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incandescentia · 4 months ago

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Ⓐ for either Sion or Killian!! ^^

@pretty-little-teacup | 𝐒𝐞𝐧𝐝 Ⓐ 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬 ( accepting! )

Killian -> Tea

Attractiveness:

repulsive || hideous || ugly || not attractive || unappealing || not unattractive || meh || no preference || ok || mildly attractive || nice looking || cute || adorable || attractive || pleasant on the eyes || good looking || hot || sexy || beautiful || gorgeous || hot damn || would tap that || perfect || godlike || holy fuck there are no words

Personality:

grating || irritating || frustrating || boring || confusing at best || awkward || unreasonable || psychotic || disturbing || interesting || engaging || affectionate || aggressive || ambitious || anxious || artistic || bad tempered || bossy || charismatic || appealing || unappealing || creative || courageous || dependable || unreliable || unpredictable || predictable || devious || dim || extroverted || introverted || egotistical || gregarious || fabulous || impulsive || intelligent || sympathetic || talkative || up beat || peaceful || calming || badass || flexible

How likely they would have sex with them:

not if they were the last person on earth and the world was ending || fuck no! || never || no way || not likely || not sure || indifferent || I’m asexual || maybe || probably || it depends || fairly likely || likely || yeah sure || yes || would tap that || hell yes || fuck yes! || wishing that could happen right now || as many times as possible || we are already having sex

Level of Friendship:

never in a million years || worst of enemies || enemies || rivals || indifferent || neutral || acquaintance || friendly toward each other || casual friends || friends || good friends || best friends || fuck buddies || bosom buddies || practically the same person || would die for them || true friends || my only friend ||

First impression of them:

I hate them so much || I don’t like them || I don’t trust them || they annoy me || they’re weird || I’m indifferent || meh || they seem alright || they’re growing on me || truce || I think I like them || I like them || I’m not sure if I trust them || I trust them || they’re cool || they’re genuine || I think we’re going to get along || I really like them || I think I’m in love || oh fuck they’re hot || I love them

Current impression of them:

How good of a kisser:

worst kisser ever || terrible || bad || awkward || just okay || alright || pretty good || good || makes me moan || excellent || exciting || oh god they’re good || I dream about it || fucking amazing || absolute perfection || we haven’t kissed (but likely no)

Sion -> Tea

Attractiveness:

Personality:

How likely they would have sex with them:

Level of Friendship:

First impression of them:

Current impression of them:

How good of a kisser:

#pretty-little-teacup #★ — 𝙨𝙚𝙖𝙡𝙚𝙙 & 𝙨𝙞𝙜𝙣𝙚𝙙 & 𝙙𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙚𝙙. ( answered )#♞ — 𝙥𝙚𝙜𝙖𝙨𝙞𝙖𝙣 𝙖𝙨𝙘𝙚𝙣𝙩. ( killian )#✜ — 𝙙𝙧𝙞𝙛𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙨𝙩𝙧𝙖𝙮𝙨𝙝𝙖𝙙𝙚. ( sion )

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the-lincyclopedia · 2 years ago

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10 fic tag game!

Rules: Pick ten of your fics, scroll to somewhere in the middle, pick a chunk of lines, and share it! Then tag ten people, if you’d like.

Thanks for the tag, @khashanakalashtar! I tag @cricketnationrise, @the-knights-who-say-book, @carryonsimoncarryonbaz, @doggernaut, @birlcholtz, @weneedtotalkaboutfic, @parvuls, @dexsbruins, @hoeratius, and @worldsentwined.

Unlike Kieran, who did a spread of years’ worth of fic, I exclusively used fics from the past four months, because I’ve been posting a LOT of (mostly very short) fics lately. This covers three fandoms, namely The Queen’s Thief, Check Please, and Boyfriend Material.

The Unlikely Friendship between the King of Attolia and his Favorite Guard - The Queen’s Thief, 2.5k, outsider POV on Gen & Costis, rated T, December 2022

After several seconds of silence, the king reaches out his right arm until his hook is right in front of me. “Touch it,” he says, and, though his voice is gentle, I recognize this as an order from my sovereign.

It’s not just the point of the hook that’s sharp, it turns out. The entire edge is essentially a razor. “You killed the assassins,” I say.

The king nods and then sighs. “I wish people had a little less trouble believing that.”

“Do you?” Ormentiedes asks. “Would you wish to be seen as just as bloodthirsty as the queen?”

Attolis sighs again. “No, admittedly not.”

When Lucia Day Dawns - Check Please, 1k, Louis character study, rated T, December 2022

Honestly, the details of this concert had eaten Lukas’s free time all semester, and he was pretty sure by now that he’d made a terrible mistake and should have just given a recital.

And then he played his pitch pipe and the choir started singing.

“Sankta Lucia” was such a classic Lucia song that Lukas had heard it a million times, but somehow his tiny, mostly American choir managed to bring out something new in it. “Lusse lella” and “Staffan stalledräng” were just fun little ditties, nothing profound, but they gave Lukas—and, seemingly, the rest of the choir—a jolt of energy and fun and wakefulness that they needed right at the beginning of the concert. “Ett barn är fött på denna dag,” “Hosianna Davids son,” and “Dotter Sion” soared in exactly the right ways, the harmonies locking in perfectly.

had the shiniest wheels (now they’re rusting) - Check Please, 769 words, Jack & Shitty, rated T, December 2022

Jack gave a quiet snort but didn’t smile. “I just—I’m worried that I’ll never again be as impressive as I was when I was a suicidal teenager. And I’m worried that I only did as well as I did back then because I was a suicidal teenager.”

Shitty decided that this conversation was probably better had in private, so he squeezed past Jack, into Jack’s room, and sat down on Jack’s bed. “What kind of bullshit logic got you to that conclusion?”

Jack closed the door and sat down next to Shitty. “I don’t think it’s bullshit logic. Back when I wanted to kill myself, I was willing to take risks that I’m not willing to take anymore, both with plays and with my body, with training. It paid off.”

“Yeah, in the short term,” Shitty broke in, even though it didn’t seem like Jack was done. “You know you can’t build a lasting career on treating your body like that. You’re smarter now, more strategic. That’s a good thing.”

First Date Jitters - The Queen’s Thief, 871 words, Costis/Kamet, rated T, November 2022

“Yes, it’s okay that you’re paying,” Kamet said. “I’m sorry for not answering that question earlier. It was a surprise, but not an unwelcome one. And you just used the word ‘unilateral,’ so I refuse to believe you’re too dumb to be anything other than a jock.”

Costis shrugged. “I just have smart friends. It rubs off on me occasionally.”

“I think that counts. Or do you think knowledge only counts as knowledge when it springs directly into your brain without any interaction with anyone else?”

this love is difficult (but it’s real) - The Queen’s Thief, 3.7k, Costis/Kamet, rated T, October 2022

Gen grimaced. “I’m sorry. That sucks. Is this because of Costis, or is it because of . . . you know, him?”

Kamet scowled. “It’s because of Nahuseresh. But like—how am I ever supposed to trust anyone again? Especially when I have no recourse if something goes wrong. It’s not like anyone would believe me if I tried to report abuse.”

“I would believe you,” Gen said immediately. “Even if it were Costis.”

“Yeah, but what good would that do?”

“You know I got Sejanus Erondites expelled last year, right? I have my ways, and I’d help you. I promise.”

Five Times People Thought Irene and Helen Were Dating and One Time Everyone Knew They Weren’t - The Queen’s Thief, 3.4k, Irene & Helen, rated T, October 2022

When Helen exited the classroom, she turned to Irene and said, “So, everyone thought you were breaking up with me just now.”

“What?” said Irene, standing up. “But—what?”

Helen laughed and rolled her eyes. “Think about what you said when you stuck your head in the classroom.”

Irene frowned. “I just told you that I was done meeting about my group project.”

“Sure, I knew that’s what you meant,” Helen allowed. “But what you actually said was, ‘Helen, we’re done.’”

every day i wake up and suspect that i was simply never cut out to be the kind of person they expect - Boyfriend Material, 1k, Luc/Oliver, rated T, October 2022

“When I was fourteen my mother told me that I never planned ahead,” Oliver says with barely any hesitation.

“What?” Luc demands. “That’s ridiculous! You plan everything! You phone ahead for dinner reservations and make bircher to eat for breakfast all week and always make sure you know what you’re going to say in court. How could she think you never planned ahead?”

“I don’t know,” Oliver replies. “Ever since she said that, every time I’ve found myself planning ahead for something, I’ve felt all confused, like, how can I be doing this thing that my mother says I don’t do?”

“That sounds deeply unpleasant to have to deal with,” Luc says, “but also, how did that not make you realize she was wrong?”

Lay All Your Love on Me - The Queen’s Thief, 14k, Gen/Irene and Helen/Sophos and lots of Gen & Helen & Irene & Sophos, rated T, October 2022

Eugenides shrugged. “Okay then. But I’m going to keep acting the way I act.”

Irene rubbed her forehead. “It would be so much better for all of us if you could just be more diplomatic.”

“You don’t have to bring me on tours,” Eugenides said. “I don’t have to be part of the band. You get a say in that. But you don’t get to control my behavior.”

“Gen,” said Helen, tone dangerous. “Surely there’s a difference between controlling you and asking you not to sabotage this thing that all of us are trying very hard to build.”

Welcome to Fandom - Boyfriend Material, 1.8k, Luc/Oliver, rated T, September 2022

Can I call you? Luc asked.

Well, that wasn’t what Oliver had expected. I’m on the Tube. Why? Is something wrong?

Nothing’s wrong, said Luc, and then: Actually, can I come over?

Lucien, you’re scaring me.

I’m sorry, Luc said. After the typing bubbles had appeared and disappeared intermittently for at least a full, anxiety-producing minute, there came: I’m not upset with you, no one is dying, and I don’t expect this to have any consequences for our relationship. Just file this under Shit About Luc That Lives On The Internet. I promise not to hide in the bathroom this time.

Care - Boyfriend Material, 2.6k, Luc/Oliver, rated G, September 2022

“I really would rather be there for you and wind up ill than do neither.”

“I’m . . . not familiar with that logic.”

“Let me guess—your parents confined you to your room when you were ill as a kid and spent as little time around you as possible to limit the chance of contagion?”

“Lucien, can you please not try to start an argument about my parents’ choices while I feel like my head is going to explode?”

“Sorry, baby. Can I come round after work?”

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losangelesleftygayvoters · 6 years ago

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Ballot Measures

General Election November 6, 2018

State Measure 1: YES

The most California Measure ever. Essentially, YES on Prop. 1 means affordable housing for veterans, working families, seniors, people with disabilities, and Californians experiencing homelessness from California’s severe housing crisis. And interestingly, Prop. 1 doesn’t raise taxes, it authorizes the state to borrow $4 billion by selling bonds for housing programs. The argument is that the housing shortage stemming from the influx of millions to California requires bigger solutions. Sure. But again, veterans, Habitat for Humanity, Congress of CA Seniors, Coalition to End Domestic Violence, and BOTH POLITICAL PARTIES agree. In fact, the only person (singular) publicly opposed to this measure is a dude named Gary B. Wesley who vowed forty years ago that he’d oppose every measure brought to the people forever no matter what. Good for you, Gary, you’re a man of your word.

State Measure 2: YES

A “yes” on 2 authorizes money from the Mental Health Services Act to be spent on housing for homeless people with mental health issues. The main arguments against the measure are that money spent on housing, even if for homeless people suffering from mental illness, is spent on housing and NOT on mental health; and that the measure would, by necessity, soak up funds from organizations and actions intended to deal with mental health directly. But, by percentage, the population in California suffering most rampantly from mental health issues is the homeless, and studies, experts, and common sense all support the idea that to treat mental illness effectively, you need to be able to find the patients. So money spent on housing the mentally ill is essentially the most basic element of their treatment. The secondary argument is that housing will suck up funds for other mental illness programs, which is correct. The LA Times says the percentage of money the housing measure would actually suck up is small, but they don’t provide a hard figure. Vote your conscience here (as everywhere), but our conscience is saying the argument for outweighs this argument against. And again, endorsements out the wazoo, including from experts and organizations for the treatment of mental illness.

State Measure 3: YES

We’re gonna build some dams and water infrastructure. Great! We’re for that. We hope there will be water to store and move around, so we like the idea of making it easier and better to do so. And also, this bill is a little weird. It’s endorsed by Feinstein and a gang of environmental groups, but it’s opposed by the Sierra Club and a few others. Endorsed by the Fresno and Bakersfield papers, rebuked by LA Times (and nearly every other paper) for not spending the money where it should be spent, it’s one of those bills that doesn’t totally fix the problem of water (but it’s California, it’s been this way since Mulholland…). The rhetoric is so bonkers and thick and hard to process. Ultimately, for us it came down to the fact that it’s one of only two propositions to be endorsed by both parties.

State Measure 4: YES

This measure authorizes $1.5 billion in bonds, to be repaid from state’s General Fund, to fund grants for construction, expansion, renovation, and equipping of qualifying children’s hospitals. Fiscal Impact: Increased state costs to repay bonds averaging about $80 million annually over the next thirty-five years. This designates 72 percent of funds to qualifying private nonprofit hospitals providing comprehensive services to high volumes of children eligible for governmental programs and children with special health needs eligible for the California Children’s Services program, 18 percent of funds to University of California general acute care children’s hospitals, and 10 percent of funds to public and private nonprofit hospitals providing services to children eligible for the California Children’s Services program. Build children’s hospitals, team.

State Measure 5: NO

This is an impossibly confusing measure. It allows individuals over fifty-five to move from their current house to a new location, transferring their tax subsidies. This means that individuals that have lived in a house for thirty years, or a house in an area that has greatly increased in value, can sell their current home and move to another location under most likely a smaller tax. This sounds, yes, like a great thing! But, it turns out it disproportionately affects the poor and benefits individuals in a strong financial place, especially current homeowners. This does not fair well for those trying to enter the market. Currently, eligible homebuyers can transfer a tax assessment if their new home is of equal or lesser value. Also, individuals can do this only once in their lifetime. If the measure passes, it allows the wealthy to get out of paying taxes on moving in a way that is currently only allowed for certain individuals who need it. Nice try, 5, we’re wise to your shenanigans.

State Measure 6: NO

State Measure 6 is a bill that’s been pushed hard by Republican lawmakers and has the strong support of Paul Ryan, Devin Nunes, and that cadre of derpy dudes who want you to build your own roads because taxes are somewhat . . . who knows, immoral, we guess? Here’s how this came to be: in 2017, Jerry Brown and the state legislature passed gas taxes that are scheduled to generate $52.4 billion over the next ten years. And then a few months ago, we all voted on and passed Proposition 69, which dedicated all of that gas tax money to transportation infrastructure: roads and bridges and stuff. Measure 6 wants to basically undo all that AND require any new gas tax to have voter approval. Look, gas taxes aren’t percentage based on income, so they do disproportionately affect lower-income families. That legitimately does suck. And so, yes, Measure 6 does try to alleviate some of the cost of living to a lot of California’s working class by repealing taxes. Arguably, we agree with that. However, passing Measure 6 would cancel up to $5 billion in existing projects where we fix roads and bridges, and those infrastructure projects have yet to be funded at the federal level. There are an estimated 680,000 construction jobs that would be wiped out with the passage of Measure 6. And, we’ve voted on this before. A couple of times. This is an effort to undo what the majority has already agreed to in the past. Nope.

State Measure 7: YES

First and foremost, this isn’t a measure that will change Daylight Savings Time right now. It’s a measure that lets California lawmakers actually decide if they want to take that up IN THE FUTURE. They are currently unable to ever really discuss Daylight Savings Time because of the way the original vote went in 1949. Voting yes here means that the state is allowed to discuss it and possibly repeal it in the future. The idea of tweaking or abolishing Daylight Savings Time (or in some cases making it the only option) is up for discussion in a lot of places, and if changes elsewhere start happening, California would currently be unable to change with them. But, actually, it’s probably something we do want to consider. Yes, every time this comes up, critics say “but kids shouldn’t go to school when it’s dark out!” Fine, sure, but… get this. The time change is really bad for all of us! Rep. Kansen Chu (D-25), Rep. Lorena Gonzalez (D-80), and Sion Roy, a cardiologist, wrote this in the state voter information guide: “University medical studies in 2012 found that the risk of heart attacks increases by 10% in the two days following a time change. In 2016, further research revealed that stroke risks increase 8% when we change our clocks. For cancer patients the stroke risk increases 25% and for people over age 65 stroke risk goes up 20%. All because we disrupt sleep patterns.” So basically, a “yes” vote here will let us actually discuss a future in which we save time, hassle, daylight, and lives.

State Measure 8: NO

This is just about punishing non-union dialysis clinics. It would have a serious impact on patients and make it much more difficult for dialysis patients to receive care. There’s a lot of problems with it. We looked into it, and it just screws patients who want their kidneys to work better. Medical groups are ROUNDLY like, “please, no.” We’re with them.

State Measure 10: YES

This is a bill that hands the issue of rent control back to a more local level, rather than having a single mandated state policy. In 1995, California passed the Costa-Hawkins Act, which basically said that the state of California sets the limits on rent increases for homes occupied after 1995. There’s been some economic changes at very different rates in different parts of California since then. So Measure 10 repeals Costa-Hawkins and lets local governments decide for themselves how to regulate rent control. Measure 10 does not actually create new policy, it just says that new policy can be created at a local level, rather than a state level, which turns out to counterintuitively benefit a lot of marginalized groups. The measure has language that entitles landlords to fair-market-value rent—they just can’t jack up the price so high that it completely screws the tenants. You can imagine how peeps in the “survival of the fittest” crowd (and banks who’ve learned how to profit from foreclosure in the current system) feel about that. It’s a weird bill because it doesn’t actually give too much guidance to how to go forward, and even the Democratic gubernatorial candidate (Newsom) is against the measure, because while he does think there should be more affordable housing in California, completely repealing Costa-Hawkins feels a little fast and loose. That said, nursing organizations, teachers unions, and labor and Democratic organizations throughout the state are trying very hard to keep people in affordable housing. And this measure does provide a sense of relief to that. So, we say yes!

State Measure 11: YES

We spent a long time trying to figure this out. And basically the status quo is that when EMTs are on break, they are uninterrupted (though, like not always, sometimes they’re called to do things when not working). So, voting no preserves that. A yes vote means that going forward, EMTs will have to remain “on call” when they’re on break, but they will be paid for any of the time they end up working. They sort of already are, but it’s meant to streamline some labor laws. We sort of wanted to say you can vote for either thing, but a yes vote on Measure 11 also adds funding for additional training and mental health services for EMTs. After looking at a number of the different arguments in favor and opposed, we say vote for yourselves or ask your EMT friends (ours seemed ambivalent). But we think mental health services for ANY profession is good, so we vote yes.

State Measure 12: YES

Requires cage-free quarters for egg-laying chickens and other animals being raised for food. I mean, we’re all for not being assholes to chickens, so this seems to make sense. Yes, this is super problematic on a lot of levels and cage-free is WAY less cage-free than like “chicken in the wild”—and PETA is against this because they want us to stop eating animals altogether, but for now, getting chickens SOME kind of autonomy and making it slightly less cruel feels like a step toward getting us where we go.

City Amendment B: YES

Much like the Daylight Savings bill, this is another of those “let us at least let the people look into this” bills. It’s hard to know what would happen if it passes, but essentially the city would like to talk about what it would mean to establish a public bank. These exist in other countries like Brazil and Germany and here in the States in North Dakota (which was the only one seemingly untouched by the 2008 crisis). And the theory is that since the city spent $170 million last year in banking fees and $1.1 billion in interest, an LA-owned bank could possibly mitigate those costs. It’s a bold, progressive move and could have implications for the whole country. In the interest of allowing our elected officials to do their job, we say: “Sure! Talk about it!”

City—Municipal Charter Amendment E: YES

You already voted on this in a previous election, but then the state changed primaries from June to March, so they have to ask us to vote again. So we’re voting about voting—twice! This thing essentially aligns city election dates with state election dates. We know barely anyone gets out to vote as it is, so alignment is obviously a good idea, although it means less “I Voted” sticker posts on Instagram. :( This time the city included language that makes it unnecessary to put this back on the ballot if election dates change again. So here we go again, vote yes.

LAUSD Charter Amendment EE: YES

Right now the school district primary elections are on a different day than the rest of the state primary elections. Voting yes would amend the city charter to align Los Angeles Unified School District primary elections with the state primary elections in March of even-numbered years. So, yes.

County Measure W: YES

A “yes” on this measure will create a parcel tax* to pay for cleaning up the toxic runoff that accumulates as rainwater flows over city streets and other paved surfaces and ultimately ends up in the ocean. As it turns out, LA is pretty filthy—so filthy that we get fined for how dirty our storm water runoff is. So, the county would like to spend more money to build infrastructure to capture and clean up the toxins in storm water, plus ensure that water gets absorbed into the ground (rather than wastefully running off into the ocean or elsewhere). So the choice is to either to establish this tax to invest in projects for cleaner, more reliable water, or to spend billions in fines that drain police, fire, and other important budgets.

*From the LA Times: “The measure imposes a tax on property owners of 2½ cents per square foot of impermeable surface—meaning ground that is paved over or otherwise doesn’t let water pass through. That comes to about $83 a year for the average single-family homeowner.”

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xtruss · 5 years ago

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Leopold II is Part of the Uncomfortable Truth of Who We Are. We Can’t Erase Him

— 06/11/2020 | By Assita Kanko | EuroNews.Com

VIEW ǀ "When it comes to the statues of figures like Leopold II, I understand the frustrations and the anger at their daily presence. I understand the desire to avoid their glorification, and instead offer condemnation. But there is danger in cleansing our history to reflect who we wished we were, rather than who we actually have been." — Assita Kanko MEP

— Opinions expressed in View articles are solely those of the authors.

I was born in Burkina Faso. My grandparents told me stories of living under colonialism, and my young parents told me the stories their parents had told them. I grew up in a soci-ety where the weak grip upon democracy was created by the legacy of a struggling politi-cal system left in the wake of the French retreat.

The tragic death of George Floyd has prompted all of us to ask some difficult questions about who we are, and how the society around us was formed. Topics that were once confined to awkward conversations at the dinner table or debates within the corners of the academic world, have flooded the public consciousness in a way not seen since the civil rights protests of the 1960s.

The death of George Floyd has lit a powder keg of decades of social and economic ine-qualities and frustrations. The movement rose from grief and injustice like a phoenix from the ashes. It prompted much-needed conversations on societal bias, abuse of power, fail-ings in healthcare, education and policing. It took an issue that had impatiently waited generations to be discussed, and placed it on every newsfeed, every social media platform and in newspaper.

There is danger in cleansing our history to reflect who we wished we were, rather than who we actually have been. — Assita Kanko, MEP

Debates over how best to forge equality have always had the potential to divide rather than unite. While the vast majority of people have protested peacefully, there are those that seek to create a narrative of all black people are oppressed and all whites people are privileged. As grief morphed into protest, and protest morphed into anger and retribution, it’s been decided by some that heads should roll; stone heads that is.

It has been decided by some that certain historical figures no longer have a place in a vi-sion of a curated and sanitised version of our history. The problem with that is that it makes cartoon heroes and villains of people. It places Churchill in the same category as a slave trader and Leopold II in the same column as Pol Pot. As I sit and write this, dozens of police officers surround a statue of Churchill in order to prevent its destruction. Yet, it wasn’t Churchill that caused the biggest genocide in human history, or ensured that black people living in Nazi Germany were persecuted, alienated and murdered. No, Churchill helped bring that to an end.

In January this year, I visited Auschwitz. Its power will always haunt me; the hair, the shoes, the bitter cold. It taught me more about loss, sacrifice, and human dignity that no text book ever could. Although I knew its history, it was another thing to see it. It showed me that although parts of our history will make us uncomfortable and horrified, and at times make us question the very humanity that lives within us; their presence is needed.

After the atomic bomb hit the domed Hiroshima Prefectural Commercial Exhibition Hall, it somehow retained some of its walls and the steel frame of the dome. This structure quickly became a symbol of destruction, survival and rebuilding. The building is now the main attraction at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” but not only must we remember our history, we need to see it.

When it comes to the statues of figures like Leopold II, I understand the frustrations and the anger at their daily presence. I understand the desire to avoid their glorification, and instead offer condemnation. But there is danger in cleansing our history to reflect who we wished we were, rather than who we actually have been.

It should never be the place of mob rule to decide who makes the cut and doesn’t of our age-old story. In a democratic society, those decisions are a consequence of debate and collective decision-making. To destroy our history rather than contextualise it, would be a mistake. In a 280-character world, the debate on black lives matter, requires nuance.

— Assita Kanko, MEP

History is complicated. Our attitudes towards it will change and evolve with time. Through the prism of the present, with all of its progress and political correctness, many of our historical figures - and even our heroes - will be found to be flawed. Do we cease to read Voltaire, Shakespeare, Dickens or Melati van Java? With every passing day, we seek to argue over the merits of the past rather than try to understand its impact on the present, missing an opportunity to move forward.

Instead of throwing a can of red paint over a statue of a man most people probably didn’t know the name of a week ago, we should do more as a society to understand who these people are. We need to talk about how King Leopold drew some 220 million francs from the Congo during his lifetime, and how at the Expo 58 in Brussels, Congolese men, women and children were put on show in “traditional” dress behind a fence like a human zoo. Genocide, war and slavery are the dark shadows of our world history. It is a history that should never be forgotten, but one which mustn’t define us.

As a black woman, I have never been defined by words like diversity, inclusion and quotas. I am not the product of inadequate government policy, historical ignorance or online hate. I am the product of my own hard work and ambition, and my parents’ belief that the sky was the limit. If we wait for others to change in order to change our own lives, we are doomed to give away our own power and fall short of fulfilling our dreams.

We must teach our children that aspiration and tolerance are the weapons of choice when it comes to making your mark on the quest for change. We all need to show up, fight for what’s right, speak up against what is wrong, and play our part in creating a better world through the power of positivity and progress. So, how can we best honour George Floyd? By all of us being a better version of ourselves.

— Assita Kanko is a Belgian Member of the European Parliament for the New Flemish Alliance

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cloudfather · 7 years ago

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Marijuana Conspiracy

SHOULD anyone still believe that the use of marijuana is spreading because of the Mafia conspiracy or a Communist plot to sap the will of our youth, let me tell of a 40‐year‐old who tried it for the first time this summer. He is a major figure in the advertising world; but despite that fact, he seldom drinks liquor and never smokes cigarettes.

What led him to pot? His 14‐year‐old daughter gave him three miserably rolled joints for a Father’s Day present. He smoked only one of them in my presence and had to be taught by the others in his room how to inhale. The thing burned like a small bonfire (no one had told him to lick the cigarette before lighting it), making little explosions (un cleaned marijuana contains seeds that sometimes go “pop” when fire hits them) as the gentleman struggled to “swallow” the smoke. He nearly choked. I doubt that he’ll ever go near it again.

But he has now become part of the most rapidly growing estimated statistic officially issued by the United States Government. Last October, a Na tional Institute of Mental Health pamphlet made the “conservative estimate” that about 5 million juveniles and adults had used marijuana at least once. Five months later, in March, another N.I.M.H. pamphlet said that “more than 8 million people have used the drug.” Then, a month later, the N.I.M.H. reported to Congress that the number “conservatively was between 8 million and 12 mil lion.” In June, Dr. Stanley F. Yolles, then director of N.LM.H., used the figure 20 million. A standard projection curve suggests that by now one could easily find someone at N.I.M.H. willing to go for 25 or even 30.

OBVIOUSLY, the N.I.M.H. figures rely on some wild guesswork, but no one at all awake through out the last decade can doubt the direction in which they point. We Americans are using a lot more marijuana than we used to, and we will be using a lot more than that. It is now the very rare college student who has never tried the drug.

In New York and the outlying areas where day time New Yorkers go to sleep, high‐school students complain that they must either smoke or learn to enjoy solitude. A ninth‐grader in Scarsdale High School estimates that 50 per cent of her friends have tried marijuana and says that not infre quently it is smoked in the school (“like during fire drill, when we’re jammed into the vestibule between the cafeteria and the outside door”). She knows of seventh‐graders in Scarsdale who are smoking; children in New York private schools are aware of its use in sixth grade. Juvenile‐delin quency cases involving possession of marijuana get into the papers under datelines from Los Angeles to Hyannis Port.

This progression of marijuana down the age scale is extremely disturbing, and properly so, to adults. Marijuana, psychiatrists inform us, is a euphoriant and can be used as a rigid defense against the problems of growing up. It is unques tionable that a certain number of children have seriously damaged their personal development by habitually turning off their problems through drugs and never learning to solve them. Thirteen‐year‐olds who turn on at recess probably do them selves no more harm than 13‐year‐olds who get drunk at recess, but psychiatrists tend to find the prospects for both quite dismal.

In conjunction with that worrisome use of mari juana by younger and younger children, however, is its use by older and older adults. Marijuana long ago bridged the generation gap and has since been streaming across like the First Army at Remagen.

Undoubtedly, the most important reason for the sudden outbreak of marijuana use in the adult working world is that young people have grown older. The pot‐smoking art student of 1965 is the pot‐smoking art director of 1970. The pot‐smoking coed of last year is today’s pot‐smoking “assistant buyer of better dresses.” And Seventh Avenue is adjusting to her.

As she explains, “You go into a showroom, and there’s a straight set of salesmen for the old ladies, and they offer the old ladies a drink, but there are also hip salesmen, guys with real long hair and groovy clothes; and they just take you in the back and turn you on. In some of the houses the design ers, the models, everybody is spaced out of his mind. And sometimes they lay dope on you. They’re very cool about it. They come over while you’ve got your book out and you’re writing orders, and they say, ‘What do you do for kicks? Do you get high? I’ve got some very interesting stuff here,’ and they give you an ounce.”

A lot more marijuana‐smoking among adults can be explained as experimental in nature. As the father of three teen‐age girls recently told me, “I’ve now tried pot twice, just to see what the girls are up to. I wanted reassurance that it wouldn’t kill them.”

ONE would have to be a man of very little curiosity not to wonder what the mari juana experience is like. Enough authorities have now indicated that the drug does no apparent harm that the risk in trying it seems to many to be solely a legal one, and people do seem willing to risk the law’s wrath on this issue. A Nobel laureate re cently asked psychiatrist Lester Grinspoon, an advo cate of legalized marijuana sales, whether he could pro vide him with a few joints. Needless to say, Dr. Grin spoon couldn’t and didn’t; but the intellectual level of his petitioner was no surprise to him. He lists among the more enthusiastic older smokers in the Boston area “social scien tists and academic people, astronomers and physicists.”

But no single explanation such as “curiosity” covers the thousands of adults who five or six years ago feared and shunned marijuana but use it today. I’ve recently met en gineers, Wall Street brokers (one of whom, three years ago, threw his best friends out of his home for offering his wife a marijuana cigarette —the break between the two families has never been re paired) and film editors, all of whom were in their 30’s before trying the drug, but who now would rate them selves as regular users. One film editor uses it in place of all other possible drugs. It is his first cigarette of the morning, his coffee break, his martini, his sleeping pill. He nevertheless manages to function.

Statistics don’t exist on this matter, but it is this observ er’s impression that in New York marijuana is being used most widely by adults in the arts and the commercial arts, in the teaching profes sion (where it is argued that one could not conceivably understand the students if one did not grasp their highs), and in the “helping” profes sions. Four members of the New York Psychoanalytic So ciety recently agreed on the estimate that 95 per cent of their colleagues in their own age group (between 35 and 45) had experimented with marijuana and that many continued to use it from time to time. Moreover, to the best of their knowledge, all the psychiatrists under the age of 35 whom they personally knew, and certainly all of their own psychiatric resi dents, smoked pot regular ly, many of them daily Knowl edgeable Bostonians suggest that their psychoanalytic com munity is equally turned on.

The smoking of marijuana, in other words, can no longer be interpreted as a sign of alienation. Great numbers of pot smokers are very nicely adjusted to our society. They make love; they make money; and for that matter, reports from Vietnam indicate, they make war. (A study in Febru ary showed that one out of five front‐line soldiers smoked marijuana every day.)

THIS wide use of marijuana is plainly a new phenomenon, at least in the middle‐class East Coast culture. (On this sort of fad—if that is what it is—we generally tend to be two or three years behind California, two or three years ahead of Kansas.) It is caus ing people to ask themselves rather serious questions about their own morality and values. It is changing the nature of many social gatherings and, more important, it is affecting many social relationships, in cluding those of parent and child, husband and wife.

I have recently been talking with middle‐class adults about their own attitudes toward marijuana. I wanted to know why they were using it or not using it, and what it was do ing to their lives.

Marijuana is not new to all members of the middle class. Its use by some of them in the past, however, had something to do with slum ming. Throughout most of its long history, marijuana has been a cheap pleasure of the most downtrodden poor of the poorer nations. (“In Moroc co,” said a man raised there 50 years ago, “we’d see the servants smoking hashish [a stronger form of marijuana]—they were forbidden to smoke in The house—but no one who had servants would smoke.”)

When marijuana began to enter this country from Mex ico in the nineteen‐twenties, however, young people in the Southwest found it not only cheap and abundant, but good for laughs at parties. It is not at all hard to find people with pleasant memories of using “the weed” 45 years ago in Albuquerque. It is even easier to find others reminiscing happily about smoking “tea” in Greenwich Village in the thirties outside of Bohemia, marijuana tended to be found mostly in the black slums, where a number of white middle‐class boys ran into it because of their love for jazz.

For almost everyone who smoked, decades past, it was simply a means to a good time. “We didn’t make a mys tique or a religion of it,” said a woman editor who smoked in the nineteen‐thirties. “We were left‐wing artists and writers not at all mystically oriented.”

“It was a form of naughti ness,” explains a female phy sician of her high‐school days in the Village in the early nineteen‐fifties. “I went out with a black guitar player who brought it down from Harlem. He thought it made him Segovia; I just thought it was fun to do something il legal. But you know, I was too young to drink, too, and it was just as big a thrill to go into a bar and get served Scotch.”

“Also, adults then didn’t seem to get as clutched by the idea of their kids smoking pot as they do now. When I told my father, all he said was, ‘Just stay out of auto mobiles. The driver’s timing might be off.’ That was the extent of it.”

Many marijuana smokers of 20 or more years ago gave up the drug when they “no long er had friends in the jazz world,” or “went off to col lege,” or found that they had to put any effort at all into getting it. Many marijuana smokers appear to take pride in the fact that they have never bought it. Now that marijuana has become so easily available, many smok ers of years ago have returned to it.

It certainly can’t yet be said that marijuana has been accepted by the New York middle‐aged middle class. As was the case some years ago with the young, it is general ly thought to be the more politically progressive and possibly more intellectual of their elders who are currently smoking. Recently this writer met with a group of 30 Long Island parents (by ac cident almost all liberals) to discuss the pot situation on the North Shore and found them in agreement that in their part of the world there are absolutely no right‐of center adults who use it.

Psychoanalytic evidence might back up this concept. The four analysts with whom I’ve discussed the matter de scribe those among their pa tients who are most against marijuana as “rigid‐moralis tic,” “struggling to control their own impulses,” “meno pausal churchgoing,” “the peo ple who oppose sex education in the schools,” “the same people who never talk about sex.” But being in analysis at all suggests a certain adven turousness; and one analyst said, “Almost all those I’ve seen in their 20’s and 30's—even the conservative, rigid ones—have tried both sex and pot, though they might feel a bit guilty about both. It seems to me that my adult patients use pot very much the way I do: occasion ally at a party or just for the fun of it. They don’t use it the way the kids take it, which is every day or to solve prob lems or to deal with tension.”

IT does not really make sense, however, to view the marijuana issue as simply age related, or political, or a sign of good or poor mental health. Many people who oppose mar ijuana are frightened of it for intelligent reasons. Marijuana does have powerful effects on human beings. No one knows precisely how marijuana cre ates its effects and there is no certainty that its action is harmless. There have been sci entific reports from Arab coun tries describing a form of psy chosis traced directly to the use of hashish.

Most American researchers at the moment doubt the ex istence of a syndrome specific to the use of cannabis, and it is hard to find a New York psychiatrist who believes in it. This can be frustrating to any one who is convinced he is suffering from it. A young writer, who is awaiting the publication of his first novel, recently described his symp toms to me as “feeling as if I’ve been stoned for a long time, and now I’m almost down but not quite, and I’m tired, and I have a kind of trippy feeling and a slight dizziness; and nausea keeps coming and going. This has been going on for six weeks.” He blames it on three years of daily pot‐smoking, claims to have friends who have simi larly suffered from long‐time heavy marijuana use (and they have all given up the drug as a consequence) but who have not yet been able to come up with a physician who would blame their symptoms on anything more than “an xiety.” Said the writer, “The last fellow I saw told me that once my book was out and well‐reviewed I’d be my old self again.”

ALTHOUGH doctors, for the moment might tend to feel the cannabis psychosis is mythical, they do seem to agree that the use of mari juana could very well trigger a psychotic reaction in a person whose ego is already shaky. It might, however, be the case that this problem, too, is self‐limiting. A study that Dr. Grinspoon made of 41 acute schizophrenic college age patients admitted to his research ward bore out an im pression that he’d had before “that schizophrenic and pre schizophrenic people tend to stay away from the drug. Only six of them,” says Dr. Grinspoon, “had ever used marijuana, which is remark ably few for that age group. In four of them, it was clear that the onset of the psycho sis was so removed in time from the use of the drug that (the two) wouldn’t have been related; in the last two I was unable to say one way or the other. I couldn’t implicate or exonerate the drug. It stands to reason that a drug like this might precipitate psychosis. But putting it into perspective with other things, if you get someone who is psychosis prone or is prepsychotic, any number of things might do it, such as, let’s say, an alcoholic debauch, a severe automobile accident, the loss of an im portant loved one….”

Dr. Grinspoon himself might be part of one of the more im portant influences leading adults to try marijuana for

It turns some people off. It turns some marriages off the first time. A highly au thoritative article of his in last December’s Scientific Ameri can, which surveyed world scientific literature on the sub ject of marijuana and essen tially found it less harmful than either liquor or tobacco, has been mentioned to me by at least two people as a fac tor that encouraged them to dare try the drug.

Marijuana, in other words, has been getting a much‐im proved press these last few years. Although, many people ask quite sensibly, “Why, with all the problems we have with alcohol, do we need another socially acceptable method for turning off our problems, act ing inanely, and killing our selves in automobiles?”, vir tually everyone, smoker or nonsmoker, under the age of 40 and reasonably educated with whom I’ve talked, is aware that marijuana is not a narcotic, is not addictive, does not produce hangovers and is furthermore considered, in some circles, chic.

IT became evident in talking with middle‐class adults that the main problem they see in the use of marijuana is that it is illegal. About half of the group of 30 I talked with in Long Island had tried mari juana. Some of them had chil dren too young to be interest ed, but none of them had told their children that they had used the drug.

Some felt that they would make that confession when a proper occasion arose. Many of these parents had very carefully worked‐out speeches to explain why “as adults we can smoke but you as a child cannot.” In general, they go: “There are things that physi cally and emotionally are harmful to children. When you’re mature enough, you can drink, you can drive an automobile, you can make love and you can use mari juana, but all of that can cause trouble for a 13‐year‐old.” Most people rehearsing such speeches feel that the legalization of marijuana with prohibition of its sale to minors would make their case more convincing.

Most smokers found the very concept of letting their children know that they had broken this law disturbing. In New York City, I did meet marijuana ‐smoking parents who have told their children they smoke, in hopes, one ex plained, “of making it seem less exotic,” but at the same time, I’ve met very few par ents who have actually smoked in front of young children. A comment I’ve now heard many times is, “We wouldn’t make love in front of them.” The connection between the two concepts remains elusive to me. But clearly this is a worri some question in many homes.

Although few adult smokers choose to smoke in front of their teen‐aged children, teen agers have a tendency to find out about such parental hab its anyway; and the use of marijuana by the older gener ation is not totally loved by the younger ones. A Westport commuter told me of a pro gressively reared 16‐year‐old who became infuriated on walking into her house and finding her parents and three other couples turning on. She accused them of being hypo crites, a favorite accusation by the young, and had to be reminded that her parents had never complained so loudly when she came in that way. Nevertheless the next day she announced that she was off marijuana for good. She explained, “If you and the rest of those sellouts are do ing it, there must be some thing wrong with it.” She did indeed quit; her thing is now macrobiotics.

But like it or not, the young will simply have to get used to the fact that there is no youthful monopoly on hedon ism. Like high‐school students who fear being left out, par ents, too, enjoy good parties, and in New York, these days, they frequently involve mari juana. Recently, for example, a New York editor found that he was excluded from a grass smoking dinner party because he had let slip that he’d never learned to inhale. To make up for the slight, his hostess‐to be invited him to a second dinner party with a bunch of drinkers, but he still felt that he’d missed the real fun.

He was, probably, just as well off, for as anyone who has ever attended one knows there is nothing more dismal than a pot party when you’re straight. There is no one type of pot party. Marijuana is easily titrated. As a study re ported to New York’s Mayor La Guardia in 1944, most ex perienced smokers know just how high they like to get, and when they reach that point they stop. For most adult smokers, that point is well within their own ability to snap out of the high, behave rationally and carry on a fair ly normal conversation. One can find people smoking at cocktail parties behaving like everyone else in the room.

But one characteristic of marijuana is that it turns peo ple thoughtful and frequently when it is smoked in small groups, people tend to grow quiet, listen to the music (a common adult reaction is, “I never understood rock music until I turned on”) and inves tigate their own fantasies. Such quiet gatherings can drive the nonsmoker to new extremes of boredom.

On the other hand, mari juana can make such state ments as “Please pass the mustard” seem fraught with hidden meanings of oracular import, and the struggle to decode them can break up everyone in the room. Abso lute uncontrolled hilarity is one of the great and mysteri ous pleasures of group mari juana use. At times it is al most clear what is knocking everyone out. (An event that apparently brought down the house at one party was a young lady’s forgetting that she had already eaten dinner and announcing that she was starved; at another party it was a young man’s holding up a roast chicken and remark ing that it looked like Bran cusi’s Bird in Space—every one agreed with him, then cracked up.)

In general, what it is that amuses everyone is a total mystery. No one knows what anyone else is laughing about and the attempt to explain only makes it seem funnier—if you happen to be high. The fellow who is not finds the entire situation at the emo tional level of a nursery school, and stomach‐turning. He often starts smoking out of self‐defense.

But gatherings solely for the purpose of smoking seem not to be part of the adult, regular smoker’s world. He is far more likely to use mari juana precisely the way he previously used alcohol, and there are now middle‐aged circles in which the drinking of liquor has almost disap peared. As a 40‐year‐old fin ancier told me over a glass of sparkling Perrier water, “I once had a great fondness for icy martinis. They had many good qualities. Of most im portance, they were lubrica tors of social interaction and the alimentary canal.

“Well, I can hardly remem ber the last time I saw a drink at a dinner party. In fact, I can’t remember the last time I had a drink.

“You know, the homes to which I get invited aren’t that remarkable. I’d say they’re upper ‐middle ‐class, typical East Side Manhattan, South Shore folks who fear drug abuse, would shun cocaine and run from LSD, but it is a rarity in their homes that I’m not offered pot in beautifully rolled joints. I ’d say that there’s a cut‐off date in this: I don’t see pot in the home or anyone older than his early 40’s unless he’s a photogra pher or an extraordinarily wealthy unreconstructed Bo hemian.

“But it seems to me that there will be an ever‐greater tendency for hostesses of all ages to provide pot as an al ternative to cocktails as the word spreads that if people turn on before dinner, there are no bad meals.

“Last weekend my wife prepared leg of lamb, casse role of rice and mushrooms, salad and cheese. We had two other couples to dinner. The leg of lamb was huge. We ex pected it to last us through Sunday. Every bit of it went. Everything went. The brie was snapped up as if there were imminent danger of war with France. When dieting, I can not smoke before I dine.

“I think,” the marijuana smoking venture capitalist went on, “that it’s ridiculous to fear that pot leads to other things, at least not for grown ups. Most pot‐smokers, I find, are serious‐minded family peo ple, politically oriented, and they smoke pot because it is a deliciously communal thing to do and it tends to sharpen everything from movies to sex; but the idea that if this is terrific, wouldn’t cocaine be better, never occurred to them.‘’

SINCE marijuana smoking is so new to the middle class, there is still a certain amount of confusion as to how one should serve it, use it, and be have under its influence. But certain rules seem to be evolv ing.

In general, in relaxed cir cumstances, it’s traditional to pass around a single mari juana cigarette The stuff is still somewhat scarce. By pass ing it around, more smoke goes into people and less into the air. But there is something about passing around a single joint at a dinner party that resembles passing around a single glass of Scotch. Host esses are now spending after noons with their rolling ma chines making enough joints to turn on three times the number of guests expected, if they smoked economically.

The question of marijuana high conversations is an in teresting one. On first turning on, almost everyone is in need of guidance. The experience is subtle, and the novice smoker needs someone to ex plain to him what it is that he is feeling and how to ride with it rather than fight it. Paranoid reactions are com mon on first smoking. Be cause of that, old‐time smok ers tend to talk new ones through the experience. That, however, is a training process; it is not done in public, for to most adult smokers it is a bore.

In fact, in adult smoking circles it is now considered bad form to discuss (as is common among new smokers) the quality of the pot, the town in Mexico from which it came, or precisely what it is doing to one’s head. One does not ask others if they are feeling it. One does not say, “Oh, wow,” or “Dynamite!” If it leads one to a feeling of unity with the universe, one keeps it between oneself and God.

The people who today seem most excited about marijuana are those who have gone for years detesting alcohol yet envying people who seemed to enjoy it. “I’d go to parties, and hold one drink all night,” a housewife in her mid‐30’s told me. “I hated the taste of alcohol. And it made me diz zy, and it left me with a hangover. Marijuana was a godsend. It’s much milder than liquor and much pleas anter, so I carry my own. When everyone else drinks, I open my cigarette case, pull out a joint; and everyone is very impressed: ‘Barbara the swinger!’ But I just smoke enough to get a slight high. I don’t really like the super‐boo that takes the top of your head off. I just want to feel more relaxed, more in the mood for a party. I love it.”

This use of marijuana, as if it were Scotch, to get through parties, however, does not ap peal to everyone. For ex ample, says one typical long time, weekend marijuana smoker, “I can’t stand using it except with my husband and sometimes close friends. I think it’s an intimate experi ence. You see, alcohol takes you out of yourself. It makes you cloddish and indiscrimi nate. Everybody’s your bud dy. But grass gets you into yourself. It heightens what ever it is you really feel, and if you’re with someone you don’t like, or with someone who is acting phony, the grass makes you really hate them.

“Grass sharpens things. The ugly gets uglier—you can’t stand to listen to bad music or a raucous voice—but the beautiful develops subtleties. I personally never see colors at all; I couldn’t tell you the color of your eyes; but on grass all colors are amazingly vivid for me.

“And I really have touch ing, personal, mysterious ex periences on it. An example?

“Well, I was walking around the block very high with a close friend one night, and suddenly he knelt down and put his arm around a fireplug. Well, you see, I found that touching, terribly significant. I still do, but I can’t say why.”

There are people who find that marijuana causes prob lems in their marriages. As one psychologist says, “Mari juana leads you to pick up a lot of non‐verbal signals that you normally don’t notice and that’s not always good for a marriage. One of my patients has been getting along for years with a very minimal sexual life. She began to smoke pot, found that it turned her on sexually, and did nothing at all to her hus band. It became completely clear to her that he didn’t want her, she didn’t want him.”

Many pot smokers insist that the drug clearly affects their sex lives. A study made of 200 marijuana users by sociologist Eric Goode showed that 68 per cent found that marijuana increased their sex ual enjoyment and 44 per cent claimed that it increased their sexual desire. A good number of pot smokers with whom I talked insisted that it im proved their marital relations, but others claimed that it cut out sex entirely by putting them to sleep.

MARIJUANA, it may be said, is now firmly rooted in our society. It helps to produce good times for influential peo ple. Unless it should be proved that it seriously harmed ev eryone who smoked it, it is unlikely that the growth of its popularity could be halted. Even then, it is not certain that the American public would not accept it as it has accepted tobacco and alco hol.

Past attempts to stop the flow of marijuana into this country either came to very little or have proved actually harmful. Last year’s “Opera tion Intercept,” along with causing the most massive traf fic jam Mexico has ever ex perienced, did create a na tionwide marijuana “famine,” but it also led gentlemen farm ers throughout the nation to lay in crops of their own. Most American marijuana is of poor quality, but says one can nabis horticulturist, “We’ve only begun to research the matter. Consider how long it took to produce a drinkable New York State champagne.” Last summer’s marijuana fam ine had more serious conse quences as well: with the rela tively mild marijuana denied them, many young people pushed on to much stronger and more dangerous stuff.

Ours is indeed a drug culture, and marijuana is generally the second or third drug (after cigarettes and alcohol) tried in a progression that can lead to disastrous addictions and ruined lives. The middle class is for the first time becoming aware of the drug menace that has so long plagued the black ghettos, now that heroin is beginning to appear in its own colleges and high schools. Pressure must surely soon build up to redraw lines between what is acceptable and what is for bidden in our drug‐taking society. But this time, let us have the sense not to misrepresent what we are doing. As Dr. Grinspoon points out. “Kids who feel lied to about marijuana’s dangers tend to assume that they are also being lied to about LSD, and cocaine, and heroin.

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