truthout.org
This fall Californians will go to the polls with a chance to make history. They will be able to cast a vote to tax and regulate marijuana like alcohol or cigarettes. California’s Proposition 19 is one of many similar initiatives cropping up on state ballots across the country.
Whether it calls for decriminalization or medical marijuana, the end of cannabis prohibition has never seemed closer. In this short animated parable, “The Flower,” award winning artist Haik Hoisington contrasts a legal marijuana economy with an illegal one, to show how everyone stands to benefit from ending the war on weed.
Found by ECA.
While I agree there would be many benefits to legalizing marijuana, honest people can see that its effects are not as bad as some people make them out to be, but are worse than the type of people who make a video like this would have you believe. Studies have shown consistently that continuous marijuana use decreases mental capacity and damages neurotransmitters.
I think half the reason many people would never go for legalizing marijuana is because of the statements to the contrary that marijuana users make. ( Marijuana must have made you pretty stupid if you are oblivious to the fact that it causes brain damage )
Now, to be fair, so does alcohol, but I would argue that alcohol does not change the brain long term in the same way that marijuana does, unless you have been a heavy drinker a very long time. Most alcoholics will admit alcohol is harmful – they just don’t care.
Now, take a person who is smoking pot vs. a person who used to smoke pot, but stopped. The person who stopped will always say that after they stopped, they realized they had changed mentally (attention levels, motivation levels, etc). The person who is still using will never see or admit these things.
Having said all of that, I would like to see a test case in a state other than California. They can’t go much more downhill than they already are. Lets take Connecticut or Vermont. If their test scores, accident rates, graduation rates, don’t get worse, then it will be a success, and legalization will probably gain acceptance nationwide.
But first, we have to figure out a quick, legally permissible test for recent use other than blood tests. I don’t know what they do in places where it is legal, but stoned drivers are almost worse than drunk drivers. They are harder to spot from far away, but are just likely to sideswipe you. And doing blood tests on the side of the rode is not going to go over too well.
#23
“But take the other end of the equation: why should people go to jail, families be broken up, for an activity that on its own harms no one?”
Now who is the silly hooman?
Harms no one? The user is harmed by pot. From the altered brain chemistry down to the lung damage over time it causes. Then WE have to PAY for their medical treatment with higher medical costs passed for those potheads that can’t pay their bills because they spend most of their cash on pot.
They drive and they are just as bad as a drunk. People get killed.
Any drug used for recreation and not for treatment of illness is wrong and harms people.
And to say that one drug causes more problems than another is the same fallacious argumentation that fails in debate.
It is selfish and without thought for your fellow man.
Cursor_
#25 “…California …currently seem to be doing an economic melt down. I don’t want to go there..”
Yeah yeah, typical Repuke lather but its economy surpasses all but a few industrialized nations. It created the semiconductor industry and the state’s economy was attracting the highest educated workers force into the 20th century.
Never mind those minor facts, the real future of America lies in Mississippi!
The people that say its harmful: Then don’t use it. Don’t buy it. Problem solved.
Don’t interfere with others lives. Just because YOU don’t like something, doesn’t mean others don’t find it useful.
To those arguing that the tax money disappears: Why haven’t you been screaming about the tax monies BEFORE now? Why does this one topic make you rally and come forward?
And for those still thinking that MJ is a ‘Scary and Addicting” substance…try it. You might like it. Or you might not. But at least after trying it, you have at least had the experience of it before making your Judgment.
People want control. Over their lives. Trouble is, some people feel they know better “just cause’. Simply out of ignorance and conditioning.
Look at what we lose because of ignorance. HEMP is the wonder plant. It provides food, fuel, and (in non-industrial cases) fun.
How do we measure pot strength and BTC (blood THC level)?
When I want a beer, I have a pretty good idea what I’m getting into….but imagine going to the bar and being handed a drink not knowing if its 6 ounces of ‘Lite’ beer or 6 ounces of Bacardi 181….and it all tastes the same. We need a measurement for pot strength.
Most of us can drive home from the bar after a couple lite beers and BAL is just fine. To my knowledge there is no roadside measurement for BTC, no amount that is legally allowed or considered a safe level of impairment. Add to that that you have way to know if a few hits become a nice mellow buzz or they knock me over. And if it knocks me over, who’s fault is it, and how the hell am I getting home safely?
IMO even if legalized, there’s a lot of work to do before this can work.
Back to the video… it makes some very good points:
a) Taxes are not being collected on a product that is regularly consumed, on the contrary, the state is diverting taxes that could be used elsewhere into enforcing bans on the product.
b) Taxes are being spent on incarcerating people unnecessarily, and building more prisons when we run out of space in the current ones. Those taxes could be spent on maintaining or improving other services.
c) Violence is created by the very illegality of the product, in a similar way that making alcohol illegal created the great mafiosi of 1930′s. Legal products do not create that kind of violence.
d) Choice… when they were passing the ‘flower’ a couple of people skipped ‘inhaling’. It was their choice.
e) Tyrannical government. One official decides that something is not going to be allowed, over the will of the people.
All in all, the video is a great little summary of the waste, lost opportunity, big government, and violence that the current ban brings upon our society.
While the video’s first half is sickeningly, cloyingly optimistic, I find the video’s second half freaking hillarious. Little blob thing with a Hitler ‘stache? Fantastic.
I also find it funny that a lot of the con arguments are essentially the exact con arguments made during Prohibition in the 20s-30s. When alcohol became legal (again), the streets were not flooded with amber waves of brew.
Good facts to know:
Q1: What’s spent by California (for instance) on all the police, DEA, incarceration, and anti-pot activities of all kinds every year?
Q2: How many lives are lost due to criminal behavior surrounding pot?
Q3: How many lives would be lost to the extra load of stoned drivers if it were legal? (subtracting out the number that would have been otherwise simply drunk instead)
Q4: What would the loss be to the alcohol industries if pot were legal?
Q5: What would the tax implications of legal pot be?
Q6: What would the criminals do –instead– if pot were not available for them to exploit?
#42–Cursor==you are right. I got lazy not spelling it out each time the pro-pot/drugs position is mentioned. Put too much emphasis on “on its own.”
So–whats better for the individual, families, society? Toke up on Fri and Sat night for a pleasant buzz harming no one but the one who chooses to do so OR be put in jail for 20 years for your rear seat ash tray having a seed?
So we have established: intoxicated drivers are bad; sin taxes are OK; weed isn’t good for you; alcohol isn’t good for you; the federal govt is incented to keep it illegal; local cops enjoy a revenue stream from its illegality; large transnationals will likely take its production over if legalized; and prohibition is largely ineffective. What’s effective is pre-employment screening; if even medically legal use prevents being hired, then legality is irrelevant. Think I’ll go indulge in the #1 American soporific, TV – brain cells be damned.
#44
“Don’t interfere with others lives. Just because YOU don’t like something, doesn’t mean others don’t find it useful.”
Then keep your reprobate ass out of the emergency rooms and go elsewhere for healthcare when you get sick from it.
Don’t go anywhere in a vehicle that must be driven by you. I don’t want our trauma centers clogged up because you swear that billboard was talking to you “man”.
#49
If you want a buzz monkey man, stay the fuck home, lock yourself in and don’t go out at all while you are high. And don’t come crying to the hospital when you find out smoke inhalation is not that great for ya.
My stance has nothing to do with the useless criminal justice system. That is a WHOLE other debate. Stay on track. Focus. If you allow this as easily as booze you are only going add more people in wrecks and more lung and other organ illness as they age.
This is only going to enable even more dopamine addicts to fuck up everything for the nation.
Cursor_
Artistically sound, but contentless.
S.
I’ve never met anyone who smoked pot regularly who was operating at anything close to 100% of his/her IQ. Most of the people I know who smoke heavily are clearly impaired, even if they only do it at night.
But I don’t think its any of my business to tell anyone what they should do with their body/mind. I don’t tell women if they should use birth control, nor adrenalin junkies that they shouldn’t go snowmobiling in the mountains, even if it costs me tax money because they get caught in an avalanche because they didn’t check the proper sources.
I don’t drink, I don’t smoke tobacco and I don’t do pot, but I don’t think its anyones business to tell me what I do with MY body. If I want to, I will. I feel its my decision, not some politician who goes out and has a three martini lunch then passes legislation high as a kite.
I drive my car with care and attention, even though many around me drive like idiots, putting my life in danger. Before putting pot heads in jail they should be arresting people who drive like idiots, placing others in danger. If those pot heads drive a car after smoking a joint, arrest them too.
Its called personal responsibility.
Alcohol makes people feel/look beautiful.
LSD makes people feel they can fly.
Pot makes people feel they are intelligent.
Cursor – Were you scared as a child by a ‘pot-head’? You call me ‘reprobate’, and you don’t even have a clue what that word means.
Keep your little mind to yourself. Or, smoke some and allow it to open up…just a bit.
And for the record – I have never in my life hallucinated on pot. So, I guess those after school specials had it ALL WRONG….
#32 No, there are no downsides to legalization.
At first I would have answered: “it can’t be healthful to smoke, whatever the substance.”
This doesn’t have to be a smoked item. It is inefficient to sell other forms because of the premium caused because it is illegal. A large portion of the trade would go to, (sorry)baked goods, candy, or butter to serve non-smokers.
Compare pot to the set of all things consumed by humans for reasons other than simple nutrition. Easily safer than tobacco and alcohol. Probably around caffeine in terms of risk. The safest painkiller or psychoactive substance by far. You ever hear the horrible side effects of most any advertised prescription?
All the negative aspects are there BECAUSE it is illegal.
This would be congruent to alcohol prohibition except alcohol is much more harmful in toxicity(extreme dose) and general health effects(normal dose).
I confidently predict legalization WILL happen. It will be championed by the GOP in an effort to gain younger voters against an increasingly solid Social Security collecting interest bloc.
And the dems WILL lose that election cycle for lack of support from their activist base.
As a matter of strategy, always do what your opponents would like to do but lack the balls to try.
Chris–you should get together with do-ill asap. He too enjoys making a sport of looking as stupid as possible.
Well, you set it up so I will bite: So, what of those who choose to smoke?
#57 You asked.
As you requested of someone recently. Prove me wrong.
It is so much easier to call people names than come back with something substantive.
I stand by my characterization of the issue, as well as the ultimate political endgame of this solution.
Do you have anything more than calling me names? You said you would walk me through it.
I will give you something STRANGe to think about..
SAFETY LAWS.
SLOW DOWN..
DONT DO THIS..
DONT TAKE THAT..
DONT drug yourself..
DONT SMOKE..
And all this..and complaints that there are TO MANY that reach retirement age to get social security..
Its also what I tell the religious persons..
IF its your concern over my soul, fine. But ITS MY FAULT, If I want to goto hell.
IF I want to be an IDIOT, FINE, its my choice. IF I kill myself doing something AFTER I know the facts, is it YOUR CONCERN?
Does the amount of tax generated make up for our shortfalls? If not, do the benefits outweigh the downsides?
Do we have a field test for pot? My understanding is that drivers under influence of pot do much better than their drunk counterparts but combined with alcohol do far worse than just being drunk.
Do judges really put people in jail for personal quantities of pot possession anymore? I suspect most of law enforcement is focused on for profit distribution rather than Joe’s stash of weed at his apartment.
Who says pot is better for you than smoking? It is far worse as pot is not smoked through any kind of filter. Will pot smokers sign something so I don’t have to pay taxes for their cancer treatments/other ailments later in life?
How would you stop legalized pot from getting to young kids? I knew many kids that smoked in Jr High. Can you imagine all the 13 year olds smoking pot at school?
In short, if you are a drug addict you support this. People that actually can benefit from pot could just as well get a prescription for Marinol. These ballot measures prove that a good portion of the population is just plain stupid/ignorant.