I am not saying that students should be searched when they go into lectures but I think we have to be a bit more grown up about it. Why is it ok for students to do drugs but those people on our streets who rob, attack, and become addicts its not ok? Why is it ok for us to talk to students and seem to say ‘hey guys your going to do it so here is the facts’? Also this drug IS banned in several countries so I would argue that this is a very well tested drug and the evidence is out their for all to see.

It’s not a question of a ‘just say no’ campaign its more about the wider role and responsibilities of us as students and as citizens. Should we make drugs legal? Whatever way students are buying this drug they are going about it in an illegal way, they are supporting more broader organised crime, and, as the Unisex people have found out, some students can’t handle this drug, yet your point is that it’s not really that big a drug.

I respect your comment but go out and talk to people who are doing this drug, ask them what else they do, what they mix it with, how often they do it. Then talk with the Talk to Frank folks and get some stats from them. If that’s not enough have a look and may be if your big enough interview some people on remand for drugs offences, ask they what they started with, what they do to get their drug of choice. The talk to the parents who have lost kids or loved ones because drugs have taken over their lives and they are now dead.

Sensational or not we are simply not mature enough to use drugs moderately and so to talk about it in a way that says ‘hey very impressionable 17-25 year old, this is our stance on drugs and these are the ones that aren’t that icky’.

Man up, drugs have a very real negative role in our society and you making out that its ‘sensationalistic’ and or fear mongering seems weak. You want your cake and eat it, do the research and get the facts then come to me and say ‘yeah students should be allowed to do what they want to do because guess what they are going to do it anyway’.

That’s a cop out, if we respect the rules then we follow them. Students follow many rules at uni and i find it a little odd that having a zero tolerance policy on drugs seems to be against the norm, rich I think!

Get out there and talk to people where ‘moderate drug usage’ became and has become something a bit more real and serious then tell me that the very well healed and protected students should be allowed to flaunt the law, practice (though limited) criminal activity in supporting local drug dealers and pushers, and have no consequences.

If you have a look at government policy and information, you’ll find that the harm minimisation and educational style of battling drug use (as used by Unisex) is a hell of a lot more effective than just outright banning or ‘just say no’ campaigns. Drug use under the Government’s ‘Just say no’ campaign a few years ago that simply preached about how awful all drugs were was a massive disaster. All signs, stats and information points to harm minimisation and impartial education about drugs used by the likes of Unisex as being by far the best way of tackling drug use. You can’t stop people taking drugs – they have done since the dawn of time – but you can sure as hell make sure they know how to be safe if they do choose to take anything.

It’s also worth pointing out that the massive increase in the use of the relatively untested mephedrone recently is largely due to the government’s clampdown on the far safer and tested MDMA. You ban a drug or make it really hard to get hold of, and people don’t stop taking it – they just look to other substances instead. How is banning mephedrone on campus going to stop anyone taking it? who’s going to police the students? Should students be frisked and drug tested before lectures?

Also funny how you cite 2(!) worldwide deaths from the LEGAL drug, whilst many thousands die from alcohol and tobacco each year.

So unless you can prove that mephedrone really is a problem and not just a media frenzy, then I will have to conclude that this is another pointless sensationalist article.