When we tell the truth, we find solutions. When we don’t tell the truth, we serve agendas. On the matter of marijuana use, some people should stop talking as though their concern is for ALL. For them it’s all about self-preservation. If they cared they would know what happens to poor people when criminal laws are passed.

In the extreme, a narrow agenda will use their voting bloc to get the government to pass criminal laws. This always ends in disaster. Religious extremists in America got their government to satisfy their narrow agenda with a law that prohibited the sale of drinking alcohol. This led to one of the most corrupt and brutal periods in that country’s history. The following excerpt from The Spruce.com exposes the horrors these narrow agendas bring when they get their way.

The prohibition of alcohol in the United States lasted for 13 years during the 1920s and 30s. It is one of the most famous—or infamous—times in recent American history. While the intention was to reduce the consumption of alcohol by eliminating businesses that manufactured, distributed, and sold it, the plan backfired. Considered by many as a failed social and political experiment, the era changed the way many Americans viewed alcoholic beverages. It also enhanced the realization that federal government control cannot always take the place of personal responsibility.

We associate the Prohibition era with gangsters, bootleggers, speakeasies, rum-runners, and an overall chaotic situation in respect to the social network of Americans. The period began in 1920 with general acceptance by the public. It ended in 1933 as the result of the public’s annoyance with the law and the ever-increasing enforcement nightmare. Prohibition was enacted under the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. To this day, it is the only constitutional amendment to be repealed by another after the passage of the 21st Amendment.

The following from The Spruce.com shows that Prohibition was never as cruel as the weed law. While it was illegal to manufacture or distribute ”beer, wine, or other intoxicating malt or vinous liquors”, it was not illegal to possess it for personal use. This provision allowed Americans to possess alcohol in their homes and partake with family and guests as long as it stayed inside and was not distributed, traded, or even given away to anyone outside the home…

…Another interesting provision to Prohibition was that alcohol was available through a physician’s prescription. For centuries, liquor had been used for medicinal purposes. In fact, many of the liqueurs we know today were first developed as cures for various ailments.

It’s obvious why the weed law is extreme. It was hashed up to stick it to BLACK and BROWN people. The weed law is a criminal law because it flouts free will. That “free will” just happens to be God’s second greatest blessing. We are the only animal on the planet that received this gift.

Animals always follow their feelings. Only the human animal can consider the feelings of others. It is important to note that when we take away a person’s right to choose, we take away their opportunity to prove themselves worthy. Narrow agendas have no right to push a law that invades other people’s right to choose the path they want to walk on. There is nothing special about a saint if he is insulated from failure. To get points, a man who detects that he has a weakness must of his own decide to insulate himself from the temptation.

Fraud laws are absolutely not included in the tools we are given to defend our turf. But rest easy, there are a number of weapons available for parents who are into insulating themselves and their offspring.

When children are very young, before the puberty years, they can be controlled with threats of physical harm. Any child who fools around with weed deserves to feel some pain. At the child stage, myths are also effective. “Tataduhende” has kept many children away from the path to damnation. Embellishing the truth is also a popular method to scare children onto the straight and narrow path.

The belt, truth embellishment, and “Tataduhende” are not proper tools to keep a youth on the right path. Too much use of the belt at this stage will cause animosity; “Tataduhende” will make the parent look like a fool; and embellishment will expose the parent as a liar. At the youth stage, education is the most important tool. Parents must arm themselves with knowledge and know how to impart it to get maximum effect.

If we absolutely can’t tolerate the ways of our neighbours, we must consider moving to another neighbourhood.

Our Mennonite Belizeans will understand this perfectly. There are three or so types of Mennonite communities in Belize, maybe four. The Barton Creek Mennonites are the most traditional. They don’t go for internal combustion engines and they don’t like taking pictures, or anything that they conceive to be vain. The Spanish Lookout and Blue Creek Mennonites are getting close to be full birds of a feather, but just a couple decades or three ago, the Spanish Lookout Mennonite was not as modern as the one in Blue Creek. A few Mennonites will take a little drink, and get friendly with people who don’t share the core religion.

Mennonites all over share many of the same core values. You don’t hear about Mennonites getting violent, and I believe their ideas about marriage are similar. But their “modernity” differences keep them apart, living in separate communities.

One might say that if you follow the Mennonite formula, then the “weed smoking” neighbour should be the one to leave. That would be legitimate if the law against smoking weed wasn’t absolute fraud.

Of course, if you live in a city or big town you have to learn tolerance. The concrete jungle is not a place for people with narrow agendas. People who hate weed should consider forming villages where their children will not see adults puffing away. Supporting criminal laws because they help them with their narrow agendas is unfair to their fellow man and, worst of the worst, interferes with a sacred gift from God.

Pink eye epidemic exposes weak disaster plan

Our GoB gets a big fat “F” for its poor handling of the nuisance pink eye. Suppose this was the bird flu? Some things you just can’t afford to be slek about. A national pink eye prevention plan should have been in place already.

But that’s just the way we are. There is an “epidemic” of motor cycle accidents, and we do nothing. We made an “epidemic” of murders, and we exacerbate it.