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Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

marijuanamoment.net

51–60 of 94 posts

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#51

Mostly off topic but when I read these stories I'm always irked at the use of "marijuana" instead of cannabis. Maybe because I'm in Toronto where cannabis is fully legal and every store around me that sells it uses cannabis - not to mention the products all use that term as well. Marijuana just seems like your using old, slightly racist terminology. And makes me think of 4/20 BLAZE IT kind of crap. Which is probably…

Saying marijuana is fine. It is offensive toward literally no group of people. Seems to me that some people are always looking for something to get offended about nowadays in order to control everybody else's speech.

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#52
post #18

As a recovering addict I’m quite mixed about legalisation. On one hand it helps out a lot of people and removes stigma around a form of indulgence. At the same time this is probably creating orders of magnitude more addicts. The adverse effects of a strong dependence can be severe: from people letting life blast past them without much realisation to lung/brain function/psychological disorders. I wish we could have a…

> probably creating orders of magnitude more addicts [citation needed]

Cannabis “addicts” Which has dubious harm potential, considering that not a single human being has ever fatally overdosed on cannabis in the history of the world.

I’m not justifying my choice of vice, merely pointing out that it’s safer than coffee

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#53

As a recovering addict I’m quite mixed about legalisation. On one hand it helps out a lot of people and removes stigma around a form of indulgence. At the same time this is probably creating orders of magnitude more addicts. The adverse effects of a strong dependence can be severe: from people letting life blast past them without much realisation to lung/brain function/psychological disorders. I wish we could have a…

Are you suggesting that I should remain in the legal shadows due to your inability to manage cannabis consumption?

In a way. Many people can text and drive but it’s advised against for everybody for a reason. it’s an extreme example but it illustrates a point that ultimately it’s a trade off between liberty and having guard rails. I’m just disappointed that we seem to be going from one extreme to the other without considering intermediate options.

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#54
post #12

Hope this won't lead to more smoking in public places. Every time I notice people consuming or having have had consumed the drug in some form, I found it even more insufferable than day-to-day cigarettes.

I’m unclear on what you are complaining about: other people enjoying other vices than your own or air pollution. While a particular odor to the stated air pollution can involve a personal preference, the odor is question arguably emits fewer carcinogenic substances and the rolling papers and filters involved certainly pollute less. Single-pull pipe smoking is rather common in some places, meaning the consumer makes o…

HN guidelines: “Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.”, and “Be kind. Don't be snarky.”. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I presumed the commenter is just extremely sensitive to the smell. The people I know like that don’t have a choice - it seems they are biologically like that.

They could have meant what you said… You could politely discover what they mean. If they were being rude, then perhaps try and help them to be more polite, to create a better community here. And IMHO downvoting is quick and appropriate if the comment is low value or inflammatory.

Edit: you are inflaming the situation with multiple low quality comments on the parent comment - please don’t do that. I am not a mod - I am just a user that wants this to be a friendly and informative place for everyone including you.

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. There is precedent in various US states and a handful of countries. Cost benefit analysis of what is actually happening in these places is a key motivator for the continued wave of legalization around the world. This is much studied. DYOR but here's a start: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_policy_of_Portugal https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=portugal+drug+policy&hl... Also, I'm not sure if you literally mea…

TIL thanks. By few OOM, I mean that the use is very small now due to taboo and legal barriers that it is likely to be faaar more pervasive once they go away. But your data seems to contradict this so I need to do more research

Germany is not Singapore. You won't face any legal consequences in most places for minor possession, and even dealing weed won't necessarily get you prison time. In Germany everyone who wants to smoke weed, smokes weed, legal or not. It's really, really prevalent as of now.

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there’s x% chance of addiction and the availability increases by few orders of magnitude wouldn’t it naturally follow?

No, anybody who wants weed knows how to get some, of questionable quality, elevated price and can't avoid mingling with people who more often than not deal with hard drugs, illegal weapons etc. I would expect the opposite in fact - legal stuff loses quite a bit of its cool factor for youth, its not much rebelling if you can buy it in shop just around the corner, with better quality and effect you exactly prefer. Adde…

> questionable quality, elevated price and can't avoid mingling with people who more often than not deal with hard drugs, illegal weapons etc.

How many people have stayed away from weed or used it less frequently due to these reasons? If they were to go away and weed was just another shop like it is here in SF, don’t you think the consumption would spike?

Agree with the cool factor being undercut. But weed he hella fun and can get you hooked.

Take it from someone who has struggled with recovery: it’s not easy to quit. I suggest you browse r/leaves subreddit to see how many people struggle with it

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#57
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marijuana was like a barely existing Spanish slang promoted at the beginning of cannabis being illegal in the first half of the 20th century to make cannabis seem more foreign and worthy of a ban. It's definitely suspicious at least. If you really want you can view it as more cynically exploiting existing prejudice than prejudiced in and of itself, but I am not sure that is much of an exoneration.

Language evolves. The use is uncontroversial today and specifically refers to the flower. We're all aware of previously uncontroversial words that are taboo today. The reverse can happen as well.

Sure, but also it just sounds weird to use a ramming together of names in Spanish as the formal word for anything in English. Especially when the thing comes from Asia.

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#58
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> probably creating orders of magnitude more addicts [citation needed]

Cannabis “addicts” Which has dubious harm potential, considering that not a single human being has ever fatally overdosed on cannabis in the history of the world. I’m not justifying my choice of vice, merely pointing out that it’s safer than coffee

Harm potential is not dubious.

Do browse r/leaves subreddit to see how many people struggle with it

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#59
post #31
post #24

This sounds like a distraction to cover actual issues right now.

So your theory is that soon everybody will be so stoned that they stop caring about everything else or whom is this distraction supposed to be targetted on?

I'm pretty sure his theory is that the whole discussion about cannabis is a distraction from other political topics, i.e. that our new Kanzler was one of the people responsible for the biggest corruption scandal in Germanys history (Google his name + CumEx) and other similar stuff.

It's not so much what people are gonna do once it's passed and more about what controversial topics they can raise so people don't pay attention to other things.

I personally have never had a worse outlook on Germanys political future. This will show any politician that they don't have to worry about anything and keep enriching themselves with no recourse to speak of.

Re: Germany will legalize marijuana and promote drug harm reduction

#60

Mostly off topic but when I read these stories I'm always irked at the use of "marijuana" instead of cannabis. Maybe because I'm in Toronto where cannabis is fully legal and every store around me that sells it uses cannabis - not to mention the products all use that term as well. Marijuana just seems like your using old, slightly racist terminology. And makes me think of 4/20 BLAZE IT kind of crap. Which is probably…

That's exactly what it is. I make a point to use the term cannabis, as marijuana is simply slang with racist connotations attached due to the propaganda of the war on drugs

For similar reasons, I refer to burritos as tortilla bean wraps.
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