MJ associated w/psychosis

[Brian Ellis]

Every time you have a glass of wine a fixed number of your brain cells go screaming off into the night

No problem! Don't have any left by now after 55 years of drinking wine and two strokes.

[Umfriend]

Because the simple availability leads to abuse by those who have not the powers of discrimination,

Which goes for a load of things. Still no case is made that with Marihuijana it is really worse than with other legit stuff.

rendering them open to all sorts of future problems including psychosis

See above.

plus the fact that criminals are creaming off megabucks in the supply.

And this really ticks me off. If it was legitimised, THERE WOULD BE NO criminals making megabucks!

I don't deny you the pleasure of your joint, if you are willing to take the risk of 3 or so months of prison. It's up to you to choose which you prefer as your pleasure.

So you do deny me the pleasure of my joint as you support punishement of it.

[Brian Ellis]

Which goes for a load of things. Still no case is made that with Marihuijana it is really worse than with other legit stuff. See above. And this really ticks me off. If it was legitimised, THERE WOULD BE NO criminals making megabucks!
So you do deny me the pleasure of my joint as you support punishement of it.

Not at all. You can have the pleasure, but if there be consequences, take them! If you think there is more pleasure in staying out of clink, then renounce on the joint. You can't have your cake and eat it. And if it were legitimised, then it would not be the criminals making the megabucks but the corporations exploiting your weakness for your joint, just as the tobacco companies do so. Criminal pushers or multinational corporations, is there really a difference? They both exploit your weakness.

[FatBastard]

Why? By what right should anyone be able to deny me the pleasure of a joint when I, an adult male, choose to have one?

So you do deny me the pleasure of my joint as you support punishement of it.

Yo , Grouchy Smurf, just out of curiosity, the way I understood it, in your little Village of mushroom-shaped houses, There is no reason to worry about Gargamel crushing the party when one smurfes some purple haze. Am I wrong?

[NetSnake]

And if it were legitimised, then it would not be the criminals making the megabucks but the corporations exploiting your weakness for your joint, just as the tobacco companies do so. Criminal pushers or multinational corporations, is there really a difference? They both exploit your weakness.

doesn't this happen already with just about everything??? (food chains, clothes, cars, petrol, computers, drugs (medical), music, cinema etc etc... ). big corporations will always find a weakness/desire to exploit in order to make money no matter what and that's just the way it is.

[Umfriend]

Not at all. You can have the pleasure, but if there be consequences, take them! If you think there is more pleasure in staying out of clink, then renounce on the joint. You can't have your cake and eat it.

I have, on occasion, trouble expressing myself in English. This must be one of them. I'll readily accept that I should accept the consequences of my actions which are caused by my actions. Going to jail is a consequence not only of my actions but of those of others as well (barring the rare case where I would lock myself up). Now I do understand that there may begood resons to lock someone up, you know, when one does harm to another in certain ways. That is not the case with me smoking a joint and you realise that. This is not a eat my cake and have it. This is wanting me to eat the cake (i.e. smoke my joint) but you stealing it (i.e. punishing me [for something that does not concern you, the police or the state in any way]).

And if it were legitimised, then it would not be the criminals making the megabucks but the corporations exploiting your weakness for your joint, just as the tobacco companies do so. Criminal pushers or multinational corporations, is there really a difference? They both exploit your weakness.

OK, I'll admit that in that case there might be a reason to punish the pushers, but ME?? What on earth for? This is not illogical because you drink wine sometimes, it is illogical because you punish the exploitation of one weakness while endorsing the other one (which does in fact kill many many people before their natural end).

Yo , Grouchy Smurf, just out of curiosity, the way I understood it, in your little Village of mushroom-shaped houses, There is no reason to worry about Gargamel crushing the party when one smurfes some purple haze. Am I wrong?

I am unsure. You are unclear to me, that's for sure. Did you actually have a question you wanted to ask me? Could you refrase it (when your out of your high perhaps )

[FatBastard]

ok ok ... in the Netherlands, I take it weed is kinda tolerated by law? so why do u worry about being arrested ?

[Umfriend]

Oh, long story. No, it is not tolerated by law but it is "overlooked" by the enforcement agencies. This of course is about the worst thing you can do: keep the law but not enforce it -> How the hell can the law remain respectable? How does one explain a practice that allows consumption and growing for own use (which still is against the law) but not the sale, or production for others? The consquence is that users purchase stuff that is unchecked, unregulated, no Q&A at all and at to high prices while the criminals make shitloads of money. There is a movement, the same one that uses the same propaganda as the UK does, to actually enforce the prohibition on MJ.

I am worried as a citizen about (a) any restiction on behaviour by law for no good reason and (b) a legal system that is not clear and thus loses respectability (and hence becomes harder to enforce generally).

Edit: Are you allowed to smoke next to a pool of vomit? Even if it is a small one?

[FatBastard]

Me and the universe have a don't ask don't tell policy regarding smoking

The official legal status is that in general its a no no, but there is an official definition of "For Personal Use", which gets leniency when brushed with the law (actually I know of nobody getting in real trouble just for that).
As far as law enforcement is concerned drunk driving is a much bigger problem.

actually I am much more concerned with getting permission from my lovely wife.
she kicks me out to the (extremely private) yard, as she can't stand the smell.
though back in the day, she has been known to appreciate the occasional brownie.

[KRSESQ]

I take little satisfaction in the fact that I've been around long enough now to have seen many people destroy their lives in many ways. One of my closest friends is well on his way to drinking himself to death (details to follow). He's lost his wife and child, his health, his driver's license, most of his ability to think rationally, and on a couple of occasions his freedom. When I compare his situation to that of the hardcore stoners I've known over the years, it's no contest. I've seen firsthand the destruction alcohol has wrought in my own family and his. There is no way in Hell you'll ever convince me that MJ is a worse drug to abuse than alcohol.

The simple fact is, 90% of users of either substance do so responsibly, to relax and take the edge off at the end of the day, and to enjoy fellowship with their friends. Of the other 10%, given the (admittedly difficult) choice, I'd take the company of stoners over the company of drunks any day. All stoners want to do is watch TV and eat Cheetos and have "intellectual conversations" - that is, when they can remember what they're talking about and can string more than ten words together at a time. Drunks are stubborn, argumentative, belligerent, loud, obnoxious, incoherent, and often violent. Yet alcohol is accepted and MJ is not. How can this ridiculous double-standard be justified?

Kevin

[FatBastard]

There is no way in Hell you'll ever convince me that MJ is a worse drug to abuse than alcohol.

Here is one of many researches supporting your stand

However which drug is worse has nothing to do with fighting it.
What does then? well ... in the UK the size of the spirits market is €10 billion , forget the USA which is much bigger. why is that? its not that simple making your own whiskey. How ever, any child can grow a plant. especially one which grows wild , if you don't disturb it. without a doubt, a death blow to all this duty free / import taxes huge industry.
and as to Tabacco .... they settled the case against them in the U.S, for hundreds of billions$ .. thats the kind of money involved. who the hell would allow people to prefer nurturing a small, funky looking plant in their rooms, or just let it grow wild in their gardens?

[Umfriend]

Sorry about your friend KRSESQ.

[ZokesPro]

Here is one of many researches supporting your stand

However which drug is worse has nothing to do with fighting it.
What does then? well ... in the UK the size of the spirits market is €10 billion , forget the USA which is much bigger. why is that? its not that simple making your own whiskey. How ever, any child can grow a plant. especially one which grows wild , if you don't disturb it. without a doubt, a death blow to all this duty free / import taxes huge industry.
and as to Tabacco .... they settled the case against them in the U.S, for hundreds of billions$ .. thats the kind of money involved. who the hell would allow people to prefer nurturing a small, funky looking plant in their rooms, or just let it grow wild in their gardens?

Here in Quebec, there are so many weed plants growing wild througout the province that's it's nearly impossible to find them all.

Area of Quebec:

1,542,056 sq. km (595,391 sq. miles) (Natural Resources Canada, 2001)

B.C. is one of the biggest growers in Canada next to Quebec.
Area - Total 944,735 km² (364,764 sq mi)

UK
Area - Total 244,820 km² (79th) 94,526 sq mi

Sometimes you hear on the news that several growers have been busted but the production never slows down and you can still buy weed anywhere and from almost anyone.

You just can't stop weed growers man. [insert sound of water bong here, man]

[KRSESQ]

@ FB:

Also take into account that Drug enforcement in the US is a $30 Billion a year industry. Local police departments are becoming more militarized with increasingly heavy equipment and firepower, to combat better equiped and highly motivated trafficers. Given their relative impotence in actually solving the drug supply problem, how is a heavily militarized police force a good thing? Especially when the "innocent until proven guilty" rule is utterly moot where possession is concerned (I believe the expression is "Dead to Rights").

To call marijuana a controlled substance is a joke. The government has no control. The few tons they bust here or there is a drop in the bucket. How much more militarization, how many more restrictions on our lives, are we willing to tolerate for a failed policy? When does the law of diminishing returns kick in, when the social, political, and financial cost of law enforcement in our society becomes a greater burden than the drugs themselves?

@ Umf:

Unfortunately I'll probably be seeing him sometime today, to see how he screwed up his modem hookup. I sold him a clunky old Dell ultra cheap to have around for his kid. My friend is completely incapable of learning even the most fundamental basics of using a computer at this point, and I've pretty much given up trying to teach him anything.

Kevin

[FatBastard]

The rule of diminishing return is completely dependent on what return you're after.
You are under the impression that the return is reducing the level of drug abuse in society
I'm not sure this is the actual return intendant by the powers that be. I am not a much of a conspiracy freak and I suspect neither are you, However the current grim state of the so called war on drugs is so apparent to so many people, that questioning the goals of this war, if they're not what is publicly advertised, might be in order.
I'll add to your set of examples something truly shocking; Meth stays in your system 2 - 4 days tops, weed traces take no less then a month to completely disappear. some schools started performing random drug testing on kids. so what are the kids thinking? "well, its Friday, and I might be tested on Monday, its safer for me to do Meth, as it will expel out of my system by the time I'll be subjected to a drug test." the result? Meth (which is just about the worst substance I can think of) consummation is exploding.
in light of all of this, I'm asking myself how come nobody is doing anything about it? where are the authorities? Then I take a long, objective, fact based look at reality:
- The governments are able to throw more and more money at enforcement agencies.
- The governments are getting a tighter and tighter grip on civil liberties.
- When you look at the racial makeup of the prison population you get an overwhelmingly clear pattern
- Billions of $ are circulated in the Alcohol and Tobacco markets.
- Convicted people, are not allowed to vote off the governments responsible to this outrages legislation.

So what do I conclude?
Maybe the war on drugs yields returns which are very much in line with certain agendas.
Maybe those agendas have little to do with "public safety" or whatever other pathetic slogan they chose to masquerade their true intentions.
Maybe, just maybe, you can think of other wars that started for reasons different then what was sold to the naive public?
... and no, I am not necessarily referring to the situation in Iraq.