quote:

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Originally posted by zapadoo:
mr. magoo - taxation of vice products has never stopped people from abusing themselves.

Paying the true cost of care would, however.

But again, I'm only suggesting that we not compound a wrong with another wrong - the liberalization and legalization of marijuana.

In the short term, why should grow-op operators not receive the maximum possible penalty for their crime?

Statistics in BC should that the average grow-op operator has had 7 convictions and the average sentence is 4.5 months. These people are among the worst leeches on society - amoral and unproductive. The system should not make it possible for them to profit.

Nor should the system give Rothmans the ability to use marijuana as its next health-killing cash cow.

Use the tools that exist now. Fight liberalizing these laws.

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For example, the BLF's review of previous research highlights that just three marijuana joints a day causes the same damage to the lung's airways as 20 cigarettes, mainly because of the way joints are smoked.

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The amount of study that has gone into the evils of tobacco absolutely dwarfs what little has really been done on cannabis. Yet when evidence from legitimate sources contradicts the pro-pot lobby position, you dismiss it or merely hope its not.

Really, its not that that bad, really, really its not, isn't it?

The same things were said about tobacco 30,40,50 years ago.

And I can find you half a dozen tobacco smokers on any given day that will repeat the closing quote from the article:

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"These allegations have been made before countless times. Lot of things are dangerous, like driving."

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Common sense suggests that where there is smoke, there is fire.

Or has your common sense been numbed? No insult is intended - but I've never known overt marijuana advocates to be open to the possibility that they are wrong.

Should the law not be something worthy of respect? If you believe in the value of laws in society, how do you justify the recreational pot / drug user's actions?

Or are laws only to be respected when they are convenient (please don't kill me, my family or steal my stereo) or affect someone else (put that guy in jail!)?

Seriously interested in your responses.

Think carefully before you respond and try re-reading what I have written. I've put forward some opinion, but also asked questions.

Hardly the actions of a troll.

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Should the law not be something worthy of respect? If you believe in the value of laws in society, how do you justify the recreational pot / drug user's actions?

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Some people would create so many laws, it would be far too easy to be a criminal.

The government has never shown cause as to why the use and cultivation of marijuanna should be prohibited.

The marijuanna laws, as they stand, are an affront to individual liberty, and should be protested, and ignored.

The reasoning about marijuanna being harmful, therefore it should be illegal rings hollow.

Clearly, the most harmful drug in this society is alcohol, and the fact that those who oppose the legalization of marijuanna don't also campaign for the prohibition laws on alcohol gives the lie to their whole arguemnt.

More people die from avalanches every year than from marijuanna.

Come back to me on this subject after you've banned skiing, and re-instituted prohibition.

What's that you say, Prohibition didn't work? All it did was provide a revenue stream for orgainzed crime?

Bingo.

To those that want big government in our faces on the marijuanna laws, I ask you, are you just a dupe of organized crime, or an accomplice?

[ 30 June 2003: Message edited by: Tommy_Paine ]

Drugs are good, they let you do things that you know you not should.
And when you do 'em people think that you're cool.
And when you do 'em people think that you're cool.

Want to join a punk band, shave your head and get a tattoo.
You don't need talent just sing attitude.
Self instruction, no moral to throw it on me.
For no particular reason beat up everyone.

Drugs are neat, and you can buy 'em relatively cheap.
And when you do 'em people think that you're cool.
And when you do 'em people think that you're cool.

NOFX LYRICS - "Drugs Are Good" - download it and chill out folks, please!

Lets try another angle. Recreational use of drugs serves no positive purpose to society.

And you are absolutely correct, abuse of alcohol serves no positive purpose to society either, and has a significant cost and impact to our society.

If you read the commentary on the Tax Freedom thread, you'd see I have no problem with people abusing their health with tobacco, pot, and lets add alcohol in the mix too - which some estimates peg at a cost of 7 - 10 billion dollars in cost to the nation annually.

No problem at all.

But, if people are keen to abuse themselves, and society throws open the proverbial floodgates to allow them that legal freedom, then let those people pay for their own mistakes later later in life when the health problems catch up to them.

These are pretty big costs.

- 45,000 people will die of tobacco related issues

- 1,000 non smokers will die of those same issues because of the lack of respect smokers have for their companions and family

- 1991 $, smoking attributable health care costs totaled $2.5 billion plus another $1.5 billion in residential care costs (chronic illness)

Not all costs can be recovered retroactively either, so lets tax or penalize abusers up front:

- In 1995$ approx 2500$ per employee in productivity costs.

- $10.5 billion in lost economic output, but hey, when you die, we'll find another willing body to work in your place. call it zero.

The 1991 study concluded that costs were some $15 Billion, will some $7.8 billion in related taxes were collected.

According to Health Canada stats, alcohol accounts for $7.5 billion in costs, for the same time frame as the $15 billion of costs measured for Tobacco.

Therefore the poster's assertion that Alcohol is so much worse in cost and impact than tobacco is to Canadian society is clearly incorrect.

Tobacco and Alcohol abusers account for a minority percentage of our society. Maybe they, and all drug abusers, should pay their own way?

[ 01 July 2003: Message edited by: zapadoo ]

Should marijuana become legal, is anyone really willing to argue that at least 2 - 7% of the population will be considered "abusers", and over a period of time, come down with the same sorts of chronic illnesses? Take 10 - 30% of the tobacco costs then and perhaps its that order of magnitude of cost to society for long term marijuana users.

Even if I am 50% wrong on the low end, you are still talking about hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars and real health care issues.

For something that isn't neccessary.

We don't need the "new tobacco" introduced in our society, and then promoted around the world by unethical companies (the old tobacco co's will surely jump on board should it ever become legal).

That wasn't the point.

Go and get those prohibited first, then come back here and whinge on about pot.

Until then, don't skirt the question.

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An analysis of research studies with long-term, recreational users of marijuana has failed to reveal a substantial, systematic effect on the neurocognitive functioning of users. According to researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine, the only deleterious side effect found was a minimal malfunction in the domains of learning and forgetting.

The findings were particularly significant considering the movement by several states to make cannabis (marijuana) available as a medicinal drug, and questions regarding its potential toxicity over long-term usage.

Published in the July issue of the Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, the study involved a quantitative synthesis of 15 previously published research studies on the non-acute (residual) effects of cannabis on the neurocognitive performance of adult human subjects.

The studies included 704 long-term cannabis users and 484 non-users. The neurocognitive performance measurements included simple reaction time, attention, verbal/language, abstraction/executive functioning, perceptual/motor skills, motor skills, learning and forgetting.

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Lets try another angle. Recreational use of drugs serves no positive purpose to society.

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No positive purpose to society?! What a load of bulls**t! Drugs like the sweet Mary Jane lower stress levels and boost imagination among our population. Without it I'm sure there would be higher instances of stress-related illnesses, mental illnesses, and a generalized anger in society.

Since the beginning of humanity humans have been experimenting with so-called "drugs" to enhance their states of mind. It is human nature.

The main problem, far from being drugs, is a society characterized by expoitation, mental environment pollution, and the chilling manipulation of the population. If anything we should be trying to outlaw these elements.

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Recreational use of drugs serves no positive purpose to society.

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By that logic, recreational ANYTHING is of no use (though really, recreation encourages consumption, so really we should all live like in Brave New World, and the only types of recreation that should be encouraged are those that require us to consume the most that is possible. It might also be mentioned that Aldous Huxley, writer of said book, also wrote on the benefits of psychotropic drug use in the Doors of Perception. I draw no conclusions based on this information, but do find it interesting.) Relaxation, self discovery, pleasure - only in a strict economic view of the world are these things percieved of as having no value for society.

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abuse of alcohol serves no positive purpose to society either

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By that logic, recreational ANYTHING is of no use (though really, recreation encourages consumption, so really we should all live like in Brave New World, and the only types of recreation that should be encouraged are those that require us to consume the most that is possible.

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I don't think "consuming" was as big a concern for Huxley as you make it out to be.

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on economics:

"Whereas we," said Dr. Robert, "have always chosen to adapt our economy and technology to human beings---not our human beings to somebody else's economy and technology. We import what we can't make; but we make an [sic] import only what we can afford. And what we can afford is limited not merely by our supply of pounds and marks and dollars, but also primarily---primarily," he insisted---"by our wish to be happy, our ambition to become fully human."

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on physical labour:

"Aren't you supposed to be intellectuals?" Will asked when the two men had emerged again and were were drying themselves.

"We do intellectual work," Vijaya answered.

"Then why all the horrible honest toil?"

"For a very simple reason: this morning I had some spare time."

"So did I," said Dr. Robert.

"So you went out into the fields and did a Tolstoy act."

Vijaya laughed. "You seem to imagine we do it for ethical reasons."

"Don't you?"

"Certainly not. I do muscular work, because I have muscles, and if I don't use
my muscles I shall become a bad-tempered sitting-addict."

"With nothing between the cortex and the buttocks," said Dr. Robert. "Or rather with everything---but in a condition of complete unconsciousness and toxic stagnation. Western intellectuals are all sitting-addicts. That's why most of you are so repulsively unwholesome. In the past even a duke had to do a lot of walking, even a moneylender, even a metaphysician. And when they weren't using their legs, they were jogging about on horses. Whereas now, from the tycoon to his typist, from the logical positivist to the positive thinker, you spend nine tenths of your time on foam rubber. Spongy seats for spongy bottoms---at home, in the office, in cars and bars, in planes and trains and buses. No moving of legs, no struggles with distance and gravity---just lifts and planes and cars, just foam rubber and an eternity of sitting. The life force that used to find an outlet through striped muscle gets turned back on the viscera and the nervous system, and slowly destroys them."

[...Vijaya explained,] "If you'd been shown how to do things with the minimum of strain and the maximum of awareness, you'd enjoy even honest toil."

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I don't think "consuming" was as big a concern for Huxley as you make it out to be.

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It was in Brave New World. That was the exclusive focus of most people's lives.

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No positive purpose to society?! What a load of bulls**t! Drugs like the sweet Mary Jane lower stress levels and boost imagination among our population. Without it I'm sure there would be higher instances of stress-related illnesses, mental illnesses, and a generalized anger in society.

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If you've a physical or mental illness that requries a drug, call a doctor.

If you are a self-serving whiner looking for some release from stress, try (safe) sex or exercise. Both achieve what you seek. Either are more fun.

And neither cost society billions in damaging impacts.

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If you are a self-serving whiner looking for some release from stress, try (safe) sex or exercise.

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Or I'll just do as I please as a free adult.

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If we could redirect the costs and associated impacts to society that substance abuse delivers to fighting poverty and other important social issues, we'd be farther ahead as a society.

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Why don't we start with something like automobiles, chronic television watching, or war?

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If you've a physical or mental illness that requries a drug, call a doctor.

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If you are a self-serving whiner...

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...try (safe) sex or exercise. And neither cost society billions in damaging impacts.

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If we could redirect the costs and associated impacts to society that substance abuse delivers to fighting poverty and other important social issues, we'd be farther ahead as a society.

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If you've a physical or mental illness that requries a drug, call a doctor.

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So drug abuse is okay as long as the drug you're abusing is perscrition? Weird.

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If you are a self-serving whiner looking for some release from stress, try (safe) sex or exercise. Both achieve what you seek. Either are more fun.

And neither cost society billions in damaging impacts.

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First: what the fuck is up with that "self-serving whiner" remark? Not a good way to win friends and influence people. For the record, I smoke weed semi-regularly. I also exercise frquently and engage in safe sex whenever humanly possible. Each activity has its own benefits and none are more or less fun than the other. But only one of these leisure activities can get me thrown in jail. Does that make sense?

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If we could redirect the costs and associated impacts to society that substance abuse delivers to fighting poverty and other important social issues, we'd be farther ahead as a society.

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Should the law not be something worthy of respect? If you believe in the value of laws in society, how do you justify the recreational pot / drug user's actions?

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Have you heard of Thoreau?

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Should marijuana become legal, is anyone really willing to argue that at least 2 - 7% of the population will be considered "abusers", and over a period of time, come down with the same sorts of chronic illnesses?

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Here's a news flash. People smoke pot. Millions of people flaunt the law and light up. We are already dealing with the health effects of pot. Legalization and regulation will encourage education and research.

Oh, and I don't think you've answered Tommy Paine's question:

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Are you a dupe, or an accomplice, of organized crime?

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Are you a dupe, or an accomplice, of organized crime?

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On the non-health side to the story, why do we tolerate and even elevate those who flout the law?
Should the law not be something worthy of respect? If you believe in the value of laws in society, how do you justify the recreational pot / drug user's actions?

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Originally posted by zapadoo:
Lets try another angle. Recreational use of drugs serves no positive purpose to society.

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From "Third Eye" of the album Aenima by Tool:

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...and if you don't think drugs have done good things for us do me a favor. Go home tonight, take all your albums, all your tapes, and all your CDs and burn them. Cuz you know what? The musicians who made all that great music thats enhanced your lives throughout the years where real fuckin high on drugs.

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Decriminalised, of course, but not necessarily legalised until I can see some much more indepth research.

I guess I'm just a skeptic that marijuana is somehow 'healthier' than tobacco. While I do not believe the intoxication level is any more dangerous to society than that of alcohol, I nevertheless worry about the lung cancer that I'm certain with further research will be apparent among even casual pot smokers.

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At least when one buys drugs from a dealer, one knows exactly what one is getting.

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Originally posted by clockwork:
Denial would be muttering to yourself over and over, "It's illegal, it's illegal, it's illegal".

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Tobacco has long been one of the biggest corporate evils pushed onto people around the world; nothing that is known today guarantees that marijuana will not take tobacco's place in every substantive way if the further liberalization of use and production continues.

Curious how many of the pro marijuana folks - so far in this discussion - are also tobacco smokers. Be honest.

I'll be honest - I am a non smoker (1 cigarette in forty years) and my moms family were large tobacco growers (we are long since out of the biz). I've seen dozens of my extended family die from tobacco related illness, some after years of misery. My father died of tobacco related illness. Two of my siblings have tobacco related illnesses.

I know that the billions of dollars of harm which tobacco inflicts on society is only one sterile face to the problem.

Common sense tells me that marijuana easily has the potential to become "the next tobacco". Liberalization of possession laws is merely one step down the slippery slope that leads to far more widespreadh adoption. Once declared legal - whether it happens in this decade or the next, it will only be a matter of time before big business - the Rothmans of the new millenia, find a way to generate profits from it. They will make new products, new blends, adopt new strategies to market these products.

Who's to say they won't dig up any of their dirty practices from the past to hook a new generation of users around the world?

Regulation of tobacco still results in 45,000 people in Canada each year finding out just how bad that product is. 45,000 dead people is more than my home town of Brandon had when I left. Dead. Wiped out. Five times what happens from car accidents, suicides, drug abuse, murger and AIDS combined.

The most argent marijuana supporter in this discussion has not put forward a cogent defense that guarantees that marijuana won't turn into "the next tobacco".

The potential risk - to society (folks here are supposed to care about society, no?) is enormous, and the benefits (leaving legitimate medicinal use out of this discussion) in no way offset the potential for great, long term, harm to our society and the world at large.

Therefore its terribly selfish to promote this agenda just because you like to get a buzz on.

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I hope you registered your gun and always declared your income (or always asked for receipts).

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You know nothing about me. You seem to be prone to predjudicial stereotyping and it clouds your thinking. You need to get out more and understand that money is not the only factor which creates divides between people. Attitudes like yours are the real issue.

I declare every single penny. I have no doubt at all that am in the conciencious taxpayer club in Canada - certainly no one is more so than I because that would be impossible to achieve. Last year I claimed a whole $235 in business entertainment expenses, every penny accounted for. No missing income.

No unreported tips. No barter arrangements. No special deal with the shirt maker down the street that if whispered to will take cash and forget to charge GST. No tax loop holes. No hiding whatsoever.

I feel fortunate, and I pay my dues, but I also work terribly hard to earn every dollar and to achieve what I have.

I contribute both funds and my time to many causes - in education, the municipal scene, social services - I have as much a stake in this discussion as anyone. I could be that person working along side you at a soup kitchen downtown and you'd never know it. I've seen some things there, and also in my families own life, that give me a personal insight into some of these issues that not everyone has.

PS: I've no personal use for guns. Never owned one, never will. My children don't get to play with anything remotely resembling a gun.

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Common sense tells me that marijuana easily has the potential to become "the next tobacco". Liberalization of possession laws is merely one step down the slippery slope that leads to far more widespreadh adoption. Once declared legal - whether it happens in this decade or the next, it will only be a matter of time before big business - the Rothmans of the new millenia, find a way to generate profits from it.

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That's why, if weed was legalized, the government should strictly monitor how pot is sold, by whom, and to whom. Make advertising weed illegal. Tax the shit out of it. Make growers and vendors jump through hoops before they can get licensed to deal in it.

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That's why, if weed was legalized, the government should strictly monitor how pot is sold, by whom, and to whom. Make advertising weed illegal. Tax the shit out of it. Make growers and vendors jump through hoops before they can get licensed to deal in it.

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And that's a good thing?

The legalization of pot, with its attendant regulation, taxation, and licensing would do nothing but concentrate the supply into the hands of the Phillip Morrises and/or the Seagrams of the world. Pot would become just another commoditity enriching the giant agri-business, pharma, and the already obscenely wealthy investor class. Like they have done to our food supply, you could count on your pot to be genetically modified, grown on monoculture third world farms taken from local subsistance farmers, heavy on pesticides, herbicides and chemical fertilizers, transported from thousands of miles away, and sold with slick marketing campaigns. Land that once grew food will now grow pot to feed the consumption of the wealthy nations.

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Originally posted by zapadoo:
On the non-health side to the story, why do we tolerate and even elevate those who flout the law?

Should the law not be something worthy of respect? If you believe in the value of laws in society, how do you justify the recreational pot / drug user's actions?

Or are laws only to be respected when they are convenient (please don't kill me, my family or steal my stereo) or affect someone else (put that guy in jail!)?

Seriously interested in your responses.

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'The Law' is not a neutral catagory, brought down from on high as a kind of unquestionable, divine fiat. 'Law' is always a codification of certain power relations within society. Our system of governance is secular and democratic. In the most simple terms, this means the 'the Law' is in place to reflect and enforce certain mores and norms, and to codify generally accepted codes of conduct. As a democratic society's views of certain activities change, 'the Law' must grow and change to reflect that. There has been a sea-change in the general attitude toward marijuana use. Atavistic sentiment for 'the Law' for law's sake is just dogmatic.

Secondly, there is the issue of individual freedom. One might say that the movement for the legalisation of marijuana is part and parcel of certain trends toward the decreasing role of general 'society' in determining what and individual may and may not do in their own private sphere. For me, the entire argument against many 'illegal' drugs from a health standpoint is a ploy to do an end-run around the purely political issue of whether or not a responsible adult should have free domain over the territory inside my own skin. What place does the government have in the neuroreceptors of the nation?

Perhaps you would be happier if we could just legislate 'danger' out of the world? Legislate it out right along with choice, I suppose....

Which is more important - your choice to do what you will, or mitigating 'danger' that could be brought about by personal choices? Further, if this the goal is legislation the right tool for the job anyway?

These are the primary questions that the 'health argument' people fail to ever address.

[ 06 July 2003: Message edited by: Courage ]

[ 06 July 2003: Message edited by: Courage ]

MIND YOUR OWN FUCKING BUSINESS!

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The most argent marijuana supporter in this discussion has not put forward a cogent defense that guarantees that marijuana won't turn into "the next tobacco".

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I wouldn't say I'm an "argent" supporter (or even all that ardent), but, number 1, I don't think its up to those supporters to prove something won't happen (proving a negative is almost always an exercise in futility - prove I haven't opened that book on my desk since Thursday, or even better, prove that I won't open it for the next week). And number 2, the fact that tabacco is HIGHLY PHYSCIALLY ADDICTIVE, whereas pot isn't, is a pretty good argument in my eyes.

But on this point:

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MIND YOUR OWN FUCKING BUSINESS!

That felt good, i think i am going to go smoke a giant joint right now, then i am going to smoke a cigarette and drink a few beers.

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And, the government has never been able to do prove their claim. The laws as they exist are an affront to liberty.

While the Mighty Brutus thinks it is an unfair question, I still point out that the prohibition on marijuanna only serves to create a revenue stream for criminals.

Alcoholizing the marijuana laws would remove that revenue stream. Therefore, far from an unfair question, it is time for those who support prohibition to justify thier desire to keep this revenue stream open.

At root here is the rather incorrect idea that legalizing a drug will lead to increased usage.

Think of all the reasons you don't use heroin, for example. "Because it's illegal" doesn't even make it into the top ten.

When it comes to these things, if anything, prohibition lends a certain cachet, and might, in fact, encourage use.

Each drug effects the human body and mind differently. So it stands to reason that we need a strategy suited to each drug.

I'd medicinalize heroin. Give it away to those that use it. Heroin itself isn't nearly as dangerous and debilitating as the things people do to get heroin.

If the government grew and prescribed heroin to addicts, crime would drop, there would be next to nil impetous to import heroin, and one could project a reduction in new users over time.

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I'd medicinalize heroin. Give it away to those that use it. Heroin itself isn't nearly as dangerous and debilitating as the things people do to get heroin.

If the government grew and prescribed heroin to addicts, crime would drop, there would be next to nil impetous to import heroin, and one could project a reduction in new users over time.

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If the government grew and prescribed heroin to addicts, crime would drop, there would be next to nil impetous to import heroin, and one could project a reduction in new users over time.

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So... why not alcohol too? They could grow, press and ferment "the People's Grapes", and I could drink the wine. I mean, if my tax dollars are going to keep a heroin user in a permanent state of bliss, why not me too? Am I the designated "worker bee" and they're the designated "sit around totally stoned bee"?

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Originally posted by zapadoo:
Speaking of BS

If you've a physical or mental illness that requries a drug, call a doctor.

If you are a self-serving whiner looking for some release from stress, try (safe) sex or exercise. Both achieve what you seek. Either are more fun.

And neither cost society billions in damaging impacts.

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Not necessarily true. Injuries and other ailments caused by excercise and physical exertion are a very common part of everyday medical practice. Chiropractors, who receive some OHIP funding are busy day and night with such injuries. The Orthopedic and Arthritic Medicine industry is booming and costly. Having been in emergency wards a couple of times for sports-related injuries, I found the doctors and nurses there quite used to these kinds of injuries.

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If we could redirect the costs and associated impacts to society that substance abuse delivers to fighting poverty and other important social issues, we'd be farther ahead as a society.

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So... why not alcohol too? They could grow, press and ferment "the People's Grapes", and I could drink the wine. I mean, if my tax dollars are going to keep a heroin user in a permanent state of bliss, why not me too? Am I the designated "worker bee" and they're the designated "sit around totally stoned bee"?

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Heroin addicts can function as productive people, Magoo, just like many alcoholics are socially functional, even if that functionality is to one degree or another, compromised.

The difference is that the Heroin addict hit the economic wall a lot sooner and harder than alcoholics do.

We prescribe opiates, and think nothing of it, to people who are in chronic physical pain. But when that pain is emotional, we look upon opiates as something evil, and criminal.

I'm not suggesting that opiates are the best treatment for emotional pain; far from it. But in a society that really doesn't want to address this kind of thing, we abandon many people to this kind of self medication.