What is going on? "Kava sold in 20g deal bags"

[TheKavaSociety]

Another "huge kava bust" in Australia: http://www.donotlink.com/www.ntnews...nrestrained-kids/story-fnk0b1zt-1227322746977

I am really confused, these guys sell kava in 20g bags for big $. This is obviously a TINY amount. Either the aboriginal communities are totally desperate to get kava or something else is going on.

#thefollyofprohibition

 

[kavadude]

To paraphrase Ron White...if I have 20g of kava, I consider myself to be out of kava.

 

[Steve Mariotti]

Yeah, I'll bet that's why it's valued by the government at $1000 per kilo, because people are making tiny bags of it and selling those at crazy prices. Per bag, that's like 1/3rd the amount of ground kava I use in a session.

Looks like drugs. They're treating it like illegal drugs, and so the police are too. Sigh. The whole thing is just sad. Starting with the condition of aborigines in Australian society, and ending with this madness of banning kava while vodka is legal.

 

[verticity]

"deal bags"? Jesus, that's ridiculous. But those kids should have been wearing seat belts.

 

[Steve Mariotti]

I guess if you mixed a "deal bag" with booze, you could get even more fucked up? Poor bastards.

 

[TheKavaSociety]

Ok, Now be ready for a shocker: Such a deal bag with crappy kava (possibly cut with flour or even cement) can be realistically (no police hysteria, actual sentences with witness testimonies) sold for $15-20. It can therefore be more expensive than the finest noble instant one can buy in America.

Sources: http://www.supremecourt.nt.gov.au/remarks/2015/02/Tupou_06022015_21422154_SenNet.pdf
http://www.supremecourt.nt.gov.au/archive/doc/judgements/2006/ntsc/20060922ntsc77.html

It's a fortune for 3 tablespoons of kava! The whole thing is really odd. Perhaps the aboriginal communities really do use kava for medicinal purposes (maybe to stop alcohol craving?)? I cannot believe that extremely poor people would be paying $20 for a tiny amount of a very mild sedative (possibly of terrible quality).

 

[TheKavaSociety]

Here's the judge's justification for sentencing a Tongan man for selling kava in northern Australia:

"It is acknowledged that kava has an adverse effect on the health of individual users, in particular, in excess, it is known to cause or lead to liver damage. It also causes significant dysfunction in Aboriginal communities, because users, particularly heavy users, tend to neglect their family responsibilities and duties. Also, it causes heavy users to lose interest and motivation to obtain and engage in gainful employment. It also causes economic dysfunction, in that money that should be spent on household goods and necessaries can be spent on kava. And that, in itself, causes problems in communities where kava is widely used. That is the basic reason why the legislature has seen fit to heavily regulate the use of kava and to make it a criminal offence to supply kava to persons without a licence to do so."

 

[TheKavaSociety]

Meanwhile, according to this survey kava is possibly the least problematic (socio-economic perspective, that also reflects availability of certain substances) of all (legal and illegal) substances consumed by the Aboriginal communities

 

[TheKavaSociety]

The same publication gives an interesting perspective on why kava trade is still popular in these areas: "The study by Clough et al. (2002b) of spending in two remote communities found that much of the estimated $21,000 a month spent on alcohol and tobacco left the local economy immediately, whereas as much as half of the $22,000 a month spent on illegal cannabis and kava remained in local hands and could be redistributed for local community or family purposes. This might go some way to explaining wider community tolerance of the cannabis trade in many areas and the persistence of highly infl ated black market kava trading in settlements with licensed availability of cheaper, better quality kava."

 

[verticity]

Here's the judge's justification for sentencing a Tongan man for selling kava in northern Australia:

"...Also, it causes heavy users to lose interest and motivation to obtain and engage in gainful employment. It also causes economic dysfunction, in that money that should be spent on household goods and necessaries can be spent on kava...."

I've heard that recording before. Not with respect to kava, but in the US, there is sometimes a very punitive attitude toward welfare recipients. The idea that if someone is poor, they should only spend money on the barest of necessities. It's really a denial of the poor as human beings who need things to sustain their spirits like the rest of us.