Monday, April 22, 2013

Education, not Legislation

SOMEWHERE IN THE good ole U.S. o f A., the land of freedom, (is it new york) there is a movement afoot to raise the legal age for purchasing tobacco products to twenty one. Currently , its eighteen, just about everywhere.

Since new york city now prohibits the sale and purchase of large sugary drinks and cholestoral, new york figures.

If we really want to keep cigarettes legal, but discourage people from smoking them because  people are too young and ill informed and cigarettes too harmful, why not raise the legal age for purchase to, say, ninety five?

When will we finally accept the basic reality that we can educate people against smoking, and other self indulgant hedonistic pleasures, such as drinking, but we cannot, and should not, attempt to legislate against it.

It simply does not, and will not work. Not in the land of freedom, where freedom is designed to give the individual maximum control over his or her own destiny, whatever it may be.

Surely this is one issue upon which right wing conservatives and left wing liberals can agree: freedom. What we put into our own bodies should be our own choice. Government should not exist for the prspose of protecting people from themselves, but for the purpose of protecting them from others, domestic and foreign.

Should public schools teach sex education? Yes, in biology class.
see how easy this is?

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