http://www.azcentral.com/offbeat/articles/2008/05/28/20080528medmarijuana28-on.html
There are any number of LEGAL drugs that people are cautioned not to drive or use heavy machinery while under their influence. Then, of course, there is that other recreational drug, alcohol. Probably not a good idea to drive when taking that drug either.
I don’t know your intention in posting this. Is it to discredit medical marijuana somehow? I don’t think it succeeds in doing so. The fact that driving becomes dangerous when the person takes certain drugs does not mean that the drugs are bad or not useful in a more appropriate (safe) environment.
Yeah, okay, I’m there with entheogens. What’s the point of posting this article? If it’s a slight against marijuana, check entheogens’s post. If it’s a slight against medical marijuana, I can tell you that it CAN be used for certain pain-relieving or other situations. I’m an insomniac, and when I can actually smoke, I get the BEST sleep of my life.
I posted it because I thought it interesting, I personally am ,pro Marijuana. I see it as another way our Federal Gov. Overrides the state laws .As if we do not have enough people in prison.
It would be like arresting the people that own Budweiser for the people that drink their product then wreck their car because they are drunk.
Sigh. Not more of this.
Original Source:
http://www.norml.org.nz/page25.html
Common Marijuana Myths Debunked
1. Marijuana causes brain damage
The most celebrated study that claims to show brain damage is the rhesus monkey study of Dr. Robert Heath, done in the late 1970s. This study was reviewed by a distinguished panel of scientists sponsored by the Institute of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences. Their results were published under the title, Marijuana and Health in 1982. Heath’s work was sharply criticized for its insufficient sample size (only four monkeys), its failure to control experimental bias, and the misidentification of normal monkey brain structure as “damaged”. Actual studies of human populations of marijuana users have shown no evidence of brain damage. For example, two studies from 1977, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) showed no evidence of brain damage in heavy users of marijuana. That same year, the American Medical Association (AMA) officially came out in favor of decriminalizing marijuana. That’s not the sort of thing you’d expect if the AMA thought marijuana damaged the brain.
2. Marijuana damages the reproductive system
This claim is based chiefly on the work of Dr. Gabriel Nahas, who experimented with tissue (cells) isolated in petri dishes, and the work of researchers who dosed animals with near-lethal amounts of cannabinoids (i.e., the intoxicating part of marijuana). Nahas’ generalizations from his petri dishes to human beings have been rejected by the scientific community as being invalid. In the case of the animal experiments, the animals that survived their ordeal returned to normal within 30 days of the end of the experiment. Studies of actual human populations have failed to demonstrate that marijuana adversely affects the reproductive system.
3. Marijuana is a “gateway” drug-it leads to hard drugs
This is one of the more persistent myths. A real world example of what happens when marijuana is readily available can be found in Holland. The Dutch partially legalized marijuana in the 1970s. Since then, hard drug use-heroin and cocaine-have DECLINED substantially. If marijuana really were a gateway drug, one would have expected use of hard drugs to have gone up, not down. This apparent “negative gateway” effect has also been observed in the United States. Studies done in the early 1970s showed a negative correlation between use of marijuana and use of alcohol. A 1993 Rand Corporation study that compared drug use in states that had decriminalized marijuana versus those that had not, found that where marijuana was more available-the states that had decriminalized-hard drug abuse as measured by emergency room episodes decreased. In short, what science and actual experience tell us is that marijuana tends to substitute for the much more dangerous hard drugs like alcohol, cocaine, and heroin.
4. Marijuana suppresses the immune system
Like the studies claiming to show damage to the reproductive system, this myth is based on studies where animals were given extremely high-in many cases, near-lethal-doses of cannabinoids. These results have never been duplicated in human beings. Interestingly, two studies done in 1978 and one done in 1988 showed that hashish and marijuana may have actually stimulated the immune system in the people studied.
5. Marijuana is much more dangerous than tobacco
Smoked marijuana contains about the same amount of carcinogens as does an equivalent amount of tobacco. It should be remembered, however, that a heavy tobacco smoker consumes much more tobacco than a heavy marijuana smoker consumes marijuana. This is because smoked tobacco, with a 90% addiction rate, is the most addictive of all drugs while marijuana is less addictive than caffeine. Two other factors are important. The first is that paraphernalia laws directed against marijuana users make it difficult to smoke safely. These laws make water pipes and bongs, which filter some of the carcinogens out of the smoke, illegal and, hence, unavailable. The second is that, if marijuana were legal, it would be more economical to have cannabis drinks like bhang (a traditional drink in the Middle East) or tea which are totally non-carcinogenic. This is in stark contrast with “smokeless” tobacco products like snuff which can cause cancer of the mouth and throat. When all of these facts are taken together, it can be clearly seen that the reverse is true: marijuana is much SAFER than tobacco.
6. Legal marijuana would cause carnage on the highways
Although marijuana, when used to intoxication, does impair performance in a manner similar to alcohol, actual studies of the effect of marijuana on the automobile accident rate suggest that it poses LESS of a hazard than alcohol. When a random sample of fatal accident victims was studied, it was initially found that marijuana was associated with RELATIVELY as many accidents as alcohol. In other words, the number of accident victims intoxicated on marijuana relative to the number of marijuana users in society gave a ratio similar to that for accident victims intoxicated on alcohol relative to the total number of alcohol users. However, a closer examination of the victims revealed that around 85% of the people intoxicated on marijuana WERE ALSO INTOXICATED ON ALCOHOL. For people only intoxicated on marijuana, the rate was much lower than for alcohol alone. This finding has been supported by other research using completely different methods. For example, an economic analysis of the effects of decriminalization on marijuana usage found that states that had reduced penalties for marijuana possession experienced a rise in marijuana use and a decline in alcohol use with the result that fatal highway accidents decreased. This would suggest that, far from causing “carnage”, legal marijuana might actually save lives.
7. Marijuana “flattens” human brainwaves
This is an out-and-out lie perpetrated by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America. A few years ago, they ran a TV ad that purported to show, first, a normal human brainwave, and second, a flat brainwave from a 14-year-old “on marijuana”. When researchers called up the TV networks to complain about this commercial, the Partnership had to pull it from the air. It seems that the Partnership faked the flat “marijuana brainwave”. In reality, marijuana has the effect of slightly INCREASING alpha wave activity. Alpha waves are associated with meditative and relaxed states which are, in turn, often associated with human creativity.
8. Marijuana is more potent today than in the past
This myth is the result of bad data. The researchers who made the claim of increased potency used as their baseline the THC content of marijuana seized by police in the early 1970s. Poor storage of this marijuana in non-air conditioned evidence rooms caused it to deteriorate and decline in potency before any chemical assay was performed. Contemporaneous, independent assays of unseized “street” marijuana from the early 1970s showed a potency equivalent to that of modern “street” marijuana. Actually, the most potent form of this drug that was generally available was sold legally in the 1920s and 1930s by the pharmaceutical company Smith-Klein under the name, “American Cannabis”.
9. Marijuana impairs short-term memory
This is true but misleading. Any impairment of short-term memory disappears when one is no longer under the influence of marijuana. Often, the short-term memory effect is paired with a reference to Dr. Heath’s poor rhesus monkeys to imply that the condition is permanent.
10. Marijuana lingers in the body like DDT
This is also true but misleading. Cannabinoids are fat soluble as are innumerable nutrients and, yes, some poisons like DDT. For example, the essential nutrient, Vitamin A, is fat soluble but one never hears people who favor marijuana prohibition making this comparison.
11. There are over a thousand chemicals in marijuana smoke
Again, true but misleading. The 31 August 1990 issue of the magazine Science notes that of the over 800 volatile chemicals present in roasted COFFEE, only 21 have actually been tested on animals and 16 of these cause cancer in rodents. Yet, coffee remains legal and is generally considered fairly safe.
12. No one has ever died of a marijuana overdose
This is true. It was put in to see if you are paying attention. Animal tests have revealed that extremely high doses of cannabinoids are needed to have lethal effect. This has led scientists to conclude that the ratio of the amount of cannabinoids necessary to get a person intoxicated (i.e., stoned) relative to the amount necessary to kill them is 1 to 40,000. In other words, to overdose, you would have to consume 40,000 times as much marijuana as you needed to get stoned. In contrast, the ratio for alcohol varies between 1 to 4 and 1 to 10. It is easy to see how upwards of 5000 people die from alcohol overdoses every year and no one EVER dies of marijuana overdoses.
I draw your attention to Number 6.
[quote]pittbulll wrote:
I posted it because I thought it interesting, I personally am ,pro Marijuana. I see it as another way our Federal Gov. Overrides the state laws .As if we do not have enough people in prison.
It would be like arresting the people that own Budweiser for the people that drink their product then wreck their car because they are drunk.
[/quote]
That aspect makes this ridiculous. Are they blaming the “drug dealer” for the crime someone commited after they were sold the “drug”?
Is that even legal? If someone kills another driver while drunk, do we arrest the guy at Stop&Shop for selling it to him?
Was alcohol involved with this accident? It usually is. It would surprise me if none was involved here…which they left out.
I get the feeling that no one is chasing down alcohol “dealers” for the massive numbers of drunk driving deaths that happen every year.
From:
[quote]In 2006, there were 13,470 fatalities in crashes involving an alcohol-impaired driver (BAC of .08 or higher) �?? 32 percent of total traffic fatalities for the year.
16,005 people were killed in the United States in alcohol-related* motor vehicle traffic crashes (BAC of .01 or higher).
In 2006, 1,794 children age 14 and younger were killed in motor vehicle crashes. Of those 1,794 fatalities, 306 (17%) occurred in alcohol-impaired driving crashes. Children riding in vehicles with drivers who had a BAC level of .08 or higher accounted for half (153) of these deaths.
The 13,470 alcohol-impaired-driving fatalities in 2006 were almost the same as compared to 13,451 alcohol-impaired-driving fatalities reported in 1996. Ten years of progress.
[/quote]
Apparently, this isn’t an issue at all.
[quote]pittbulll wrote:
I posted it because I thought it interesting, I personally am ,pro Marijuana. I see it as another way our Federal Gov. Overrides the state laws .As if we do not have enough people in prison.
It would be like arresting the people that own Budweiser for the people that drink their product then wreck their car because they are drunk.[/quote]
Hm. I did not see this. Ignore my sour response.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Apparently, this isn’t an issue at all.[/quote]
Of course not, Alcohol has no proven negative effects. Jeez Prof, they told me you were smart!
[quote]Makavali wrote:
pittbulll wrote:
I posted it because I thought it interesting, I personally am ,pro Marijuana. I see it as another way our Federal Gov. Overrides the state laws .As if we do not have enough people in prison.
It would be like arresting the people that own Budweiser for the people that drink their product then wreck their car because they are drunk.
Hm. I did not see this. Ignore my sour response.[/quote]
Makavali, despite this, thanks for posting these. Very interesting. The only “myth” I agree with is #8 Marijuana is more potent today than in the past.
I actually think that one is true (at least for the United States). I can remember back in the 70s that it took a joint or more to get me as stoned as one bong hit does now.
[quote]entheogens wrote:
Makavali, despite this, thanks for posting these. Very interesting. The only “myth” I agree with is #8 Marijuana is more potent today than in the past.
I actually think that one is true (at least for the United States). I can remember back in the 70s that it took a joint or more to get me as stoned as one bong hit does now.[/quote]
No problem! But I believe that what they meant by potency was the actual plant itself. The enhanced potency you experience is likely because of improved “harvesting” techniques, meaning you get more for your money.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
pittbulll wrote:
I posted it because I thought it interesting, I personally am ,pro Marijuana. I see it as another way our Federal Gov. Overrides the state laws .As if we do not have enough people in prison.
It would be like arresting the people that own Budweiser for the people that drink their product then wreck their car because they are drunk.
That aspect makes this ridiculous. Are they blaming the “drug dealer” for the crime someone commited after they were sold the “drug”?
Is that even legal? If someone kills another driver while drunk, do we arrest the guy at Stop&Shop for selling it to him?
Was alcohol involved with this accident? It usually is. It would surprise me if none was involved here…which they left out.
I get the feeling that no one is chasing down alcohol “dealers” for the massive numbers of drunk driving deaths that happen every year.[/quote]
I do not believe the article stated that Alcohol was part of the equation, but I would bet it was .
[quote]Makavali wrote:
Sigh. Not more of this.
Original Source:
http://www.norml.org.nz/page25.html
Common Marijuana Myths Debunked
8. Marijuana is more potent today than in the past
[/quote]
How is this a bad thing?
[quote]Artem wrote:
How is this a bad thing?[/quote]
LOL! Not a bad thing, but not true either.
For those Canadians out there, it will be interesting to see in the next federal election with the greens gaining steam and their view with marijuana. I personally think that the majority of Canadians don’t like the NDP or greens, but they strongly are opposed to the current marijuana laws, this may give quite a bit of support to those such parties who are for the legalization. Sorry for the hijack, but it kinda pertained.
[quote]bluefloyd wrote:
For those Canadians out there, it will be interesting to see in the next federal election with the greens gaining steam and their view with marijuana. I personally think that the majority of Canadians don’t like the NDP or greens, but they strongly are opposed to the current marijuana laws, this may give quite a bit of support to those such parties who are for the legalization. Sorry for the hijack, but it kinda pertained.[/quote]
I wish NZ politics could be more like that.
Marijuana’s a good thing, anyone who thinks otherwise has obviously never used it.
I’ve been stressed way the fuck out over the last week and it really helps you fall asleep.
[quote]entheogens wrote:
Makavali wrote:
pittbulll wrote:
I posted it because I thought it interesting, I personally am ,pro Marijuana. I see it as another way our Federal Gov. Overrides the state laws .As if we do not have enough people in prison.
It would be like arresting the people that own Budweiser for the people that drink their product then wreck their car because they are drunk.
Hm. I did not see this. Ignore my sour response.
Makavali, despite this, thanks for posting these. Very interesting. The only “myth” I agree with is #8 Marijuana is more potent today than in the past.
I actually think that one is true (at least for the United States). I can remember back in the 70s that it took a joint or more to get me as stoned as one bong hit does now.
[/quote]
That is the reaction of the market to the prohibition.
Not only did most of the growing move indoors, where the conditions can be monitored more closely, it also makes sense that illegal drugs become as potent as possible to make smuggling easier.
When one kg of Mexican outdoor weed is worth 600$ and on kg of Canadian indoor hydro weed is close to 8000$ the Canadian weed must be more potent.
[quote]Ghost22 wrote:
Marijuana’s a good thing, anyone who thinks otherwise has obviously never used it.
I’ve been stressed way the fuck out over the last week and it really helps you fall asleep. [/quote]
Thats about all its good for, more then anything I think it makes you lazy and not want to do much.