[alphageek31337]

Is it me, or did a post about someone smoking mairjuana (albeit copious amounts of it) somehow spiral into a discussion of heroin addiction and alcoholism? I think this illustrates a significant problem with the reality of the war on drugs. Somehow it ends up in a lot of people's heads that pot=acid=coke=h=crack=mdma=psylocibine, and this is simply not true. By lumping a plant like marijuana in with drugs like heroin and crack is to say it is just as likely to destroy/end your life as these drugs. I personally think that occasional, casual use of marijuana is harmless, and even if you disagree, there's no way on earth you can even try to prove that it is as harmful as the aforementioned. Do I want to see 13 year olds smoking pot? Of course not. But I think that if it is within the realm of reasonable control for a consenting adult to use alcohol or (especially) nicotine, how is it not within that same adult's control to use marijuana? So, instead of letting people get a controlled dosage of an enjoyable and minimally harmful chemical within an environment prepared to handle them while they use this chemical, we send them to the streets to get something that isn't guaranteed to even be just pot (though it is the extremely vast majority of the time, simply because most other drugs are so much more expensive) not to mention being able to control the strength of the dosage or consider different cannabinoid blends to try to achieve different types of "high". Then, if you are found to be using this chemical, you end up in prison and with a permanently marred record. It will be difficult for you to get a job, especially if you aren't in college yet, because having a gram of pot in your pocket means that you can't get student aid anymore. One mistake in high school, and not even all that serious of one, and you pay for it for the rest of your life. Marijuana laws are Draconian and completely seperate from the reality of marijuana use. One must remember some of the arguments given to originally criminalize the plant, including that it might "make a black man look twice at a white woman" and could "cause the user to fall under the influence of listening to jazz"*. After I work my ass off all day, why shouldn't I be allowed to smoke a joint, eat a box of twinkies and take a nap? How is that any more harmful than having a few beers and watching TV?

To be honest, if drug laws were truly effective in keeping people from harming themselves, and limited in their scope so as to only be concerned with drugs that could cause significant harm even with casual use, I would support them with every last bit of moral fiber I have. But, in reality, the drug laws are more harmful than most of the drugs themselves, and they prevent these drugs from being used in a safe way by responsible people. Instead, we've returned to the days of gangsters shooting up the streets and people going blind from drinking bathtub gin. It wouldn't surprise me at all to find that more people have been killed by competition in the black market for drugs than by the drugs themselves, and rather than eliminate this black market and provide a safe environment for users and help for people with real problems, we continue to fuel the idea that all drugs are evil, horrible things that will inevitably ruin your life. Parents, let me ask you this: What's the quickest way to ensure that your children will go digging through the kitchen cabinet? Tell them they aren't allowed to, and don't tell them why. The "drugs are bad" additude doesn't stop people from using them; instead it fuels curiousity, then breeds mistrust when little Timmy smokes that joint with his friends and finds out that no one got killed, no one got pregnant, and no one ended up having to smoke pot every day just to feel normal. So he starts to wonder if he's been lied to about acid, and he takes it. He doesn't go insane, he doesn't try to fly off of a ten-story balcony, and, in fact, he has a pretty great experience listening to funky music and watching the winamp visualizer. So he wonders if he's been lied to about MDMA, and he takes it. He doesn't have a seizure and choke on his tongue, he doesn't die of dehydration, he doesn't go into a deep depression, and he doesn't end up addicted. So he wonders if he's been lied to about hardcore drugs like coke, opiates, meth, pcp, etc. So he tries one of them, and finds out that this time, he really hasn't been lied to.

We need to foster a culture where knowledge is valued more than abject, baseless fear. We need to be realistic about drugs to ourselves, to each other, and to our children. We need to create an environment where softer drugs like marijuana are considered safe for use in the home, or in more controlled environments outside the home than, say, in the back of some guy you never met before's car in the wal-mart parking lot. For people with chemical dependencies, we need to not make them outcasts and untouchables, and consider them doomed and unable to be helped. Instead, we need to allow them access to treatment and, either if treatment fails or in conjunction with said treatment, a supply of their chemical of choice free from random chemical cuts that you find on the street, and with a regulated dosage that allows them to be weaned off of the chemical, or at least down to a dosage where there is maximum functionality in the addict. To paraphrase from the dextramorphan FAQ, I'd rather see a thousand people do a drug safely than one person injure or kill themselves using a drug, and if they hurt themselves because of lack of non-biased, zero-bullshit information, then I consider myself partially responsible. Just Say Know to Drugs.

That being said, I had an interesting experience flipping through the police blotter a few years back that relates to the original article in this thread. Anyone who went to school in the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh in the past 10 years might remember an officer by the name of Andrew McNellis. Officer Andy headed up the D.A.R.E. program in a few schools in our area, and could be counted on at least twice a year to show up and deliver a rousing speech about how, if you smoke pot even once, you'll die penniless in the gutter, face-down in a pool of your own vomit. Well, as it turns out, Officer Andy and Spike, the drug/bomb dog he brought with him, had a lucrative side-business taking weapons and drugs (marijuana and cocaine, according to the police blotter) from the evidence locker and selling them, en masse, to various ne'er-do-wells throughout the Pittsburgh area. Kudos to Officer Andy, for giving me one more story to tell when people ask me why I'm so cynical.

*Quotes taken from Jello Biafra's spoken word bit, entitled "Grow More Pot". Look for it on YFP2P