What would happen if drugs were legalised Part 3. Marijuana

[MazDan]

Its time for part 3. Marijuana

Lets get those grey cells working and ask you to consider the world in ten years time and what would happen if tomorrow Marijuana production and use was made legal.

Sure there would be some good points but Im more interested in a balanced viewpoint.

Would there be any downsides?

Could there be other changes to the law because of this?

Can you see into the future?



This is Part 3 of a series to see how thoughts might change if the substance is different.

Part 1 MDMA can be found here......... http://www.bluelight.ru/vb/showthread.php?t=504804

Part 2 Heroin can be found here.........http://www.bluelight.ru/vb/showthread.php?t=506942

 

[Jabberwocky]

it's be nice to hear yout thoughts on the matter, maz

 

[Mr Blonde]

I think more people smoking marijuana who wouldn't have, and people possibly smoking it more regularly.

With this I think we would see an increase in people having issues with mental illness that have been triggered or worsened by marijuana usage. I think compared with MDMA and heroin, marijuana can be more troublesome in this aspect.

Marijuana would become an option for analgesia, which would be an excellent alternative for many and for a lot of people would probably increase their quality of life a lot more then it currently is.

I think marijuana could probably be the big challenger to alcohol as our society's recreational drug of choice, you would see a lot more people smoking and maybe designated shops where you can smoke inside legally. There will be changes to smoking laws to either accommodate marijuana smokers or perhaps provide for venues to buy licenses to allow consumption on their premises.

There will be an increase in research into the possibly carcinogenic nature of smoking marijuana and how bad it is.

 

[boodha]

how it should be done: take California medical marijuana cross it with Amsterdam coffee shops.

impact, the removal of the criminal element of the marijuana trade,
what affect that would have, at first, big novelty, then the novelty would wear off and it would settle usage may rise a bit, but harm would stay about the same(has california or netherlands fallen into a country full of people dying from weed ?), it would make safer consumption of marihuana an easy thing to do, it would promote hight quality bong manufacturers to sell there bongs(which usually have intricate filtering systems, RooR) vapourisers could be offered, people would be able to learn of there existence even.

basically this has happened, there are more marijuana dispensing facilities in california than there are coffee shops in amsterdam, we only need to look at these places to see that it DOES work, it dosnt destroy society, it should be the first step in the removal of the criminal aspects of the street drug supply market.

 

[hyroller]

I don't think there'd be a huge difference, in all truth. People would just be more open about it. There are plenty of dope smokers at large, make no mistake of it. Cops would probably be twiddling their thumbs a lot more of the time.....that's probably the biggest change I could foresee.

You're either a dope smoker, or you're not. It's just one of those things....IMO it has far less abuse potential than, say, legalised meth

 

[lynnie]

I don't think there'd be a huge difference, in all truth. People would just be more open about it. There are plenty of dope smokers at large, make no mistake of it. Cops would probably be twiddling their thumbs a lot more of the time.....that's probably the biggest change I could foresee.

You're either a dope smoker, or you're not. It's just one of those things....IMO it has far less abuse potential than, say, legalised meth

There comes a point in your life especially chronic long term users need to re-evaluate there bad habits and there addiction. I cannot see this drug being legal there isn't much info out there or what to do when a persons life becomes very dependent on marijuana.

 

[AussieSWIMer]

There comes a point in your life especially chronic long term users need to re-evaluate there bad habits and there addiction. I cannot see this drug being legal there isn't much info out there or what to do when a persons life becomes very dependent on marijuana.

Yes, but intervention programs would help prevent that in a large group of people. Weed would be more social and you would have people around you that would be able to pick you up out of the dumps and give you a hand getting back on track.

 

[Sykik]

An increasein thc induced mental illness. I for one have seen this first hand. Some people are proun to this. So if more people smoke, more of theae pre-disposioined people will be exposed and may get sick.

This is true. Drug induced psycosis i wouldnt wish on my worse enemy.

I for one am not pro complete legalazation of THC.

 

[TripppAR]

Evvvvvvvvery body knows "that guy that flipped on pot"

But the truth is it only occurs in around 1% of the population. Look at the drugs we have available that are legal. Alcohol. Cigerettes..


I was speaking with my girlfriend last night about "choices". She was telling me she has 'pleanty of choices and she chooses what to do blah blah blah.." and i said "ok babe".. "take grog." "If you had a choice you could go down the street and get any drug that you wanted"

And she is like Umm.. noo thats wrong! We cant have that blah blah blah.. I have the choice to drink...or not to drink..!!

hmm.. oooo k...

I said no, babe.. in reality there are no choices.. everything is chosen for us and we are given the ILLUSION of choice... When it comes down to it the only choices we make is coke/pepsi Coles/woolworths / Abbot/gillard.. who are all working for the same people in the end anyways..

But, i digress... we would have FAR FAR FAR less problems.. then the problems occuring with alcohol on a daily basis. 440,000 deaths per year...40% of all mental ward admissions... 50% of all fatal and non fatal car accidents..

its ridiculous.

It would work wonderuflly but there is to much at stake for the people in power.

On another note. If hemp was legalised we would have no real need for oil and billions of $ would be lost to a select few.. and they dont want that... so oil continues..war contines...etc..etc..



The first ford T-model was made entirely from hemp and ran on HEMP FUEL for fucks sake..

Popular mechanics 1941


Peeeaaace

 

[Sykik]

Evvvvvvvvery body knows "that guy that flipped on pot"

But the truth is it only occurs in around 1% of the population.

So that is 200 000 Australians. 1% is a lot. Also where did you get that statistic?

 

[MrIbis]

One word: Chaos.

Everyone knows the guy that flipped on pot. Because EVERYONE DOES KNOW THE GUY WHO FLIPPED FROM POT!.

Or several.

Thats not to say it's medicinal values in cancer patients and stuff don't need to be evaluated and determined/used for the good of mankind.

But people sitting around smoking dope all day because it's legal and no other reason would be chaos. lazy, dope smoking bludgers everywhere. I thought bludgin cunts like me were enough.

 

[Rondeau]

several legally available drugs can generate mental issues in people...should they remain legal? no. with drug legalization comes drug education. at this moment in time, there are two major schools of thought when it comes marijuana (in the USA).

DARE "drugs are evil" vs Weed is harmless

both of these groups are wrong, and a middle ground has to be reached.

weed's illegality/potential legality does nothing to stop or increase my usage. i stopped smoking so much because i realized it was turning me into a lazy fucker.....the fact that it was illegal had nothing to do with it. Similarly, how many people have you heard say "I'm gonna cut back on my drinking."

Remember, bluelight encourages responsible drug use. it's the irresponsible people that ruin it for the rest of us.

 

[Mysterie]

awareness of the benefits of the herb would increase
christian and anti-pot groups would riot trying to get the law changed
I would smoke in public all the time

 

[TripppAR]

Bloody ibis.. such a fucking downer all the time.

Mate.. chaos.. hahahahahahah.. that is HILLARIOUS...sort of the way alcohol is every weekend.

 

[phase_dancer]

On another note. If hemp was legalised we would have no real need for oil and billions of $ would be lost to a select few.. and they dont want that... so oil continues..war contines...etc..etc..

Fuels and lubricants are only a fraction of the products produced from oil.

In fact, the cost of crude oil underlies virtually all products grown, manufactured or produced using 20th century technologies.

from here

No doubting the hemp plant and it's oils are valuable, but regardless of the economics, hemp products couldn't hope to replace many of the chemicals derived from crude oil.

 

[puckboy]

I think in many cases marijuana-induced psychosis would be reduced, particularly amongst young people who are the most at risk.

Marijuana is readily available to the public regardless of its legality, you find people starting to smoke heavily at a young age (12-14) because of this. They're told in school it's bad and will cause mental illness, but it doesn't stop them because they've been smoking for a year or two and "they're fine" right? Once potential problems start to surface it's often too late and usually comes at a time in their life (late teens-early twenties) which is not good timing considering the importance of those years.

Legalising marijuana doesn't solve this problem, thats not the point, it's about reducing harm which IMO would be the case if marijuana were legalised and its sale was restricted to those 18 years and over.

It was much easier for myself and my peers to get weed compared to alcohol during high school, much easier. Just food for thought.

 

[Busty St Clare]

It could be argued that cannabis causes a larger percentage of mental illness than other illicit drugs, but reality is it is also used by a far greater proportion of the population than say mdma or meth. Personally I see more benefit in decriminalising weed than the current situation where more peoples lives are ruined because of the law and not the substance.

Sure there will be a spike in metal illness, thats a given. But people who are suceptible will be a risk no matter what the substance. In an ideal world we would all look after each other and hopefully help those who we feel are slipping into the abyss. Like Hyroller said, you either love the stuff or you hate it. Majority of users enjoy the mellow high and are happy to supplement their life once and a while with weed. For a choosen few even a couple of tokes will cause paranoia and anxiety. If we as a society can recognise these individuals and encourage them to stick to other substances perhaps we could help prevent psycosis taking hold. Just as you get the loner who's life becomes a solitude prison in front of a computer game, you will always have those people who the dope lifestyle takes over and they drop out. Weed is not a productive drug for the majority of users and Australia is likely to be more known as the Lazy country than Lucky.

If it is legalised/decriminalised I hope they take a lesson from tobacco and ban smoking in public. Watching people spark up as they roll down the street is crass and not an example I want to set for my children. The smoke pollution in my personal space is a pet peeve and it is not that difficult to smoke in private before venturing out. (Hell isn't that what pot smokers do now any way?) There is not added health benefits to smoking shops like Amsterdam. There should be only a visible retail arm and not a social scene.

There has to be a better way to police drug driving as well. At present it is impossible to be sure if the drug testers will pick you out even if it has been 5 hours or more and you feel back to ground zero. The advantage of a government sponsered distribution may be a standardised dose/concentration. I don't expect killer hydro to be the drug of choice but instead a pretty mild but predictable strain. Sure it will not be as accurate as current alcohol percentage measures but it would be better than what we face now. The ability to test drug impairment is crucial. At present it is ridiculous that we can only test for past drug use (even months after the fact).

As much as hemp is a wonderful product I don't see how legalising cannabis has any roll in it's failure to be utilised more. After all THC is as easy to breed out just as it is to breed more potent strains. Commercial crops contain high concentrations of oils and more fibre (when you are not trying to grow buds and heads) with next to no need for the plant to produce THC.

 

[MrIbis]

Trippar: It's not about being a downer, it's about seeing the whole picture.

Sure it's got it's uses, but like every other drug it's got its downfalls too.

 

[blazelate]

Being a stoner would br more considered a problem than a lifestyle.

And my parents would go beezerk ahah

Police can spend their time fighting real crime. Money will be saved from jailing such minor offenders (in my eyes)

 

[ayjay]

I've posted links to the research before - might do it later if pressed BUT the indication is that there would be no increase in cannabis useage if it became decriminalised/legalised. So all the arguments above based on an increase in use post-legalisation are probably invalid. So sorry MrIbis but your fears are likely to be unfounded. And Busty your "spike in mental illness" is pretty unlikely.

As for smoking in the street - that would be the best part of legalisation! Having a smoke before you go out is a given, but so is topping up later in the night...