That's why they call it "dope". [brick]



Whoop! back to work for me!

Or maybe people with mental illness are at a greater risk for the abuse of cannabis?

[i]Possibly[/i].... but that's MUCH less likely given the fact that regular marijuana use PRECEDED the onset of mental illness by many years.

That's sort of like saying people with a predisposition to emphysema are more likely to become smokers. [whacko]

Correlation<>Causation

I'm not saying he's wrong, but statistics can be touchy.  It's like saying white guys with mullets are 4 times more likely to be in prison than ones without mullets.  So mullets must cause an increase in criminal activity.  No... Not really, it's just that those living the lifestyle lived by this group, sees the mullet as a desired 'look'.

[b]Study also shows [url=http://www.theonion.com/onion3001w/marijuana.html]Marijuana Linked to Sitting Around and Getting High.[/url][/b]

While I tend to agree with this study's findings, the one weekenss I see in it is that it doesn't track the [i]onset[/i] of the mental illness, just when the diagnosis took place and that usually doesn't happen till the person is so bad off he can no longer function in society.
Even the socialist countries of europe dont do en mass screenings for the early warning signs of severe mental illness.

And on the other hand it it really doesn't matter. It could be that the people who find the effects of pot the most pleasing, and therefore use it more than once ARE mentally ill. Which is the chicken and which is the egg is irrelevent since the end result is a harmful vicious cycle either way.

How about Alcoholic have a greater risk of health problems.

What your point. People who abuse any substance will run a risk of problems.

Successful People who use drugs are NOT going to tell you. Why should they.

[size=1]Quote:__________________________________
According to a Government fact sheet, cannabis "can cause psychotic reactions amongst individuals with mental health problems",
[b]but it does not suggest use of the drug can prompt those problems.[/b][/size=1]
___________________________________

Cures NOT Wars.

Remember Prohibition.

Simple Peaceful Possession, Like Owning a gun will be Criminal.

[size=1]^ Million Gun Freedom March on Washington July 4th, 2003. A Well-Regulated Militia Being Necessary To The...
[url]www.Cures-not-wars.org/[/url] Truth Will Liberate Earth.
[url]www.RKBA.org/antis/hci-master[/url]Allege 1993 feinstein/hci PRETEXT for TOTAL Gun Freedom Confiscation.
[url]www.digitalAngel.net/[/url]Revelation 13:18  ID-GPS-MONEY [red]BAN[/red] Human Power Implant Micro-chip.
   
Never Again, Never Forget --  Seek the Truth , Liberate Your Mind -- We Are At War[/size=1]
 
FIXED BAYONETS -- FORWARD

VX

Well, maybe.

But cannibis helps keep mental conditions under control for a time, so that they [b]seem[/b] to appear after the cannibis use. I had a roommate that was a serious pot head. Would spend all his time in the room doing nothing (not nothing like looking on the internet, reading a book, etc. Nothing like stare at the wall), [i]until[/i] he smoked pot. Then he would be out in the hall talking to everyone, being "normal". When he was on the pot everyone would think he was normal, when he was off it no one was around. So he was "normal" to almost all observers until the symptoms of the mental illness progressed.

Make sense?

As far as the emphysema thing goes if smoking eased emphysema, then yes, emphysema might cause smoking. We know that is not the case, but if we didn't who would be to say?

Yes.

its very hard to prove the non-existant..

The only successful people with a history of drug use are those who QUIT in order to remain successful.

The others are either dead, or are now very unsuccessfully broke...

The ever nebulous 'heavy user' again.

Some of the medical test where I have seen the reports depicting a 'heavy user' has the consumed amounts at 100 grams a day or more. I don't care what Cheech & Chong movie you're trying to recreate -- it just ain't possible to smoke that much a day, day in and day out.

Drinking extreme amounts of water will kill you too.

[self1] What bullshit!! I can't believe you'd post such a silly assed story![/self1]

[self2] Who are you talking to? Why can't you just get along?[/self2]

[self1] What are YOU doing back here??!! I told you to stop following me!![/self1]

[self2] But I'm always here. Who else is there for you to talk too?[/self2]


[self1] Mommy!!![/self1]

[self2] That's a good boy. Listen to the dog- he has a message for you.[/self2]

[size=1]Quote:____________________
its very hard to prove the non-existant..
[/size=1]___________________

True, Why should they tell You. Unless you Personally Know Them.

My point is Remember Alcohol Prohibition.

How many Successful People Drank Alcohol, Like the Kenndy's, Coor's, Busch, Budweiser.

Peaceful Simple Possesion, Makes you a Criminal, Why ?????

What have you DONE wrong. Murder someone, rob any one lately, Shoot anyone Today.

Cures Not Wars.

^^^^^
[size=1]^ Million Gun Freedom March on Washington July 4th, 2003. A Well-Regulated Militia Being Necessary To The...
[url]www.Cures-not-wars.org/[/url] Truth Will Liberate Earth.
[url]www.RKBA.org/antis/hci-master[/url]Allege 1993 feinstein/hci PRETEXT for TOTAL Gun Freedom Confiscation.
[url]www.digitalAngel.net/[/url]Revelation 13:18  ID-GPS-MONEY [red]BAN[/red] Human Power Implant Micro-chip.
   
Never Again, Never Forget --  Seek the Truth , Liberate Your Mind -- We Are At War[/size=1]
 
FIXED BAYONETS -- FORWARD

VX

100g is about the same as the ammoutn of tobacco in two packs of cigarretts. And at one time marajuana was of poor enough quantity that you could smoke that much in a day and not OD.

So because you saw one test using a obsolete standard ALL such tests are therefore invalid?

10g is more like it, and I have seen some claims that 5g/day is "heavy" use. That is like one average size bong and that may be too low.

Of course finding a daily user that can stay at one bong a day for more than a year or two is difficult in itself.

Wrong. Sorry to burst your bubble. It hurt when mine was burst as well BTW.

Successful alcoholic users? Well my uncle is on the board of TI Europe. Drinks at least 6 drinks a night, some in the day, etc. Drives a $100,000 car. Owns 4 homes in Europe!!! No small feat.

I have friends whose parents are pot head doctors, they smoke with their kids. Make sense? No, but real life rarely does.

Not to mention all users of legal drugs. How many caffine junkies do you know?

I agree self-medication.

Most every male in my family is a alcoholic, and has been as far back as my great-grandfathers on both sides.

They are all very miserable and most unsuccessful individuals who struggle to make a living and have numerous marital and family problems.

I have never personally met a drug addict who was able to stay healthy and wealthy for very long. In my experience they all died lonely and miserable, hated by even their own children.

Which is why I have avoided all of it.

1/8 of an ounce is 3.5 grams. 1/8 of an ounce a day is enough that even potheads will start to make fun of you. No one could smoke 100 grams a day, almost 1/4 pound, without already being insane already.

Good call avoiding it. I do too, not because of fear or anything, I just value a clear mind.

As for never having met a drug addict I would say that if you have never done drugs it is unlikely that you would recognize many drug addicts. Also your opinions and associations (not bad or good just the way it is) will keep you out of the social circles where you would learn who is a drug addict. BTW, I am 100% sure you have met a drug addict who you would not believe did drugs.

I am sure I have met more than a few people who abused drugs of some kind, its not possible to know that as long as they are still acting normal and don't light up in front of you.

Almost nobody is stoned all the time for starters. For most people it takes time to get fucked up.

I am not a botano-pharmicist but I have seen/heard/read many refrences to the THC content in confiscated pot samples has been increasing at a rather rapid clip. And that like the nicotine content of tobacco, there are differences in THC content not only between strains but between different geographic areas and between outdoor and indoor grown pot.

Come up to this hell hole of Boulder sometime, that will change your mind. Guess I don't really know about down in AZ though. I read somewhere recently that CO was the highest in the nation for marijuana use? Can't remember where though, or what the qualifiers were.

You have people in Boulder who are new users who already smoke marijuana like it was tobacco, and keep a buzz on 24/7? That was what I was refering to in my last post.

Well they sleep (a lot) so not 24/7, but yes there are new smokers who smoke like it is tabacco.

Way............back, in my younger days you could say I played with the magic weed some.  I also drank quite a bit back them. And I can't say it has.........uh.........done anything.....
..........you know........I don't think it......
.......well, uh........I forgot.  What did you call to ask me about again????????

Well it's a good thing I've never smoked any [i]REGULAR[/i] cannabis then. [):)]



CHRIS

Professor Robin Murray's alternate personality published those findings.

Conventional wisdom has it that heavy alcohol users drink to self-medicate for a mental problem, often depression.  I believe that there is a strong correlation for heavy cannibis users.

[b]Regular marijuana use correlates with greater risk of mental illness[/b]

And this is something we didn't know?

According to the pot legalization faction we didn't.

Bingo.

I don't mind decriminalizing marijuana. Make it a petty offense - like public intoxication.

But it just makes me wanna rip the knappy braids right out of those smug, in-your-face, birkenstock-wearing, scraggly-goatyed, ragged-clothes, sit-in-a-circle-on-the-grass gypsies who are so fucking condescending and [u]dishonest[/u] (or willfully ignorant) about the damaging effects of marijuana all the while they push for legalizing pot and mainstream use of "hemp".

Facts about Pot:
1) it fucks up your brain.
2) it makes you stupid, slow and lazy.
3) it IS a "gateway drug".
4) people who push for pot legalization [b]LIE[/b] about it's known damaging effects on the brain.

But if alcohol is legal (even protected by a Constitutional amendment) then pot should be decriminalized too.

And let the fucktard hippies who live on it tune out, burn out and rot in the gutter.


DAMMIT! I said I didn't want anyone posting interesting or controversial stuff today - Now I just wasted 10 minutes when I should be working. Who started this topic anyway? [stick]



[size=1]oh.[/size=1]

There seems to be a relation between Heavy cannibus use and ADD or ADHD.

I bet alot of pot users out there are unknowingly medicating themselves for chemical imbalances they didn't even know they had.

Somebody say my name?[;D]



1. It does fuck up your brain.  Well, maybe not YOUR brain, but the brain of someone who chooses to use it.  Then again, so does alcohol.
2. It makes you slow, stupid and lazy while you are under its effects...course, alcohol does unpleasant things to people's personalities while they are under its influence as well.
3. Gateway drug, my ass.  If you're smoking weed, you've walked through that gate a long time ago.  I would rank cigarettes as the 'gateway' drug.  They generally precede ANY substance use in anyone.  Of course, does it really matter about the gateway?  it is, after all, up to you how far you walk in once that gateway has been crossed.
4. I cannot defend those who claim weed is harmless.  It will cause damage, there will be side effects that you wish were not there.  People who are championing a cause that I belive in use methods I would not, and I can't say I'm happy with that.



Not only that, it should be legal.  Alcohol causes problems not only for the person on it, but the people around them(drunk drivers, anyone?  Bar brawls?  Ring a bell?) whereas the worst thing that someone smoking pot will do to those around them will be eating their food and listening to Phish.  Marijuana generally only causes harm to those who use it.  And who the hell cares if someone fucks themselves up?  I want no laws that protect anyone from themselves, only laws that protect them from hurting others.  If someone was found driving stoned, then I would be entirely in favor of slapping them with a DUI/DWI.  That's endangering the public at large, and I wouldn't want anyone to tolerate it.  But if someone is not harming anyone else, only themselves, let 'em at it.



Indeed.  You fucked yourself up?  Too bad, too sad and NOT MY FUCKING PROBLEM.  If someone becomes addicted and is crippled by it, then they can damn well get themselves out of what they got themselves into.  If I EVER blame my problems on marijuana instead of the person that got me involved with it in the first place(me), feel free to use me as a backstop at your next shoot.

This is exactly correct. Use it or don't, most people won't. Not an area for government involvement.

It does me. Willie Nelson's had me believing that grass was a food group. [smoke]

BTW, why are YOU goofin' off at work?

If you beleve this is true then you must be on it right now. Marajuana users may be too laid back when they got a buzz on to get into a brawl-but they are also so laid back they cant see and react to things like stop signs and red lights when they are behind the wheel. And someone on a buzz cannot be trusted to have a realistic assesment of how impared he really is

Alcohol legalization should be accepted for what it is, A MISTAKE, one that we are stuck living with and we should not increase the damage by providing a 31 flavors of mind altering drugs.

There IS no parallel between this and gun control, or prostitution, or other "anti-freedom" laws because none of those behaviors take away your ability to judge if your continued action is going to injure a third party.

wow. "Alcohol legalization is a mistake." That comment boggles my mind coming from someone I bet is a christian. I was under the impression that laws were meant to protect us from criminals not from life or personal choice.

Gateway drug my skinny white ass...
I challenge anyone to show me a cannabis user who didnt first use caffeine to alter their mental state.
And I challange again .. Show me anyone who uses caffeine who didn't first use sucrose.

For the record I do not use THC. It is illegal and I want to keep my guns. I do not use caffeine. I avoid sucrose as much as possible in our "fatten the cow society". Alcohol on the other hand...Psalms 104:15

I am sick of all the laws that tell people what to do with there body. If you want to OD on some sh!t great, please eliminate yourself from the genepool. If you wanna base jump (yeah I do
baby)  and die great, your f'ing stupid.  I dont want to live in a nerf world  do you ?

Highly unlikely vs. minutely more than highly unlikely?

Great point.

You miss the point.

VERY few people who use caffeine or alcohol move on to using marijuana but a significant proportion of people who use marijuana move on to using other harder drugs.

That's why it's called a "gateway" drug.



I agree but I'll add that I value my brain cells even more than my guns. [:D]



Me: Dr. Pepperaholic.  

I am one VERY cranky SOB if I don't start my day with a Dr. Pepper fix. [furious]

Yeah, like Paul McCartney, the founders of Microsoft, Harrison Ford, the founders of Apple, etc., etc.,

BTW, in case you are interested, even the US government says that no one has ever died from pot. And alcohol and tobacco kill more people every year than all the people killed by all the illegal drugs in the last century or so.

That's hilarious. I am sure it was even funnier when someone first came up with it back in 1962 or so. It must still be funny because every time this subject comes up someone hauls it out again. Oh well, so much for your career in comedy.

A "significant proportion"? -- as in about one percent.

No, the reason it is called a gateway drug is because the idea was invented by Harry Anslinger during the hearings for the Boggs Act in 1951. Anslinger was testifying before Congress trying to get more money and agents to enforce the marijuana laws. Unfortunately for Mr. Anslinger, just before he testified, the head of the US Federal addiction research program testified that they knew for sure that all the reasons that had been given to outlaw marijuana in 1937 were completely wrong. It didn't do any of the things that the Government had alleged at the time.

Anslinger was left with no justification for his request for more money to enforce the marijuana laws. In response, he made up the idea that marijuana is the "certain stepping stone" to heroin. In doing so, he contradicted all the known research at the time, as well as his own testimony for the Marihuana Tax Act in 1937.

In fact, the reason that some of the early state marijuana laws were passed was the fear that heroin addiction would lead to the use of marijuana -- exactly the opposite of what the US Government would like us to believe now.

The gateway idea is urban legend become public policy and nothing more.

If you are really interested, you can read a short history of the laws describing the origins of the gateway myth at http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/History/whiteb1.htm

You can read Anslinger's own testimony for the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 -- in which he specifically states that there is no connection between marijuana and heroin at http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/hemp/taxact/taxact.htm  

The exact quote from that testimony is:

MR. DINGELL: I am just wondering whether the marihuana addict graduates into a heroin, an opium, or a cocaine user.

MR. ANSLINGER: No, sir; I have not heard of a case of that kind. I think it is an entirely different class. The marihuana addict does not go in that direction.

MR. DINGELL: And the hardened narcotic user does not fall back on marihuana.

MR. ANSLINGER: No, sir: he would not touch that.




Caffeine was almost outlawed at the same time cocaine was, and for the same reasons.

The US Government's own research shows that marijuana is not a significant cause of accidents on the road. Some research even shows that pot smokers may be marginally safer than sober drivers because they can compensate for the effects.

But, even if that wasn't true, it wouldn't make any sense to try to bust every pot smoker because of supposed hazards on the road any more than it would make sense to bust every beer drinker to try to stop drunk driving. As we discovered with alcohol prohibition, it is far better to concentrate on the small number of people who actually do create a problem.



Maybe you weren't aware of the fact that prohibiting alcohol made all those problems worse. For some really interesting, and often funny, quotes on the subject see http://www.druglibrary.org/prohibitionresults.htm



The vast majority of people don't use either alcohol or marijuana to the point where it takes away their ability to judge. Most people use them moderately, simply because moderate use is more fun. For the few people who don't do that, it is more cost-effective to deal with them directly rather than trying to bust all the people who drink an occasional beer or glass of wine but don't do any harm.

And there is a connection between the gun laws and the drug laws. They are intimately tied together.

1) Gun control laws were originally based on the same legal principles established with the drug prohibition laws. Even the people who wrote the laws recognized that the US Government had no constitutional power to prohibit things, but they still wanted to prohibit drugs, so they put a tax on them. The "tax" idea of prohibition survived a Supreme Court test so they used it as the basis of the first gun control law, the National Firearms Act of 1933.

2) Gun control laws are the product of drug prohibition. Calls for gun control invariably follow intense periods of drug prohibition with greatly increased crime. For example, the National Firearms Act came immediately after the huge increase in homicides during alcohol prohibition.

Gun owners who support drug prohibition are shooting themselves in the foot politically.

STUDY: POT DOESN'T CAUSE PERMANENT BRAIN DAMAGE

LOS ANGELES ( Reuters ) - Smoking marijuana will certainly affect perception, but it does not cause permanent brain damage, researchers from the University of California at San Diego said on Friday in a study.

"The findings were kind of a surprise.  One might have expected to see more impairment of higher mental function," said Dr.  Igor Grant, a UCSD professor of psychiatry and the study's lead author.  Other illegal drugs, or even alcohol, can cause brain damage.

His team analyzed data from 15 previously published, controlled studies into the impact of long-term, recreational cannabis use on the neurocognitive ability of adults.

The studies tested the mental functions of routine pot smokers, but not while they were actually high, Grant said.

The results, published in the July issue of the Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, show that marijuana has only a marginally harmful long-term effect on learning and memory.

No effect at all was seen on other functions, including reaction time, attention, language, reasoning ability, and perceptual and motor skills.  Grant said the findings are particularly significant amid questions about marijuana's long-term toxicity now that several states are considering whether to make it available as a medicinal drug.

In California, growing marijuana for medical purposes is legal under a voter-approved law.

The UCSD analysis of studies involving 704 long-term cannabis users and 484 nonusers was sponsored by a state-supported program that oversees research into the use of cannabis to treat certain diseases.

Anecdotal evidence has shown that marijuana can help ease pain in patients with diseases like multiple sclerosis or prevent severe nausea in cancer patients, but the effects have yet to be proven in controlled studies, Grant said.

The UCSD research team said the problems observed in learning and forgetting suggest that long-term marijuana use results in selective memory defects, but said the impact was of a very small magnitude.

"If we barely find this tiny effect in long-term heavy users of cannabis, then we are unlikely to see deleterious side effects in individuals who receive cannabis for a short time in a medical setting," Grant said.

In addition, he noted that heavy marijuana users often abuse other drugs, such as alcohol and amphetamines, which also might have long-term neurological effects.

Some of the research studies used in the analysis were limited by the numbers of subjects or insufficient information about factors like exposure to other drugs or whether participants suffered from conditions like depression or personality disorders.

"If it turned out that new studies find that cannabis is helpful in treating some medical conditions, this enables us to see a marginal level of safety," Grant said.  

From: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v03/n966/a09.html?1509



Slow, stupid, and lazy. Like the founders of Microsoft and Apple, Harrison Ford, etc.

Sorry, but this is an old tale, long since debunked.

3. Gateway drug, my ass.  If you're smoking weed, you've walked through that gate a long time ago.  I would rank cigarettes as the 'gateway' drug.  They generally precede ANY substance use in anyone.  Of course, does it really matter about the gateway?  it is, after all, up to you how far you walk in once that gateway has been crossed.



The most comprehensive research on the health effects of mj to date was done by Kaiser Permanente Health Group. They surveyed the medical records of 65,000 patients over six years and compared pot smokers with non-pot-smokers. They found no significant differences in the health of the two groups. You can find the full text of the report at http://www.druglibrary.org/crl/aging/sidney-01.html

You're going back to 1937 to support your position??????? [rolleyes]



The current debate about marijuana is not WHETHER it's a gateway drug (that's widely accepted in scientific circles now) but rather WHY it is a gateway drug.

This study provides evidence that rules out genetics or other environmental factors. Seems that just the idea of using this drug and all the trappings that surround being a pothead may be part of what leads potsmokers to use harder drugs.

Generally it's just the pro-hemp crowd that wants to deny well-accepted and current scientific research findings regarding marijuana being a gateway drug.  

The idea has a long and funny history, in case you were interested. If you study the history you can understand how silly it was in the beginning. Originally, they believed that things like "eating Mexicanized food" would lead people to drug addiction. They have updated the belief because -- obviously -- most people would recognize the earlier explanations as pretty stupid.

But, in this case, I went back to 1951 -- when it became the justification for the current marijuana laws. It had no basis in fact and all the research contradicted it.

But, I notice that while you do the rolleyes, you don't have anything of your own to explain how it arose.



No, the term is entirely erroneous, as your own post shows. Note the statement:

"The association may arise from the effects of the peer and social context within which cannabis is used and obtained. In particular, [red]early access to and use of cannabis may reduce perceived barriers against the use of other illegal drugs and provide access to these drugs."

In other words, there is nothing chemically inherent in the drug that would make one crave other, completely different drugs they have never had. Indeed, there is no drug in the world that would do that. That is a belief in magic, not science.

As your own quote shows, the "association" is probably due to social factors surrounding the drug. In other words, the association is caused by the fact that both are illegal and sold by some of the same people. In the Netherlands, where they have made an active effort to separate marijuana from the other drugs, the percentage of mj users who progress to harder drugs is much smaller.

The National Institute of Medicine report on medical marijuana -- commissioned by the Drug Czar himself -- reached the same conclusion -- the association between marijuana and harder drugs is the result of the prohibition laws that put them in the same black market -- not anything that is in marijuana itself. You can find that at http://www.nap.edu/html/marimed/



You failed to note that your own post says the association is due to "social factors" -- i.e., the "social factors" created by making those drugs illegal.



Generally, it is the prohibitionists who fail to read their own research and understand what it really means. Your post is a good example.

BTW The_Macallan, try this idea in any elementary college class on logic. Write a paper explaining how the gateway myth has real validity. If your prof is nice, he will explain why he flunked you -- post hoc ergo propter hoc, among other things.

What is really so silly about this whole thing is that anyone who has had any elementary college class in logic should recognize the obvious flaws right away.

But the gateway idea is an old one, variously described according to the latest zealot using the thing. You can find some of the history in "Themes in Chemical Prohibition" from a NIDA conference at [url]http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/History/ticp.html[/url]

It would be really funny -- if people still didn't believe in this nonsense.

You know [b]wolfman[/b], NOTHING in your {} rantings support the illogic of your contentions.

You deny that pot screws up brain function - yeah right, that's why potheads risk jailtime - 'cuz it DOESN'T fuck up their mental function. [/sarcasm]

You really think it's all just temporary in its effects??? "Marginally harmful"??? What the hell is that? Then you throw out stats like "one percent" without ever showing how you arrive at that!

Then you try to contort what I posted into actual supporting YOUR position that pot ISN'T a gateway drug.


[b]You completely overlook the fact that [u]potsmokers DO progress onto harder drugs at a MUCH greater rate than nonpotsmokers[/u] - and [b]THAT[/b] was my whole point [red]that you immediately and orignally denied[/red]!!!! [/b][stick]

The hows and whys are very muddy right now so get off your fucking high horse of denying that pot MAY have multifactorial effects surrounding it, some of which may be inherent in the drug itself, which make users much more likely to move onto harder drugs.

You're actually [u]denying[/u] X without ever providing any evidence that X is indeed false. Try passing THAT off as a "logical position"

You then come real close to calling me a "prohibitionist" wrt pot. Well that's not the case either. But your denial of what's as plain as the nose on your face makes it real hard to find common ground in our postion on this matter.

Stop. I don't need a history lesson because that's irrelevant to the physiologic effects of pot and its KNOWN significant association with hard drug use.




No. YOU just failed to comprehend what I wrote:
[i]"Seems that just the idea of using this drug and all the trappings that surround being a pothead may be part of what leads potsmokers to use harder drugs."[/i]