For the benefit of those just coming to this story:
* Peter Reynolds is the leader of Clear, the UK cannabis law reform party, having got that position in February 2011 through joining the Legalise Cannabis Alliance.
* In January, someone found a whole bunch of homophobic and racist posts on his personal blog and posted them on his Facebook. Peter Reynolds’ response was to call gay people perverts and state that he stood by everything he said. Being quite shocked, I wrote my first blogpost condemning his homophobia.
* The following week, as the homophobic/racist/calling people nasty things scandal wore on, someone started contacting the MPs on Peter Reynolds’ Facebook friends list to show them the screencaps of all these statements that Peter Reynolds and his dwindling band of supporters continue to claim do not affect his credibility as a political leader. The MPs all duly deleted him (14 at the time of publication, now 17). Someone sent me the screencaps, and I duly published my third post.
* At this point, the Mail on Sunday got involved, and wrote up a feature article on Peter Reynolds and his ways. They were supposed to publish this on the 22nd January, but it has been withheld for some weeks because, well, Peter Reynolds and Clear aren’t that important compared to news. But the night before it was originally due to come out, Peter Reynolds decided it would be a great idea to publish a blogpost attacking me. Like, actually attacking me. Not disagreeing with me politically, or rebutting any, any of my points. He called me “half-werewolf, half-woman”, “genetically confused” and “heterophobic” (because to denounce the beliefs of Peter Reynolds is to denounce all straight people, at least that was what I got from that), among other things. This prompted my fourth blogpost, a response to his attacks on me. I still, several weeks later, can’t quite believe that the leader of a political party, aspiring to be a national authority on cannabis legalisation, saw fit to publish such a petty name-calling post in the first place. And he says he has a background in PR? Newsflash: calling someone “politically correct” doesn’t mean you’re therefore justified in calling them sub-human.
* Peter Reynolds seems to have taken exception to my last blogpost because he then announced an intention to sue myself and Darryl Bickler of the Drug Equality Alliance. I would like to thank everyone who has got in contact to express their support for me. The great and the good of the cannabis movement, and several involved in global drug law reform, have got in touch to tell me what they think of the whole situation. Several drug policy NGOs have privately told me they will never be working with Clear again. I am unable to comment any further for all encompassing “legal reasons” (my side, not his). One of the few public thanks I can make go out to Dopefiend, who has posted two supportive podcasts (302 and 303) mentioning me and also many other things relating to cannabis activists and how they view Peter Reynolds, that I would highly recommend to people who genuinely seem to believe that Peter Reynolds is some kind of good thing for the cannabis campaign.
The sad fact is, I am not the only person that Peter Reynolds has been blogging about because he can’t censor our own websites. He used Clear’s blog to publish a post attacking Winston Matthews (a long-time cannabis campaigner and medicinal cannabis user who was jailed last week), for “provoking” the judge who sentenced him by posting videos of Winston using cannabis. Setting aside the silliness of a pro-legalisation party saying that a chronically ill medicinal cannabis user somehow brought his sixteen month prison sentence on himself, I’m sure that post had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that both he and all Clear Executive members were banned from the FREE WINSTON MATTHEWS Facebook group (which everyone should join, btw), which has gained over 1400 members in the last week.
In the same post, Peter Reynolds even attacked Release, the drug law charity whose annual turnover is about, ooh, several hundred thousand times that of Clear’s, who have saved thousands of drug users from prison, who run five national campaigns about different aspects of drug policy, who host and support a variety of other drug policy NGOs in their office, who basically do everything that you think a good, effective drug policy campaign should. Peter Reynolds’ judgement? Well, in an article whose title implied they were cowards, he said “Release has turned away from the mainstream and become an uber-politically correct collection of lawyers interested only in more and more esoteric minorities. Now it is little more than a free legal advice bureau.” God forbid that actually qualified lawyers should have something to say about drug laws and the people who suffer under them. I’m sure that, too, had absolutely nothing to do with their webpage politely pointing out that Peter Reynolds’ claims that the new British sentencing guidelines for cannabis offences means that cannabis has been decriminalised are wrong.
In light of the fact that Peter Reynolds has taken to dissing pretty much any and every drug law reform group and campaigner going, I think this is beyond the tiny political party he “leads”. I would therefore suggest that you sign this petition, calling on him to resign. 170 people have signed it in the last two weeks, which I think says a lot about the strength of feeling and also neatly rebuts the claim that Clear Exec members like to put about that all this fuss is just the result of some annoyed ex-LCA members jealous of Peter Reynolds’ “success”. He won’t resign, of course, but I think it’s very important that there is a clear sign that Peter Reynolds speaks for no-one but himself. Read more here.
what a well written article, I congratulate you on some good hard hitting evidence
Thanks Des, and thanks for sharing it. :)
Sarah
Another great article Sarah,much kudos to you for your researching into what is very muddy waters where Peter Reynolds is concerned it seems
Thankyou Glyn!
You are all just trolls and liars!
Release, the SSDP, the 17 MP’s, the many activists who have spoken up, Dopefiend, they are all just TROLLS, LIARS AND PROHIBITIONISTS! You should be ashamed of yourself Sarah, attacking a defenceless old man.
Attacking a defenceless old man? lol. Probably you Peter who wrote that. Stop covering for a bigot by lying about liars.
It is *remarkable* just how everyone who isn’t Peter Reynolds are such persistent and devious liars when he’s the only one out of all of us with a conviction for dishonesty…
Nice article confirming what we had all suspected Sarah. If you’re planning to sue Peter for defamation then good on you.
Given his previous conviction (and prison sentence) for ‘dishonesty’, shouldn’t CLEAR’s accounts be open to inspection by all?
Clear’s accounts are handled by Jan Wells, not Peter Reynolds, according to the Clear website. They are legally obliged to report their income and expenditure to the electoral commission every twelve months from their registration date. I think its reasonable to wait until that time comes and then begin making demands to see their accounts if they are not forthcoming, I think it’s fair to say that not every receipt and every donation needs to be published for public view!
Does Jan Wells have the personality and/or authority to over-ride Peter?
Somehow I doubt it. The Electoral Commission will also give out very little information.
This is a fairly unique situation in terms of Peter’s conviction for ‘dishonesty’. I doubt there’s a direct precedent.
I have no idea, but I also don’t think that Clear has a lot of money to worry about, tbh. We’ll have to see what the accounts say, but we’re looking at the low thousands in terms of cash, aren’t we? Or am I missing something?
It adepends on the donations and how many members they have. Both seem to be a big secret. And as you’ve demonstrated, it appears that we can’t necessarily take anything Peter says at face value.
If you read that article about fashion and think it’s homophobic, you’re an idiot. With regards to the rest of the rubbish contained within this ‘article’, get over your self. Once we have won the ‘actual’ fight, then by all means, slander away. I’ve said the same thing to Peter in the past. Just leave this horse shit alone, it’s fucking us all. How many times have I said it.
As Dopefiend said, “I have never seen such unity in the cannabis movement in my life, but it’s not against prohibition, it’s against Peter Reynolds.” I remain astonished that people can believe that alienating everyone he comes into contact with is a viable strategy for influencing British drug policy.
I also note you have nothing to say about what, exactly, is inaccurate about my article you deride.
ooft – http://peterreynolds.wordpress.com/2012/02/20/response-to-foi-request-concerning-home-affairs-select-committee-records-from-1983/
Good journalism as expected Sarah! I’m non-political but a great fan of the humour in this case. If PR did one thing for the disabled, he made us laugh at his stunning personality. He may well have put the cause back 10 years but great things grow out of quality muck.
Thanks again,
Sarah x
“I have never seen such unity in the cannabis movement in my life, but it’s not against prohibition, it’s against Peter Reynolds.” Indeed.
As someone posted to my Facebook page recently:
Big minds discuss ideas
Average minds discuss events
Small minds discuss people
As for Release, perhaps you should read the thoughts of one of its founders, Caroline Coon: http://www.carolinecoon.com/news.htm – scroll down the long page to Oct – Nov 2007). Actually, Release were wrong in their advice re the recent changes in sentencing guidelines, as the famous judge in Sheffield recently agreed
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2101528/Judges-fury-guidelines-stop-jailing-cannabis-farmer-despite-local-epidemic.html
If you go to Release for drugs advice now they tell you to ask Frank. Yeah, right.
If you and your freinds had put even a fraction of the effort into fighting for law reform that you’ve put into this vendetta against Peter Reynolds we would be well on the way ending prohibition by now.
Life is way too short Sarah.
Derek
I have, in fact, read the criticism of Release by Caroline Coon – I read it in 2009, long before Peter Reynolds started looking for dirt on them. Caroline’s criticism in 2007 was that Release didn’t do any active campaigning against Prohibition – well, in 2012, they now run five, so I think that criticism is long invalid. Caroline continues to link to them and endorse them on her contact page.
The judge that you mentioned was pissed off that he couldn’t jail the cannabis grower in question, not that he couldn’t convict him. The very article you have posted states, “[Judge Murphy] finally gave Tyler a four-month prison term suspended for 12 months and ordered him to complete 120 hours of unpaid community work.” So that’s not decriminalisation, it’s not being “free” is it? Tyler still has a criminal record, he’s still heading to jail if he commits another crime, and he’s still having to do community service. So, exactly what Release said in their commentary then:
“In relation to someone who is producing for their own purposes, or even where it is social supply, it is likely they will fall within the ‘lesser role’ category within the new guidelines. In terms of quantity 1kg (25 plants) would fall within category 3. This would lead to a sentencing starting point of a high level community order and a sentencing range of a low level community order to 26 weeks custody, again depending on mitigating and aggravating circumstances.”
http://release.org.uk/comment/375-sentencing-guidelines-for-cannabis-offences
I spent all day today co-ordinating our new batch of volunteers who are keen to get to work ending the drug war. Yesterday I spent much of my evening in a meeting discussing future plans for our local groups, and the rest of it writing up our new leaflets to introduce young people to drug policy. If Clear spent anywhere near as much time combating Prohibition as it does publishing blogposts containing highly inaccurate and dangerous claims about drug laws and attacking every other drug policy organisation in Britain, we probably wouldn’t even have a drug war.
Sarah
What a load of twaddle Derek.
I see Sarah has already rebutted lots of your points. Have you ever considered that you might be wrong Derek? Have you ever considered that you might actually be in the minority Derek with regards to you supporting the homophobic, racist and bullying dictator Peter Reynolds?
Do you still believe that anyone who disagrees with Peter is a liar, troll and a prohibitionist? Am I a liar and a troll? What about all the other people Derek? Are the 17 MPs, Mark and Lezley Gibson, Jeff Ditchfield, Ed Stratton, Sarah McCulloch, Mel Thomas, Dopefiend, and the scores of other people who have spoken out about Peter Reynolds… are they trolls, liars and prohibitionists too?
Why do you put so much blind faith in Peter Reynolds when he has been exposed time and time again as a liar and a fraud?
Is it that you have a crush on him?
I’m confused.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot
Yes, the judge couldn’t jail the cannabis grower, but he certainly would have done before the guidelines and he had made a point of doing so. No, it is not decrim, but it is a much reduced threat and more to the point a very much reduced “reward” for the police effort at a time of reduced resources. In some areas it’s not much at all perhaps, but in others it’s close to a revolution, such was the postcode lottery that has now been ended. It isn’t enough but it is a hugly positive development and a sure sign that the regime is under pressure.
One thing I didn’t mention before realtes to Winston. Now I do know Winston enough to know he doesn’t deserve a jail sentence, but fact is if you go putting videos of yourself on youtube smoking bongs you are waving a red flag to a bull if you get busted. There is nothing to be gained from making a martyr of yourself as he did,we really don’t need any more martyrs and it won’t help win this fight. That, I believe was the correct message of Peter’s recent blog you mentioned.
It also has to be mentioned I’m afraid that Winston got himself banned from just about every cannabis website forum going apart from the LCA – including my own UKCIA – fact is he made himself very unpopular. If he managed to piss cannabis forums off – which he did – it’s no surprise really that he pissed the judge off. What I regret is the way he was encouraged to carry on in this way by certain people.
If you’re motivated to get out there and run a better campaign than CLEAR, fine, great and good luck to you. But I bet you don’t. When I see something postive coming from you guys I will say so and give you praise, but I haven’t seen much yet and frankly I don’t expect to. Prove me wrong, please do.
Derek, what about Peter’s claims that he worked as a creative director for Saatchi and Saatchi? The reason why I’m asking is that Saatchi and Saatchi have no record of a Peter Reynolds working for them.
Peter claimed that he had a regular column in the Independent called ‘On Your Bike’. The Independent dispute this, although they did publish 3 user-contributed fluff pieces from Mr Reynolds.
Similar enquiries have also uncovered that the MOD have no record of a Peter Reynolds working for them as a civilian in communications in Germany.
Apart from that rather bland CV that Peter produced (where if I were an employer, I’d say he’d been unemployed for 20 years), there is no record of Peter Reynolds ever working anywhere.
Peter Reynolds should retract his claim and apologise to Sarah and every other person he has abused, he has been exposed as a fraud, liar and bigot and every post from him or his many sock puppets prove all accusations beyond all doubt,
the only person responsible for the outrage surrounding PR and CLEAR is PR himself with his naive
tabloid style regurgitations of propaganda and his subsequent attempts to defend them which he never managed due to the amount of sheer abuse and wildly paranoid accusations he threw at everyone, all classic ad hominem troll tactics of someone avoiding the actual issues by creating additional shit fests by using personal abuse,
personalities, activism and all else aside he is plainly
a mega troll hell bent on self promotion regardless of damage to the cause he pretends to champion or the amount of people outraged by his petulant, immature and plainly childish behaviour,
all bullies are cowards but those that assist them by proxy out of hope of reward or fear of rejection are lower than a snakes bollocks in a wheel rut, how does it feel to assist such a despicable coward in his fraud, abuse and deception Derek?, you were as dubious about his credentials and history as the rest of us Derek, that all fell by the wayside when he gave you the web master job on CLEAR, so we can see you are as dishonest and fraudulent as your boss and it is a wonder why anybody continues to take anything either of you say seriously,
I’m still waiting for the “police investigation” PR pretended to initiate last April into
“abuse and threats” he alleges appeared on his web pages, well they never existed in the first place hence no police action, all just a bluff and an empty threat to attempt to silence detractors and accusations of his unsuitability to hold personal information (like in the BMCR) which his publication of IP and E mail addresses
previous to removing them and pretence they were part of the “ongoing police investigation” instead of his realisation that publishing those details proved the points raised that he was trying to silence,
epic fail Peter
Peter Reynolds own actions, behaviour and writings
prove every accusation made against him and like every narcissist his ego and grandiose delusions will not let him admit he is wrong in any way shape or form, like every troll he keeps digging, all of this is his responsibility and his alone, If he was man enough to apologise and resign he may gain a sliver of respect but
we all know that will never happen, he has absolute power
over his little CLEAR world and as we see absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Derek,Still supporting your racist “leader”I see.It is you and others in what is left of the exec still supporting a racist/homophobic bigot, that is blighting the cause,17 MP’s who want nothing to do with him or Clear anymore,Wow,I guess they are all trolls and liars huh? Clear are now nothing more than a party represented by a right wing extremist damaging the cause.
Reading comments like yours Bertie you would think there was a coherent group of people who had been working together as one for years now being torn apart by the efforts of Peter Reynolds and CLEAR.
Lets be honest for heavens sake, the cannabis law reform campaign had become a joke, a terrible and embarrassing farce. At the centre of this farce was the old LCA, a tiny group of people who had managed to alienate almost everyone who came into contact with it – including several of the people now posting to this blog such as Stuart Wyatt for example.
Absolutely nothing of value was happening in this so-called “campaign” before CLEAR came along, there was indeed, no “cause” for anyone to damage. Because of the people involved and the way they were doing things any change was bound to be an improvement, CLEAR was a real breath of fresh air. Yes, I celebrated when when Peter took over and changed it all, it was long overdue.
How can I say this? I’ve been around this whole sorry mess for almost 20 years now; I tried to work with the LCA for years, I even stood for them in an election. Please, don’t try to claim they were anything less than a rag-tag collection of time wasters who presented the worst possible stereotype of the unwashed hippy dope smoker.
Is this just my opinion? No it’s not. I get a lot of feedback via my site UKCIA. Sarah is all excited at having 1000 people look at her little blog, UKCIA gets 120,000 visits a month. I only mention that to put a little perspective into things.
The thing that characterised the “campaign” over the past 10 years or so has been in-fighting and back-biting. This attack on Peter is perhaps better organised than we’ve sen before, but it’s not new by any means. For all the solidarity now being shown to Winston now, only a year or so back he was the subject of utter ridicule by many of the same people now posting here. Winston managed to get himself and the LCA banned from just about every cannabis forum going over the years. I banned him form the old UKCIA forum because he spammed it with LCA links and wouldn’t stop despite being asked. He was also banned from UK420, along with the rest of LCA.
Sorry, I’ve been around too long to be worried by this sort of thing. Many of the people involved in this anti Peter Reynolds campaign are best regarded as a waste of space anyway, having them screaming from the sidelines is probably a good thing, we’re better off with them opposing us.
I used to think of cannabis users as being placid friendly people, clearly I was wrong. To be honest if you guys are representative of cannabis users I’m just glad I don’t use the stuff anymore. I don’t think you are, at least I hope you’re not.
Unlike most of you guys, I actually know Peter Reynolds and I will tell you from my direct knowledge of him (as opposed to a few cherry picked quotes from a few blog rants) he is no racist nor have I seen any evidence he is homophobic. I don’t agree with much of his politics but that doesn’t stop me working with a very competent and professionally minded individual who shares my views on cannabis law reform.
Like I said upthread – get out there and do some work aimed at changing this nasty, destructive and vicious prohibition law. When you do that – if you ever do, which I doubt – then I will take you seriously, not before.
It’s a pity your attempt to help the Mail undermine the cannabis law reform campaign didn’t come off Sarah, I was looking forward to the free publicity it would have brought. But honestly, joining forces with the Mail just about sums up your credability. Just how low can you get?
Hi Derek.
I see you mentioned my name in your last comment. Why wont you actually reply to some of the comments I’ve made?
Would it have something to with trying to defend the indefensible? Or am I a persona non-grata because I’ve said mean things about your dear leader who you love so much?
You are an embarrassing joke Derek, and we are all laughing at you.
No Stuart, as I’ve explained to you before, you have a long history of trouble-making, simple as. I only mentioned your name to point out that not so long ago you were attacking the LCA, now you seem to have forgotten all of that as you join forces with the very people you spat venom at only recently.
I respect you, Stuart, just not very much, that’s all.
Hi Derek.
My respect for you has all but vanished – which is a shame, as I thought we made ground when we met face-to-face in London that time. I just don’t understand, given the amount of incriminating evidence regarding Peter and the scores of first-hand accounts where he has lied, bullied and censored many activists, why you should still blindly defend him?
Is it because he rescued you from your stranded ukcia lifeboat, and now you actually have people to moderate and bully yourself? Is it a power thing Derek? You claim you have 120,000 visits a month on ukcia. How many unique visitors? And how many of those ‘visits’ are from actual people rather than bots? UKCIA was like a ghost ship prior to you joining CLEAR.
Now, about the fact that Saatchi and Saatchi claim that Peter Reynolds never worked for them, and that the Independent has claimed that Peter Reynolds was never employed by them and never had a regular column… or that the MOD has no record of Peter working as a civilian in communications in Germany… what are your thoughts about that?
What about the many points already made in this thread that you have ignored? Why won’t you answer those? More importantly, why are you here defending Peter? Why doesn’t Peter have the courage to answer questions himself? Does he have something to hide maybe?
I know you are fearful seeing Peter Reynolds step down or kicked out, as Peter gives you a position of power that would not exist if someone else were in power. I understand that it is hard for you to voluntarily give up this position of power. It makes you feel good. It makes you feel important. It makes you feel respected. I understand how your ego needs this Derek. The same ego made you take over UKCIA and turn it into a one-man campaigning group.
When we met face-to-face that time, you came across as an intelligent and level-headed person. What went wrong since then? Why are you supporting Peter Reynolds and CLEAR? Why are you avoiding addressing the issues head-on?
So many questions…
Peter Reynolds has done more damage to cannabis activism
than any other person, it is not the people that are being torn apart it is the credibility of the entire movement that PR claims to be head of that is being torn apart,
let us examine Peter Reynolds success shall we
Schengen loophole highlighted and closed for all
destroyed the LCA
BMCR crashed and burned
alienated huge possible support on UK420
extremely flawed legalisation proposal completely ignored
by all
alienated other possible support with his bigoted and racist rhetoric
made enemies in the media with his pointless complaints
alienated other campaigning organisations with paranoid accusations and insinuations
abuses,deletes and blocks persons for asking relevant questions
makes wild paranoid accusations about opponents
need I go on
Why are you here Derek?, your boss not trusted to reply
like an adult without resorting to abuse, accusations and
whining so he sends his lap Dog to do his cowardly bidding by proxy, perhaps he will appear as one of his many sock puppets and praise CLEAR and its leadership
for it’s success in activism while blaming others for the lack of success in activism?, quite a few whom oppose PR
are not activists, I’m certainly not, some of those whom oppose him do more good in the cannabis community in a week than PR has ever achieved or likely to, all out of their own pocket without blowing their own trumpet for
ego massaging purposes, real activists, helping the medi users and cancer sufferers directly instead of shooting off their mouths endlessly talking a good fight but failing to do anything meaningful, just because many are unable to participate in activism does not mean we can not oppose a person so obviously destroying decades of work by others, such is akin to the emotional blackmail/propaganda technique often used by Reynolds to suggest that if you oppose him or CLEAR you care not for the suffering of medi users,
Over Humanization: It is a perfectly valid technique to tell a story by focusing on the real people who the story impacts. However, this is also an easy technique for manipulation when a propagandist tries to mask an issue by making anyone who has a valid disagreement look evil due to all the human suffering talked about in the story.
works with “activism” too eh Derek, I could sit all day and list and highlight the propaganda and tabloid style tricks of PR but I suspect they are all obvious, it is all so predictable Derek, classic trolling and obvious
avoidance of the issues
Peter Reynolds is a fraud,liar,coward and bigoted bully,
you Derek are no better and will never be trusted or taken seriously again, credibility? you cant even spell it Derek.
Troll on lap dog.
Don’t forget the 17 MP’s who have ceased all contact with Peter Reynolds, or the SSDP UK and SSDP Ireland who have cut all ties with Peter Reynolds and CLEAR, or RELEASE doing the same.
Peter Reynolds claims to have succeeded in doing so much for the cannabis movement, when in fact, he has been destroying everything he touches. And he calls that activism? lol
Note to self: Don’t feed the troll.
Sorry for getting sucked into a converstation with Stuart Wyatt, Sarah, I should know better.
For the record I just checked by site stats and to answer Stuarts question
Total number of visits to UKCIA last month = 157,028
Total number of unique visits = 97,225
The only reason for showing these figures, as I said before, is to give some perspective to all this. I wonder who is more in contact with “the cannabis culture”?
Dear Derek,
I notice that you resorted to once again ignoring the many points put to you regarding Peter Reynolds and CLEAR. I suppose even in your current delusion, you understand that trying to defend the indefensible is an impossible task.
And congratulations for using the ‘Dont feed the troll’ excuse so that you can avoid questions. Scientologists do the same when people question their beliefs….
Thank you for producing the site stats. Congratulations on so many unique visits. How many of those visitors contribute to the site? I remember the forum having as many regular users as the current CLEAR forum (you could count them on one hand). How many of those people were following legacy links from the past 10 years only to find a 1990’s style website and then moving on?
Anyway, lets try and steer the conversation away from your attempt at deflection, and focus on Peter Reynolds and CLEAR. When will you or your dear leader respond to the many points put to him?
The whole story is being repeated in the comments:
When Peter Reynolds is proven to have made hateful remarks, misrepresentations and attacks, defenders (whether himself or another representative of CLEAR) resort to more hateful remarks, misrepresentations and attacks.
If this were a site controlled by CLEAR, there would also be censorship and blocking of anyone who disagrees.
We know by now, that this is what we must expect from Reynolds himself. Every time his serious flaws as a leader are pointed out, he performs true to form.
What we don’t know: Why would any other CLEAR leaders compromise their own integrity by coming to Reynolds’ defence? He is a liability, and the longer the party support him, the less chance the party itself can be salvaged from the wreckage as he falls.
Why are people who point out truths about Peter Reynolds attacked as detrimental to the cause, when in fact it’s Reynolds himself who is a detriment?
Please, CLEAR, do everyone a favor and oust Reynolds. To keep him on board and prop him up against all reasonable evidence against him, only makes CLEAR look unfathomably self-destructive.
I just want to add that I have great respect for Sarah McCulloch who has continued calm and reasonable reporting despite the vitriolic and really bizarre attacks against her.
Derek do you think the leader of a political party as the naked rambler “Reynolds” claims to be should be forgiven for calling people genetically confused, appearing naked asking for young girls to ingest his bodily produce, making racist posts and then to top it all insulting respected organisations such as Release? If you do can you please explain why?
Excellent piece.Peter Reynolds is a walking disaster area for the legalisation movement from the racism to the homophobia to the bullying to the pathological dishonesty and the hypocrisy-someone with a conviction for dishonesty really shouldn’t be so cavalier with the word ‘liar’.Those 18 MPs didn’t delete him for no reason so it’s about time his CLEARly deluded supporters woke up and smelled the coffee.
I am not going to get involved in all the name calling and backstabbing thats going on,I will leave that to all of you.I would like to CLEAR up some points that have been raised.Someone mentioned the failing of the BMCR,let me remind you all Peter Reynolds did not setup the BMCR,Idid,and I must say I was disapointed at the lack of resonse it received.It seems that paranoia is prevelent amongst medical users,because none of them could be bothered to provide me with their true names.How in gods name could we even expect to be taken seriously if everyone was in hideing.If you need any other ammo to launch attacks on PR,and his leadership you might also like to use this,his claim to be involved in the campaigne to bring many much needed jobs into the country is and allways has been my own work.No other group or organisation is involved.The offer to help create these jobs has been made to me in partnership with an American group The Medicine Wheel Project.I also have access to the patented technology for the production of a transdermal method of medicateing with whole cannabis.If all of you could find the time to support those of us working independently of politics, to get our ideas recognised by those in politics for all that it worth,then we might get somewhere.
Thanks for sticking your hand up to be the whistle-blower on the US and UK pharm med industry connection to both the BMCR and CLEAR, Mr. Hamilton. Much appreciated by our Campaign.
If you would like to expound further on the cause of your sour grapes with Peter Reynolds, our Campaign would be very interested to hear about it. Email address on website.
In the meantime, your signature on the Petition would be most welcome
Peter Reynolds: Resign as leader of the UK political party CLEAR
https://www.change.org/petitions/peter-reynolds-leader-of-the-uk-political-party-resign-as-leader-of-the-uk-political-party-clear
Thanks!
Peter Reynolds’s Connection with Big Pharma
http://www.campaign.mondialvillage.com/Peter-Reynolds-connection-with-Big-Pharma/
Victor, PR assured the membership the BMCR data was secure
then admitted it was not, that is the reason it failed
not because of peoples paranoia but because the person promoting it lied constantly about it and was caught out doing so, then he launched a sickening tabloid style attack on everyone on the site not because of any abuse he received previous to his outburst but because he was caught out being a liar on a site he was unable to censor, when accusations were made about his suitability to hold peoples details he published peoples IP and E mail addresses out of spite and anger completely proving the accusations made, when he realised or was advised of this he removed them and pretended they were part of an “ongoing police investigation” about abuse and threats that never appeared on his sites and were part of his
drama queen sympathy tactic also intended to blacken the names of any person asking relevant questions or pointing out the facts, anybody backing this pathetic childish excuse for a man is as fraudulent, dishonest and delusional as he is.
From Bertie Griffin, who is apparently struggling on post on this thread (I neither endorse nor condemn this message, I just don’t censor my comments):
“Derek ,if you think I am bothered by being taken seriously by you,you are very much mistaken,you are a laughing stock,hiding in the holes that yourself and Peter have dug for yourselves,This is precisely what happens when racist bullies and those that support them are exposed for what they truly are.It also doesn’t shock me to find out ye dont partake of the herb,maybe ye should go and medicate yourself Derek,though I am not too sure if its a cure for verbal diarrhea”
Victor Hamilton wrote, “How in gods name could we even expect to be taken seriously if everyone was in hideing.”
Really? See “Anonymous.”
As to patent medicines that deliver the whole plant, that’s wonderful, if poor people with chronic conditions can grow our own medicine, but pharmaceutical corporations are touchy about their patents and their profits.
Are you the same Vic Hamilton that appeared on Dereks site when he opposed PR and insinuated he was a paedophile?, allegedly it was a sock puppet using your name though given recent events and behaviour from some that is increasingly dubious.
So Victor, you are saying that we should ignore all the threats, abuse, censorship, racism and homophobia from Peter Reynolds, as well as ignoring the fact that he has systematically lied about his past and his credentials…. just so that you can make a fortune in your position as Director Strategic Marketing for The Medicine Wheel Project?
Your only interest is to produce an expensive patented THC patch for medicinal users?
I used to have a lot of respect for you Victor. Not any more.
I am wondering if Peter Reynolds was hired by the Medicine Wheel Project to steer the UK cannabis movement? The reason why I am asking is that Peter Reynolds knew nothing about the UK cannabis scene, and he seems to know very little about cannabis, yet he claims to be a PR/Marketing specialist.
Thank you Victor for highlighting all of this. I think I now understand some of Peter’s motives with regards to holding onto his seat of power, and why he has been acting in the way that he has.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/tomchiversscience/100137480/david-cameron-knows-the-drug-laws-arent- working-his-failure-to-change-them-is-simple-cowardice/
In the comments section, Peter Reynolds has written this:
“I am also working with a US group of companies that has put detailed proposals to the UK government for a medicinal cannabis industry that would produce 100,000 new jobs within five years.”
Suddenly everything becomes very CLEAR…
Stuart, you’ve hit the nail on the head I think.
The problem with Peter is that, even if you accept that his motives are genuine, he fits all of the preconceptions for the stereotypical drug user put out by the prohibitionists.
A conviction for ‘dishonesty’, multiple spells in prison, no proper employment record, half naked photographs on the web (with ten years deducted from his age and looking for young girls who are ‘gagging for his spunk’), admitted use of ‘hard’ drugs such as crack. And that’s before you even get on to the racism and sexism evident in the posts on his blog and the CLEAR website. In fact I’d go further and say that he seems to have no self control after he sits down in front of a keyboard.
To that we can now add unspecified links to a commercial organisation seeking to exert political influence in order to establish a ‘regulated’ market for weed in the UK. What, precisely,is the nature of this relationship?
bet you’re handy with a hammer mate. You can certainly hit the nail on the head. ;)
Never let PR near a gun, he’s shot himself in the foot too many times already
All joking aside and Seriously though – I’m serious;)
(For more pointed clichés go here: http://www.clichésRus.com)
Problem with that Mike is he doesn’t even use cannabis himself just claims to to establish his cannabis credentials,Derek is a non user too as is another major player in this, it’s all about money nothing more nothing less.
Reynolds keeps saying that Ed Stratton and Sarah have been shown to be liars because the HASC existed in 1983. I tried to point out that he has completely misconstrued the issue and is insulting people for making stupid points when the points are were not raised and are not the points in issue. Anyway, he chose not to publish it on his blog as usual. I see he is still making threats for extortion of money and appology – he is a real bully.
Where is he going to find £200,000 to fund an action for defamation, which he’d lose anyway?
i’ve not been in this game for too long. i’ve been smoking up for 9 years and recently became very interested in the law reform because i am sick of being treated as a criminal and also sick of buying varying qualities of cannabis at ever increasing prices. i dont know everything there is to know about peter reynolds but from what i’ve seen CLEAR is promoting something good to get behind in the prohibition law reform. As a newcomer clear definately grabbed my attention and i think has got valuable information which is being put out to the people maybe its not the approach others would have chosen but at least something is being done. I dont care if sarah is a troll or whether peter used to search for girls that were gagging for spunk. We’re all in this because we have a common interest and want change so if you dont agree with peter then dont have anything to do with clear and spend your time creating something better and if you agree with him then get behind it. we wont achieve anything if our time is spent fighting each other instead of the problem at hand
Hi there,
I don’t know about your overall political views, but drug law reform fits into my general belief that people have the right to live their lives free from harrassment. So I believe in drug law reform, and I also believe in challenging homophobia and racism wherever I find it. This is what got me interested in Peter Reynolds. There are things that are just as important as drug law reform, and I will not, nor it seems, will a lot of people, be silent about rampant bigotry which is driving all sorts of people out of the movement so that he can stay because you don’t like a bit of controversy.
Now, I also dispute that we have a common interest as well – Peter Reynolds’ plan for the legalisation of cannabis involves selling growing licences at £100 per year, lots of red tape, and annual inspections for growers. In reality, only large corporations will realistically be able to grow cannabis, and their interest is in profit. In stark contrast, I believe in the freedom of people to grow and use cannabis as they see fit, and I do spend much of my time campaigning for this as part of the Re:Vision Drug Policy Network.
However, it cannot be ignored that Peter Reynolds uses his platform as leader of Clear to attack other people and groups involved in the movement, to lie about things that have been uncovered about him, and to generally bring shame on the rest of us. I couldn’t care less whether Peter has sex profiles on the internet, but the fact is that he *does*, but he is now saying he will report medicinal cannabis users to the police for “posting fake sex profiles” of him, knowing that they have cannabis in their possession and can’t afford to get into a fight with him. He posted people’s IP addresses that he obtained from the British Medical Cannabis Register when they disagreed with him, and we hear today that he’s reported two cannabis growers to the police for growing because they have said publicly that he should resign. It is an appalling action and breach of trust by the leader of a political party supposedly campaigning for the rights of cannabis users.
Now, two members of the Clear Executive have resigned in the last two months because they refuse to work with Peter Reynolds anymore (including one who was subjected to racist comments by him), and another two have tabled a no confidence motion in him as of today because they find the way he treats other people as intolerable. So even if you don’t believe me, believe the people who have done their best for cannabis law reform and found it impossible with Peter Reynolds around.
Sarah
i just want to make it clear that i’m not backing either of you or attacking either of you. but in terms of there being licences or red tape that is inevitable because the government wont take any notice unless theres money to be made and i think that the point he’s trying to make that the government will never just let us grow however we want to but they make take notice if theres a business model that will make them money
The way tobacco is regulated is you can grow your own, and pay tax on it, and then there’s also a regulated industry. Similarly with alcohol, you can produce your own, within paying tax, within a certain limit and as long as you don’t sell it. Both options would be workable for cannabis without handing over the entire industry to corporations.
also any links to other organisations that are fighting for cannabis law reform would be most appreciated so i can see what they have to offer on that front
cheers
Sure.
The Cannabis Alliance: http://www.facebook.com/groups/231783873566722/
Legalise Cannabis International:
http://www.facebook.com/groups/360600757801/
The UK Cannabis Social Clubs:
http://cannabiscure.co.uk/ukcsc/
And there’s other non-affiliated groups around, but you’ll find them if you poke around the others. Obviously across the pond you’ve got NORML.
They’re all cannabis-focussed, but obviously there’s a lot of other general drug law reform groups out there that you can check out, like Release, Transform, Re:Vision, etc.