Anti-sex, pro-censorship gangs want to be called “abolitionist” because it lets them pretend their racist schemes are a continuation of the 19th-century campaign against chattel slavery. But in actuality, they are a continuation of the 19th-century campaign to harass, spy upon, inflict state violence upon, and generally destroy the lives of people who did things the prohibitionists (whose movement was rooted in US evangelical Protestantism) disapproved of, such as alcohol, extramarital sex of any kind (including masturbation, homosexuality, and sexual imagery), abortion, interracial fraternization, etc, etc. Only the most deranged of this warped cult of busybodies actually believe they can “abolish” human nature; what most of them really want is a permanent government-backed war on human nature, AKA Prohibition. Prohibitionists not only live in a fantasy world, but demand that the rest of us live in it with them. And they want the state to restrict the liberties of those they fantasize about, and enact violence on those who refuse to pretend their fantasies are real. Supporters of Prohibition are properly called Prohibitionists, not “abolitionists”. Words mean things; call prohibitionists what they are, not what they pretend to be.
What They Are
January 29, 2021 by Maggie McNeill
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Words mean things; call prohibitionists what they are, not what they pretend to be.
Most important part of the article, in my opinion. Thank you, Maggie.
The hypocrisy of prohibitionists is another example of the human capacity to compartmentalize and rationalize.
We have to outlaw marijuana and other drugs because of the harm they do — but not tobacco products, which are more harmful, because that would “just drive it underground” and make things worse.
We have to keep women who did any kind of sex work from being doctors, lawyers, teachers, etc., because of the “poor moral example” it sets … but let’s give embezzlers, con artists and other so-called white collar criminals a second chance.
We have to shut down porn sites because “experts” say it screws up young people’s brains … but we have to be careful about sites that are used to defraud people because of concerns about “free markets” and “free speech”.
True.
During the US civil war the “temperance” movement (which was primarily an alcohol prohibition movement) lost membership and influence.
After the US civil war and the legal abolition of slavery, many slavery abolitionists turned to the temperance movement as their next great crusade.
That historical link is one reason that the terms “prohibitionist” and “abolitionist” became conflated in political rhetoric.
Prohibition of alcohol and other drugs was always inherently racist. Among the earliest cannabis prohibition laws enacted were in (of all places) California, around 1912. The crusade was against “Hindoos”, who apparently used and cultivated cannabis.
Not to mention linking cannabis to African-American and Mexican-American communities.
In California, that demonization occurred a year or two after the 1911-1912 legislature’s moral panic about “Hindoos” (which generally meant all South Asians). After the prohibition law passed the legislature, by 1914 demonization of African-Americans and Mexican-Americans began happening in full force as well.
The first major raid on Mexican-Americans was in 1914, in Sonoratown. a Los Angeles neighborhood.
Those are facts.
My conjecture about the cause of the initial “Hindoo” moral panic, and this is only conjecture, is that South Asians were very successful farmers of ordinary commercial crops in the Central Valley around Fresno, and the prohibition law was an attempt to drive them out.
But this is not conjecture: after the law passed, it became a useful legal tool to persecute other ethnicities.
Its amazing how simple rebranding can completely change the narrative around the issues. Hell, just ask anybody on Twitter who claims they support “Freedom and free speech” and it soon becomes apparent what they truly mean while using those words.
Every time a western government talking-head talks about how the world needs ‘democracy and free expression’ I physically cringe.