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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   5371 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 1, 2025

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There are people who make the argument that gun sellers should be held responsible for anything done with their product, but it's generally laughed out of American society. Especially by the right wing, given the long history of focusing on personal responsibilities.

But how about the other examples then? Are sugar companies terrorists? Are the tobacco and alcohol companies terrorists? They're all dangerous unhealthy products that get misused and abused, causing health damage and even death.

Well, there's a reason why I went with the example of arms dealers circumventing international law to smuggle drugs into a war zone with an ongoing genocide. I think Colt or H&K are entirely above board. Cars kill people too, and I don't blame Honda as long as they met government safety standards.

With alcohol and cigarettes, everyone knows what they're getting into. Society beats into your head the fact that you're almost certainly strictly better off not touching them, but hey, you're a free man, and if you're an adult that's your choice. I like that. I also believe that most currently illegal drugs should be held to the same standard.

The arguments you bring up are emotive and sway the innumerate. I am okay with greater than zero people dying because of their choices, and that point it becomes a question of quantity, not quality. Swimming pools kill kids too.

By those standards, a fent dealer is closer to someone aiding and abetting a genocide. Someone selling weed and coke at Burning Man is not. That's my two cents.

By those standards, a fent dealer is closer to someone aiding and abetting a genocide. Someone selling weed and coke at Burning Man is not. That's my two cents.

By raw numbers, junk food companies kill and injure way more citizens a year than fentanyl does. They have massive lobbying arms to get themselves into schools (where they clog our childrens arteries and make them unable to exercise well and ugly), remain on programs like SNAP, and get funneled government money.

And Google says

Tobacco use is responsible for over 480,000 deaths per year in the United States,

In raw numbers, that's about 6.5x as deadly as fentanyl! And some of those are secondhand smoking, people who didn't choose to be harmed by cigarettes unlike an addict ODing.

Why aren't we drone striking the tobacco companies? They kill half a million citizens a year, and there's not a "legitimate use" for cigarettes.

The coke is illegal, though, so the buyer can't quite claim consumer rights. If you're using it, you have to know that it might be smuggled from dubious places and laced with dubious chemicals, some of which can send you into OD.

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