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Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

nytimes.com

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Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#131

Post by rch »

thucydides wrote: post #96
martinald wrote: post #13

While I'm totally for drug (all drugs - not just cannabis) legalisation/regulation, I do think the "dangers" of marijuana have been really downplayed over the last few years. I know a lot of people at university who got into smoking it very often and basically lost 10+ years of their life to complete apathy to anything. Some have now stopped and are totally different people - just 10 years behind. While it doesn't ca…

Yes. Ceteris paribus, mutatis mutandis, all else equal, blah blah blah, marijuana decreases motivation. Period. How is this controversial today? Here's an n = 1 study. A few years ago, I used a Pax to vaporize cannabis nearly every night for a year. I quit altogether after moving to an area where it was harder to buy. After a month or two, I unexpectedly noticed a fog had lifted. It was easier to summon the right wor…

Your sample size is less of an issue than the fact that you're describing an obviously bad habit. I'm glad you were able to alter your behavior so easily when you moved though.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#132

Post by will_brown »

rayiner wrote: post #47
arcticbull wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the $30-60,000 per year spent to incarcerate every low level drug offender could help. And it's not like they're avoiding managing it now between policing, encampments and incarceration. Not to mention health costs.

Very few non-violent drug offenders are incarcerated.

Its sad your comment is downvoted simply because it runs counter to a favorite talking point.

Certainly very few non-violent marijuana offenders are incarcerated for periods of a year or more where the tax payers would see savings to the tune of $30k-$60k/year. In fact in the 2.5 years I did criminal defense I didn't have a single client with a marijuana possession sentenced to serve any jail time, and most of my cases included additional charges such as DUI, Leaving the Scene of Accidents, etc...

Just to further illustrate your point, I had a handful of more serious possession cases, including, cocaine, opiates, and crack pipe. Not a single one of them was sentenced to serve jail time either.

I would actually like to see the statistics on first time misdemeanor marijuana offenders who receive 1 year jail sentences without any accompanying charges, my guess it might even be 0%.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#133

Post by lettergram »

arthurcolle wrote: post #127
contemporary2u wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Top banker at major Investment bank on Wall street. From what i understand smoking marijuana there is like having a soda..in certain branches/areas anyway.

This is hard to believe, major banks drug test.

Coming from one such bank, and a background of drug tests...

No, major banks don't all drug test. And in general you are given some warning about drug tests (at least at the several companies I was at). All you have to do is get off drugs for a week or so, and youre fine.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#134

Post by mastax »

rayiner wrote: post #47
arcticbull wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the $30-60,000 per year spent to incarcerate every low level drug offender could help. And it's not like they're avoiding managing it now between policing, encampments and incarceration. Not to mention health costs.

Very few non-violent drug offenders are incarcerated.

http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/dofp12.pdf

- More than a third (35%) of drug offenders in federal prison at sentencing, had either no or minimal criminal history— lowest criminal history category.

- Nearly a quarter (24%) of drug offenders in federal prison used a weapon in their most recent offense.

Which is to say over 3/4 of them did not.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#135

Post by IsaacL »

lettergram wrote: post #126
IsaacL wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've also known three people who smoked marijuana regularly and developed serious life problems as a result, along with a larger number who didn't develop major problems but who definitely "stalled". I also knew many who smoked it regularly without major issues, so I'm not saying it inevitably causes problems, but I am 99.99% certain that if you already suffer problems with motivation or life direction, marijuana can…

To add to the antidotal evidence... Ive smoked a lot of weed for a long time, I finished college, have a job paying well above average, I work on projects / my startup, I have a wife, and am looking to start a family (at which point I'll stop smoking for a bit). Further, my startup is starting to make money and I'm up for promotion at work. Then to tie this in nicely which the argument that people with issues will ig…

    All of that is insanely stressful and I would argue if weed would have caused issues, I would have had larger problems.
I did say "If you have your s... more or less together, you can probably use weed semi-regularly without too much damage."

    I'd even expand my argument, and say any vice including videogames, cars, etc. Anything can get out of hand if people are trying to avoid a problem.
People use many things as psychological crutches, yes. What I'm arguing is that some of the specific effects of weed (esp. the effects on cognition) make it more dangerous than other crutches.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#136

Post by natecavanaugh »

martinald wrote: post #13

While I'm totally for drug (all drugs - not just cannabis) legalisation/regulation, I do think the "dangers" of marijuana have been really downplayed over the last few years. I know a lot of people at university who got into smoking it very often and basically lost 10+ years of their life to complete apathy to anything. Some have now stopped and are totally different people - just 10 years behind. While it doesn't ca…

I agree with you, but... :)

There are quite a few people who go overboard with it, and I'm not arguing complete unfettered access for all, but I think the reason it's dangers are trivialized is in reaction to how trivialized alcohol is in our culture. Every show you watch, and people are drinking alcohol left and right. In entertainment it's just something you do. Costco is willing to sell you gallons of it cheaply and of high quality.

And yet the dangers of alcohol both short and long term are taken as "things we just put up with" from a societal perspective.

I think when people compare the dangers of long term apathy, malaise and possible overeating (which also just sound like responses to getting older ;) to people who get drunk and murder other people and end up killing themselves, short or long term, one set does seem kind of trivial.

*Note: I am not meaning to make it sound like I'm anti-alcohol or pro-cannabis. I think responsible people can handle each one responsibly, and that instead of prohibiting everyone, we do what we do with bad drivers: we help them get better or forbid them from doing that activity any more and provide safe alternatives.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#137

Post by Symmetry »

martinald wrote: post #13

While I'm totally for drug (all drugs - not just cannabis) legalisation/regulation, I do think the "dangers" of marijuana have been really downplayed over the last few years. I know a lot of people at university who got into smoking it very often and basically lost 10+ years of their life to complete apathy to anything. Some have now stopped and are totally different people - just 10 years behind. While it doesn't ca…

True, but I'm rather people develop substance problems with weed than with alcohol for many reasons. Even if there was only a 50% chance that without access to cannabis the people you knew in college would become drunks that's still a good tradeoff for society.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#138

Post by aianus »

davidf18 wrote: post #111
davidf18 wrote: post #102

A problem is that women are smoking marijuana and may not yet know they are pregnant. Medical marijuana laws and pregnancy: implications for public health policy. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27422056 "Although there is much to learn yet about the effects of prenatal marijuana use on pregnancy and child outcome, there is enough evidence to suggest that marijuana, contrary to popular perception, is not a harmles…

Why are people allowed to downvote medical studies from highly regarded journals? Journal of the American Medical Association, American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and Obstetrics and Gynecology? What kind of human being would want increased babies neurologically deprived from marijuana exposure or additional stillbirths? Instead of downvoting, why don't you explain why you want these effects in infants?

Replace Marijuana with Alcohol in that comment and it's all still true.

But Alcohol is not schedule 1.

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#139

Post by zeroer »

davidf18 wrote: post #102

A problem is that women are smoking marijuana and may not yet know they are pregnant. Medical marijuana laws and pregnancy: implications for public health policy. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27422056 "Although there is much to learn yet about the effects of prenatal marijuana use on pregnancy and child outcome, there is enough evidence to suggest that marijuana, contrary to popular perception, is not a harmles…

100% agree.

Isn't this the same situation with alcohol and tobacco?

Re: Stop Treating Marijuana Like Heroin

#140

Post by mastax »

snarfy wrote: post #68
arca_vorago wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, 30 years! Is it for a medical condition? I have a friend with ptsd who uses regularly, but he claims he feels a "buildup" in hos brain so he does a week or two on and a week or two, sometimes more off. Do you feel that as well?

I have/had stomach ulcers and was self medicating for a long time before getting it treated. Now it's mostly habitual. Your body builds up a large tolerance rapidly, like 10x difference when you are a daily user vs casual user. I can see why your friend takes a break once in a while. If I smoke 0.5 gram (about 5 large pulls from a pipe), the effects wear off in about 2 hours. If I take a break for two weeks, one tiny…

This video is dry yet informative: https://youtu.be/DAiIShrNhEE

tl;dr: slowly increase consumption to promote cannabinoid sensitivity and avoid overconsumption which raises tolerance

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