Naivety in a Nutshell

Like many people across New Zealand, I watched the article on 60 Minutes about the boy who spent several weeks in intensive care thanks to BZP*.

Nobody's going to doubt that drugs can do bad things to all different types of people, but we should face the facts. The rate of drug usage in this country isn't going to automatically go down with a simple ban on BZP. Instead, it just drives usage underground. Instead of being controlled by the free market, the drugs are controlled by the gangs in this country, who are already extremely notorious. And drug usage becomes more of a "Ooh, this is a bad thing to do-lets do it!" taboo with New Zealand's children. Even if BZP had already been banned, the teenager affected in the article would've still gotten his hands on BZP, one way or another. I fight the War on the War on Drugs on the principle that banning things doesn't make them go away-it just makes them go underground. Ultimately, it's an adults choice what to put into their bodies-with them taking the full consequences of that decision.

Anybody who thinks otherwise-that banning drugs makes them go away- is a very naive person. I shouldn't need to provide examples, as anybody with a modicum of sense knows what they are.

*It was, in fact, the boy's own choice what he put into his body, and now he has to pay the price.