Marijuana habits and legalization

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Thor

These drugs need to be available, but the over-prescribing is a massive issue. I saw that HBO doc, that was really tough to watch, still think about it from time to time.

The issue I have is the ease at which youth are given prescription drugs from psychiatrists for a host of issues, I think most people agree its something we need to take a hard look at.

A friend that died in 2002 from a prescription overdose, on irc chat no less (you can google the thing, RIPPER was his handle)

His family ended up on the John Walsh show and they talked about how he manipulated his shrinks to get more and more drugs, so he could abuse them. He would proudly tell others tricks and kids are not dumb, they know what to say and do to get the drugs they need.

I think we both agree that cannabis is a minor issue in comparison to what damage the prescription industry can do on a massive scale.

Edit, here's the story on Ripper that was pretty famous at the time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Brandon_Vedas

That's a surreal story... So sad. His situation also doesn't sound dissimilar to many overdose in the sense that others are often unwilling to go the the authorities for help for fear of criminal reprisal.

It seems like there's a ready-made solution for that.

[Violator]

Talking about over the counter pharmaceuticals.Skittles parties around messed up

[flamesfever]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

Smokers actually cost the healthcare system less than non smokers. I imagine a similar thing could be said of pot smokers

nm

[flamesfever]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

Drinking heavily during the critical stage of brain development you're referring to, it's just as bad for a kid as the requisite amount of pot. Nobody loses their mind because they hit a J once in a while. No matter how old they are. Just like no 14 year old ruins their life with a couple beers at a party.

Prolonged, consistent use during teenage years is going to have consequences. That's where it's on parents to do their jobs and parent their kids.

That's easier said than done, as they'll smoke it without you knowing. However, you may eventually start noticing sudden changes in their cognitive ability. Other signs may be a drop in their grades from a B to a D, they or many of their male friends may have hair down to their *******, and the word "man" is frequently used in their conversation or text messages.

[Mike F]

Originally Posted by Thor

Harvard study not long ago added to the long list of studies refuting mental health issues being caused by smoking cannabis, yet this myth continues.

This study?

BRAIN CHANGES ARE ASSOCIATED WITH CASUAL MARIJUANA USE IN YOUNG ADULTS

The size and shape of two brain regions involved in emotion and motivation may differ in young adults who smoke marijuana at least once a week, according to a study published April 16 in The Journal of Neuroscience. The findings suggest that recreational marijuana use may lead to previously unidentified brain changes, and highlight the importance of research aimed at understanding the long-term effects of low to moderate marijuana use on the brain.

In the current study, Jodi Gilman, PhD, Anne Blood, PhD, and Hans Breiter, MD, of Northwestern University and Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to compare the brains of 18- to 25-year olds who reported smoking marijuana at least once per week with those with little to no history of marijuana use. Although psychiatric evaluations ruled out the possibility that the marijuana users were dependent on the drug, imaging data revealed they had significant brain differences. The nucleus accumbens — a brain region known to be involved in reward processing — was larger and altered in its shape and structure in the marijuana users compared to non-users.

“This study raises a strong challenge to the idea that casual marijuana use isn’t associated with bad consequences,” Breiter said.

[TorqueDog]

I always see references in studies to smoking marijuana, but what I'm really interested in is the effect of THC on the body, irrespective of how it's taken in.

I don't smoke anything at all because my sinuses get congested and my throat feels like hell very shortly after doing so, and typically the next morning as well (so cigars with my scotch are out), but I have no problem eating it.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by flamesfever

That's easier said than done, as they'll smoke it without you knowing. However, you may eventually start noticing sudden changes in their cognitive ability. Other signs may be a drop in their grades from a B to a D, they or many of their male friends may have hair down to their *******, and the word "man" is frequently used in their conversation or text messages.

I genuinely don't know how to respond to a post this terrible.

Other people's inability to impart wisdom to their children is not a reason for me, the adult, to risk arrest, injury or death because I can't get weed from a store. Kids act out. It's what they do. The ones with good parents act out within reason. Be a good parent. Give your kid books instead of an iPad. Take them to museums. Whatever. Just engage them intellectually. I really had no interest in drugs until I was in my early 20s, and based on the poll results I'm not alone.

I don't care about your kids. Because they're YOUR kids. Which means they're YOUR problem. Preparing them to correctly deal with drugs sex and alcohol is part of the job.

Parental unwillingness or inability to perform that job has no bearing on the legality of marijuana. I'm sick of this fear mongering bull####. If weed were on sale tomorrow, the people who don't smoke it would notice nothing different about their lives. At all. We would have $6 billion that could go into our health care system (lmfao that legal weed is going to to negatively offset THAT - as opposed to the billions we spend on weed related care now.)

Pot is illegal for arbitrary and illogical reasons. Those days are ending. Tell your kids.

[PepsiFree]

I disagree and thought it was a great post that showed a lot of real-life hands on experience that definitely wasn't taken from an after school special aired in 1973, man.

[flamesfever]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

I genuinely don't know how to respond to a post this terrible.

Other people's inability to impart wisdom to their children is not a reason for me, the adult, to risk arrest, injury or death because I can't get weed from a store. Kids act out. It's what they do. The ones with good parents act out within reason. Be a good parent. Give your kid books instead of an iPad. Take them to museums. Whatever. Just engage them intellectually. I really had no interest in drugs until I was in my early 20s, and based on the poll results I'm not alone.

I don't care about your kids. Because they're YOUR kids. Which means they're YOUR problem. Preparing them to correctly deal with drugs sex and alcohol is part of the job.

Parental unwillingness or inability to perform that job has no bearing on the legality of marijuana. I'm sick of this fear mongering bull####. If weed were on sale tomorrow, the people who don't smoke it would notice nothing different about their lives. At all. We would have $6 billion that could go into our health care system (lmfao that legal weed is going to to negatively offset THAT - as opposed to the billions we spend on weed related care now.)

Pot is illegal for arbitrary and illogical reasons. Those days are ending. Tell your kids.

I know my post is hard to take by someone who doesn't want to see the other side of the argument.

I agree keeping kids busy doing healthy and constructive things is helpful. However, I think your vision of parenting may be a bit idealistic. Sometimes difficult kids come with the best of parents. And many times peer pressure may lead kids astray. Some of the most gifted and independent kids stop talking to their parents in early adolescence. I seem to recall my own son avoided talking to me at about 12, and never started again until he was 24. It was always, "Don't tell me that Dad, I already know that". And he has turned out as good as one could ever expect from a child. I am so proud of him. I like to think his avoidance of drugs, including pot, probably came from our strong stance against drugs in general from his early age. I have witnessed other parents, who were not so lucky, see their kids negatively affected by pot, particularly in the 1960's when pot began to replace alcohol...and I am not trying to downplay the negative effects of alcohol.

I honestly think we would be making a big mistake by being too liberal with the use of pot in our society. IMO we should proceed extremely carefully and cautiously in our decriminalization of pot. One always has to weigh the good with the bad, before making a decision.

[Zevo]

Originally Posted by Mike F

This study?

20 people were studied. How long were they observed? Any long term effects? Also showed marijuana use is not addictive.

I'm guessing there are many,many legal drugs that alter brain chemistry, at least in the short term, on the market. I'm also guessing a lot of those drugs are also highly addictive.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by flamesfever

I know my post is hard to take by someone who doesn't want to see the other side of the argument.

I agree keeping kids busy doing healthy and constructive things is helpful. However, I think your vision of parenting may be a bit idealistic. Sometimes difficult kids come with the best of parents. And many times peer pressure may lead kids astray. Some of the most gifted and independent kids stop talking to their parents in early adolescence. I seem to recall my own son avoided talking to me at about 12, and never started again until he was 24. It was always, "Don't tell me that Dad, I already know that". And he has turned out as good as one could ever expect from a child. I am so proud of him. I like to think his avoidance of drugs, including pot, probably came from our strong stance against drugs in general, including pot, from his early age. I have witnessed other parents, who were not so lucky, see their kids negatively affected by pot, particularly in the 1960's when pot began to replace alcohol...and I am not trying to downplay the negative effects of alcohol.

I honestly think we would be making a big mistake by being too liberal with the use of pot in our society. IMO we should proceed extremely carefully and cautiously in our decriminalization of pot. One always has to weigh the good with the bad, before making a decision.

Pot has been illegal for the entirety of both our lives. This has done nothing to discourage its use en masse, especially among young people. As long as we educate the public about the risks of marijuana I doubt you'll see the country sink into the couch.

If you take smoking as a comparable - 64% of all Canadians who have identified as smokers in their lifetime have quit. 60% of teenage smokers were seriously considering quitting in the next 6 months.

Smoking is a rebellious activity. When kids realize it's a stupid way to rebel, the numbers bear out that they stop. Marijuana is far less addictive (I don't agree with those who say it isn't - if nothing else it's very compelling) and I think you undersell self preservation instincts in young people. If you've smoked weed at all, you can acknowledge that it doesn't exactly enhance your cognitive function. So it's not a tough sell that early heavy use of cannabis is detrimental to your brain's development . The point is not to get kids to never do something - it's to get them to understand it's a thing for when they're older. Like alcohol. Like sex. If you're 14, those things are not for you.

The reasons for it being illegal are arbitrary and illogical. It is not a benign substance. It has consequences. We as adult need to be able to make the choice for ourselves, and we need to be able to have a legal avenue to do so.

Cloaking this failure of policy under the guise of protection diminishes the public trust in government. Marijuana use is not and has never been a justifiable reason to incarcerate a human being. That's the argument I refuse to see the other side of.

[flamesfever]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

Cloaking this failure of policy under the guise of protection diminishes the public trust in government. Marijuana use is not and has never been a justifiable reason to incarcerate a human being. That's the argument I refuse to see the other side of.

The government have, and always will, create laws to protect us from ourselves.

I agree that incarceration and ruining young lives, for smoking pot, is not justified. The questions I would like to see answered before changing the system, apart from decriminalization, are:

1. The possible long range medical effects on the developing brain.

2. Why are so many doctors against the use of pot? I would hazard a guess that the medical evidence is not definitive enough at present.

3. Will the true cost to the healthcare system be offset by the income from selling pot?

4. Are the problems, that other jurisdictions have encountered in legalizing pot, going to be factored into the final decision?

5. ETC.

[Zevo]

Originally Posted by flamesfever

The government have, and always will, create laws to protect us from ourselves.

I agree that incarceration and ruining young lives, for smoking pot, is not justified. The questions I would like to see answered before changing the system, apart from decriminalization, are:

1. The possible long range medical effects on the developing brain.

2. Why are so many doctors against the use of pot? I would hazard a guess that the medical evidence is not definitive enough at present.

3. Will the true cost to the healthcare system be offset by the income from selling pot?

4. Are the problems, that other jurisdictions have encountered in legalizing pot, going to be factored into the final decision?

5. ETC.

That is changing. There are a lot of docs, including pain specialists that now write prescriptions for pot for a myriad of things instead of the usual meds that are highly addictive.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by flamesfever

The government have, and always will, create laws to protect us from ourselves.

I agree that incarceration and ruining young lives, for smoking pot, is not justified. The questions I would like to see answered before changing the system, apart from decriminalization, are:

1. The possible long range medical effects on the developing brain.

2. Why are so many doctors against the use of pot? I would hazard a guess that the medical evidence is not definitive enough at present.

3. Will the true cost to the healthcare system be offset by the income from selling pot?

4. Are the problems, that other jurisdictions have encountered in legalizing pot, going to be factored into the final decision?

5. ETC.

There's no way pot costs the health care system $6 billion a year - it would be impossible to pass legalization if it did. There would be stories on your Facebook feed every six hours about the amount of money we spend treating pot related ailments.

When it's legal we can research its medicinal properties - frankly I don't see cannabis as a magic plant. It's a great recreational drug. Its medical benefits seem vastly overstated because 'medicinal' is the only way to legally buy it. It hasn't ever been enough to say 'I'm an adult, I like this drug, I should be allowed to take it'.

The effects on marijuana on the developing brain are immaterial. There is currently no mechanism to prevent some unscrupulous character from selling weed to a kid. Legalisation puts that control into place.

Kids will always ask their older friends to buy for them. But now that older friend goes to a convenience store instead of a drug dealer. And how many 15-17 year olds REALLY want to go to a drug dealer's house or meet up with them?

Criminalising drugs does not protect people from themselves. It is a government washing its hands of the responsibility to protect its citizens. People are less likely to call for help in the event of an overdose because they fear a criminal reprisal. There is a story on the last page about someone dying in just this scenario.

This is a personal freedom issue. It's. It isn't a problem that's beyond our capacity to solve, and the rights of children here are secondary. Kids aren't allowed in bars or strip clubs or casinos or any number of other adult only establishments. That's the solution with pot. Kids aren't allowed to have it. If a cop sees you smoking it he can confiscate your stuff. If you buy for younger kids, there should be penalties. It doesn't need to be prison - an 18 year old senior doesn't have 2 grand to pay a fine, and he sure as #### won't want to give up the next ten weekends to pick trash as his community service. And then what? Drug dealers are going to start lurking around high school parking lots to sell $40 worth of weed to a teenager? That seems worth the risk. Teenagers aren't an especially mobile group, and it seems police resources could stop high school level dealing reasonably quickly when they aren't also forced to police grown ups who want joints.

When compared to other legal substances (including prescription pain pills), the inability to purchase pot legally is an arbitrary and illogical distinction.

[Mike F]

Originally Posted by Zevo

20 people were studied. How long were they observed? Any long term effects? Also showed marijuana use is not addictive.

It was sufficient enough to get published in an established peer reviewed journal.

And it did not conclude that marijuana is not addictive. It reported that the people studied, who were categorized as recreational users, were not addicted. Very different conclusions.

Originally Posted by Zevo

I'm guessing there are many,many legal drugs that alter brain chemistry, at least in the short term, on the market. I'm also guessing a lot of those drugs are also highly addictive.

I don't have a strong opinion one way or the other about marijuana legalization, but I do know for sure that the argument that "there's lots of other harmful stuff legalized, so we should legalize this too even if it is harmful" will never sway me. It's the equivalent of "But all of my friends are doing it!!!"

Legalization of anything should be based on its own merits: Will legalization result in a net benefit or detriment to society? If marijuana legalization really does show significant tax revenue, decreases in organized crime, no significant increased in usage among children or impaired driving events, etc., in Colorado and Washington State, I'll be all for it even though I may never use it. If the opposite results come in, then I won't support it.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Mike F

It was sufficient enough to get published in an established peer reviewed journal.

And it did not conclude that marijuana is not addictive. It reported that the people studied, who were categorized as recreational users, were not addicted. Very different conclusions.



I don't have a strong opinion one way or the other about marijuana legalization, but I do know for sure that the argument that "there's lots of other harmful stuff legalized, so we should legalize this too even if it is harmful" will never sway me. It's the equivalent of "But all of my friends are doing it!!!"

Legalization of anything should be based on its own merits: Will legalization result in a net benefit or detriment to society? If marijuana legalization really does show significant tax revenue, decreases in organized crime, no significant increased in usage among children or impaired driving events, etc., in Colorado and Washington State, I'll be all for it even though I may never use it. If the opposite results come in, then I won't support it.

Human beings like to ingest substances that alter their consciousness. Weed is demonstrably less harmful than many legal substances. Some of those require a prescription from a physician, but nonetheless you have a legal avenue to purchase them.

Does it make sense for grown ups have to go to criminals for marijuana?

[Zevo]

Originally Posted by Mike F

It was sufficient enough to get published in an established peer reviewed journal.

And it did not conclude that marijuana is not addictive. It reported that the people studied, who were categorized as recreational users, were not addicted. Very different conclusions.



I don't have a strong opinion one way or the other about marijuana legalization, but I do know for sure that the argument that "there's lots of other harmful stuff legalized, so we should legalize this too even if it is harmful" will never sway me. It's the equivalent of "But all of my friends are doing it!!!"

Legalization of anything should be based on its own merits: Will legalization result in a net benefit or detriment to society? If marijuana legalization really does show significant tax revenue, decreases in organized crime, no significant increased in usage among children or impaired driving events, etc., in Colorado and Washington State, I'll be all for it even though I may never use it. If the opposite results come in, then I won't support it.

I can agree with that. My opinion is that the war on drugs has done nothing to curb the use of pot. I'm in my 50's and pot was incredibly easy to get from when I was 15. I don't think that has changed and, in my opinion, I don't see how legalizing it would change that.

Kids are going to smoke weed whether it`s legal or not. I`m going to smoke weed whether I can buy it in a store or not. Why not regulate it.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by Mike F

Legalization of anything should be based on its own merits: Will legalization result in a net benefit or detriment to society?

The difficulty of assessing net benefit to society is how do you measure pleasure? Videogames, for example, don't add any measurable benefit to society besides the pleasure they give people playing them.

[Red Potato Standing By]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

When it's legal we can research its medicinal properties - frankly I don't see cannabis as a magic plant. It's a great recreational drug. Its medical benefits seem vastly overstated because 'medicinal' is the only way to legally buy it.

honest question why do they have to wait? isn't morphine and codeine based of an illegal drug?

[Flames in 07]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

I genuinely don't know how to respond to a post this terrible.


Parental unwillingness or inability to perform that job has no bearing on the legality of marijuana. I'm sick of this fear mongering bull####. If weed were on sale tomorrow, the people who don't smoke it would notice nothing different about their lives. At all. We would have $6 billion that could go into our health care system (lmfao that legal weed is going to to negatively offset THAT - as opposed to the billions we spend on weed related care now.)

Pot is illegal for arbitrary and illogical reasons. Those days are ending. Tell your kids.

When you start by commenting on how terrible a post is, you may want to refrain from saying ridiculous things like 6 billion will go straight to health care, like its some net benefit.

When you tax something new, you don't just create billions out of thin air. That's is 6 billion that has to disappear from something else. It's a zero sum game.