 Ban adult ads on Craigslist. Ban the sale of condoms to minors. Ban shoes for Dahlia … Heck, ban adulthood for her too. When I was a kid I couldn’t wait to be an adult. I promised myself I would eat as much chocolate as I wanted. I would have cake and ice cream for supper. And I would go out to restaurants every night (presumably ones that served cake and ice cream). There are many things I can do now, because nobody can tell me what to do anymore. I can eat bags and bags of chips. I can stay up all hours of the night. I can buy the perfect shoe (size-6, no hint intended, my lovelies) - in every colour. Nonetheless, I must ask the government to enact laws to eliminate these choices from my repertoire, because they simply encourage me to act irresponsibly and potentially harm myself. Certainly, without these options my responsibility would be guaranteed, the same way teenagers would refrain from sex if we refrained from providing them with condoms, and the same way sex trade workers would disappear if their ads were banned from a classifieds Web site.  A picture saves a thousand lives. Consider this: If I gave you cyanide, would you kill yourself? Of course you would. If you were walking down the street, and I gave you a condom, would you go and have sex? Of course you would. (True story: When I was younger, a major condom company sent me to rock concerts as a host and to hand out their prophylactics. The hundreds and hundreds of leftovers were mine to keep. You could only imagine.) And what about adult ads? If you were presented with one, would you immediately procure those services? Of course you would. Honestly, if Craigslist didn’t exist, how would sex traffickers ever find their victims? You think they would resort to newspaper and magazine ads, or the vulnerable and disenfranchised? As if. On second thought, banning the site’s adult ads, that is, the legal business of sex between consenting adults, wouldn’t make a difference. Nope. All ads should be banned there. Craigslist should be taken down. It also promotes fraud. Oh, what a tangled Internet we weave, when first we practice to deceive. The entire Web encourages sex, crime, violence, gluttony, and terrorism. Get rid of the whole thing.  Don't eat yellow snow or molest alligators. While we’re at it, let’s give our elected officials time off from their lobbyist rendezvous to regulate common sense entirely, as the common sense of the many must be sacrificed for the stupidity of the few. There’s only one problem: you can’t ban common sense. It will always find a way to prevail. You can’t ban hot coffee. Coffee will always be hot. You can’t ban sex trade workers. They will always exist. You can’t ban sex. People will always find a way to have it. During prohibition, many individuals still found ways not only to consume alcohol, but to distill and distribute it as well. Naturally, it created and nurtured never before seen levels of organized crime, and made criminals millions in the process. Today, prohibition has impacted the world both socially and criminally. Granted, there are laws that have been made to protect us with tangible positive results, such as the requirement to wear seatbelts. Since it became law to buckle up, more lives have been saved. Conversely, since the Ontario ban-to-the-bone “Pit Bull” restriction, there has not been a reduction in the amount of dog bites in the province.  And surprise, surprise, I do not eat cake and ice cream for supper every night. Nor do I down bags of potato chips, while staying up all hours, contemplating which of my hundreds of shoes I will wear the next day. As much as it may be fun to indulge in a hedonist lifestyle, I don’t. I eat healthy and relegate myself to rationing shoe purchases. But, if I ever want the perfect pair of shoes badly enough, even if it they are not in my closet, and not in any of the 50 different stores I search in, I will find them and will find a way to buy them. Because when you really want something, you make it happen. And sometimes the more people tell you not to do it, the more you want it. Remember, every don’t is an invitation to do. P.S. Please don’t buy me Betsey Johnson, Lucky Brand, or Chinese Laundry size-6 shoes.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |