OT, Channel 4 Documentary on Marajuana

I struggle with the idea of legalising it because it just doesn't seem right somehow. Will it encourage more users who may use it as a stepping stone to other drugs? I really don't know, it's been illegal for a reason, what's changed?

 

It was initially made illegal because of a racist American who thought it made white women want to sleep with black men. You can find the ridiculous script of the meeting in which it was made illegal in America, it's insane, they basically passed the law without having a clue what it was. And then applied pressure to other countries to follow.

Now whilst there are other reasons given for why it has remained illegal, it being illegal in the first place doesn't attribute anything actually negative to it.

I don't think it would encourage more users in the long term. I'd expect a short term spike in users and then it to level out. If heroin was legal I wouldn't all of a sudden be a smack head.

As far as the gateway argument is concerned, i just plain disagree with it. I think it's a paper argument that doesn't hold up. Cannabis doesn't lead people to take other drugs any more than drinking alcohol, smoking, drinking energy drinks, caffeine etc leads to people taking harder drugs. The people who are open to taking drugs may be more likely to try more than one type of drug or experiment further with drugs, but that is the individual, not the actual drug.

California is a pretty good example as they have seen hard drug use and the amount of hard drugs seized by police reduce as marijuana has become a legitimate business. On top of that the increased tax revenue can more than pay for any treatment arising from cannabis use and improved education around it.

 

And what's changed is people are far more educated now

 

Cannabis possession is still illegal in California - only medical marijuana is legal! And only 4 states have legalised it for recreational use, it's still illegal in almost the whole country - so not a good example for you to choose.

 

California is a perfect example to use because despite the actual laws, it is in effect legal. You don't go to some doctor and get your weed, you go to a shop, that sells cakes and biscuits and weed. Getting a medical card for this is not difficult at all and doesn't actual require you to have any real health problems.

Since the changes to make marijuana legal (though only through dispensaries) hard drug use has fallen and the amount of hard drugs seized by police has fallen.

Your also well off the mark with your ideas about cannabis in America in general. Over 70% of adult Americans have access to marijuana through a legal source (due to the population density in the states that allow for recreational or medicinal marijuana). *source - daily politics show

Cannabis is also, despite only being fully recreationally legal in 4 states, either legal (recreationally, medicinally or both) or decriminalised in over 50% of the US states.

 

''Nearly all of the nation’s banks refuse to take money from marijuana sales or offer basic checking or credit card services to the industry for fear they’ll be shut down by federal authorities, for whom marijuana remains an illegal narcotic. The banks won’t do business with growers, processors, retail shops and medical dispensaries, nor with their employees and contractors. It’s the biggest problem we have,” said Taylor West, deputy director of the National Cannabis Industry Association, many of whose 800 members are awash in $5, $10 and $20 bills and change and no bank to put them in.

The abundance of cash makes the country’s 2,000 retail shops and medical dispensaries tantalizing targets for criminals. Without bank accounts, legal marijuana businesses have a hard time paying their employees and vendors. Relying solely on cash leads to a lack of transparency in accounting and auditing, and it complicates paying the taxes that states impose on cannabis.
The problems caused by a cash-and-carry retail business likely will grow as more states move to legalize pot for medical or recreational use, unless Congress steps in and changes federal drug and drug-trafficking laws.''

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What's your point? That because the federal government doesn't allow legalisation the country doesn't get the full benefits it could? I agree, further legalisation is the way to deal with this problem.

 

You cited California as a place where cannabis dealing is a legitimate business, I was pointing out it isn't, so was a bad example. I just threw the other stuff in to show that the US has more states were it's criminalised than not criminalised.

 

That quote is out of date, the Heck amendment passed by Congress last December exempts Banks from potential prosecution

http://www.ibtimes.com/marijuana-in...-become-more-attractive-partner-banks-1632622

 

No. I used California as the example due to it being very easy to find statistics from us government websites showing a decrease in hard drugs in California in the period since cannabis has become readily available.

Whether technically it is illegal or not doesn't make even the slightest bit of difference to the point I'm making. If you want to go and buy yourself some weed in California, you do it.

Cannabis is also not legal in holland, are you suggesting that couldn't be used either as an example of somewhere that cannabis is openly available, and in turn how that has effected harder drug use?

Your point is pedantic and doesn't actually add anything either way to the discussion. The technicalities of the law don't make a blind bit of difference to how access to marijuana effects hard drug use...

 

Oh and your also wrong, if you include states where marijuana use is decriminalised it amounts to over 50% of US states.

 

I'm going to be pedantic again and say decriminalisation is different to legalising and at present I think only 18 states have decriminalised so not over 50%.

 

Fine I'll play the pedant game.

Your exact words were that there are more states where cannabis is criminalised than not criminalised. Which means of course in states that it is decriminalised it falls into the latter category.

When you combine states with legal cannabis, both recreationally and medicinally with the states that have decriminalised you get 31 states. (That includes Guam and the us Virgin Islands).

So over 50% of US states have at the very least decriminalisation.

 

Doing a quick calculation we get that as 57% of US states (after removing the us Virgin Islands and Guam, therefore using only actual states plus the federal district for a total of 29 out of 51)

 

It's not something that interests me nowadays tbh. Did find it amusing that the BBC were using licence payers money to grow though lol

 

This seems to me yet another argument (we have so many) where opinions prevail and no-one is likely to be swayed by evidence offered by either side. Going into detail is just a waste of time when each side has an entrenched position on the matter and is only looking to put forward their own case as opposed to holding a debate on it.
How on Earth does it descend into a detailed analysis of the legal approach in the U.S.? More importantly, why should we give a flying **** what they think or do, when making up our own minds?

 

You're wrong. Decriminalised states only number 18. http://norml.org/aboutmarijuana/item/states-that-have-decriminalized

But it's not what the thread's about so let's stop. You asked about legalising - I don't know if legalising is good or bad, other than for medicinal purposes which shows great benefits.

 

FFS


#channelfucking4

 

It's slightly worrying that I seem to start most of them