Marijuana Laws Are Discriminatory

[Guest]

The users take care of the problem... if one would call it a problem.

Most worry about the "Spread" of invasive species. []

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The Puna Enquirer Hat tip to David Smith []

[Jon]

So far I have not seen dope as a problem here, but having a kid on the street ask me if I have any crank makes me think there is some kind of a problem.

If they make dope legal, I bet we have a jungle full of it in a year.


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I do not believe that America is better than everybody else...
America "IS" everybody else.

[Greg]

Quote: "I will be sure to mention that Myth of the Gateway Drug, the next time I meet with one of the few living school mates that started on dope and ended on Cocaine, and maybe write some letters to the families of dead friends who died from drug OD's, I am sure they will feel much better that it was not the dope that did it." -Jon
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Jon, First I'd like to thank you and your partner for taking the time to introduce yourselves to me Sunday.

It's hard to explain "the myth". Maybe the "alcoholic gene" is the gateway. Your friends started their downward spiral on pot, but even if they had started on beer, qualudes, or cough syrup, I'm pretty sure their path and destiny was pretty well mapped out. The only thing that would have saved them would have been intervention. Not everyone is going to die though. Many addicts and alcoholics live long and relatively uneventful lives. There's just a lot of untapped potential, and unrealized happiness involved with these folks.

The problem with pakalolo, and how it relates to this thread, is that it wasn't prohibited for health or safety reasons. It was prohibited because of the economic threat that legalization presents to the phamiceutical, alcohol, and law enforcement industries.

(That's also why it will probably never BE legal, no matter how much public opinion supports it)

Because of the situation, criminals profit, users don't care (no law ever stopped me), and the only people being denied are the sick people that legitimetly need it as medication.

[Jon]

Greg...
I was kind of worried that you did not realize it was me... and I did not have time to explain it, as our ride was trying to leave.
But your welcome, we have been eying you stuff for a while now.

I know a bit about "Addictive Personalities" I have one, I can easily be addicted to anything I like. If you noticed I think dope and other drugs should be legal, but the rehab/help system needs to be in place and easily accessible. I am a product of an alcoholic family and have all the symptoms of an alcoholic now, but I have not had a drink in over 25 years. My mother had me in Alteens at a very young age so I could understand my father and that helped me understand myself years later. So I know a little about addiction.

I am sure my stories are worse than some, I grew up in a bad part of town, in school we had stabbings regularly and at least one shooting I was around for.(you would think there would have been more shootings, as most of the kids trucks had gun racks and guns... huh.)

But Drugs were the real problem, they were everywhere, they hired a plain clothed officer to patrol inside the school, he was assaulted for days...
The big push came after I was out of school, when the war on drugs got big, and a few years after I was gone, it was cleaning up. Hell we even looked at buying a house across the street from the there.

I do believe that some of the problem is the fact that dope is illegal, I think if it were legal, it would be come a little more common to look at a doper in Pahoa and tell your kids, "yep, that is what happens if you don't take care of yourself" vs "yep, that is what happens if you used drugs". The first promotes responsibility the second promotes fear.












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I do not believe that America is better than everybody else...
America "IS" everybody else.

[centipede]

quote:

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Originally posted by punafish

The gateway drug logic: people who do hard drugs started with pot. But wait! They also drank alcohol. But wait! They all started drinking milk as infants. Therefore it follows that milk is a gateway drug?

I've got lots of anecdotal evidence that points to alcohol as the real "gateway drug". Most of the kids who were heavy drinkers in high school are now hanging out at the local bar shooting pool. Many hold down a job but never reached their potential. It's sad because many had so much potential.

I also know pot smokers who never amounted to anything, but you can say that about any demographic. I also know pot-smoking executives, lawyers, bankers, doctors and (of course) professional musicians who like the happy smoke. (But none were from Texas that I know of :-)

I would argue that the guys in the DEA who couldn't find a better job than hovering over homes in their helicopters to harass folks growing an herb (Puna focus here) have "amounted to nothing."

Too many problems and not enough resources to solve them all. That's why we have to PRIORITIZE. In a sane world, we wouldn't be wasting precious resources on something as benign as pot.

Just my humble opinion...

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[centipede]

Let's get real. The whole concept that marijuana in and of itself leads to harder drugs is bull. But it does lead kids to harder drugs because, in a nutshell, marijuana is illegal and people have to buy it from the same dealers who sell the other stuff as well. The "gateway" is not the weed, it's who they have to buy it from. Then there's peer pressure that is fueled by an uncontrolled environment. People are individuals and react differently to similar situations. I know some who have been smoking pot for 30 years or more and do nothing else even though they associate with hard drug users, and I know alcoholics who never "graduated" beyond that substance. Same for the nicotine addicts who, by the way, happen to be hooked on what is arguably one of the most addictive substances there is.

If there were no drugs other than alcohol, there would be more abusers of booze than there are today because there would be no other drug of choice and society would suffer more than now because for many, alcohol generates violence and aggression, and it causes people to do things that a pot smoker won't do. Marijuana is not a weapon of mass destruction but alcohol, when abused by some, most certainly is.

[LeeE]

The Dutch put cannabis in coffee shops thirty years ago in order to, in their words, create a "Separation of the markets". It worked.

Well, kids sell crank and other illegal drugs because of the huge profits they command.

I'll leave it to you good folks to explain exactly why varieties of cheaply produced drugs that were once sold in every pharmacy in America for pennies per dose are now worth their weight in gold and sold in our streets by children.

Imho, As we've all noticed, the business is good and our political and economic leaders are happy, (Obama has clearly stated that he wants cannabis to remain illegal), so if we're going to see "change", we will have to compel them to implement that change.

[Jon]

you might want to look into that again, they are closing a bunch of coffee shops because they are to close to schools and such. I don't think its working out as well as some like to believe.


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I do not believe that America is better than everybody else...
America "IS" everybody else.

[oink]

Yeah, and I think the drug tourism that resulted turned out to have an unattractive side. I think I agree with the idea of government controlled, tax stamped, sales in stores governed like liquor stores are in some places. It doesn't seem that marijuana will ever go away so lets let it pay it's way and take it away from the drug dealers or at least make the drug dealers join the tax paying society. However, I would hate to see those that have been involved in the illegal trade profit if it became legal. I also agree that providing pot to minors should be punished extremely severely, as should those who provide booze to minors.

Pua`a
S. FL
Big Islander to be.

[Jon]

Oh, and dope is still illegal in the Netherlands... they just don't enforce the law, which produces more law breaking in my opinion.


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I do not believe that America is better than everybody else...
America "IS" everybody else.