Should cannabis be legal

[bladesufc1]

. . and that's a fair point too.

 

The reason it aint legal is cos there's no money in it for the government.

 

Mr X gets spannered with his mates, wrecks the pub, roit van turns up with ambulances for the bystanders caught in the crossfire. Adding that up, you've got furniture sales, glaiser, public service workers all work put thier way indirectly through alcohol.

 

What would they get from legalising cannabis, less people would go out and kit-kat sales would increase slightly.

 

in the olden days everybody use to grow canabiss even the queen, please check as you will find this correct, when i say EVERYBODY i mean around 70% of the population.. not usre why they made it illegal, but i'm sure somebody on here will point that out

[munky]

Conspiracy theories would say it was banned by a combination of Du-Pont and William Randolph Hearst when a process was developed to pick and decorticate hemp which would make hemp based paper cheap and plentifull and make the sulphuric acid wood pulping process owned by Du-Pont (wich significant holdings by Hearst). With hemp being an anually re-newable resource (unlike the many years that it takes to grow a tree to a suitable size for felling and pulping) and the cost of hemp paper production being about half that of wood pulping a slide in Du-Pont's and Hearst's worth wouldn't be hard to anticipate. To avert this Hearst used his papers, magazines, tabloids and news reels to spread sensationalist stories about how evil Canabis was. Firstly how is would turn people into psychotic killers and then when this was rebuffed how it would make American boys too apathetic to 'fight in our wars'. Whether this is true or not I've no idea, but I love a good conspiracy theory!

 

Dunno if that's true, but an quite interesting fact about the famous Laughing Cavelier painting is he's on hemp, as the painting is painted on hemp paper.

[Cyclone]

It's also not strictly true. In the 19th century, and - I believe - part way into the 20th, cannabis (and cocaine, and various other substances) were legal.

 

 

 

And the main thrust of the argument still isn't answered. What logical reason is there to outlaw cannabis - a mild drug which will occasionally cause mental health problems - and legalise nicotine, a highly addictive drug which comes packaged with a buttload of known carcinogens? Or worse, alcohol, an even more addictive drug which is highly likely to turn people aggressive and dangerous?

 

Yes they were, I said nothing to contradict that, so why does it make me wrong?

 

At the moment there are several psycoactive products that are legal, they will be banned when the legislature catches up, but by then some more will have been synthesised or extracted.

 

alcohol wasn't banned when opiates were because it's use was far more widespread and had been going on for much longer, and it probably made an awful lot of tax money at the time, far more than from opium dens.

 

Doesn't the majority of the evidence for canabis use indicate that it may bring out schizophrenia in people already predisposed to it, rather than being the route cause itself?

 

At the end of the day I'd like to see most drugs (not quite all) legalised, controlled, taxed and sold in appropriate forms and amounts with the appropriate controls being enforced.

[TimmyR]

In droves - but the druggie-loving posters will argue beyond any logic that it's just great for you and hasn't done them any harm at all. Prats.

 

I don't think anyone thinks its good for you. I personally doubt the necessity for making it illegal however. It costs vast sums to police anti drugs laws and I'm not sure this actually does anything much to reduce the amount drugs are used. Inform people of the dangers and give them the freedom of choice as they do with nicotine.

 

I still agree with a smoking ban in pubs however, that is when freedom of one persons choice effects the health of others.

[Phanerothyme]

Conspiracy theories would say it was banned by a combination of Du-Pont and William Randolph Hearst when a process was developed to pick and decorticate hemp which would make hemp based paper cheap and plentifull and make the sulphuric acid wood pulping process owned by Du-Pont (wich significant holdings by Hearst). With hemp being an anually re-newable resource (unlike the many years that it takes to grow a tree to a suitable size for felling and pulping) and the cost of hemp paper production being about half that of wood pulping a slide in Du-Pont's and Hearst's worth wouldn't be hard to anticipate. To avert this Hearst used his papers, magazines, tabloids and news reels to spread sensationalist stories about how evil Canabis was. Firstly how is would turn people into psychotic killers and then when this was rebuffed how it would make American boys too apathetic to 'fight in our wars'. Whether this is true or not I've no idea, but I love a good conspiracy theory!

 

I'm of the opinion that is partly true. I think it was a political opportunity that proved just to tasty to resist, actually outlawing a competetive industry that could have put some big names under the gun.

 

Then there was Anslinger, who pumped up the marijuana/immigrant scare in order to elevate himself in the Government bureaucracy.

 

Agencies at the time were careful so as not to associate the well known plant hemp, with a million uses, with the drug, 'marijuana'.

 

The first US statute on cannabis was actually a compulsion to grow it - and you could even pay your taxes with it.

 

The first law against it in the US was in Utah, because a bunch of teetotal mormons had return from mexico with a penchant for it

 

as for the uk, I found this:

Cannabis first became illegal in the UK, and most of the rest of the world, on 28th September 1928 when the 1925 Dangerous Drugs Act came into force. There were no British domestic reasons, no lobbying for or against prohibition, and no Parliamentary debates. The Act controlling 'Indian Hemp and all resins and preparations based thereon' had been passed after Britain signed the 1925 Geneva International Convention on Narcotics Control, organised by the League of Nations. Asked what it was all about on a slow day in Parliament, a junior Home Office Minister explained that the Convention could not be ratified without an 'important but small' law being passed. 'What it does is include coca leaves under a former Act. They are the real basis of cocaine - we place them in the same category as raw opium.' Cannabis itself was ever mentioned aloud.

 

This apathy was nothing new. When the 1920 Act controlling opium and cocaine was passed, there were problems finding enough MPs to vote on the committee stages. In 1893 a huge report by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission had concluded that 'the moderate use of hemp drugs is practically attended by no evil results at all'. It recommended, for India, 'restraining use and improving the revenue by the imposition of suitable taxation' at 'as high a rate of duty as can be levied without inducing illicit practices' on the grounds that 'the best way to restrict the consumption of drugs is to tax them.' Taxes on cannabis were already normal in India - Bengal state government made about £100,000 per year through the 1860's [£5-10 million in today's money]. This report from the Empire was never publicly discussed in the UK, and the authorities were content to have no laws at all controlling cannabis for another thirty years.

 

I don't think anyone thinks its good for you. I personally doubt the necessity for making it illegal however. It costs vast sums to police anti drugs laws and I'm not sure this actually does anything much to reduce the amount drugs are used.

 

Almost consistently, the proportion of the population (in the US)using drugs other than the big three remains at about 1.3%. The USA is most cited because the most information exists about their drugs situation, given they spend over $40 billion every year on it - but have no effect on the number of users, inspite of imprisoning over a million offenders every year)

 

Here are a bunch of US Law enforcement officers who, like Cyclone and myself, believe that no drug should be illegal - http://www.leap.cc/Multimedia/LEAPpromo.php

 

 

In addition, whilst it does have some deleterious effects, especially in the predisposed, it can also be good for you. The Scripps Medical Research institute have published research that shows cannabinoids can be used to treat, and possibly halt the onset of Alzheimers disease.

"Our results provide a mechanism whereby the THC molecule can directly impact Alzheimer's disease pathology," researchers concluded. "THC and its analogues may provide an improved therapeutic [option] for Alzheimer's disease [by]... simultaneously treating both the symptoms and the progression of [the] disease."

 

And given that there are several Cannabis derived drugs on the market at the moment means that it must have therapeutic uses; it is being used in therapy.

 

Although of course there was the tragic case of a woman who died in Sheffield from a pharmaceutical preparation of the drug (the drug was implicated in her death).

[Bartfarst]

I love you barty.

You've got your fingers so far in your ears that your actually tickling your brain.

I don't think any self respecting smoker would try to "argue beyond any logic that it's just great for you " as they generally appriciate that this is their thing and it aint for everyone.

Where as you've actually gone to the other side of the scale and tried desparatly hard to prove that you are right and all "druggies" can't possibly have a point or be anywhere near correct.

You rock!

Why thank you - it would seem that we agree then.

My view - all drug users must be cretins by virtue of the fact that they take illegal, damaging substances, and they should be banged up.

All dealers should be hanged - any amount, any category.

Straightforward enough view, I think.

[pumatic]

My view - all drug users must be cretins by virtue of the fact that they take illegal, damaging substances, and they should be banged up.

All dealers should be hanged - any amount, any category.

Straightforward enough view, I think.

Assuming that you drink tea or coffee, or enjoy a pint down the pub, or smoke (probably not the latter); all of which activities involve the ingestion of drugs, would your opinion remain the same if any of them were suddenly declared illegal, or would you 'see the error of your ways' and give up the offending substance because 'nanny knows best'? Not an attempt to wind you up, I'm genuinely interested in your answer.

[Phanerothyme]

Also, if you are a member of the Taleban, it provides convenient, and unexpectedly resilient cover.

Fireproof Forest

 

So now cannabis gives succour to terrorists

[Bartfarst]

Assuming that you drink tea or coffee, or enjoy a pint down the pub, or smoke (probably not the latter); all of which activities involve the ingestion of drugs, would your opinion remain the same if any of them were suddenly declared illegal, or would you 'see the error of your ways' and give up the offending substance because 'nanny knows best'? Not an attempt to wind you up, I'm genuinely interested in your answer.

Good question, and not taken as a wind up. If my favorite pint became illegal I'd be saddened, but have to understand and accept it.

Bizarrely enough, the state often does know better than we the masses.

[pumatic]

Good question, and not taken as a wind up. If my favorite pint became illegal I'd be saddened, but have to understand and accept it.

Bizarrely enough, the state often does know better than we the masses.

Fair enough, your position is consistent. I have to disagree with you about the state knowing better than the people though, I am very distrustful of the machine of state.