Searching the archives of the BBC, Daily Mail or Guardian returns hundreds of results for date rape drugs, such as Rohypnol. Figures from Google Trends show that search volume for 'date rape drugs' or more specific terms like 'Rohypnol' has decreased since 2004, but remains high. Up and down the country, many people are convinced they have been a victim of date rape drugs, their fears fuelled by media scare stories and alarming reports from the usually sensible ACMD.

There’s been a lot of talk lately about angry mobs. When Jan Moir wrote a viciously homophobic attack on the recently deceased singer Stephen Gately and his grieving friends and family, she was confronted by an angry mob. When ace lawyers Carter-Fuck attempted to gag the Guardian’s reporting of a parliamentary question, the censored information was carried along the information super-highway on virtual placards by an angry mob.

While I was mid-upgrade, Professor David Nutt was sensationally sacked as the chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs by the home secretary, Alan Johnson. The news was broken by BBC reporter Mark Easton, who has been following conflict between science and politics that has been simmering ever since the government ignored scientific advice to reclassify cannabis as a Class B drug.

I'll be blogging in much more depth about this as events continue to unfold, but it's worth making one point very clear about the relationship between science and the public, because a lot of people writing about this topic haven't picked up on it yet.

Back in 2001, the Portuguese government defied stiff opposition from right-wing groups to decriminalise drug use, making drug laws far more liberal than even the Netherlands.

The idea went down with the right about as well as a fancy-dress costume at a state funeral, and Bad Things were predicted. Drug use would explode, tourists would travel from far and wide to get high on the streets of Lisbon, law and order would collapse, and people would start riding around in modified cars and fighting in Thunderdomes. The reality was quite different as two reports published in the last 18 months have demonstrated, the Libertarian Cato Institute have declared the policy an undisputed success on the basis of a report by Glenn Greenwald, and this has been a popular assessment among liberal people. How correct is it though? Let's look at the evidence.

Continue reading at Liberal Conspiracy!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Find me on Twitter! @mjrobbins