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Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2012 19:14:19 GMT
I don't feel directly concerned by this subject anymore, so I observe it from a distance. Nevertheless, when I think of the number of basically useless arrests, the gigantic profits made by drug lords, and all of the other bad substances (tobacco, alcohol) which are tolerated by society, it does seem rather ridiculous not to legalise cannabis. I thought this was an interesting item from Al Jazeera about the situation in Mexico faced with recent election results in the United States. France remains adamantly opposed to any depenalisation even though a few prominent politicians support it, not to mention the fact that French youth are the biggest cannabis users in Europe. With the government looking desperately for new sources of tax revenue these days, it does seem a bit hypocritical not to consider this particular source, which would be a financial jackpot, besides completely undermining organized crime. It is also interesting to note that the Netherlands cancelled their recent law which prevented sales of cannabis to foreigners, and the reason for this was for both economics and a sudden surge in crime due to illegal sales taking over the market. My own position at the moment is that cannabis should be authorised as long as alcohol and tobacco are legally on sale. If anybody wants to try banning those other two items, I would frankly not be opposed to giving it a try for health reasons rather than the mostly moral reasons that were used for U.S. prohibition in the 1920's. New generations are much more open to such changes than their elders, and they are already used to living in a world full of constraints.
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Post by mossie on Nov 11, 2012 22:32:08 GMT
I have to agree with you Kerouac, even though I am a very law abiding citizen. Legalising all drugs may be the way to go, by controlling the use and price perhaps some of the excesses can be avoided. But the really obscene thing is the people who are killed by drugs which are adulterated with worse substances to give the dealers more profit. The useful by product would be the substantial tax revenue which governments, and citizens, could enjoy. May I say, the only drug I have taken is benzedrine. that was given to me by a caring RAF to enable me to stay awake ;D ;D ;D
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Post by fumobici on Nov 12, 2012 0:55:26 GMT
The state I live in, Washington State, did just that and legalized possession of up to an ounce (28g) of cannabis last week for any adult over 21 years of age. The initiative put to a public vote sailed through easily, what surprised me was not only the margin of victory but the complete and utter lack of any organized opposition to it.
It seems as it does to most of my fellow Washingtonians to be simple commonsense. There is simply no good reason not to and good reasons to. As powerful as the stereotypes of conservative Americans are, we on the West coast often make Europeans seem stodgy, backward and closed minded by comparison.
All that said I expect the Obama Justice Department to fight this as best they can. Obama unlike his portrayal by his opposition is really as stodgy and conservative a President as one could ever wish for.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 7, 2014 9:30:10 GMT
Okay, a year has passed and we have now entered the new world of legal cannabis, at least Colorado has, quickly to be followed by Washington and Uruguay.
Assuming that civilisation as we know it does not collapse, opinions in other places should start shifting at increasing speed, especially when people drag out the statistics about the cost of repression enforcement and the amount of tax revenue being generated.
Naturally, we can also expect some horror stories about why certain people should not have touched the stuff.
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Post by lagatta on Jan 7, 2014 13:14:53 GMT
I like the Uruguay system, though I believe it is restricted to citizens, which will create a huge grey market in a tiny country between two huge ones. I understand that Uruguay doesn't want to become a druggy paradise, unfortunately attracting the (illegal) sale of hard drugs as has become a problem in the Netherlands, but the restriction doesn't seem practical.
I can't smoke anything; I'd eat a cannabis biscuit if something like that were available, only for recreational purposes, just like having a couple of glasses of wine. It can also be a good therapy for arthritis, though I certainly wouldn't want to rely on it all the time. Even though the health problems are much less severe than smoking cigarettes or staying a bit drunk all day would entail, dope use can make people sluggish, and I don't want to be sluggish.
Kerouac, I wouldn't be happy in a place where I couldn't drink a bit of wine, and it is certainly not because of ignorance of the very severe harm caused by abuse of drink - I have worked in the Far North and seen the dire harm substance abuse (alcohol, drugs, and various toxic substances such as glue and gasoline sniffing) have caused in such already damaged places.
As for cigarette smoking, perhaps it could be "grandfathered" or something? I don't want to force longterm smokers to quit when the harm has been done. Certainly 30 years ago, we couldn't have imagined the degree to which people actually abide by the current regulations.
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Post by htmb on Jan 7, 2014 20:29:15 GMT
Hmm, Kerouac. Let me get this straight. You logged in to our new and "improved" version gift from Proboards. Looked at neon green and black, and you instantly thought about legalizing cannabis? Makes sense to me.
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Post by fumobici on Jan 8, 2014 0:18:28 GMT
Cannabis has been legal to possess and use for a year here now although it won't begin showing up on store shelves for people without a prescription for a couple or three months I suppose. Net effect on daily life here thus far: zero.
I'm not a big cannabis user but I do enjoy it from time to time. It's a bit less rebellious now to use here licitly, so has lost some of its charm as a forbidden fruit, but that charm was not worth the people's lives pointlessly disrupted and even ruined my criminalization.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 9, 2014 12:44:34 GMT
I have no idea if this has any relation to the winds of change on the subject, but France has finally approved its first cannabis based drug, which will be prescribed later this year for sufferers of multiple sclerosis.
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Post by lagatta on Jan 10, 2014 0:27:23 GMT
Yes, it does. It is very important. Delivery of cannabis or related drugs is not just through toking, nor only for overaged hippies.
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Post by questa on Jul 2, 2014 2:24:23 GMT
Still finding new things on these boards... In South Australia it is OK to have 3 plants for personal use. Not allowed to sell or carry over a certain very small amount. Drug testing is carried out in many occupations and with our many alcohol testing mobile units to catch drivers.
The sky hasn't fallen down as yet.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 27, 2017 14:00:57 GMT
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Post by lagatta on Mar 27, 2017 15:33:00 GMT
It is really bizarre about France. I know many people in France, from teenagers to boomers, who smoke or otherwise ingest cannabis.
Radio-Canada reports that the Liberal government plans to have it legalized by July 2018.
My main reason for supporting legalisation is the harm criminal records for such a trifling matter have done to many people, in particular young people. I could legally use medical cannabis in any event, but I want more information on non-smoked products available, and if possible, strangely I want some that doesn't have much of a psychotropic effect. Mainly because I'd like to cut down on ibuprofen and other anti-inflammatories used to counteract the stiffness and pain of arthritis. Note that when it isn't wintry and I can ride my bicycle every day, I'm pretty much asymptomatic.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 27, 2017 16:01:21 GMT
France reputedly has the highest level of cannabis use among young people of any country in Europe. It is one of the reasons that there is so much political opposition to relaxing the law, since the politicians do not seem to understand the "forbidden fruit" attraction of it. There have been numerous surveys about what should be done, and they have all come to the conclusion that the laws must be changed, and every time these surveys have been rejected by the authorities because it is not the conclusion that they wanted.
Nevertheless, there is a slight movement in favour of medical use. This might finally happen depending on who is elected as president in the upcoming elections. Further evolution of attitudes about the subject will take considerably more time.
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Post by mich64 on Mar 27, 2017 18:03:22 GMT
My sister has been taking medicinal cannabis for the past few months.
While a bit off topic, with all the talk and activity over health care in the US, I am so very thankful for not only the health care coverage we Canadians are provided but also the level of care that has been provided to her. My sister has not been denied any request to assist in her care, from botox to medicinal cannabis to home care and medical assistive devices, she is receiving an abundance of care and support from her doctors and our medical system.
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Post by fumobici on Mar 28, 2017 2:55:04 GMT
Europe, NL excepted, feels like it's still living in the past century here to me. Here we've had shops where any adult can go into and select among a hundred different cannabis products for three or four years now. They're everywhere. Every hysterical, delusional fear thrown in the path of legalization here has proven to be baseless. There have been no problems at all, use among teens hasn't increased, car crashes are still declining as before, none of the predicted mental or physical health crises has materialized. As has been the case for the better part of 100 years now, the opponents of cannabis legalization have few or no hard facts, no evidence, and lacking those just make stuff up whole cloth as necessary to bolster their ridiculous arguments. Nowadays with better information widely accessible and available, it takes a pretty determined effort to stay in the Reefer Madness reality-hostile bubble. I think most of the opposition is from old people who cannot summon the effort to overcome a lifetime long exposure of lurid and baseless propaganda.
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Post by lagatta on Mar 28, 2017 15:44:03 GMT
Are there many of those old people left? We are moving to an era where the bulk of pensioners will be boomers. Of course some people from earlier generations survive - a good thing, with improved living conditions and medical progress, and I know several people born during or before the Second World war who don't hold such reactionary attitudes. But the people I know in their 80s or 90s have lost most of their friends...
Many young Dutch people aren't particularly interested in cannabis - sure they will have some puffs at a party, just as they will drink a beer - but problem users are rare, and found among those with other psychological or social problems (including social exclusion). Many coffeeshops (which in Dutch means cannabis cafés) have closed in favour of places with first computer posts and now WIFI zones.
Mich, those issues are very important. So is the reminder that injectable botox was developed first for twitches and convulsions, not for vanity. Just as "plastic surgery" first meant restoring a human appearance to mutilated Great War veterans, not vanity or some of the horrors we see now such as the South Korean girlgroup who all underwent multiple cosmetic surgeries to "improve" their already attractive faces and figures. And while our public healthcare system, like its forebear in the UK, faces a lot of underfunding and other problems, it is still far better than the denial of care to a large proportion of the public who can't afford private care.
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Post by patricklondon on Mar 28, 2017 17:38:35 GMT
I was just reading another angle on this - a long piece about Vietnamese children trafficked into the UK to work more or less as slave labour on illegal cannabis factories, in a whole variety of properties with incurious landlords. Clearly if there were a legal supply, the market for illegal production and supply would be threatened, but of course the press would have a field day with any politician who tried to set up a workable system. And criminals whose "business" is threatened don't just give up and go away - they'll be looking for some new thing to take over, or to maintain an under-the-counter tax-free supply. (There's also the argument that we don't need to risk providing any extra incentive for smoking). At the moment in the UK, the police turn a blind eye to possession of small quantities, AFAIK, but crack down on producers and suppliers when they find them. My blog | My photos | My video clips"too literate to be spam"
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Post by lagatta on Mar 28, 2017 17:55:05 GMT
I don't know about the UK, but in Canada the most dire drug problem now is with illegally-sold synthetic opiates such as fentanyl.
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Post by rikita on Apr 5, 2017 7:13:41 GMT
i agree that full legalization would make much more sense. no idea how common it is among younger people these days (or among any people, i am not good at keeping track of what is common) ... right now afaik in germany it is not illegal to consume but it is illegal to own, buy or sell (though if all you own is a small amount then usually this will be ignored). while consumption is not illegal, driving uti is - which is a problem, because tests show up as positive for quite a while after the actual effects have stopped. my brother lost his license once for quite a while (a problem for someone who has to drive as part of his job), when checked around mid-day, for consumption that had taken place the previous evening.
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Post by rikita on Apr 5, 2017 7:17:56 GMT
for problems in the states of the USA that have it legalized, i found this recent last week tonight interesting:
the part with children taken away aparently is not uncommon and is one that seems particularly horrible to me - as it is not only traumatizing to the parents but also to the kids (read an article afterwards about an 11 month old boy taken away, and while he was returned to his parents after 12 days - and such a fast return i suppose indicates that he really was taken away without valid reason - and i suppose for a child that age being taken away from their crying and pleading parents will shatter a lot of their sense of security and trust and could have repercussions for years ... not sure if similar things happen here, might research sometime - but sorry, that is kind of off-topic).
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Post by whatagain on Apr 7, 2017 17:19:56 GMT
My neighbour smoked some dew and spent 45 days in a psychiatric asylum. Hope with a legalisation 'they' would check and reduce the number of such secondary effects ...
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Post by fumobici on Apr 7, 2017 21:24:00 GMT
What is "dew"?
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Post by rikita on Apr 8, 2017 0:09:27 GMT
mildew maybe?
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Post by whatagain on Apr 8, 2017 17:24:42 GMT
Sorry I thought dew meant shit - herbs, 'beu' in french. Cannabis ... well, I think , I'm really no expert on it.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 8, 2017 17:47:07 GMT
There must have been an added ingredient to warrant 45 days of psychiatric care. Or else your neighbour was not completely honest about the item that caused the problem.
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Post by fumobici on Apr 9, 2017 0:40:48 GMT
Yeah, if smoking some cannabis puts you in the asylum for 45 days, something must be very, very wrong with you in the first place. That's unheard of. Either that or it wasn't cannabis they smoked.
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Post by mossie on Apr 9, 2017 18:47:59 GMT
Good old fashioned cannabis or hashish is not too bad although it can really get people very dopey, they just sit with a beautific smile and are incapable of rational thought. However nowadays something called 'skunk' is produced which is a much more potent version and can have serious effects. If it was legalised hopefully that stuff would be come extinct.
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Post by whatagain on Apr 10, 2017 8:31:12 GMT
Only cannabis. That is part of my remark : did these guys who want to legalize asked some psychiatric or are they all thinking like you (or me 3 months ago).
Just google 'cannabis décompensation psychotique' and become an expert - no idea how to translate in English.
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Post by patricklondon on Apr 10, 2017 14:23:23 GMT
did these guys who want to legalize asked some psychiatric or are they all thinking like you (or me 3 months ago). Just google 'cannabis décompensation psychotique' and become an expert That's another example of why I think some ideas about legalisation are so unrealistic: the issue isn't between "regulation as a crime" and "no regulation at all", it's about the most effective form of regulation to minimise adverse medical and social problems. On most counts the "war on drugs" ultra-criminalisation approach looks to have made the situation worse rather than better, but nothing that looks like taking business away from criminals is going to stop them being criminals: they'll either seek to find some illegal form of the regulated product (the equivalent of moonshine, or smuggled and untaxed tobacco), or they'll move on to something else. My blog | My photos | My video clips"too literate to be spam"
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Post by kerouac2 on Nov 8, 2020 15:41:18 GMT
I saw that recreational cannabis has been legalised in a few more American states during the last election. If I am not mistaken, one state even legalised cocaine.
France continues to fight against any relaxation of cannabis laws while being surrounded by countries that accept it. And since the forbidden fruit remains appealing, France is the country in Europe with the highest percentage of cannabis use.
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