Quote from: RE on Jun 06, 2026, 11:52 AM

Quote from: TDoS on Jun 06, 2026, 06:40 AMI wonder what the 20-30k people a year who die from this wonderful substance think about it?

6000 people/year die in motorcycle crashes too.

Indeed. And car crashes. And falling down stairs. Drowning. Robbery gone bad. Pulling a gun on the wrong person (seen this one before). The causes of death are indeed legion. But none of these are voluntary acts(well, pulling a gun on someone might be). Taking drugs to get high and dying is a choice. Robbers don't plan on dying in the act of robbing...but it happens. The suicidal might drive a car knowing they plan on using it to kill themselves, but normal folk don't. The suicidal might swim knowing they can't...and drown. Pulling a gun on the wrong person is a voluntary act....that can turn out poorly depending on who you are pulling on.

Come on RE, you aren't required to demonstrate that statistics can lie, and liars use statistics in front of someone who can spot either or both a mile away.

Quote from: REAt least with coke, it's only your own stupidity that causes the death.

If by "stupidity" you mean "stupid enough to do dangerous drugs that might have corrupted you ability to know when to stop" then I agree with you.

Quote from: REOn a bike, you risk other people's stupidity causing it.

That is called life. Be it an idiot cager killing you, or getting hit by space junk falling from the sky. In neither case is it you deciding that "Hey! Lets do some cool drugs today and hope I don't overdose, or my dealer didn't substitute in a little too much drain cleaner to the mix". It isn't as though hard illegal drugs are FDA approved now, is it?

Quote from: REIn any event, all worthwhile things carry some risk.

LIFE carrys risk, and is indeed worthwhile. And then there are all things we do in life that raise or lower our chances of making it to the average or median age before croaking more naturally.

Hunter Thompson and reaching the finish line....best quote ever. He got it. Drugs, motorcycles, parachuting without a parachute, whatever. We all choose our brand of risk, but I think Hunter had the idea right.

So I let the drug users use drugs. And I hope that I don't low side in Turn 6 at Laguna and slide off the cliff awaiting on the outside of the corner.

Quote from: REFar as LSD goes, virtually nobody dies and it's non-addictive.

Outstanding! I imagine that is why it is legal in all 50 states. Oops...wait....for some strange reason....it isn't. You make it sound so safe....I wonder why it isn't legal? All those straight laced folks just being a drag on a happy go lucky drug culture types?

Quote from: REAnyhow, as I said earlier, your attitude stems from childhood.  It's clearly a reaction to having an alcoholic father.  You never got over that.
RE

Thank you for that Mr Dr of Psychology RE. I remember when you tried to play geologist once, it was a riot. At least now with AI you could probably do better I bet. I might agree with your amateur shrink routine though, but only because I do analytics for a living, and logically, it seems reasonable that some of my life choices and current behavior stem from childhood events. I imagine a Shrink AI would say the same thing. 

But I don't consider choosing to avoid illegal drugs to be an attitude. It is a decision. And dad did booze, he wasn't a doper. So it isnt' apropos anyway, unless I just wanted to be some alky in the bag all the time. Which obviously I didn't.

So while maybe I can agree that a little of some part of each of us probably can be traced back that far, it doesn't necessary express itself as much as some might think. But a little...somewhere...somehow..maybe.