I wrote this blog four years ago about our ignorant policy and attitudes towards drugs and drug users. I started it with a satire comparing obese people to drug addicts. You may not like the satire but the problem and analogy is spot on. We have an arbitrary drug policy in this country which hurts millions of people. Witness the incarceration rates for drugs. This article is about the reasons for this stupidity and why we need to change our thinking.
Just this week, I heard two candidates for sheriff in my county talk about the need for stronger drug enforcement and more SWOT teams. The answer is always more police and more arrests. When will we wake up and address the real problems of drug addiction and drug abuse?
Picture yourself in a boat on a river
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes —- (From the Beatles)(Click here to listen)
Have you ever wondered why we do not arrest obese people? What if we treated people who abused food like we treated people who abused drugs? We could argue “Why don’t we arrest obese people since we arrest drug addicts?” Do not both of them abuse their bodies? If you look at the five most common reasons given for drug control policy: Morality, Health, Profit, Discrimination and Social Control, it could be argued that obesity violates at least four of these principles. As yet, we do not see too many obese people running amok, but who knows, maybe cases of “Crazed” obese people are just being under-reported.
It seems unfair to me that obese people are…
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Aging Capriciously 