Professor Nutt... this is why you're fired.

Professor Nutt... (it's all in the name)... the Nutty Professor? Hmmm, no no, it won't do, they are all too easy. And so in contravention of the growing trend the title of this comment will contain no cheesy puns. I will just put it plainly and leave the puns for The Sun to come up with.

As I'm sure you know Prof Nutt, the government's advisor has been sacked after comments about how ecstasy and cannabis is less dangerous than alcohol and tobacco.

There seems to be a bit of an uproar about all this after all he pleads 'I was just giving the truth based in science and now I've been sacked for it'.

The response of the public seems to be that of 'oh, yes, you can't sack a man for just saying what is true' (or is that just the left wing media? I don't know).

But everyone seems to be missing the point a little.

Sure as far as I can tell only a complete idiot would say that cannabis is worse than tobacco because at no point has it been suggested that there is a link between cigarettes and having voices in your head. Now as a threat to society goes smoke may kill you, but psychopaths are a lot more dangerous... and the people they harm much more likely to be innocent. However all this means nothing, because unlike Prof Nutt, I haven't commited my time to working out which is more dangerous... in fact I've probably hardly spend more than 6 hours thinking about it in my whole life when considered as an aggregate. So unless he worked it out like this:

people killed by alcohol 8,000
people killed by ecstasy 80
ergo alcohol is more dangerous than pills

I will happily accept that he knows more about it than me. If he did work it out in terms of absolute numbers and disregarding proportions then he should just be sacked for being retarded... but I'll give him more credit than that.

So while I don't believe what he says I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that he has figures to back up what he is saying.

And so I can get on to my actual point, why was he fired.

To understand this you have to understand only that his comments were not in privacy... they were in a lecture. Essentially that means instead of having a quiet word to the government, he shouted out 'I think that ecstasy is less dangerous than alcohol' to the whole world and it gets worse once you think about the subtext that the moron on the street will hear:

+ to the drug user he said: you're no worse than the man in the pub;
+ to the dealer he said: you're no worse than a publican;
+ to the drinker he said: you've tried alcohol and you were fine, why not try pills? There is no reason not to;
+ to the smoker he said: why not add weed?

He didn't actually say this to anyone of course but sub textually he shouted it from every hill top in the land. Drug users don't need another excuse for their habit, they will think of them on their own, I've sat on a bus while associates argued that weed is better for you than tobacco because there is less material in a 'reefa' than there is in a cigarette to smoke (they didn't take into account the higher level of carcinogens in weed). Surely the idea of society (call me mad) is for people to actually be able to enjoy life without needing to be totally 'out of it' as often as possible? Or did the idea that you can be happy without having your high artificially propped up with chemicals die out with dinosaurs?

People will take drugs whether you want them to or not, they don't need encouragement in the same way that robbery doesn't need encouragement, it always has happened and it always will. The police just try and limit it and punish those responsible.

But I digress, Prof Nutt, if in future you wish not to be fired, a simple rule may be applied;
If you want to make any statement about any recreational drugs check it doesn't encourage their use (even implicitly) and if it does put it in a report, back it with some concrete figures and most of all, don't let the press see it!