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Original poster

Tory drug use - please can someone explain!

33 replies

MrsCatnip · 10/06/2019 07:08

Why are the media coming down so hard on Michael Gove, when several other candidates have admitted taking illegal drugs too?
Personally, I couldn't give a toss what any of them have taken in the past. I don't think that flirting with drugs in your youth is in any way unusual and it's not as if any of them are admitting to a present day drug habit. In fact, while it's not illegal, I think Boris' repeated infidelity renders him equally unsuitable in character for a PM... it's shows him to be a liar and a cheat, which in my mind is worse than occasional drug use 20+ years ago.

OP posts:

Barnabyboy · 10/06/2019 07:10

I’d be more surprised if there were an mp of any party who hadn’t taken anything in the past tbh

Mnbb · 10/06/2019 07:13

Gove is a front runner who was forced into an admission he didn’t want to make.

The others are less prominent chances who volunteered admissions about softer drugs and mainly as one of experiments.

Gove has a history of zero tolerance of drugs. Including introducing a life time ban on teachers who are found to take cocaine.

It’s the hypocrisy that is the bigger issue not the drug taking alone.

ZenNudist · 10/06/2019 07:14

Hypocrisy and media bias towards Bo Jo.

I agree i think liars snd cheats should be barred.

whyohwhyowhydididoit · 10/06/2019 07:15

Because when Gove was minister for education he implemented a rule that any teacher who used illegal drugs would be banned from teaching for life. Even for a politician that level of hypocrisy is quite staggering.

BambooBoobam · 10/06/2019 07:16

If liars and cheats were barred, they’d be no one to stand as leader!

gamerwidow · 10/06/2019 07:17

It’s not the taking drugs that’s important. Lots of people have experimented in their youth. It’s their voting record on criminalising other people for doing the same. It’s the hypocrisy that’s the problem.

gamerwidow · 10/06/2019 07:18

P.s. you’re right that Boris is worse but he is the darling of the right wing media.

OldUnit · 10/06/2019 07:21

It's more the sheer hypocrisy and lying if of it, really. THAT speaks more to the character of the man than the odd line of coke, 20yrs ago does.

Baconbutties · 10/06/2019 07:22

Because when he was Secretary of State for education he brought in a teachers code of conduct in 2014 that meant teachers using class A drugs got a lifetime ban . So one mistake for them means lifetime ban from their careers but it’s ok to be education secretary and potential PM? It’s the hypocrisy not the drug taking that is the issue.

SisterMaryLoquacious · 10/06/2019 07:27

Most of them have admitted either very occasional class B drug use or one off use of drugs overseas where they may have been legal.
Gove is different because this was
A) class A
B) in no way a one-off
C) followed up by an published article in a broadsheet (I think) about the badness of middle class drug use
D) the teacher thing

Cameron also ticked boxes A and B but there wasn’t anyone in his social circle who loathes him enough to to stick their neck out and dob him in so he got away with the “private life before politics” line.

Boris almost certainly ticks both A and B but seems to have got away with it.

rosedream · 10/06/2019 07:28

He didn't dabble with it in his youth he was late 20s early 30s I think.
It was a class A drug.
He didn't do it once it was a life style choice.

I totally get that you can change and I'm all for that makes a real person. However I think that person should be upfront about their past and see it as a positive not hide it and pretend it never happened until forced to admit it.

He also made it that a teacher is stuck off for life if caught with drugs on them in their own time. A teacher is bared from teaching if caught with cannabis even if they never touch it again. He however can run a country when he was in possession of a class A drug as with a teacher never touching since. It's the hypocrisy.

Boris is out their on his own. I wish his infidelity was all that was wrong with him. He's Teflon ! For some obscure reason.

rosedream · 10/06/2019 07:29

There *

howwudufeel · 10/06/2019 07:30

He was writing articles condemning drug use while using cocaine himself.

SisterMaryLoquacious · 10/06/2019 07:31

A Govista was just on Today claiming that it was before he planned to enter public life. PPE graduate in his late twenties? Chinny reckon.

FeminismandWomensFights · 10/06/2019 07:38

I totally agree about Boris being morally untrustworthy and Gove just barefacedly hypocritical. Jeremy Hunt is an enormous hypocrite too, desperate to deflect attention by trotting out his anti women views. Do these candidates think the conservatives and the wider electorate are idiots?

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3607795-Jeremy-Hunt-believes-abortion-limit-should-be-12-weeks?pg=1&order=

Mnbb · 10/06/2019 07:51

His statement that it was “before I knew I was going to enter public life” is bizarre. Does that mean he thinks it’s was an ok thing to do and the only problem is that he’s now being held to account for it? If those are his thoughts why has he been so hard on those not in public life who dabble in drugs?

No moral consistency at all.

x2boys · 10/06/2019 07:52

It's a bit different being a teacher and actively using class A drugs and being a teacher who may have used class A drugs in their dim and distant past ,I don't think he's still using drugs is he ?

ZenNudist · 10/06/2019 08:27

I think Gove has no chance of being PM. Hes just there to make it look like a competition before they crown BJ.

I like that Rory guy more. Im not a tory voter but him v corbyn id choose him, maybe.

Mammajay · 10/06/2019 08:38

I like Sam Gyimah ...don't care about his youthful past ( if there is any thing lurking) but Boris is a present day liar and cheat!

AChickenCalledKorma · 10/06/2019 08:39

Gove is a year older than me. He says the drug use was about 20 years ago.

20 years ago, I was married with a large mortgage and a responsible job. I was not by any stretch of imagination a youth with a tendency to make foolish choices. And nor was he.

Mammajay · 10/06/2019 08:40

Why did Jeremy hunt mention a cannabis lassi milk drink from his backpacking days in India?

Reallybadidea · 10/06/2019 08:48

According to The Times, they published an article he wrote condemning the use of drugs the day after he took cocaine at a party. That is absolutely staggering hypocrisy.

Not to mention that he probably lied in his ESTA application.

Inforthelonghaul · 10/06/2019 09:21

when I was a young adult I believed very differently about things like the use of drugs to the way I do now as a fully fledged bill paying responsible adult with teenage children.

Inforthelonghaul · 10/06/2019 10:01

If every would be MP was excluded for trying drugs as a student there would be zero applicants. I am much less inclined to trust someone who cheats on their partner than someone who tried drugs 30 yrs ago at uni.

Tawdrylocalbrouhaha · 10/06/2019 10:10

I think the thought of MICHEAL GOVE fuelled by coke is just horrifying, and it's hard to get past that.

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