The Shaken and Stirred Christmas Prohibition Speakeasy was a resounding success, with something for everyone to disagree with. Debate and argument raged well into the night, fueled by some decent moonshine from our favourite bootleggers, Winestar. To get riled up again or get furious by your lonesome, we’ve provided the speeches and audio from the night, as well as some photos, below.
You can download the audio here.
Dr Ingrid van Beek of the medically supervised King’s Cross injecting room spoke on drugs and harm minimisation:
Dr Ingrid van Beek
“At present, publicly funded programs operate to provide syringes and needles to injecting drug users with the clear understanding that they will be used to administer prohibited drugs. In these circumstances to shrink from the provision of safe, sanitary premises where users can safely inject is somewhat short sighted. The health and public safety benefits outweigh the policy considerations against condoning otherwise unlawful behaviour.” (Justice James Wood, 1997)
Dee Madigan, discussed advertising and internet censorship:
Dee Madigan
“…What is so wrong with being offended? Is being offended such a bad thing in itself – why do we need to live in a world that is so bloody inoffensive? We’ve all been offended at some stage in our lives. If not, then we’re not confronting issues we should be. Imagine if every time you were offended by something you could stop it from happening. Would you, or more importantly should you? And think of how many times you’ve offended someone. Imagine if they had the right to restrict what you could say. Being offended is one of the costs of free speech, but it’s a price worth paying… If an ad offends you switch it off and don’t buy the product!”
Elena Jeffreys, President of the Scarlet Alliance, the criminalisation and regulation of prostitution:
Elena Jeffreys
“Given that people imagine that sex workers are women and clients are male, it can only be that we need to be protected from male clients. Hello to the crisis in masculinity. And if you look at the logical conclusion of this approach, in Sweden they have taken it to the next level, and protected us by criminalising the clients. For good. Sorry, I mean for our good. Oh wouldn’t that be great?! Making my source of income, the men that I see, criminal?”
And David Leyonhjelm, of the Liberty and Democracy Party, spoke on gun control:
David Leyonhjelm
“Some people actually fear guns, like some fear heights or spiders. The term for fear of guns is hoplophobia. People who fear guns are not open to rational persuasion, just as some people can never relax when there’s a spider on the wall no matter how much scientific data is offered explaining how spiders can’t jump.”
Smart stuff, made fun – the photo gallery:
