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It's disgusting exploitation and degradation of a human being.

18 (20.9%)

It's pretty terrible.

14 (16.3%)

I don't care about it.

6 (7%)

Sort've funny.

15 (17.4%)

Absolutely hilarious.

21 (24.4%)

Other Opinion ( Please Post )

2 (2.3%)

Don't care / View poll

10 (11.6%)

Total Members Voted: 86

[Jackrabbit]

It's sort of the same over here, I guess, in that there's a lot of violent alcoholic homeless Aboriginies because of, well, basically because of the way they were treated when we arrived. Introduced to all this new technology and then treated like shit.

I guess I get what you're saying. My apologies.

[Pathos]

Following laws blindly is something I will never agree to.

To be fair, this is how I felt when I was like ten or whatever. Trouble is, you end up realising a lot of laws have a place in the world, especially ones you may have disagree with as a kid.

But still, marijuana should be legal.

This has nothing to do with being cool or rebellious. I dont like seeing innocent people get punished.

He's not innocent of a crime. At all.

Then we just go and get them again. Or make a place they can do this stuff without being in danger.

At least for the drug users. Im not against all the laws.

There's no such place. They'd be a danger to themselves, if they were just thrown into an empty room. Why should the government not attempt to rehabilitate them? Do you not WANT them to get better? They're ill, cowofdoom.

[Zombie]

I would like to point out that the entire premise of making something "illegal" has been based on moral reasons in the past, so the juxtaposition of law and moral is not misplaced. Prohibition and prostitution, for example, were made illegal on moral grounds. Prohibition was because wives thought that alcohol made their husbands act immorally. Prostitution was considered (rightfully so) as selling your body, which religious groups took offense to.

Historically, punishing serious crime before it happens is always frowned upon by society and drug abuse is considered one of those crimes. Drugs are only illegal for two reasons. One is that someone thinks they are wrong and the other is to prevent people from becoming addicted and damaging themselves. It's a moral ban to "protect you from yourself". However, how many of us remember our childhood? Or perhaps have younger siblings? When you tell a two year old not to do something without what they consider a proper reason, what do they do? They do it anyway. Now, yes, they do get punished but that is not the point. The idea is that the illegalization of drugs like cannabis and cocaine actually PROMOTE usage and increase drug funds. The reason for this is that it is now banned, so prices can shoot through the roof with a minimum of actual production cost increase. There are actually groups that are seriously posing the point that governments could actually be profiting off of illegal drug trade (corruption, bribes, kickbacks, etc) so they have a personal interest in ensuring that drugs stay illegal.

Another side-effect of drug illegalization is that they become taboo. People fear drug education because they think that saying, "Well, it makes you stupid but you feel great while you're on them" or something will make kids run out and take drugs. The sad thing is that only drug education can make a world where we won't NEED to make drugs illegal.

I now go back to prohibition. What did prohibition do to Chicago? It caused a large explosion of organized crime, which could lead to violent confrontations. This is all because of a moral crackdown on something that has been considered controlled for years. If a drunk is out in public, peeing where he shouldn't, he gets arrested. Someone thought, "Why not just keep people from getting drunk?" I think that was a bad idea.

Personally, I despise drugs and drug users. I, however, realize that drugs being illegal does allow the drug traders to jack up the prices and make a viable smuggling business. The only way to truly quash these activities is to simply make it a legal controlled substance. People who smoke pot can enjoy unlaced weed and if you like heroin, then whatever. Go ahead. The implications are not anywhere as dire as things are now. People wrongly fear that if these substances are not illegal that there will be a huge explosion of people doing them. Well, here's a thought... The people who want to do them find ways around the ban. Anyone in the states enjoy a contraband cigar recently? Ever wonder how it got here? Smuggling. Illegal products make smuggling viable. They make organized crime viable.

What we need are regulations and consequences for improper use. Improper use in the case of a drug would be any usage that can harm others. In the same way that violent drunks get arrested, violent druggies should get arrested. If Johnny wants to shoot up on heroin in his basement, though, and trip the night away then he's going to do it if the drug is illegal or not.

Now we come to, what I consider, the MOST crucial point: Rehab. If you are on an illegal drug, rehab is often not painless. Depending on length of usage and repeat offenses, you will likely not only be demonized and be unable to find a job, you will probably spend some time in jail or doing community service. While this may not seem too bad and while it may seem just, consider for a moment that if a drug user gets arrested and convicted, he likely will not get a job outside of food service or menial labour. These jobs barely pay a living wage, which means he's more likely to use what connections he has (read: drug connections) to obtain enough money to make ends meet. Then he's back in drugs. The punishment should fit the crime and if someone is simply out bothering people in public while hopped up on cocaine, they should be kept under surveillance until they are deemed clean and can be released. If they steal, they should be charged for stealing while under the influence of a controlled substance. If they rob a house, it's breaking and entering while under the influence. Drug and alcohol charges should be synonymous as alcohol is also a drug. Now, rehab centers tend to not be all lovey dovey heply welpy. These people get paid because you have a problem. It is not in their best interest for you to get better. There are NFP (not for profit) rehab centers around Chicago that, actually, deal with STDs and GLBTQ issues as well, so those sorts of people are not solely invested in people like you coming back. They want you to get better, usually. The entire problem here, though, is that people do not have enough education or enough access to help that will not impair their ability to function in society. This is kind of ironic as these things should really be helping you rejoin undrugged society instead of forever tarnishing any background check with a possible moment of weakness.

[Kagus]

Thanks for that post, Zombie.  You make a very strong and clearly-worded point.

Education is a very touchy subject.  Heck, we've got all sorts of problems with sex education, and that's (somewhat) legal.  And just about the only place you'll learn about the effects of alcohol is a friendly toilet the morning after.  And as far as tobacco is concerned, well...  That kinda fell flat on its face.

I'll have to agree with you that drug education is more important than drug bans.  If people knew just how easy it is to seriously f*ck yourself up with heroin, then it's possible that the substance might be handled with a little more respect.

And if LSD could finally get that ridiculous ban lifted on it so it could go back to helping psychiatric patients and cluster headache sufferers, that'd also be nice.  I'm sure that heroin would enjoy popular use with terminally ill patients as well, as a means of easing their pain (I'd just like to put in a plug for The Barbarian Invasions, a stunningly human film that I like enough to mention whenever the opportunity arises).

And marijuana has uses far beyond what it's being somewhat-allowed to do now (as a dopehead friend of mine will never cease to regale me about).  Not quite sure what you'd use coke for, but having it legalized should at least edge out some of the nastier cuts that can come around, such as people adding whiteners to make it look purer than it is.

Actually...  Cocaine's got a lot of nasty stuff it as it is.  But it's not like we've taken to legalizing the healthiest of drugs, now have we?


Another minor point for legalization that wasn't fully touched upon in your post is the subject of rebellion.  Kids who seek to lash out against their parents will seek to do exactly that which they've been told not to do.  Illegal activities tend to rank rather high on the list of "Not To Do" handed down by Mom and Pops.  If it's legal, then what's the fun in that?  It'd be like rebelling against your folks by eating lots of Snickers bars (which may occur as a side effect of some other substances, but that's beside the point...).  If you don't want your kids to have a drug problem, don't remove the drug...  Remove the problem.

Mind you, that's more just about lowering drug usage rates, which isn't really the point (although it's often held aloft as a banner, because people tend to flock to it without really paying attention).  However, rash decisions tend to be made when you're trying to prove a point, so even if there was education about the substance it might be ignored.  Then again, if it's not illegal, then there's not really that huge of a point to prove.

...unless, of course, you're under the ordained legal age for whatever it is.  Then it's illegal again, and therefore fun.


I'm really starting to babble.  Think I'll go now.

[Jackrabbit]

You'd be surprised how good a drug education program we have at our school. It is pretty in depth.

[Pathos]

You'd be surprised how good a drug education program we have at our school. It is pretty in depth.

In the biology labs at my college, we had a bunch of posters about drugs.

The cannabis one had no negative side effects. I asked one of the teachers about it, and he claimed that "finding anything funny" was a negative side effect. It was just odd.

And that's how far my drug education stretched!

[Jackrabbit]

Really? I would have thought that damaging your short term memory and the possibility of triggering a mental illness if you have an adverse reaction would both be dangerous side effects. Neither are anywhere near as dangerous as other, harder drugs but it doesn't mean there aren't negative effects.

[Zombie]

Well the interesting thing is that many prescription drugs have side effects that can be just as serious as narcotic drugs.

Adderall (possibly misspelled), which I was on in high school for ADHD, is interesting. It's essentially an amphetamine. Kids used to try to buy my pills off of me so they could crack them open and snort it or take them themselves. It helps you focus, but after a while I realized that I was becoming dependent on it despite the fact that I only agreed to take it until I learned how to properly control myself and my actions. It was a scary thing, realizing that you were becoming addicted to something that you weren't told was addictive and weren't exactly told what it would do to you.

Looking back at it, it really has changed my perception of any and all drugs. I'm much more critical of drug laws now because of possible government ties to organized crime and because of possible influence from pharmaceutical companies. There are no established corporate strangleholds on any of the narcotics, currently, so pharmaceutical companies can lobby against drugs on the premise that they are trying to "help you" when they may have completely different motivations. Cannabis is the most damning evidence, as anyone with a pot full of soil and a grow lamp can have their own pot and cannabis is one of the most demonized narcotics out there.

There's also a bit of a hitch with cannabis... It is useful. Frighteningly so, actually. We can use it to make clothes, rope, it can season food, it can help farmers turn the soil as a crop shift... You can make paper out of it, which would reduce the amount of lumber we would need... It also is very durable when used for clothes, rope, and paper. Hemp paper lasts longer with less treatment than treepulp paper.

Drug laws are all very interesting because they all seem to take a leaf from prohibition, which I am against. I may not support drugs nor would I approve of anyone using them... But the fact exists that by making them illegal, we CREATE crime. If they were not illegal, there would be no need to smuggle them an there would be no need to have organized crime revolving around them. I would wager that if they were not illegal they may even be relatively safer, as FDA regulation could set a standard for production and conduct PROPER (read: non propaganda) research about effects, side effects, dangers, benefits, and when it should be considered illegal to use them. For instance, driving on cocaine should be illegal. Snorting a few lines in your basement and then passing out on the couch shouldn't.

Another point I forgot to bring up is prisons. We imprison repeat offenders, which takes a toll. We have less and less space to house inmates and, honestly, they don't make us money. Prisoners cost tax dollars and prisons take up space and money. While prisons may create jobs, they also create deficit that we do not need. If we released all of the drug offenders that did not violate any other laws while on drugs then I'm sure our prisons would be a LOT less full. That means that if doing, selling, or possessing drugs was their only crime, by the way.

[lordnincompoop]

I only saw the first minute or two (him chasing it around a bit, stretching, and bashing into a pole), and thought it was pretty funny. From what you guys are saying about the later bits though, it sounds like they got worse.

[Kagus]

I'd recommend watching the rest of it.  Seeing him "catch" the laser is just priceless.

[Pathos]

Really? I would have thought that damaging your short term memory and the possibility of triggering a mental illness if you have an adverse reaction would both be dangerous side effects. Neither are anywhere near as dangerous as other, harder drugs but it doesn't mean there aren't negative effects.

Neither are as dangerous as softer drugs, either. There's also no real evidence (ie. chemical basis) as to how marijuana would effect people in a way as to cause schizophrenia, just a load of conjecture and "could possibly maybe". I'd not even heard of the damaging short-term memory thing up to now.

Compared with say alcohol:

• Cirrhosis of the liver.
• Heavy brain damage, if you drink enough of it.
• Increased risk of cancers in liver, mouth area and breasts.
• Osteoporosis.

Or your typical cigarrette:

• Various smell / appearance related problems. Wrinkles / premature aging etc.
• Blindness.
• Gum disease.
• Thyroid diseases.
• Loss of sense of taste / smell.
• Cancer of basically everything.
• Emphysema.
• Weakens arteries.
• Infertility / impotence.
• Various vascular diseases.
• Weakened immune system.
• Deformities of a child if you smoke whilst going through pregnancy.

Oh, and try and remember these are all proven with scientific fact, rather than what a Swedish study said (and didn't prove, they admitted there were various circumstances in the participants lives that heavily effected the test, nevermind the fact there's no true reason why it could cause schizophrenia).

I don't know, man, I'd much rather smoke pot.

P.S. Apparently, the reasoning behind not legalising pot isn't the fact it's dangerous, but because it's untaxable. People could grow it themselves and therefore avoid the government fucking them over.

[Zombie]

P.S. Apparently, the reasoning behind not legalising pot isn't the fact it's dangerous, but because it's untaxable. People could grow it themselves and therefore avoid the government fucking them over.

That is, actually, one of the few real reasons for it being illegal today. It would be hard to profit off of as everyone and their grandma could grow it in their closet. Other than this, there is little actual, factually supported, evidence as to pot being any worse than cigarettes.

I remember there was a heavyhanded advertising campaign a while back where they were claiming that cannabis contained four times (might be a bit off, there) the amount of "cancer causing" tar than cigarettes. It was later revealed that not only was this completely unfounded, but studies show that tar leads to respiratory difficulties whereas the SMOKE from cigarettes is what contains many chemicals tentatively linked to cancer. Also, cannabis doesn't really contain much tar at all. In fact, it was at one time prescribed to patients who were suffering from too much tar in their lungs!

[G-Flex]

It was later revealed that not only was this completely unfounded, but studies show that tar leads to respiratory difficulties whereas the SMOKE from cigarettes is what contains many chemicals tentatively linked to cancer.

... What? Tar is the substance in the smoke. They are not different things. The tar contains most of the carcinogenic/mutagenic stuff in the smoke.

[Zombie]

Well then I am very mistaken. My sources of information will be reviewed and burned for being inept at delivering knowledge to my brain.

[smigenboger]

I have a few questions for this thread:

I'd assume smoking is legal because it is taxable, and it is quite bad for you. Alcohol is bad for you, but too popular to remove too.

Now, (as a non-smoker), cannabis is popular, and less dangerous short term and long term for people, but will most likely be abused like alcohol anyway. Why cant it be taxed like cigarettes?

And, I'm not exactly an expert on this kind of thing, but why the hell are people smoking pot? If you're looking for a chemical high, why not extract the THC or whatever active ingredient it is and place it in a pill or patch form? Then, you only have the negative affect of having a (dopamine?) overflow, as compared to that and the cancer causing agents of inhaling smoke. Why are people smoking cigarettes anyway. As an ex-addict of caffeine, I'd think I'd much rather drink a beverage or take a caffeine pill than try to smoke something that happens to have caffeine in it.

Actually, smoking coffee beans would be a funny experiment.

I'd support rational thinking in many of these cases. If you want a dopamine rush, wouldn't you rather want to take a pure substance in the least harmful way to get that affect? Why snort cocaine, or shoot up heroine, when you could get it in a patch, pill, or beverage?

How could you prevent the negative effects? Why not remove the bad components in the first place?

On an extreme case, why not literally change the way the brain interacts? I'm sure some futuristic surgery where you quite literally trim the brain like an overgrown shrub could prevent some stress, increase efficiency, and possibly create a steady flow of 'happy' thoughts, compared to waves of 'happy', 'neutral', and 'bad'. (Unless emotions and mental states don't work on purely chemical reactions)