[Watch the moive here for free]
[Sign the petition here]
The Beckley Foundation is about to launch a new global campaign in collaboration with Virgin Unite, Avaaz and the Global Commission on Drug Policy – “Breaking the Taboo” – to be launched with the film of the same name. The Mission Statement of the new campaign is the Beckley Foundation Public Letter, and the campaign will include a re-launching of the Avaaz petition to End the War on Drugs.
From
Movieline.com:
Aviation and music tycoon Sir Richard Branson and his son Sam Branson are no fans of the War on Drugs and they're hoping a new film that they launched on YouTube will do for their cause what An Inconvenient Truth did for the issue of global warming.
Produced through the younger Branson's production company, Sundog Pictures, Breaking the Taboo features a host of notables including former U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, other former world leaders as well as experts and other household names in a doc hoping to change hearts and minds about the global war on drugs.
Clinton is shown in the trailer saying the War on Drugs, which has cost billions and jailed thousands in the U.S. alone, "hasn't worked."
World leaders lend weight to film urging end to drug prohibition
Current and former world leaders on the frontline of the US-led war on drugs have called for a radical change of approach in a British-made film, to be launched online on Friday, that aims to do for global drugs policy what An Inconvenient Truth did to highlight manmade climate change.
By featuring a host of leaders, experts, opinion formers and household names pointing out the devastation they say has been inflicted on communities through prohibition, Breaking the Taboo seeks to persuade politicians to put aside fears about being seen as soft on drugs and explore alternatives.
Among those featured are Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos and former US president Bill Clinton, who admits bluntly that the US-led war on drugs in Colombia "hasn't worked". Clinton also talks about the need for rehabilitation rather than incarceration when dealing with addicts.
[...]
There have been signs of a shift in thinking, with Washington and Colorado recently legalising marijuana. Additionally, Latin American leaders in April asserted that the war on drugs had failed and that alternatives to prohibition must be found. The UN general assembly unanimously voted last week to hold a special session on drugs in 2016. Barack Obama is featured in Breaking the Taboo talking, before he was elected, about how a change in policy was needed, but he said earlier this year that legalisation was not the answer.
The
Drug Reform Policy says:
On 5 December, we are launching a new initiative called Breaking the Taboo. To mark the event we are holding two film premieres of the documentary “Breaking the Taboo”, one in London on the 5th and the other in New York on the 6th, at venues provided by Google. At the same time our new website will go live at breakingthetaboo.com. The film will be made available on YouTube on 7 December. Until then, go see who’s breaking the taboo, featuring Kate Winslet, Morgan Freeman, and Dizzee Rascal.
You can also view the Beckley Public Letter, published in the Times and the Guardian, signed by President Otto Pérez Molina of Guatemala, seven former presidents, twelve nobel laureates and many world-famous celebrities including Yoko Ono, Sting, and Richard Branson. The Beckley Public Letter forms the mission statement of Breaking the Taboo, and calls for an end to the war on drugs.
As if it needed to be said, I encourage everyone to make the time and spare the bandwidth to both watch and sign the above items.
Critical mass is being achieved. I would hope that the other side, so in favor of debt reduction, will see the value of the ending of prohibition in the face of their "moral" objection.
With Breaking the Taboo and the film The house we live in coming out in rapid succession many eyes will see the side of the argument that has been suppressed by government propaganda for decades.
Cowen Thorne