Will Drugs Become Legal ?

[DarkBlizzard]

If u live in Canada, sooner or later, all drugs on earth will be legal...odd candians.

[echidna]

I believe that the terms used in this debate should be regulation and prohibition, as i feel the optimum outcome would be as Rat Faced laid out, one where the junk on the streets was replaced by clean products of known dosages and that the health and social security systems could be reinforced by the taxes levied on these newly regulated products.

The main reason that the US had to abandon the project of alcohol prohibition was the hideous toxicity along with the huge growth it granted the black economy.
People were dying and going blind from drink every day. Despite the regulation of alcohol production and sale it and the other legal 'recreational' drug tobacco cause far more death and suffering than the illicit drugs do;

Originally posted by http://www.curtin.edu.au/curtin/cent...25conf_mr3.htm@25 February 2003
Tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs are prematurely killing around seven million people worldwide each year, and robbing tens of millions more of a healthy life, according to research presented this week at the National Drug Research Institute international research symposium, Preventing substance use, risky use and harm: What is evidence-based policy?, in Fremantle.
The research into the global burden of disease attributable to alcohol, tobacco and illicit drugs found that in 2000, tobacco use was responsible for 4.9 million deaths worldwide, equating to 71 percent of all drug-related deaths. Around 1.8 million deaths were attributable to the use of alcohol (26 percent of all drug-related deaths), and illicit drugs (heroin, cocaine and amphetamines) caused approximately 223,000 deaths (3 percent of all drug-related deaths).
The research estimated that between them, tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs were responsible for around 8.9 percent of the total global burden of disease worldwide in 2000, accounting for the loss of 129 million DALYs (disability-adjusted life years). This measure of burden of disease combines years of life lost due to premature death with years of living with a disabling condition, thus a DALY is equal to the loss of one healthy year of life.
Tobacco and alcohol accounted for about the same amount of global burden of disease at 59 million DALYs (4.1 percent) and 58 million DALYs (4.0 percent) respectively, both about 5 times as much as the burden attributable to illicit drugs at 11.6 million DALYs (0.8 percent). The large difference between DALYs and mortality is due to the fact that tobacco is related to mortality and morbidity later in life, whereas the consequences of alcohol and illicit drugs occur at younger ages.

regulation is what will stop people ODing on junk of unknown strength alone in the street.
I've known LOTS of very heavy drinkers but have never known one to drop, i wish the same were true of those people I've known who chose other than alcohol.

if you can't see that drugs are already pervasive throughout the world then your living in a dream world.
if you can't appreciate the need to regulate the distribution of recreational drugs then you are in favour of black markets profiting criminals with tax free profits from killing kids in the streets.
if that's what you want then i question your sanity [or vested interests]

the worlds arms and security industries businesses have a lot of money riding on the continuing criminalisation of drugs, not to mention the armed and police forces whose funding and workload would be diminished.

trying to make a plant illegal is pathetically stupid in the first place more so with alcohol causing so much mayhem

[blade1356uk]

Originally posted by balamm+16 August 2003 - 23:03--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (balamm @ 16 August 2003 - 23:03)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-SodiumChloride@16 August 2003 - 23:50
If marijuana becomes legal, billions of state and federal funds could be freed up (along with the nonviolent prisoners). Those billions could be diverted to increase fighting cocaine, heroin, and other deadly drugs.

I think the first priority would have to be money for the psyhcriatric care that would be neccesary to deal with increased cases of depression, psychosis, paranoia, etc.

Tell me those things are not related to the excessive use of marijuana and I&#39;ll tell you it&#39;s probably time to quit [/b][/quote]
my son died smoking M & H & as far as I am concerned bomb the Poppy Fields did Bush & Blair say this after the 11th September Murders. Bombing the poppy fields would cost less than billions & the extra revenue could go to treating our kids to get off this evil drug & my son started on M

[RGX]

I am sorry to hear about your son


I could quite easily walk out of my door, down the road, turn left, down a road, past a school, up an alleyway, into a close, and buy as much cannabis as i could ever have wanted. I could very easily get crack, and cocaine as well, and e&#39;s if i looked hard enough among dealers. Many 15 year olds go there, and spend their hard earned pocket money on skunk.

Personally, i&#39;d rather they would get it legally from a shop, clean with no dodgy additives etc

just my lil opinion, not intended to upset anyone

[sArA]

Originally posted by RGX@4 September 2003 - 19:47
I am sorry to hear about your son

Personally, i&#39;d rather they would get it legally from a shop, clean with no dodgy additives etc

just my lil opinion, not intended to upset anyone

I agree on all counts.... B)

[ilw]

It took me ages, but i read each and every post in this topic and it was all very interesting. I would like to contribute a website : http://www.newscientist.com/hottopics/marijuana/ i was quite surprised but they seem to come out quite strongly in favour or legalising it, a fair bit of their evidence points to the studies of the netherlands over the last 25 years. As i know very few people can be arsed looking up the links provided and reading through the copious arguments, there was however one interesting point:

Pot smoking does leave more tar in your lungs, not only because of the lack of filters, but also because pot smokers hold their breath and breathe more deeply. Also cannabis may in addition be more likely to cause cancer than nicotine/tobacco, studies show that it causes more cellular damage than tobacco and surpresses the immune response of the cells. However, cannabis seems to oddly produce almost no emphysema (the curent theory is that the lessened immune response is behind this)
My advice is to eat it as JPaul suggested. u get less control of the high, but it lasts longer and is smoother IMO (I just wish that it was easier to make the stuff taste nice, all my attempts have been rank)

the page also covers many of the points bagpuss went over (and i am in total agreement with him on many points. If info isn&#39;t from a peer reviewed study/article then its worth sh*t.) eg safety aspects of cannabis, the gateway drug myth and the addiction thing.
The mental health aspect of cannabis has been studied quite a few times, and there is evidence that it can bring on psychosis, but it is unknown whether it just brings out psychosis in those that are predetermined to it (And would thus most likely have suffered a psychotic attack at some point in their lives anyway). ITs also true that a large number of mentally ill people smoke cannabis, but many claim that it helps with their symptomns rather than causing the symptomns.

My personal opinion is that all drugs should be legalised, but that just like now, safer drugs u just need to be a certain age whereas more dangerous drugs should need a prescription/some method of tighter control. Cannabis I reckon is one of the safest recreational drugs and should IMO fall into exactly the same category and laws as alcohol. (though i reckon u should be able to buy beer at 16 and spirits at 18). Ecstasy is one drug which IMO must be legalised and controlled as the current situation seems to create more problems and danger than it solves .

Just a couple of interesting points., did u know that nutmeg if eaten in large quantities can produce similar effects to weed. apparently used to be called the poor mans cannabis, recommended dosage about a matchboxfull (i dunno how big matchboxes were back when this advice was given) in a glass of water.
Also telecomms engineers are the most likely demographic to have tried weed, (in uk study) the figure of those who said they had tried it was between 90 and 95%.

[asmithz]

Ok i dont smoke weed but the fact that theres a law against it makes me mad. They say it makes a peoson not do anything with his/her life. Not true i have a friend that does it alot and is more active then me. He has his own show (puplic accses) where he puts on a wrestling show. Also they say in makes a peoson dumb. Well his not but if it does who cares beer does the same thing. Also Achol has the same effect but weeds better you dont get sick. and you dont feel the need to drive just sleep. I think that it should be legal but if you comit a crime thats when the punishment gets harsh. Just like they do with achole. Anyone got thoght one this. Please keep it sanatray i dont want this post to get closed.

[balamm]

Well since it&#39;s already been done to death, why don&#39;t we just merge this with the first one

[asmithz]

thanks balamm i thoght i was in troble for posting when it wsant there.

[Billy_Dean]

My advice is to eat it as JPaul suggested. u get less control of the high, but it lasts longer and is smoother IMO (I just wish that it was easier to make the stuff taste nice, all my attempts have been rank)

I make small sponge cakes with the powdered grass in. I then put them in a large bowl and pour on jelly made with fruit juice which soaks into the sponges, you can then top this up with whatever you want, custard, blancmange or whatever, to make a nice trifle. Divide it up so you know the dose, and enjoy.


B)