General Discussions

**Michel Samuel** · 09-18-2007, 12:08 PM

I figured this needed a thread of to itself.
Before I start the rule is this...

1) No personal attacks like calling of names.

2) No denouncing someone because you do not like their point of view.
eg: accusing someone of "Un" american/british/etc or "Anti" or "Phobic." Just because you do not like their argument.

3) No stupid jokes or commentary from the media that is not grounded in facts. (: Anne Coulter and Donahue are not allowed.)

4) You do not have the right to be offened and can not tell someone to shut up or cry to moderator to lock thread.

5) Discuss anything you want. Legalize drugs or blow up Iraq. All is acceptable.

--------

I'll start this with stating that I have never believed that French Canadiens have ever truely been part of Canada. And nothing has ever led us to belive that we were a welcome group within it.

Between the federal gouvernment program of erradication that existed from 1948 to 1984 in Newfoundland, against the Franco-terreneuviens.

(A program that changed family names to english ones, removed children from their parents if they spoke french at home, to violating a the charter of rights that guaranteed a french education for those of french ancestory. )

To even Regulation 17 that banned teaching french in schools unless the person proved they could not learn english due to "defective training"

Personally I am glad that Québec is independant. And that the fight is being settled without further deaths or groups like the FLQ. But I still think it is too slow and not enough.

I want to see Québec with frontier crossings and people need to show passportes to enter. (Even if they are Canadians. ) I want to see the death of the parlimentary gouvernment system and the death of english schools in Québec. And I think we need more language laws that force rules that english can not be spoken in public unless it is a tourist attraction area or the downtown centre of a city.

**Learning Newbie** · 09-18-2007, 02:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Michel Samuel

3) No stupid jokes or commentary from the media that is not grounded in facts. (: Anne Coulter and Donahue are not allowed.)

Ann Coulter is a four letter word I can't use in polite company. Against the rules or not, since you brought her name up and since you were glad to see mention of Darfur in the Iraq War thread, you'll be interested to know what Mrs Coulter has to say about the Darfur crisis:

These people can’t even wrap up genocide. We’ve been hearing about this slaughter in Darfur forever - and they still haven’t finished. The aggressors are moving like termites across that country. It’s like genocide by committee. Who’s running this holocaust in Darfur, FEMA?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Michel Samuel

5) Discuss anything you want. Legalize drugs or blow up Iraq. All is acceptable.

Drugs should be legalized. They advertise two different drugs on TV for when your oui oui doesn't work. Anybody in America can go to the hospital emergency room, say they hurt really bad, and be given opiates in the form of pills. (Hospital has to treat you if you complain about severe pain.) Countless people die from alcohol and tobacco every month. Hard drugs are available on the street, and because the opium that heroin addicts buy and shoot up isn't manufactured by Pfizer, safely and without "cut" to make the dealer more profit, their drug is a lot more dangerous than hospital opium. It's also more expensive which leads people into crime to get their fix. At the end of the day drug addiction (whether it's to alcohol or to opium) is a medical problem. We need to treat it like one, lower the barriers to treatment for people who want to get better, and figure out how to deal with addicts that don't want to recover, as a society.

**CSS4Life** · 09-18-2007, 03:44 PM

Basically Michel, you want to destroy English. Oh well. If I had my way, most of the world would speak English and French would be even less important than it is now. I can't see French gaining much importance in the future - France isn't a rich country compared to the USA or Britain and it's not part of the growing economies in the East (India and China).

Your point that there should be barriers and restrictions between Canada and Quebec (not politically independent anyway, still part of Canada) is ridiculous! What good would that do? Do you seriously believe that the English speaking people are of some security risk to people living in Quebec?! It's just a stupid status thing and it will drive the French Canadians even further from their fellow English Canadians which won't do anyone any good. Stop trying to aggravate people or find a French forum on which to rant about the English!

**CSS4Life** · 09-18-2007, 03:46 PM

Also - what good would banning English do? This sounds like some sort of Nazi regime - maybe that's your political beliefs, maybe not. In the real world, we are allowed to speak our language where we like and don't have a group of backward thinking weirdos forcing us to use their language in public places or in our own homes

**Michel Samuel** · 05:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by whym

Basically Michel, you want to destroy English. Oh well. If I had my way, most of the world would speak English and French would be even less important than it is now. I can't see French gaining much importance in the future - France isn't a rich country compared to the USA or Britain and it's not part of the growing economies in the East (India and China).

Your point that there should be barriers and restrictions between Canada and Quebec (not politically independent anyway, still part of Canada) is ridiculous! What good would that do? Do you seriously believe that the English speaking people are of some security risk to people living in Quebec?! It's just a stupid status thing and it will drive the French Canadians even further from their fellow English Canadians which won't do anyone any good. Stop trying to aggravate people or find a French forum on which to rant about the English!

You know it's amazing that you are not even canadian and now nothing of the issues, treatment, etc of french canadians. You know nothing of Ontario's Reg 17, the newfoundland erradication program, the 5 year struggle for Alberta building codes that only ever got applied if you were building a francophone school.. etc etc etc.

And in single handed swoop...
You have done what anglo canadians have always done.

Trivialized our problems.
The proceeded to..

Tell us how stupid we are.
Tell us how we can't live with out them.
Tell us how we will never amount to anthing important in the world.

Finally if we don't like it, we can leave.
Which is what we want.

You know if this was a husband talking to his wife...
It would be considered spouse abuse and grounds for a divorce.

Québec is an independant nation.
We have never signed or ratified the canadian constitution.
We have our own immigration policy, officials, etc.
We have embassies in several countries in the world.

And like an abusive spouse doesn't want to acknowledge the relationship is over. Canada plays games trying to find ways to hold on to something they lost.

The only thing that is being done at this time is the seperation at a gentil pace to avoid economic catastrophe. Québec was the largest provice of land, largest administrative centre, still holds the bulk of Canada's financial holdings. Population we are second to ontario and we control passage into the St. Lawerence seaway.

So again back to the husband that beats his wife analogy.
Canada needs Québec more than we need Canada.
The federalists are going to do everything they can to make it look like we are still living together.

And that is why I want frontier officials. Send a clear message to the world we are no longer married.

Quote:

Originally Posted by whym

Also - what good would banning English do? This sounds like some sort of Nazi regime - maybe that's your political beliefs, maybe not. In the real world, we are allowed to speak our language where we like and don't have a group of backward thinking weirdos forcing us to use their language in public places or in our own homes

Have you ever seen how anglophones act when they visit other nations ?
Most don't even try to say hello. They just start talking at you in english. And if you don't understand they think you are deaf and start to talk really loud. And some people even start to talk down as if you are a child.

As for Québec.

Why is that in Québec 80% of television emmisions are in english ?
(They are not even in Canadian they are american. )
That is why the language laws exist in Québec. I just want them more strict.

But people are free to talk in the language of their choice at home.
If we can ban people who smoke in public to go to special areas we can do the same with english.

**Michel Samuel** · 09-18-2007, 05:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

Ann Coulter is a four letter word I can't use in polite company. Against the rules or not, since you brought her name up and since you were glad to see mention of Darfur in the Iraq War thread, you'll be interested to know what Mrs Coulter has to say about the Darfur crisis:

These people can’t even wrap up genocide. We’ve been hearing about this slaughter in Darfur forever - and they still haven’t finished. The aggressors are moving like termites across that country. It’s like genocide by committee. Who’s running this holocaust in Darfur, FEMA?

Drugs should be legalized. They advertise two different drugs on TV for when your oui oui doesn't work. Anybody in America can go to the hospital emergency room, say they hurt really bad, and be given opiates in the form of pills. (Hospital has to treat you if you complain about severe pain.) Countless people die from alcohol and tobacco every month. Hard drugs are available on the street, and because the opium that heroin addicts buy and shoot up isn't manufactured by Pfizer, safely and without "cut" to make the dealer more profit, their drug is a lot more dangerous than hospital opium. It's also more expensive which leads people into crime to get their fix. At the end of the day drug addiction (whether it's to alcohol or to opium) is a medical problem. We need to treat it like one, lower the barriers to treatment for people who want to get better, and figure out how to deal with addicts that don't want to recover, as a society.

I will be honest I do not think I would know who anne coulter if I made love to her. I only know she is some angry person that thinks all non americans should be nuked.

As for drugs I think all drugs should be legal.
But the recreational ones should be taxed. And those taux should be used to lower my tax. As for it being a medical problem. I agree.

**Learning Newbie** · 09-18-2007, 05:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Michel Samuel

I will be honest I do not think I would know who anne coulter if I made love to her. I only know she is some angry person that thinks all non americans should be nuked.

I don't think you would make love to "her" because Ann Coulter has an Adam's Apple.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Michel Samuel

As for drugs I think all drugs should be legal.
But the recreational ones should be taxed. And those taux should be used to lower my tax. As for it being a medical problem. I agree.

I think they should be taxed too! In fact, drugs already are taxed, it's just criminals get to collect and hold onto the tax, instead of The People.

**Michel Samuel** · 09-18-2007, 05:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

I don't think you would make love to "her" because Ann Coulter has an Adam's Apple.

I think they should be taxed too! In fact, drugs already are taxed, it's just criminals get to collect and hold onto the tax, instead of The People.

Exactly !!!

The best way to get rid of a criminal is to legalize what he is doing. Once it is legal more and more people start to go into his industry. Then he stops making lots of money and lost powers.

**Learning Newbie** · 09-18-2007, 05:34 PM

I think people will get a kick out of this, since we're talking about stereotypes.

**CSS4Life** · 09-18-2007, 05:46 PM

I don't support that at all. I believe the government should use the iron fist if necessary to eradicate drugs completely. Ban tobacco completely. Ban just about every drugs like that and enforce this strongly. The British are very stubborn people and don't react like other people do.

I.e. when we made it legal for pubs to remain open 24 hours a day like in other European countries, we ended up with more binge drinking, as I suspected. The British will simply go drugs mad if we legalized every substance under the sun and it would be the end for us as a strong nation. Our biggest export is now education, totaling a respectable £35 billion ($70 billion) export to people from other countries. The way to get people off these substances and into a better life is through decent education.

**Learning Newbie** · 09-18-2007, 06:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by whym

I don't support that at all. I believe the government should use the iron fist if necessary to eradicate drugs completely. Ban tobacco completely. Ban just about every drugs like that and enforce this strongly. The British are very stubborn people and don't react like other people do.

I take a middle of the road approach. I don't think it's a crime to alter your body chemistry and make your mind work in different ways. I think that comes under freedom of thought (an Englishman once invented the terms thought crime and thought police) and I also think by traditional definitions food is a drug.

Before you think "Old Johnny has lost his mind" think about how people on a diet eat peanuts before a meal because the combination of fat + protein makes them full (satiated) for longer, how high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) isn't recognized by your body as "real" calories and keeps you hungry longer, and how coffee makes you awake. In that sense, there isn't much to distinguish marijuana from caffeine or the Atkins diet?

But on the other hand, an all out ban is a better solution than what we have today. Tobacco is much more dangerous to smoke than it's green counterpart (and I don't mean green environmentally!) but the law suggests just the opposite. Still, I think when doctors can prescribe morphine and some pain patients give the stuff away or sell it, an outright ban on drugs (as opposed to "some" drugs) is impossible.

**Michel Samuel** · 03:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by whym

I don't support that at all. I believe the government should use the iron fist if necessary to eradicate drugs completely. Ban tobacco completely. Ban just about every drugs like that and enforce this strongly. The British are very stubborn people and don't react like other people do.

I.e. when we made it legal for pubs to remain open 24 hours a day like in other European countries, we ended up with more binge drinking, as I suspected. The British will simply go drugs mad if we legalized every substance under the sun and it would be the end for us as a strong nation. Our biggest export is now education, totaling a respectable £35 billion ($70 billion) export to people from other countries. The way to get people off these substances and into a better life is through decent education.

I think the British public education system is second to only the american.

Just for the sake of advocat of devil.
Is this mentality very prevelant in the UK because it would explain why I need a camera follow me to the bathroom. Want to randomly check my cards of identity. Or why I can not make to purchase a bottle of cola without a big sticker telling me there is no nuts, etc. Purchase ear drop antibiotics without ordonnance from doctor.

Or why my wife had to visit 3 pharmacies to purchase "contraception d'urgence."
(I do not know the name of this product in english. It is a pill that must be taken after amour to prevent pregnancy. A woman does not have the time to see a doctor for an ordonnance)

There is a quality of life my friend. It is the small little trucs that make it have value. Unless this is something you enjoy to live by.

1984 is very real.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

I take a middle of the road approach. I don't think it's a crime to alter your body chemistry and make your mind work in different ways. I think that comes under freedom of thought (an Englishman once invented the terms thought crime and thought police) .

WAR IS PEACE = Keep citzens focused on the conflict and you have peace. (The war on Terror.)

FREEDOM IS SLAVERY = You are free but we must put cameras, snitch lines, biometric cartes of identity to ensure you are free.

IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH = Stupid people are arogant and will do as they are told. Believe whatever someone says on Television. Get hostile whenever someone expresses an opinion that does not support the conception of the masses. (This is best manifested in hyper patriotism)

**CSS4Life** · 09-19-2007, 11:27 AM

I don't care what you say. Drugs overall do not improve quality of life - they mess people up and are the road to destroying someones life as they know it. Therefore, it is necessary to protect the general public and particularly vulnerable people from drugs

**Learning Newbie** · 09-19-2007, 02:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by whym

I don't care what you say. Drugs overall do not improve quality of life - they mess people up and are the road to destroying someones life as they know it. Therefore, it is necessary to protect the general public and particularly vulnerable people from drugs

What do you think about Doctor Kevorkian?

**CSS4Life** · 09-19-2007, 03:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

What do you think about Doctor Kevorkian?

Who?!

**Learning Newbie** · 09-19-2007, 03:59 PM

That never made the news in Wales?

Kevorkian is a doctor who built a suicide machine for old people who are dieing of things like cancer. He spent about 10 years in prison for it. Mostly the patient does everything, but Kevorkian would set the machine up and as a doctor he would prescribe drugs to stop the patient's heart. Then he's set up a video tape of the event, and tell the person what he was doing at every step of the way. He'd ask "Are you sure you want me to go on? This will end your life." The people say yes, and he would do it. Kevorkian said every time he watched someone die, a part of him would die, but as a doctor he knew he was doing the right thing because he was ending people's suffering that had no chance of ever being cured.

It's still a controversy over here in Britney Spears Land, but Kevorkian is free from prison. A lot of people (like me) support the guy and don't see anything wrong with what he's doing. Others say a person has no right to end their own life under any circumstances and a doctor has no right to help them.

I ask about Kevorkian in response to the drug legality issue because it's the same question. Who owns a person's life? That person, or the society they live in?

**CSS4Life** · 09-19-2007, 04:04 PM

I'm undecided on this suicide and the other stuff that you mentioned.

But back to the drugs debate, I remain against it - while the person may own their life, society should be there to stop them going off the rails. People can start out just trying a drug and within a few years, be a drug dealer and completely addicted to substances. People from good backgrounds can get pulled down by drugs too. It's bad for society and bad for the individual.

**Learning Newbie** · 09-19-2007, 05:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by whym

But back to the drugs debate, I remain against it - while the person may own their life, society should be there to stop them going off the rails. People can start out just trying a drug and within a few years, be a drug dealer and completely addicted to substances. People from good backgrounds can get pulled down by drugs too. It's bad for society and bad for the individual.

What if I told you that this "pulls you in" concept only happens because drugs are illegal?

There are really two ways what you're talking about (the gateway effect) works. One is that we have people at least in America who come into schools and tell people "If you try marijuana once you're hooked for life then you get fat from the munchies and finally you're having sex for money to support your speed habit to loose weight." Kids hear this so many times they loose count, then when some of them try marijuana, they learn that they've been lied to. Most of them really don't like the stuff, and never touch it again because they spend their time and money on better things. But they all realize they've been lied to, and it's sad because cocaine and heroin and drugs like that really are poison, but people who've been lied to about drugs stop believing any of what they were told.

The other is for people who try some kind of hard drug (which could be a prescription), are hard wired to really really like it, and get hooked. Because it's illegal that makes the drug a lot more expensive so to support their habit they have to turn to crime. Selling drugs, breaking into stores at night, stealing identities, stuff like that. If you look at how a pack of 20 cigarettes (more addictive than anything) costs $5 but 20 joints costs about $200, if you're going to be a daily joint smoker you need either a high paying job or crime skills. Hard drugs like coke are much more expensive because they're "more" illegal - harsher penalties.

I'm not disagreeing with what you said. Only trying to point out that keeping drugs illegal causes as much, maybe even more, harm than having them legal. It's just less obvious so we mostly don't think about it in logical pros and cons terms to weigh the issue.

**CSS4Life** · 09-19-2007, 06:41 PM

I've heard this argument before a while ago and while I can see where its coming from, I don't really agree with it.

There is a music festival that takes place in Presteigne (my local town) every year, and sadly, the place is full of drugs. It really worries me - I'm strongly against drugs as you can see and I hate thinking about anyone taking them, let alone someone I know. But of course, it is someone I know and not just that, but a girl who I'm keen on (we had a thing going a while back - I still have feelings for her yadda yadda yadda you get the picture). She would probably take them whenever she could lay her hands on them, which happens to be once a year at the moment since she doesn't have "contacts" or anything. However, legalising things like this would lead a lot of people to try marijuana and probably stay on it.

I'm fundamentally opposed to drugs so legalising it seems to be trivializing it and is morally wrong in my opinion. At least by making it illegal, we are making the statement "Drugs are wrong", rather than the statement "It's up to you to experiment. Don't blame us if you mess up your life"

**joder** · 09-19-2007, 06:51 PM

whym, do you see alcohol in the same category as marijuana? It certainly does a lot of harm and has the effects you described for "drugs".