Decriminalization of Pot possession - Page 2

Legalize it!

This is an interesting topic to me because in my class at the University of Phoenix, my group has chosen to debate on the legalization of pot for medical reasons. It's me and my husband being for it, and the other 2 in our group against it, or maybe it;s the other way around.
Personally, I don't care ... If it helps people with terminal illnesses, then yes, let them smoke it. If you look at it for recreational use though, I think there might be less crime than now.

I think it should be legalized and controled like alcohol. I saw a report on the news today on a new study that just came out. It said contrary to popular belief, Pot doesn't affect memory and other cognitive skills as much as previously thought.

Personally, I don't use it. I've also heard that legalizing it will make it less desired by some and harder to get for the underaged. Would put the dealers out of business!

I think it should be legal, although I do not use it myself. I think if it was legal the Goverment would have better control over it, and then there would be less crime.

I think they should make it legal and TAX IT BIG TIME!!! it would need to have rules just like beer does. Can't drive when you are under the influence and so on. I also think less people would do it, some people do it just because it is illegal.

I have never tried it and never will, but i think it should be legal.

Legalize it!

Study its medicinal capabilities. Use hemp fiber for paper instead of decimating our forests. Use hemp fiber for clothing - the plants are naturally pest resistant and less harmful to soil, and better for our environment than other traditional fibers.

Our prisons are letting violent criminals out early to make room for people caught with drugs. The cost of incarceration has already been brought up here.

I think the best defense against irresponsible drug use is education...educate people about the negative effects of drugs AND alcohol AND cigarettes. If, knowing the consequences, an individual is foolish enough to abuse these substances, then so be it! We can come down hard on anyone endangering others by driving under the influence, but if a person wants to ruin his or her own body and mind by abusing drugs, then that is his or her choice.

I really don't think things will change anytime soon though - seized propery currently provides financing for a great deal of our law enforcement. They have a great stake in maintaining the status quo. The drug war is a big business here.

Last year Arizona tried to pass a law that if a person was found with pot and had less than 1 oz. then they wouldn't be charged. I really wish it would have passed because I thought it was a great idea. I don't smoke but I don't see anything wrong with people who do. I just think it's stupid that so much money is wasted everytime the cops arrest or a kid has to go to court for possesion. I liked that the cap off was 1 oz because I do think that their are problems with the people that deal pot in large amounts, they are often involved in a lot of crimes. But if you are at home smoking a little I don't really see the problem with it. I figure if you aren't hurting anyone then what's the big deal.

I'm all for it, considering that I used it quite often in high school and college and it didn't affect my grades! It was peer pressure ma and dad! Honest! It makes such excellent ground cover and shade! Awww I'm rambling...personally I think alcohol does more damage physically, mentally and affects others around you, number one cause for domestic violence, car accidents and deaths caused by car accidents. These small offense for possessing pot (anyone has a crock pot? ) is clogging up our prisons and releasing the sick, perverted, pyscho freaks on 'good behavior!'

But now that I'm a mother, I would not want my son to touch it, gives the munchies and makes you gain weight!

Ok, I might as well get myself in trouble right away.

1. Pot does not come from Hemp plants. The plants are in the same family, but the THC levels of Hemp plants are miniscule. Calling Pot HEMP is just a generality of language like calling beer and scotch booze. You could smoke a bale of Hemp and accomplish nothing but getting sick from smoke inhalation.

2. Pot, like alchohol, is NOT a stimulant but rather a depressant. That's one reason both are dangerous. Pot is given to Cancer patients because it MASKS the pain, not because it is medically beneficial. I suppose you can argue that is in itself beneficial in those cases and I can see that Ok..no prob there. It's the idea that this makes it ok as "recreation" or "cool" that irks me. I'm a child of the 60's..yeah, hippies and all that scene. No, I didn't get into drugs..booze was my thing. I came within a whisker of being a full-blown alchoholic and dang near killed someone because of that. Several of my Cool druggie friends weren't so lucky. They're dead.
BTW, they ALL started out on Weed.

3. As a depressant, like alcohol, Pot makes you feel "Better" by numbing our response to outside stimuli. What would "ring your alarm bells" while sober make little or no impression while "stoned". Your reaction time to danger, etc is shot all to hell, just like alcohol.
I've been a professional driver for 30+ years and I'm tired of seeing young kids splattered all over the pavement because they were being "cool".

4. Pot isn't addictive. Of course it is. Agreed that chemically it's not in the same class as Heroin, etc. but it is Psychologically so, just like booze or tobacco. Think about it; "Oh, I just use it to mellow out", "It helps me unwind", "It makes me more creative/fun", "It's a party drug man, loosens me up". So you use it to make yourself into a more desirable, altered state? That's a dependancy, a habit..an addiction.

5. It isn't a "gateway drug". Sorry, folks but I still know some folks in the drug trade. Pot, as it is cultivated these days, has a monumentally higher THC level than the Pot we dealt with. That's for a reason folks. Dealers aren't trying to give you a "better deal", they don't give a damn about you. All they want is for you to buy more and more and the more expensive the better for them. They LOVE the perceptions that Pot is harmless. In addition, much of the Pot is LACED with stuff like Coke. THEY WANT YOU HOOKED ASAP. That's all they care about. That's why they deal in schools, hook 'em while they're young. 10 yr olds don't have the bucks for the Big Profit items; but if they grow up as users they will one day. Or they can be turned out as prostitutes, etc. It's all for money folks. Think making it "legal" and "corporate" will change that?? You been reading about the crap that tobacco companies have been adding to their product???

Ok, time to get off my soapbox. Suffice it to say that I rank drug dealers several steps below child molesters and serial killers. At least those are mentally deranged and do their crime face to face. Dealers are a disease which kills indiscriminately. And yeah, those people I alluded to before know what I think of them; they think that's funny as all get out.

While I agree that Pot is a psychological addiction, its not a physical one. Of course I'm speaking of the 'pure' stuff here, not the laced. Our own brains produce THC, so to me its like a super rush of stuff I already have in my veins.

Of all my friends who smoked weed in the past, and still do NONE of them ever 'graduated' to anything more hardcore. We're all a very mellow bunch who can for the most part take it or leave it. If ya got it, smoke it. I have only one friend who is psychologically addicted- his life is crap and he started over-using to the point that he thinks he needs it to 'level out'. He is definitely the exception.

I have seen my friends do stupid things while drinking- trying to drive being the stupidest(I've physically stopped them before by sitting on the hood of their car). But NEVER have I seen one of them attempt anything more reckless than trying to play Super Mario Brothers , while high.

If any 'drug' should be illegal- its alcohol, IMO.

Ok..... here is my opinion, short and sweet!!!!
(I aint as long winded as Wayne)

I think it should be legal for medical reasons ONLY. And then only when precribed and watch over by a doctor. My son has an extremely bad back. By the end of each work day he can hardly move. He will go outside away from the kids and have half a joint. Then a bedtime he will smoke the other half. If not for that I dont think he could work and support his family. But I respect him for doing so only when in bad pain and NOT in front of the children.

I smoked it a few times in the 70's and to be honest 2 puffs and I was out like a light. So I just never bother with the stuff!

I also read somewhere that they are using it in a study with anerexic adults- since it promotes the munchies. The study will take 3 years to complete.

Tybalt, I think it safe to say that you and I will never agree on this. However, I want to clear up a couple of misconceptions.

Exactly, it does not CURE the cause of nausea, it reduces your ability to FEEL it. In the same way and for the same reason they used to prescribe opiates to people with painful illnesses. Or getting the patient drunk before amputation.

Either way, I have no problems with medical usage.

I wasn't violent, just STUPID. I was one of those idiots who think booze makes you MORE alert, MORE confident, etc, etc.
I chugged a water glass full of whiskey while partying with my "friends". Then, like a TOTAL fool, I drove them to get more. I blacked out and hit another car. It tossed a little baby from the back seat of the other car to the front. Thank God it wasn't thrown into the dash or windshield. That was MY wakeup call. I haven't been able to drink since.

No, in business parliance it's called a "Loss Leader". You sell a lower profit item to get your potential customer into your "store" and expose them to stuff you make big bucks on. Business 101 guy.

Here, you can use mine. Seriously tho, do you think these people sell in grade schools for lunch money for some benevolent reason?? It's for the same reason the tobacco companies used to sell cigarettes in bunches of 2 or 3 in stores near schools exclusively. That was the only places you could buy them that way. That's not anecdotal btw, it came out in the legal hassles with the tobacco companies and made page 1 in many papers. It was a deliberate policy to generate "lifelong customers". Their phrase, not mine.

Why not get High?
Honestly, how many Americans are taking Prozac, Alprazolam, Effexor, Paxil, Trazadone, Xoloft, Welbutrin, Celexa, Serzone, Nortryptiline, Pamelor, Remeron, etc. So why the prejudice against those who use marijuana to feel better?

DEAREST TYBALT. The purpose for taking any the above medications is to control a chemical imbalance and to ease the problems of clinical depression or to help a bipolar person to cope. I have been prescribed several of the above to try to control severe depression. Believe me, none of them could ever be said to make you GET HIGH! Personally, I never had a problem with Marijuana, being a teen in the 50's. I never heard of it in high school and never ran into it after high school and in my dating days. So, I am absolutely ignorant about the drug and plan to stay that way. And, by the way, Effexor is the one that helped me cope (1 a day), and I am not sad anymore.
TALLYHO and Carry On Luv.
__________________

IMO, you have unwittingly given one of the prime reasons it *should* be legalized. What makes pot a "gateway drug" is the dealers. They do lace it, they convince kids to "just try this" other, harder drug and get them hooked. They are businessmen, and quite successful ones at that. They certainly understand fundamental business practices, especially when it comes to making lifetime customers - no matter how short that lifetime is. If it's legalized you at least take that part out of the equation. It can be regulated, and the opportunities for introduction to the harder, more harmful drugs is minimized.

Valanhb, you have one heck of a lot more faith in Govt and Big Business than I have. The Canadian Provincial Govts own all the liquor stores and licence all the bars, clubs, etc. They supposedly have VERY strict controls on these through the licensing systems. In reality the bars can do pretty much as they please. Fines are minimal, licence suspensions are for 2-3 days. Local bars in this university city regularly advertise 1/2 price shooters for students and "all you can drink" nights, especially for "the ladies". Nothing is said about that by the licencing boards.

When Govt took control of lotteries and such there was just one. Now there's hundreds and we have verified evidence of people pouring their whole paychecks, or seniors their entire pension checks, into the video gambling terminals that have popped up everyplace. Their "answer" was to place the gambling machines in the "private hands" of their friends and look innocent. Again, "regulation violations" are winked at.

The Tobacco Wars should show everyone how willing Big Business is to go after schoolkids.

When Billions of dollars are involved, "respectable" people have no more concience than the meanest street dealer.

No, I don't trust the corporate world or government regulations inherently. However, who even attempts to regulate the dealers? No one. At least under government control and regulations you could have a minimum age to buy (which I know will be usurped and that many kids will still get access), and what additives can and cannot be put in there. Granted, they will probably approve some not-very-good things, like added nicotine to put that physically addictive punch in it, but I would certainly rather have added nicotine than cocain. If we're looking at the lesser of two evils, I would much rather the government regulations that the dealers.

I personaly am a non smoker but I do belive that it should be legalized. I am married to a HEAVY smoker. more then a 1/2 oz a week. Like it was said in here by numerous people.......alcohal is far more worse then pot is.....heck my hubby doesn't drink because it just makes him feel worse! but when he smokes it relaxes him to where ha can Fix his back when it is out of place........he has a very bad back.


anyway......if anyone is interested in a site concerning this topic go to......Norml.com or is it .org not sure right now. but look for it if you are interested.