Dead right Weez …. recreational drugs aren’t recreational … I am going to get that slogan made into a car sticker.

I am sick of people in the media and others using this phrase – they just don’t get it do they … recreational drugs are N-O-T recreational.

If you’re using a drug primarily for the pleasure of the effect, how is that not recreational?

Weez … credentials – I was CEO of Life Education – which takes the drugs and alcohol message out to kids in schools. In NSW, we see >200,000 kids a year.

“Recreational” drugs physically interfere with the safe re-creational biological process – you may think they have a pleasant effect, but at best they are just addictively destructive, and at worst they impose brain impairment and physical damage into the procreation and re-creation activity.

Perhaps you have not seen the results of recreational drugs on our aboriginal population ? Maybe Ben Cousins thinks recreational drugs have been good for his sporting career, but I doubt it. His career is over and his best mate is dead.

Death is not very recreational.

With regard to occasional use of cannabis (and I have smoked a bit of shit myself), the evidence from longitudinal studies is indicating that male and female reproductive systems may receive damage in the hypothalamo-pituitary-gonadal system, reducing secretion of testosterone, and hence reducing sperm production, motility, and viability in males.

In women, there is evidence of damage to the ovulatory cycle and during pregnancy. The current thinking is that this probably impairs foetal development, leading to smaller birthweight, perhaps as a consequence of a shorter period of gestation and exposure of the foetus in utero.

Sure, none of this is certain – the problem is that small amounts occasionally often lead to more serious levels of addiction and damage.

As you may detect, I am not a supporter of the harm minimisation school of thinking. On the other hand, if it were my child in an alley determined to get a hit, I think I would prefer that to be available in the Gallery than in the gutter.

A difficult topic for sure.

With regard to occasional use of cannabis (and I have smoked a bit of shit myself), the evidence from longitudinal studies

Linkage, please? Whose studies are these?

Regardless of the effect, deleterious or none, if the primary purpose of use of a drug is enjoyment, the purpose is recreational.

Sorry, but spin-it-til-you-like-it use of language, i.e. Drug Free Australia and Bronnie Bishop’s ‘harm prevention’ reframe of ‘zero-tolerance’ won’t score any points with anyone.

As you may detect, I am not a supporter of the harm minimisation school of thinking.

So, you’re opposed to medical evidence being used in drug treatment, instead favouring bent research, moralism and punishment.

Shall we bring back the stocks and pillory and perhaps a bit of caning of drug users to suit you?

I’m still waiting for links to the ‘longitudinal studies’ which prove your zero-tolerance case.

Drug use is utterly normal human behaviour, has been throughout history. Drug abuse is something else entirely- and is a medical problem for abusers. Medical problems should be treated with proven methods based in medical evidence, not jail (which has never once cured an addiction), faerie-tales and other moralistic voodoo. No one with a shred of commonsense would treat cancer with admonishments; drug addiction is absolutely no different.