Alcohol, Cannabis, Money and Mortality

I have not for a very long time felt so contested against an issue than I do against the idiotic proposal of a minimum alcohol price per unit.

Having been assaulted by a drunken moron within a few hundred yards of my home, I'm more than qualified to comment on the effects of alcohol abuse. Raising the price of such a despicable substance is in no way a solution to the problem. Raising the price of such a despicable substance simply earns the government more money. I'm all for that. If they can fuel their strange nonsensical crusades by penalising those who drink cheap alcoholic drinks, then sure, go ahead, but I'd like them to admit that this is their aim. Under no circumstances will this save lives. If someone is hellbent on drinking themselves first into oblivion and then later to death, they will manage it eventually. Money is immaterial to the dead man. Besides which, saving lives is not the duty of the government. If it is, then why would the government move to cannibalise the NHS?

I have a much more elegant solution to the falling levels of sobriety across Britain: the legalisation of cannabis. As an alternative depressant to alcohol, it is much less damaging to the user, much less likely to invoke violence and has never been known to cause any death, ever. Furthermore, legalising the substance allows the implementation of taxes upon it. This could easily earn HM Treasury more than raising the price of alcohol ever would. It would also limit funding to organised crime somewhat, as would the legalisation of prostitution, which could also be taxed. As I understand it, Köln makes quite some revenue from taxing prostitution, legalisation of which would also render safer the lives of prostitutes. Nonetheless, I was discussing the advantages of legalising cannabis, which are manifold.

Though more intoxicating in a mental sense, cannabis causes less damage to the body than tobacco and is less addictive than nicotine. Of course, smoking cannabis on a 15-minute break might have a greater effect on productivity than smoking tobacco, but workplaces generally forbid the consumption of alcohol whilst working on the job, so there should be no problem with forbidding the consumption of cannabis for employers. The same is true of transport, and public places may well still carry a smoking ban that extends to cannabis, though I cannot see any problem with consumption of special brew or spacecakes in a pub or licensed café, for instance. Since all of these products can be taxed and charges implemented for the relevant licenses, the government stands to rake in funds for its activities — the National Health Service, for example — through legalising cannabis.

Whilst I'm on the subject of legalising things, I also believe strongly that laws allowing or implementing the following would greatly improve society.

• Gambling age of 12
• Drinking age of 12
• Legalise prostitution, as vaguely outlined above
• The Alternative Vote system for General and Local elections
• 650 apartments in one building in Westminster, for MPs' second homes

I have arguments ranging from reasonable to firm and structured for the above, but this post is getting lengthy anyway, so I'll stop here.

Disagree with any of the above? Well, there is a space to leave comments below. It's possible to make them anonymously, but, really, an anonymous opinion is a worthless one. If you believe something, put your name to it.

Act II

Last term was incredible. I don't know anyone here who is not of that opinion. I've already written more than enough in the past ten weeks about the brilliance of meeting new people and that it is a pleasure unequalled by any other. I spoke at the close of last term with many a friend of the difficulty returning home at Christmas presented; departing new friends and heading back to a place which was no longer home.

This term, heading back to Whitley Bay seems near inconsequential. I am much looking forward to seeing friends of old, a great deal more so than I was at Christmas. Nonetheless, it is neither saddening nor a relief to be leaving campus for five weeks. Why is that so? Well, I've given it a great deal of thought. Here comes that thought.

Act Two

That's just it. Only once before did I ever truly dive into a new setting, and that would have been at the very start of school, which failed to make any mark on my memory at all. Neither have I ever encountered so many fresh faces in such a short period as I did at the start of university. In much respect, those ten weeks was the establishing piece of this year, of my university experience, and possibly of my life as a whole. Thus, Term 1 was in all respects Act I. Conversely, this term, as I mentioned to Josh Glenn on numerous occasions, has felt very much like Act II. Very little has developed; nothing much has changed. We have, for a second time, reached the interval, and this time the anticipation for further narrative is much diminished.

The word "diminished" leads me nicely onto a second, partially detached, point.

Diminishing Returns

Viewing this term not as a second part, but as a second story, it is then a sequel and not a second act. Thus, as ever, it suffers inevitably from diminishing returns. It could never measure up to the original, or, at the very least, it would fail to stand alone. Term 2 relies on Term 1 for all of its themes and motifs, but Term 1 being a conceptualised, perfectly closed work of art — as shown by its ability to captivate the audience and render them wanting more — Term 2 would never manage to match the effect of the former.

Leaving analogues to performance art in all its forms aside, we venture for my final deliberation into the wacky world of philosophy.

Me

Douglas Adams closes the first of his undeniably fantastic Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series of books with the following gem:

The History of every major Galactic Civilization tends to pass through three distinct and recognizable phases, those of Survival, Inquiry and Sophistication, otherwise known as the How, Why and Where phases.

I like to think of three phases in the development of personal relationships as the You, Me, and Them stages. In the You phase, the main aim is to build rapport with the new person with whom one is building a relationship. The Me phase involves discovering how this new relationship affects oneself, or rather, finding one's own identity. The third and final stage is the most complex, and this Them stage appertains to the theorising of how any third party might view the first two parties and any interaction between them.

In very basic animals, knowledge of one's surroundings is acquired, and some basic prey may understand the existence of a predator without necessarily having any concept of self. The next level of creatures up I'd imagine includes cats, who can both reason that the bird in its vision is a living thing and that it is itself a creature capable of choices. Thus, the cat can reach the Me stage, which the ant cannot.

The human has a very strange ability yet. He is not only capable of reasoning that the creature in his vision is a conscious one, nor that he himself is thinking, but further: he can think as though he were that creature. The Them phase, then, is covered by any creature with the ability to empathise. This strange affinity for putting oneself in the shoes of another is something quite sophisticated indeed. What the hell does this have to do with trimesters? I'm glad you asked.

In Term 1, the emphasis was very much on getting to know one's surroundings, and, more precisely, the knew people in one's life. Thus, upon leaving said people who had very much been the focus of any thought, whether conscious or subconscious, the observer suffers a sudden sense of emptiness, of desolation. "Why am I leaving my whole world behind?" is possibly the thought that occurs in some shape or form of anyone vacating a brand new home for the first time.

In Term 2, I have noticed in myself and others a tendency to question one's own identity. After ten weeks of this tendency, suddenly the world is no longer about everyone else, but more about the new person whom one has become. As such, leaving this place behind no longer equates to deserting one's world. My world is where I am. Next term, according to my "You, Me, Them" theory, we may well pass into a phase of questions such as "What do they think of us?" Nonetheless, at this point in time, I'm much more concerned with knowing who I am than wondering who everyone around me is, or what they think of everyone else around me. A five week break may well change all of that, but for the moment I have no quarrel with taking a five week break.

By Any Other Name

I've ordered pasta from Pizza Hut. I've had pizzas from Shire Chippy. I've drank lemonade made by Coca-Cola. When I eat a Mars bar, I don't expect red rocks or the bringer of war. I have never yet expected intelligent conversation from Smarties.

If I pick up The Sun in the morning, I don't expect to burn myself, nor to find it incredibly massive and one astronomical unit away. I don't expect to have The Daily Mail delivered daily, nor the Express to run faster than the rest. The Guardian does not watch over me, and neither does The Observer see what I'm doing. I have never yet expected The Times to be a world clock.

This was going to be a lot longer and cover more than food and newspapers, but since the notion against which I was attempting to make a point is increasingly rearing its ugly head, I must endeavour to spread the word as quickly as possible.

Yes, "Marvel Avengers Assemble" is an idiotic name for anything but an action figure collection, or one of those overpriced collect-one-piece-each-week magazines, but, really, who gives a fuck? It's just a name.