Victoria’s Secret, Part Two

I gather from twitter that Victoria Coren couldn’t be
bothered to read (or reply to) my response to her ‘Observer’ article last week.
Well, if that was too much of an effort, she has an alternative. 

I
wrote a brief letter to the ‘Observer’, explaining my objections to what she
had said. I had hoped that newspaper, once the standard-bearer of civilised,
fair-minded  liberalism, and respected by many for its correct and
courageous refusal to back the Suez invasion,  would publish this epistle.
But it hasn’t ( and since every letter in this week’s paper referred to a
week-old article, and none to any from further back in time,  I suspect it
now won’t).

 

So, for those who can’t be doing with my lengthy dissections
of Miss Coren’s article (including her, apparently ) here is the letter:

 

‘Victoria Coren (‘Don’t be nice to addicts. Be fair’
19.08.12) makes several mistaken assumptions about my beliefs and opinions on
illegal drugs. May I correct them?  I have no wish to ‘hate’ heroin
abusers. It is the action I loathe, not the person. You do not have to be
indulgent to be compassionate. I do not want to put people in prison for its
own sake.  If deterrents are effective, and people understand that they are
real,  they rarely need to be used. Unlike her, I don’t wish to instruct
my opponents, peremptorily, to agree with me. I just want them to consider my
arguments rationally, and to rebut them (if they can) with facts and logic
rather than with personal abuse.