From: snow <snow@smoke.suba.com>
Date: Thu, 11 Jul 1996 15:02:39 +0800
To: "Mark M." <markm@voicenet.com>
Subject: Re: [RANT] Giving Mind Control Drugs to Children
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.3.94.960708214829.704A-100000@gak>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.3.93.960710193438.711C-100000@smoke.suba.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


On Mon, 8 Jul 1996, Mark M. wrote:

> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> OK, so I lied.  However, I can fit some crypto relevance into this.
> > On Mon, 8 Jul 1996, Arun Mehta wrote:
> > > Ritalin is a lifesaver for a small % of children who suffer from a condition
> >      Key word here.            |||||||
> > > Ritalin... mother was furious.  
> > > Some of the kids who use foul language (a very small %) have Tourette's
> > > disease, and also need medicine (a different one)... by and large the
> As long as we're talking about "key words", the "very small %" is very small
> indeed.  In the next paragraph you say "most kids" which is not at all
> contradictory to "a very small %".  I may have my facts mixed up, but
> Tourette's disease is an illness where one tends to say things that one was
> thinking but not meaning.

     Tourettes was brought up to explain one small boys behavior towards 
his mother. He would (IIRC) call her a "fucking asshole", yet he didn't 
seem to have these sorts of problems around his father. True tourettes is 
not an emotional problem, it is _very_ rare, and the person with tourettes
does not curse at only one person. 

    Undisiplined brats do have emotional problems. Parents who are under 
the ignorant mis-apprehension that children do not need disipline are the
cause of more than a few of this societies problems. 

> > 
> >      Bullshit. Most kids (these days) who use profanity are simply 
> > undisiplined louts. Yes, I use profanity today, at 28. However, I would 
> > NEVER have called my mother a "Fucking Asshole" under ANY circumstances, 
> > My father would have torn my head off. In fact if my father had caught me
> > speaking like that to ANYONE at 8 years of age, I would have had trouble
> > sitting for a couple days at least. 
> > 
> >      Of course my parents made sure not to talk like that around me. 
> 
> You are forgetting that this is a _disease_.  That means that someone cannot
> be cured of it by discipline or common sense.  It's no different from diabetes
> or any other disease.

     It is a disease becasuse the people who get paid to diagnois and treat 
it call it a disease? 

     Is it a crime because a cop thinks it is a crime? 

     I will admit to the possibility of ADD being a "disease", but I think 
that the number of children who really have the disease is small compared 
to the number of childern recieving drugs for it. 

     15 years ago I would have been diagnoised as having ADD. I had trouble 
paying attention in class, I spent a lot of time looking out the window. I 
was a mild behavior problem. I didn't have ADD. I was simply bored by a 
system that either taught me stuff that was irrelevant (I thought so 15 
years ago, and feel so today), that taught so badly as to seem irrelevant
(like algebra & higher math) (notice SEEM, I feel much different now), or 
taught stuff that was simply wrong (I don't remember examples now, but I 
remember calling teachers on wrong info back in HS, and getting in trouble
for it).
> > 
> > > politically correct thing is sometimes to label a kid as sick rather than
> > > bad or spoiled, this is probably why drugs are over-used.  But we can't
> > > throw the baby out with the bathwater!
> > 
> >      On the other hand, if only 20% of the children that are being drugged
> > need it, that means that we are sacrificing 80% of these children to save 
> > 20%. 
> 
> That wasn't the point.  The point is instead of dopping every kid that doesn't
> pay attention in school up with Ritalin, kids should instead be diagnosed as
> having ADD before receiving Ritalin treatment.  It can be helpful for the kids
> who actually have ADD.
>

	Ok, so instead of arresting everyone who uses PGP as a child 
pornographer and throwing them in jail, we should arrest them, convict them
(after all, they must be hiding something with that crypto) and then throw
them in jail. Is that what you are saying?

	Hoz-a-bout we GIVE THE KIDS SOMETHING TO BE INTERESTED IN HUH? 

        NO, WE CAN"T DO THAT THEY MIGHT ACTUALLY LEARN SOMETHING. 
 
        Look at the difference between the numbers of ADD kids in private 
schools and public schools. 

> >      Drugs are supposed to be for fun, not for long term behavior 
> > modification. People need to learn to deal with life. 
> Someone with a disease such as bipolar disorder would disagree with you.  There
> are some bipolar people who, without lithium, will end up with large wounds

      Uh.. That was a joke. Seriously tho' There is a difference between some
one who takes Lithium to even out neurochemistry, and a person who takes 
prozac to even take the edges off. 

     One is a medical condition, one is a psychological problem. 

> OK, now for the real crypto relevance.  Snow seems to be in denial about
> psychological illnesses.  This is the "it will never happen to me" attitude.

     Last time I checked the only symptom of Bipolar Manic depression I 
didn't have was suicide ideation. I have homicidal ideation. 

     I am not joking at this point. I'd be willindg to bet that I fall
VERY near the "Manic Depressive" line. 


     I just doubt that there are more than a small percentage of people out 
there who have mental illnesses that need strong drugs to combat. More people
SHOULD just learn to deal with it. I have found a couple of things that 
really help take the edge off my problems. Regular exercise is one. I 
recently started bike riding again, and I am doing 22+ miles a day. For the 
first time in about 10 years I have been sleeping a semi-regular schedule
(about 6 hours a night) I have been exercising about 3 weeks now, so we will 
see what happens. 

     This gets into what you are about to say, but in my case I am dealing
with my problems the best I can. It would be a hell of a lot easier to simple
take that little pill and have a nice calm chemical existence. It would be 
a lot easier to allow GAK and escrow. It is much better on all levels to 
deal with it yourself as much as possible. 

     I had never used PGP until today. Yes, I had D/Led it, compiled it, and 
installed it but never published a key, nor encrypted anything. An instance 
arose where someone else insisted I use it, so I figured it out. No problems.

     Part of the reason it was no problem is that I have spent a lot of 
time figuring shit out on my own, and only asking for help when I needed it,
or to help point the way. Too many people don't want that. They want all the 
questions answered for them. They like their mental fog and feel threatened
by people who don't. 

     I'd bet that a lot of these so called "ADD" kids are the ones who ask 
the hard questions in class, the ones who threaten to wake the other students
up. Can't have that. 

> Tyranny can effect anyone and everyone.  It's not limited to criminals.  This
> is why strong crypto is necessary.

     Well, something we agree on anyway. 

     Again, I am not saying that there are NO ADD kids, I know one, and he is 
a mess. However, there are many kids who are labeled ADD who aren't. I know
what Speed does to a person, Been there. Liked that (remember the Manic 
Depressive? I _LIKE_ manic.), but speed is very dangerous stuff, and 
highly addicted. Got an ex-friend to testify to that. Or he would if he 
could breath.  

Petro, Christopher C.
petro@suba.com <prefered for any non-list stuff>
snow@crash.suba.com