RT> * You have CHOSEN to use marijuana.  Some of us believe that it is   
RT> detrimental to your well being.  You don't.  Nevertheless, it is   
RT> your choice to use it.
RB> And will it be my choice if I am ever *arrested* for using
RB> marijuana? A pretty  stupid example to start out with, Ron.
Yes.  You know that one of the possible consequences of
using marijuana is being arrested yet you still CHOOSE
to use it therefore if you do get arrested it will be
because you weighed the pros and cons of continued use
and made the CHOICE to continue.
IOW, you have to choice to use it and be arrested or
not to use and not be arrested.
RB> I suppose it will be my *choice* to go  to jail, right? The
See above.
RB> key there is that "some of us believe..." Maybe you forget 
RB> that the police actively hunt drug users, to justify their
RB> own bloated war  against it?
Which you clearly know about so see above.
RB> Of course, everything could be drawn into that simple idea,
RB> huh. We could even  blame the blacks for the systemic racism
RB> against them in the 50's and 60's -  they HAD a choice, they
RB> could have moved to Africa, or maybe they shouldn't  have
RB> tried to go out to eat, they wouldnt have had to sit in the
RB> colored  section, huh. Everything is easy to say was a
RB> mistake in hindsight.  
You need to talk to some people who were there!!!  They
made some of the hardest choices anyone ever had to
make.  Given the choice which would you do: go out in
the streets where you know you are going to be beaten
or bitten or sprayed with a fire hose (FYI, it takes at
least two men to control a hose that's how much
pressure it exerts) or would you choice to stay home?
Would you choose to try to change things in an area
where blacks are regularly beaten and often killed for
just looking at a white woman and where you faced the
same thing even though you were white or would you just
sit at home watching TV and thinking how someone should
do something about it?
People (black and white) made choices, HARD CHOICES,
choices that I don't think YOU would make to change
things.  And yes some people chose to just continue to
ride in the back of the bus and drink at the colored
water fountain.  That was their choice
RB> Maybe if that 13-year-old kid wasn't sick of working at
RB> Kroger's to support his 
RB> family and hadn't decided to mug a drunk rich person going
RB> through their  neighborhood one night, they wouldn't be
RB> spending life in prison, only to  become an even more
RB> hardened criminal, etc etc. 
RB> I agree that many of the middle- and upper- class have tons
RB> of choices in life. 
So every poor person has no choice but to be a
criminal?  Sorry I don't buy it.  Mainly because even
today most people (poor, rich or whatever) are honest
hard working people.
RB> But I will say that you are trying to deny the effects of
RB> racism and classism  and sexism on the lower class as a
RB> whole - and you will always fail. If you  think those forces
RB> aren't present, you are either naive & ignorant, or a liar. 
Everything you mention is human nature.  People hang
out with people like themselves and are more
comfortable doing it.  Let's use a fairly benign group,
athletes.  You put a large groups of athletes together
and the football players will hang out with other
football players; baseball players will hang out with
other baseball players; etc.  You will notice that in
the groups there will be different races and classes of
people.  These little things are over looked because
there is a stronger bond, their sport.
There it no way to change human nature, you can pass
all the laws you want and send people to all the
sensitivity classes you want to but in the end you are
still going to have all the 'isms there are now.
                      Remember:  Freedom isn't Free!
--- timEd-B11
---------------