legalize pot?

[Howdy]

I think it should be legalized, it's being used medically to treat cancer. They wouldn't supply it to people if it were bad for you.

[Princess Cupcake]

Anyway, marijuana is really similar to alcohol. It's perfectly safe and harmless if used right. So honestly, either ban both, or legalize both cause this is just silly.

What is silly is that you just said it is very similar to alcohol because no it isn't. Alcohol is far more dangerous and harmful to one's health. The only thing they have in common would be that they are drugs which alter the state of mind. Marijuana is a naturally grown herb. Alcohol has to be brewed by humans. Marijuana has many clinical uses. You don't often hear of alcohol being prescribed to someone. Many people die from alcohol. You cannot say the same for Marijuana. Many people become physically dependent on alcohol. Marijuana addiction is all in your head. It is possible to get alcohol poisoning and black out after consuming too much alcohol. You cannot OD on marijuana. The two couldn't be more opposite.

[Chi The Sweet]

I just wish the drinking age was lower

[AnimeBboy]

I don't use it now and I most likely wouldn't use it even if it was legalized.

[Dr. Evil]

If supply is sorted out and a good roadside test is found for drivers, sure. Otherwise no.

This. However, I assume you mean for recreational purposes. I agree with that. Restrict it like tobacco or alcohol. There's already a test for finding THC levels instantly. It's a cotton swab type thing. Anywho, if it WERE legalized, I'd smoke more than I already do.

[Samuru]

I had no idea this discussion was still live? Wow, no one read my post on the first page? :/

[Hyouka]

frelling druggie

[threewolves]

I know a lot more city ordinances are changing laws to make it a misdemeanor instead of a felony.

I'd have to see the pros and cons for both, but like someone else said, alcohol is legal which technically is just as bad as far as impairment of judgement as weed, so if it is, so should pot.

But at this time I am leaning towards the make it legal.

[Kaleohano]

frelling druggie

know the difference between someone who smokes weed and a druggie.

Weed smoker (And legend!)



Druggie

[elisaelisa]

I have thought about it a lot, and i mean a lot. So i could actually go on for about 20 pages of the pros and cons of it.
However i wont make it that long.
I just say that theres more pros than cons to legalizing it. Specially the ones to do with taxation and control of supply. At moment people who use it often fund mafia, scumbags or people who should not get that funding. Then at least in a way it would benefit all of us.
I think a lot of the taxes collected from it should go for treatment centres of narcotics and alcohol abuse.
At moment most of profit goes to scumbags pockets and yet governments and charities are still the ones who have to foot the bill for rehabs. That would be a worthier cause.

As i said, theres both pros and cons, but i am for legalizing it and think it should involve a lot of wrk on governments behalf.

[.:neuko:.]

In short, and although I'm not interested in smoking "pot" (or if you prefer, Marijuana, grass, dope, weed, hash, joints, reefers, buddha, ganga, Cannabis etc.), I'd say legalise it. But anyway, for the sake of the debate, here's my 2 pennies worth:

By the way, as I'm a UK citizen, my statement is based on the British government's stance on legislation of Cannabis (aka pot), and so may not exactly reflect the (presumably) American government's stance on legislation of "pot". Nonetheless, I hope my post will still be of relevance since both governments continue to make such drugs illegal and have similar views on them, but apologies in advance if this is not the case.

In reading this post, you may also notice that I make a lot of references to alcohol in addition to Cannabis. This is mostly for the sake of comparison, but also partly due to the fact that where I come from it's legal to drink alcohol whilst illegal to smoke Cannabis, which makes very little sense to me. I mean, if alcohol and Cannabis were weapons, our government would be effectively saying: "It's perfectly legal to wield a gun but not a knife", and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure which one does the greater damage.

Anyway, on with the post and firstly, my 2 points on alcohol:

Firstly, I think our government would do well to better regulate that which causes real social issues instead of giving the public an unfounded, hypocritical, insulting and fear-mongering lecture on the harmful effects of drugs such as Cannabis. By "that", I'm of course referring to alcohol, the fuel behind many social issues, including crime, poverty, retarded social development, premature deaths, accidents, and not least, overloaded public services such as A&E departments, and of course, many of which come at the expense of the taxpayer.

Secondly, there's too much an emphasis on drinking in general society in our country, and this has unfortunately resulted in national headlines such as "Booze Britain", "Britain's Booze Crisis", and "Britain: The Drinking Culture". Moreover, our government's policy of regulating alcohol is woefully inept: seemingly, it chooses to enforce effective measures only when social-level drinking poses some kind of economic threat (as is the case at the moment) or social inconvenience to its "own people" (i.e. essentially the upper class), and even then, the propositions essentially boil down to putting up the tax on the unit of alcohol. Oh goody... how comforting it is know that my taxes are being wasted on cheap "solutions" akin to the thinking of five year olds.

Now for my view on Cannabis:

There's a lot of scientific evidence to suggest that Cannabis is less harmful than alcohol. However, true as the evidence may be, that is to miss the point. Any psychologically influential substance can pose a threat to the user as well as those around him/her if he/she abuses it. For this reason, I would argue that yes, Cannabis should be legalised, but only if backed with effective regulation. Like alcohol, there needs to be some measure in place to penalise those who would abuse Cannabis such that they would be harmful to themselves and others. Rather than placing an added tax on the substance however (as with alcohol), I think a "driver's license" approach would fair better, although let's be clear, this would not be so much a complete solution than a necessary process. Anyway, if a person abuses their legal right to smoke Cannabis such that he/she harms him/herself or others, he/she will lose points on his/her Cannabis Licence much in the same way that a driver would lose points on his/her Drivers License through reckless driving. Since only the user would be affected here, they'd be no need to penalise everyone through unfair taxation just because a minority of people (or in this case one person) would abuse their legal rights.

Of course, in practice it's likely that Cannabis regulation could not be as simple as the approach suggested above, and like I said, it would be a "necessary process" - but in any case, the truth of the matter is, our government is not prepared to legalise Cannabis at all because it ultimately fears that such a lenience would lead to a counter-productive economy. It fears that the working class will be less inclined to go to work, pay their dues and consume in manner that can be manipulated through tax, in other words, do the very things that have long been relied upon to drive an economy that has long favoured the rich and powerful as opposed to the public in general. Much of our government's fear is founded on ignorance of course, hence the fear-mongering and cherry-picked nature of its public information on the harmful effects of Cannabis - and worse, the pretending to give a damn about public health when in fact its concealing more selfish motives. The effects of alcohol (and sorry to bring it up again) on the other hand are well known by our government, yet it does effectively nothing to address what is really a deep-rooted social problem - so much so in fact that even if it wished to outlaw drinking alcohol tomorrow it couldn't - for if it did I'm sure that beyond doubt, our drink-orientated society would crash like an asteroid to Earth, diminishing much of our national economy in the process.

[darkrider21]

I watched episode 420 on famly guy and pot legal in quahag and peter was seling pot bagies at a baseball game wow

[Eris]

Not really misc material. This topic is better suited for the Serious Talk forum. There may even be a thread like this in there.