[quote]Professor X wrote:
drag0n252pi wrote:
So it is ok for our government to make addicts out of the populace?
Apparently so considering how many americans are hooked on anti-depressants and the number of kids on prescribed drugs for ADD. We are already a nation of drug addicts. Nothing you have written explains why marijuana should not be legalized especially for medical use.[/quote]
the argument about marijuana being legalized has come up and looked upon many times, the thing that they go wrong is that they try to legalize it for smoking well smoking couses lung cancer and does kill brain cells i dont care what you say this much is true. but if they went about legalizing marijuana as an edible herb they would have a better chance for example. if you smoke paper you can still get lung cancer no matter what smoke is carbon dioxide and that is not good for a human to inhale in any form. and holding your breath will kill brain cells. but if you ate marijuana you would not get lung cancer becouse you would not be inhaling massive amounts of carbon dioxide. and you would not kill brain cells becouse you are not holding your hit in. but you will still get the same effects as smoking yes it does take more of it to get the same amounts into the blood stream quick enough for you to get high but you will still get the medical effects just as effectivly if not more. also if it was soked in alcohol for a couple days then rubbed in to your injured muscle it will relax that muscle. my friend has bad knees and a bad back he had to get his back fused. well most of the time he can not even move becouse of his back but when he has marijuana massaged into his back and his knees trhe pain will not be as bad and he is able to move around like normal something no muscle relaxer or pain killer in this world could do for him.
marijuana is not bad for the human body thc is known to cure pain, help with eye sight and help cancer be controlled. but no matter what it does if the aurgument is for the us government to legalize marijuana so it can be smoked it will never happen there is no reason for it.
[quote]drag0n252pi wrote:
So it is ok for our government to make addicts out of the populace?[/quote]
If you were in law enforcement then you should know; the addicts are already here. I’m not advocating the use of drugs. You totally missed the point of my earlier post.
When I was a police officer many times I had people who wanted to kick drugs and/or alcohol. Most addicts are indigent and can’t afford to go to Betty Ford or other private treatment facilities. So we’d bring them to community hospitals and publicly funded treatment facilities. Due to limited funding, bureaucratic red tape and overcrowding they were either turned away or told to come back in weeks or months later. When an addict is ready to give it up, they need to be detoxed right then and there before they have time to reconsider. Most never went back voluntarily again. I’d usually find them dead or seriously injured later on.
My point is if you legalize drugs, and funnel the tax dollars into treatment and education then:
1.) People who wanted to get help could.
2.) Educate people on the true dangers of drugs to try to prevent future addicts.
3.) Ensure the quality of the drugs to prevent people from dying of overdoses or poisoning from bunk product.
4.) Decriminalization allows for redistribution of manpower and resources to deal with real crime. It will also ease jail over crowding and free up the criminal court system. It also takes the black market money out of it and stops the senseless killing of people. If there’s no money in it where is the incentive to deal?
No matter what you do, you are never going to stop people from using. Even if you bomb countries, pillage their fields, etc. as you suggest in a previous post. People will always find other alternatives to get high. Look at Methamphetamine. I live in Las Vegas where Meth is a huge problem. The police bust at least 7 to 10 major labs a week here. It’s just so damned easy to make the shit up in a garage or kitchen with chemicals available anywhere. During prohibition when alcohol was outlawed. People drank turpentine, after shave lotion, colognes, wood grain alcohol, etc. which caused blindness and death. So what was accomplished? Bootleggers still made bath tub gin and got rich off of it. It also helped finance organized crime giving it a toe hold in America that still exist today. And the poor user still managed to get high even at the risk of serious consequences.
drag0n252pi, you seem to be pretty resolute in your view as I am in mine. I’m sure you will have a rebuttal to this post. So as to try to keep the peace let’s just agree now to disagree on this subject and move on.
i use to smoke bud all the time i mean atleast an once a day and thats no understatement. the one thing it did for me is help me focus. it will not make you stronger but when i did smoke all the time i could perform more reps while high. but i smoked everyday all day so when i was high it was more like being sober. if the individual smokes pot on a daily bases, i can see how he would say that it makes him stronger becouse he would have some sort of an amunity for him to be sober is like a sober man being high is what i am trying to say. [/quote]
[quote]Professor X wrote:
mindeffer01 wrote:
If I had a dime for every time I saw a pothead do something stupid that put themselves and others at risk and resulted in equipment and personal damage, I could retire right now.
You could have retired 20 years ago had you received the same return for those who were drunk and performed poorly. The truth is, you can die due to alcohol poisoning. There has never been a marijuana overdose case resulting in death. Either ban both, or legalize both.
[/quote]
I would actualy be for the legalization of pot to reduce the organized crime surrounding it alone. Factor in the medical uses, tax dollars, and agricultural employment that would be created, and I’d look into becoming a farmer. But the point that I’m addressing is the origin of the thread. That is the effect it has in the workplace. When you have to move employees into a position of least harm or send them home because they are stoned, drunk, or nodding off from various narcotics, you have problems in the workplace.
Do you know people in your profession who get smoked up before a surgery? How about a few beers, maybee a shot of phentanyl or ketocet? If they do, do you want to work with them? Go ahead, let a hygenist mellow out a little with a few tokes and let her have at it.
After all, the stuff should be legal, Right?
[quote]mindeffer01 wrote:
Do you know people in your profession who get smoked up before a surgery? How about a few beers, maybee a shot of phentanyl or ketocet? If they do, do you want to work with them? Go ahead, let a hygenist mellow out a little with a few tokes and let her have at it.
After all, the stuff should be legal, Right?
[/quote]
I like the argument you just made…because it implies that you think someone would smoke weed differently than someone would drink alcohol. Anyone retarded enough to get drunk before a surgery would also be retarded enough to get high before a surgery. Since one is legal, chances are there are many who drink alcohol before complicated tasks. You just haven’t been publicly exposed to them.
In other words, why do you think someone who wouldn’t get drunk before surgery would suddenly think it was alright to get high before surgery? Your logic seems askew.
What part of my answer didn’t you understand. I agreed to disagree so I am through. We can go around all night but I have better things to do than beat a dead horse.
Thank you Assbuster for your thoughtful and well presented posts. Your contribution to this thread has raised the bar.
Props to Prof. X for getting right to the heart of matters.
Ask yourself if you want a community where you are trying to put more and more citizens in prison?
Ask yourself if you want more corruption in your community? Money has surpassed freedom as the highest value in our country. And there is just too much money in the illegal drug trade. As has been pointed out earlier, learn from history or be doomed to repeat it. Prohibition did not work. And remember there are many corporate and govt. powers that would like to keep mary jane illegal because it benefits them directly. i.e. protects profits, certain agencies, jobs, salaries and is an easy scapegoat in the game of distracting the populace.
[quote]drag0n252pi wrote:
What part of my answer didn’t you understand. I agreed to disagree so I am through. We can go around all night but I have better things to do than beat a dead horse. [/quote]
How about list a few reasons why drug legalization is not a viable solution?
The only actual reason you gave in your post was to say that drug use would sky rocket and would result in a massive loss of productivity. Perhaps you could back this up with some evidence?
[quote]Professor X wrote:
mindeffer01 wrote:
Do you know people in your profession who get smoked up before a surgery? How about a few beers, maybee a shot of phentanyl or ketocet? If they do, do you want to work with them? Go ahead, let a hygenist mellow out a little with a few tokes and let her have at it.
After all, the stuff should be legal, Right?
I like the argument you just made…because it implies that you think someone would smoke weed differently than someone would drink alcohol. Anyone retarded enough to get drunk before a surgery would also be retarded enough to get high before a surgery. Since one is legal, chances are there are many who drink alcohol before complicated tasks. You just haven’t been publicly exposed to them.
In other words, why do you think someone who wouldn’t get drunk before surgery would suddenly think it was alright to get high before surgery? Your logic seems askew.[/quote]
Actualy, there is no implication of difference, there is a paralell of similarity, and I have been exposed to them, both publicly and personaly. I actualy know first hand of medical professionals who have used mainly at work for a good part of their careers, specificaly because of availability. Thats why I know that they are completely similar.
So, given the chance are statement of legality corelated to use, would you want the likelyhood of someone smoking pot at work to increase? How do you think it would affect their performance?
[quote]drag0n252pi wrote:
So it is ok for our government to make addicts out of the populace? Think what that would be like, more lost work time lower production more injuries on the job. We did fight a war on drugs we fought a Vietnam. We could stop the flow of drugs a lot better if we pulled our aid from the producing countries and destroy their crops ourselves. But, I am not as niave as to believe that will happen. I also worked narcotics and homicide. Until we can fight this as a war and fight it as a threat to our national security then we will lose. As far as I am concerned dealers should be shot where they stand. John Kay was right God Damn the Pusherman.[/quote]
My view may be cynical, but one of the big reasons that drugs (lets say Marijuana for the sake of argument) are not legalized is in part because the demand for them is too low for the government to make it a worthwhile investment. I fail to see how marijuana is any worse than alcohol, cigarettes or gambling, 3 “industries” that most countries make a killing off of through government regulation.
Moreover, there is a weak correlation between increased supply and increased demand for any product, thus making your position that “legalizing drugs will massively decrease productivity” to be pretty baseless.
Sure if drugs are more available, some people will chose to consume more of it than now. But keep in mind that the legalization of such drugs will significantly reduce the crime rates and murders caused directly by drugs. Increasing the supply of marijuana, for example, will in turn lead to lower prices (although if it is government regulated, these prices would not be at the market optimum point) for consumers, and people will be less inclined to go to desperate measures to get their “fix”.
The net effect of a legalization of a drug such as marijuana will in turn lead to a benefit to both consumers who demand it, governments who can regulate it (through $$$) and lower crime.
[quote]mindeffer01 wrote:
So, given the chance are statement of legality corelated to use, would you want the likelyhood of someone smoking pot at work to increase? How do you think it would affect their performance?
[/quote]
I already told you, it is a flawed question. I wouldn’t want someone getting drunk at work. Why not make alcohol illegal?
From what I have seen in studies, alcohol is a greater risk because the first thing to be compromised is judgement…which is most crucial in a hospital setting. The same can not be said of marijuana even though precision could be compromised.
No one should be getting drunk or high at work so why act as if one being illegal would stop this from happening? Anyone willing to do this at work would also be the type to not be hindered by legalities.
[quote]BallisticBob wrote:
My view may be cynical, but one of the big reasons that drugs (lets say Marijuana for the sake of argument) are not legalized is in part because the demand for them is too low for the government to make it a worthwhile investment.
[/quote]
Studies we’ve preformed in my school district show that about 30-35% are regular smokers (tobacco) and 30-35% are regular potsmokers. There is some overlap, but far from 100%.
Also, I heard (sorry no source) that there is a greater black market for cigarettes than for weed today.
Personally, I have known many kids who were “hooked” on weed (however, behaviorally or whatever) from poor neighborhoods who would have had a much better chance at success if they hadn’t used.
Of the kids I’ve known, many who were my friends when I was a kid, 3 out of 4 were always talking about wanting to get off of weed. Many who did suddenly started being successful in school or got steady jobs.
I can’t believe that weed is not chemically addictive at all as it is a depressant and I know of no depressant that does not cause SOME withdrawal symptoms, but I’m sure its a pretty easy withdrawal. I do think the high cost helps some kids break the habit. Its easier to give up a 50 dollar habit then a 5 dollar habit.
I don’t really care if its legal or not. I see potential advantages and problems each way, but ultimately its an arbitrary decision of the government and us to make it, or AAS, or ephedrine, or anything illegal. Its should be a pragmatic question not a moral question.
[quote]mertdawg wrote:
I can’t believe that weed is not chemically addictive at all as it is a depressant and I know of no depressant that does not cause SOME withdrawal symptoms, but I’m sure its a pretty easy withdrawal. I do think the high cost helps some kids break the habit. Its easier to give up a 50 dollar habit then a 5 dollar habit.
[/quote]
It isn’t a depressant. Depressants are drugs like barbituates or tranquilizers. Cannibus can actually be categorized as a relaxant, an appetite stimulant and a euphoric agent. They are not considered the same or interchangeable. There is no chemical dependency, however, someone using it for the purpose of relaxation would no doubt experience anything that comes from the lack of it…like insomnia, loss of appetite or anxiety. Most would stem from a mental dependence.
agreed 100%. if they legalized heroin tomorrow, how many people do you really think are gonna go jump all over that and start shooting up? gimme a break.
drugs need to legalized. the amount of people going through the corrections system in the US right now due to drug offences is unbelievable.
and the war on drugs in a sham. it is unwinnable. education is the only way to prevent drug use. putting people in jail for being hooked on drugs isn’t the answer.