this choice of their
own "free will," whatever that is (no one can figure this out...), given
genetics and cultural conditioning, exposure to tobacco in childhood,
and other deterministic factors in life... Anyway, early death lowers the
burden on social security, so there are societal benefits to dying young.
Tobacco is a social security cost saving plan.

Of course, trying to enforce smoking restrictions is a waste of time and
money, they are unenforceable, like laws against murder (do I need to spell
it out?) and stealing (Madoff), or the principles of the Geneva Conventions,
against torture (US torture campaign during the Bush administration).  Look
at what a failure they are!

Besides, having to go outside in inclement weather to patronize a bar is
surely unreasonable, as is asking smokers to step outside!  Last winter on a
cold wet day, given the lack of convenient parking in downtown Moscow
(the suffering bar goers must endure!), I had to actually walk (can you
believe it?) several blocks in the cold and wet just to get to John's
Alley!  It must have been at least five minutes of exposure to the harsh
winter elements.  How can they expect to attract customers in these
conditions?

I protested to the Idaho Human Rights commission (just joking...).  They
insisted they would consider a court case regarding discrimination against
bar patrons (are they not a protected minority?), and the human
rights abuses in forcing tobacco smokers into harsh outdoor weather to
manage their addiction, when they should have safe and comfortable
accommodations to administer their drug.

Outdoor covered areas with those nifty infrared heaters might be a
solution, mandated by law to be within 20 feet of all bar entrances to keep
smokers warm and dry.  And buses to take bar goers from home to the bar and
back, with front door service on both ends, like children bused to school,
could be mandated by law, for a modest fee.  Drunk driving reduced!  Isn't
one life saved worth the cost?

Seriously though, bar owners/operators will likely act as the primary
enforcers of the smoking ordinance.  If a patron is smoking, they can ask
the patron to leave.  Bars can 86 anyone they want, its private property,
and if they don't comply, they are trespassing, correct?  From my
observations, bar operators often ask patrons causing problems to leave
before calling the police, except in special cases.  That's why bars have
bouncers... I've generally thought it best not to argue with a bouncer.

Consider the significant number of people who, if they thought they could
get away with it, would light up a joint in the bars?  Why don't they?  If
there is no practical way to enforce a smoking ban, what stops cannabis
smoking in bars?  Or on the sidewalks in downtown Moscow?

Ted Moffett

On 7/27/09, Joe Campbell <philosopher.joe at gmail.com> wrote:


>  Very interesting stuff, Ted. Thanks!
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Jul 26, 2009, at 6:49 PM, Ted Moffett <starbliss at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>  While I think government regulation of addictive drug use in the
> workplace (tobacco in bars, in this case) that has dramatic negative health
> impacts, when employees sometimes breathe the drugs continuously during
> their shift, is reasonable, I have doubts about restricting outdoor tobacco
> use.  For one thing, this is not occurring in the workplace (unless the bar
> happens to be outdoors), and outdoor use of tobacco does not concentrate the
> smoke as use indoors.
>
> But the twenty foot ban on smoking outside entrances to bars in Moscow does
> not make it hard to find a spot to smoke outside some bars.  Consider John's
> Alley.  Along the sidewalk in front of the Alley to the east is the south
> wall of the Moscow Food CO-OP.  There are no entrances along this wall.
> Twenty feet to the east from the south entrance to John's Alley is within a
> quick few steps of a "legal smoke zone."
>
> Anyway, drugs, sex, politics, economics and religion are main subjects
> (what else?) that it seems are difficult sometimes to approach rationally
> and factually...
>
> What drugs are determined to be "hard" or "soft" is often not based on
> objective medical knowledge, and the legal status of illegal/legal drugs is
> sometimes not based on the rational application of medical science and
> sociology.  Isn't cannabis criminalization an example?
>
> Alcohol in quantities easy to consume induces dramatic impairment of mind
> and body (and can kill, as the sad case of the U of I student who overdosed
> on alcohol last spring reveals:
> http://www.kxly.com/Global/story.asp?S=10258470  ), that use of
> methamphetamine or cocaine, for contrast, will not, though long term abuse
> of these drugs will impair function and injection makes overdosing a
> risk.  Who injects alcohol?  Is this possible?  However, alcohol is the
> number one drug associated with violent crime.
>
> One of the signs of cocaine or methamphetamine use/abuse is increased
> efficiency on the job, which is not associated with alcohol use.  And the
> rates of vehicle accidents from cocaine or methamphetamine use is not very
> high, unlike alcohol, which being a depressant reduces reaction time and
> coordination.  Soldiers use methamphetamine for critical times in battle, to
> increase their performance or stay awake.  Alcohol can also be physically
> addictive, and damaging to health (liver).  It could therefore be classified
> as a "hard" drug, as cocaine and methamphetamine sometimes are.
>
> Though tobacco use usually does not induce the radical impairments of
> mental and physical function that alcohol does immediately after a few
> drinks, it (nicotine) can induce profound physical addiction; and the long
> term health damage is severe, which is why, combined with tobacco's
> widespread availability and use, tobacco is the leading cause of premature
> death.  Nicotine can also easily kill due to an overdose, if injected into
> the blood stream, but tobacco smoking makes this outcome nearly impossible,
> from what I have read.
>
> Tobacco is insidious because a user can become addicted for years, with
> minimal impairment of function (unless having high standards for
> performance, as an athlete would) before the most serious health impacts
> manifest (cancer and respiratory diseases, etc.).  People often seem to
> tolerate "smokers cough," and the smell.  Alcohol's impairment of
> functioning soon after a significant dose is a discouragement to abuse,
> as some U of I freshmen every year, apparently lacking in experience,
> discover after a night at the bars, leaving their dinner on the sidewalk, a
> rite of passage for youth, some might claim...
>
> If physical addiction and either radical impairment of functioning or very
> serious negative health impacts on large numbers of people defines a "hard"
> drug, tobacco would be the number one candidate, among drugs commonly used,
> with alcohol second.
>
> Heroin is highly addictive, but does not cause the extent of health
> problems tobacco does, or at least not directly from only the effects of the
> drug; and I don't mean because heroin is used much less than tobacco.  This
> statement will raise eyebrows, but this is because people have not studied
> the objective medical science, and are conditioned by socially constructed
> myths about drugs and their effects.  Of course overdosing on heroin is
> fatal, but the negative health impacts of heroin use are often due to
> impurities in the drug, needles used incorrectly, and the life style of
> addiction.  This is one argument for decriminalzing heroin (with regulation,
> of course), given criminalization encourages many of the behaviors that are
> damaging from heroin addiction.  Doctors who have had access to high quality
> heroin, who know how to administer it, and avoid overdosing, and are
> financially secure, have been heroin addicts for years, reliably carrying on
> their medical practice with their addiction in secret. Below read an animal
> study comparing cocaine to heroin; the effects of cocaine were clearly more
> damaging than heroin:
>
> http://wings.buffalo.edu/aru/ARUreport06.htm
> --------
>
> It is rather amazing that five Nobel Prize winning US authors were
> alcoholics, with some of them claiming alcohol had a "stimulating" effect on
> their writing skills.  Info on this issue is from this excellent and
> fascinating book, a great read:
>
> http://www.slushpile.net/index.php/2005/09/06/bod-the-thirsty-muse/
>
> Today’s Book-of-the-Day is *The Thirsty Muse: Alcohol and the American
> Writer* by Tom Dardis. The book examines the influence of alcohol on so
> many American authors. And the list is incredibly long. Five of the seven
> (at the time of publication) American Nobel laureates–Sinclair Lewis, Eugene
> O’Neill, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, and John Steinbeck–were
> alcoholic. Similarly afflicted writers include Jack London, Edna St. Vincent
> Millay, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Hart Crane, Thomas Wolfe, Dashiell Hammett,
> Dorothy Parker, Ring Larnder, Djuna Barnes, John O’Hara, Tennessee Williams,
> Carson McCullers, James Jones, John Cheever, Truman Capote, Raymond Carver,
> Robert Lowell, and James Agee.
>
> ------------------------------------------
>
> Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett
>
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