Kudos to Cate Faehrmann:
"Since my 20s, I’ve occasionally taken MDMA at dance parties and music festivals. I know journalists, tradies, lawyers, public servants, doctors, police and yes, politicians (most well into their forties), who have done the same.
As a politician I’ve made the difficult decision to "come out" in this way because the government’s zero-tolerance approach to drugs has not only been a catastrophic failure in stopping drug use, it is costing people their lives. It is so out-of-touch with millions of people’s reality that everyone has stopped listening.
Young people are not fools. They want us, as politicians, to "get real" about illegal drugs. Their parents want us to stop the moral crusade and listen to the evidence.
This means being honest about the nature and extent of drug use and accepting the evidence that a harm minimisation approach, where illegal drug use is treated as a health issue not a criminal one, works.
When the millions of Australians, including every third or fourth person between the ages of 20 and 29, who have used cannabis, ecstasy or cocaine over the past twelve months hear the Premier’s message that "there is no such thing as a safe illegal drug" and "just say no" they wonder what planet she is living on."
https://www.smh.com.au/national/i-m-coming-out-about-drugs-it-s-time-get-real-about-pill-testing-20190120-p50shc.html
"Since my 20s, I’ve occasionally taken MDMA at dance parties and music festivals. I know journalists, tradies, lawyers, public servants, doctors, police and yes, politicians (most well into their forties), who have done the same.
As a politician I’ve made the difficult decision to "come out" in this way because the government’s zero-tolerance approach to drugs has not only been a catastrophic failure in stopping drug use, it is costing people their lives. It is so out-of-touch with millions of people’s reality that everyone has stopped listening.
Young people are not fools. They want us, as politicians, to "get real" about illegal drugs. Their parents want us to stop the moral crusade and listen to the evidence.
This means being honest about the nature and extent of drug use and accepting the evidence that a harm minimisation approach, where illegal drug use is treated as a health issue not a criminal one, works.
When the millions of Australians, including every third or fourth person between the ages of 20 and 29, who have used cannabis, ecstasy or cocaine over the past twelve months hear the Premier’s message that "there is no such thing as a safe illegal drug" and "just say no" they wonder what planet she is living on."
https://www.smh.com.au/national/i-m-coming-out-about-drugs-it-s-time-get-real-about-pill-testing-20190120-p50shc.html