I think the Doctor will be leaving Laaandaan just in time, before this madness spreads to other boroughs...
You don’t have to wait for the psychoactive substances bill to become law for the absurd spectacle of its enforcement.
If you want a quick preview of what happens when society truly loses its mind over drugs, pop down to Lambeth after August 17th,
when they’ll be imposing a ‘public spaces protection order’
banning…. well, pretty much everything.
A press release by Lambeth council focuses almost exclusively on laughing gas – a basically harmless substance which causes very mild euphoria for a minute or so. It adds:
“There have been 57 separate reports by police regarding legal highs in the borough over the last 12 months with incidents including robbery, theft, anti-social behaviour and sexual assault.”
The idea that someone is committing robbery or sexual assault because of laughing gas – either in some drug-addled frenzy or to feed their non-existent addiction to a non-addictive drug – is almost laughable. Except of course the moral implications of these sorts of easy, dim-witted statements are perverse. It suggests that those who rob or commit sexual assault are somehow less responsible for their action, because of the mystical influence of these terrible new drugs. It’s utter pish, but pish which removes the full moral culpability of those who commit real crime. And by crimes I mean the old fashioned sort – things which are actually real and wrong and banned by legislation after a debate between elected representatives in parliament.
Because none of the major parties have the bravery or the sense to oppose this comically illiberal nonsense, it’s up to smaller fringe ones like the Pirate party to issue statements criticising it. Here’s Mark Chapman of its Lambeth division doing what the major parties should be doing if they retained any basic comprehension or conviction:
“This is a totally disproportionate response to a genuine problem of anti-social behaviour and litter and highlights the absurdity which follows from the government’s widely-ridiculed psychoactive substances bill.
"Clearly I don’t really believe that the police are going to be targeting churches using incense, or stopping DIY shops selling glue – but the fact that these activities will become illegal in Lambeth and are just not being enforced highlights the chilling effect that such draconian legislation has.
"We see only too well with incidents in the past that the police need to enforce the law without fear or favour – and not just target those whom they don’t like for whatever reason.”
I’m tempted to put Chapman’s hypothesis to the test. Perhaps we should all show up to the police station in Lambeth with paint and demand to be arrested. Let’s see how committed they are to this nonsense.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/comment/talki ... ml#pnaFsf5
Crazy new laws, The law is supposed to protect people from other people, not strangle people's freedom of choice. .
Technically this law is illegal and non enforceable.
