Legalisation of Cannabis
 

I figured there had to be something worth talking about that didn't involve what's spreading across the forum at the moment. It was either this, or 'does religion cause war'.

This had to be something worth debating, and I can't remember if we've had a specific cannabis thread in the past, whether we did or we didn't isn't the point. It's a topic I've been interested in for a while, I'm not fond of smoking any more, haven't had a good puff in months and months. Yet I do advocate for the legalisation of cannabis, as a drug, it's less potent and less dangerous than alcohol, and causes less deaths.

Furthermore, simply illegalise the drug is such a lazy way to try and stop it circulating common usage. If they brought it into our shops, not only would have a remarkable liberalising impact on our culture, the tax generated from its legal consumption could be used to provide cash injections to the NHS for the purpose of tackling smoking related health issues.

The only qualm would be the possibility that legalising the drug would lead to a short run increase in consumption as people who've always wanted to try cannabis, but have never had the balls or inclination due to its legal status, might now have a try.

What say you all?

I have smoked marijuana with some Hashish but it didn't do anything to me, so I never bothered again. I don't mind legalizing it, because the ones who smoke it, already do, so...whats the deal? Also, legalizing it, will make a market where there is a lot of people buying it, making it legal will stop most drug dealers. But it will also mean that there will be some company who will take advantage of people who wants to work and use them for hours for a single buck. It's Nike and Coke all over.

I prefer when people hide to smoke it, I can't imagine having this smell while waiting for the bus, outside bars, people smoking pot with kids in their cars because they won't have to hide from police anymore... Cigarette is already too annoying imo.

I don't know about other peoples but all the friends I have that started smoking pot became incredibly boring, wasting hours sat in their cars or in the living room smoking, looking at the ceiling and talking about bongs or the biggest joint they smoked... (that's kinda sad)

-Hey dude, last week I smoked a foot-long joint...
-Cool story bro.
-Man, I'd like a fucking BigMac....
-Yeah, BigMac's are great.
-Yeah.
-Yeah !
-What were we talking about already ?

Not all, I have a friend that smokes and he's perfectly normal, can talk about anything without dwelling in stupidity.. Gotta say, it was the only one that I've encountered in my whole life. So, 99.99% are ridiculously annoying.Oh, and doesn't lie about it, if someone asks he says he does smoke it, but he's not one of those who goes like "Hey, look at me, I'm cool and I smoke pot and shit".

What's sad is that depending on how their friends circle is or their relationship with their parents, some people I know are totally normal and some ended like in "Dude, Where's my car ?"

I think that it would be an economical and political step forward but it's really genuinely not something for everyone and should not be available as such. It can be a sadder more pathetic escape from reality than booze in that you don't become chemically adjusted to having it in your system, but emotionally, wherein they depend on it in the short term. I don't think it should be available to everyone unless there is a foolproof, straightforward way to determine if someone won't get attached to it and become a socially stagnant, boring little pissant with baffling emotional responses. God I hate pot culture. Bunch of dweebs.

Additionally, the legaliztion process should involve acknowledging that as a medical product it's about as beneficent as cigarettes (with a big fat exception to all the things it does actually help treat). You're still inhaling a big mouthful of smoke. You're still burning something and drawing it into your body. Every croaky-voiced skinny hipster that argues it has some magical healing property should be castrated to prevent their womanly idiocy from poisoning further generations.

It would definitely alleviate a lot of a small crime around here though. Pretty much every petty thief or criminal around has their fingers in the Pot pie in some capacity and removing that illegal stepping stone will probably mean seeing a lot less slack-jawed white dudes dressing like they're black. It'll also keep me from having to stumble into the horrible projects that I buy in; It's a goddamn eden compared to big city slums but it still gives me the willies, ooh.

So in summary, I am all for legalization providing that information about the many, many possible cons is pushed just as much as the ridiculous, half-true pros.

Pretty much the only other people who's opinions I care about on the matter are 30 years plus. Age of majority or bust, kiddies.

I don't know if I could care less about the legalization of it. I can get it either way, and the political/moral/financial applications, while not lost on me, amount to exactly jack shit to me.

I think what would tip the scale for me would be whether or not it helped to extinguish the obnoxious "weed" culture that Gen Y so ardently embraces. On one hand, I think that if weed was made widely available, weed culture would flourish. "Across the Universe" would be regarded as the greatest film ever made ever, and Spencer's Gifts would effectively become the next Enron. This, for me, would be a nightmare from which there is no waking.

On the other hand, weed culture stems(*snort*) from rebellion. The second it's legalized and kids see their grandparents wakin' and bakin', it could become the least popular euphoric inhalant on the market.

Obviously my views on this subject have been simplified for the sake of comedy and laziness. You get the idea.

I demand a poll :P

also cannabis will always be in society and it is legalized in some countrys but skychase has a good point who wants to walk down a street walking past a whole lot of stoned people and the smell would be everywhere.

just wondering, has anyone here ever actually been caught with weed

Caught by who? The cops?

Anyone here who was in a situation where there was even a slight possibility of being caught by the police, and got caught, fucking deserved it.

by anyone and true, if your about to go walking around with drugs on you then your a dumbass and should accept it

If you mean caught by parents, my parents know I smoke on occasion and do not care. They know I'm smart/responsible enough to handle it. Not to mention my mom has taken pretty much every drug known to man at least once in her lifetime, so she has quite the tolerance.

Living in pretty much the only western country where this shit is (semi-)legal (It's illegal to grow 5 or more weed plants per person and it's illegal to supply weed to the sellers, but it's not illegal for the sellers to sell the weed they aren't allowed to buy in. Weird, I know), it baffles me how much of a campaign some countries take against cannabis.

Alcohol is many many many many many MANY times more dangerous than weed and that's legal everywhere and I simply don't get where people get the idea that weed is 'bad' for you, aside from the smoking part. It chills you out and gives you the munchies.

If there's something that should be legalized worldwide, make it weed. Put tax on it, make it legal to be sold to everyone above 18 and you'll have a nice additional income to patch your enormous debt with.

Ah the old debate to make weed legal, this takes me back to my RE lessons at school :D

Anyway, I have personally never smoked weed in my life and I don't plan to as well. Where I live, smoking weed especially at my age and younger is found upon and that's obviously because it's titled a 'Drug'

And what Havoc said. Tobacco and certainly Alcohol are much worse then Weed. I've seen the long term effects with Tobacco and Weed in my family and Tobacco is much worse. It's a horrid thing an I personally believe it should be made illegal but that can't happen because the country would be in a state of moral panic. I'm not saying Weed has bad side-effects because it does. I'm saying in comparison

So I do agree with it being made legal however that still doesn't make me want to try it. I don't partake in these things, it's just not me. I don't drink as well.

I've been caught by the police once, fortunately they didn't care, in fact they thought we were pretty funny. I guess I wasn't very high though because I was shitting myself, we were in KFC and these two cops came in and started asking us questions like, 'guys, do you think it's a little hot in here?' then laughing at the answers.

This annoys me a little. Weed may be less dangerous than alcohol but you actually seem to be ignoring the fact that it does have its negative side effects.

I've never taken weed, and I never plan to. It smells disgusting and I've never come to a point in my life where I feel the need to "chill out" with a smoke. I don't know, I just don't understand people's need for it, so I can't particularly make a judgement on whether or not I think it should be legalised.

I think that people who smoke weed are some of the most arrogant, self righteous and entitled fuckwits I've ever encountered, both on and offline.

That being said, it should be legalized.

I think it's that culture associated with weed. Shed dwelling, middle class teenagers who think what they're doing is oh so cool because it's illegal and their favourite rappers sing about it.

Rather it's the fact that everyone (exaggeration) who smokes weed tells you in a very loud voice how awesome it is, how it won't possibly hurt you, how stupid people who don't like weed are, how much it's improved their outlook on life, how worse other things are for you etc etc.

Weed smokers, especially in university and on large public forums are loud, obnoxious and bizarrely proud of what they do.

Yeah, it really sucks, I've lost a lot of friends because of this, lost, in the sense I almost refuse to hang out with them outside of sixth form because this ^ is all the do. Just one more God-damned year to go though. One more year.

Then again, if you smoke weed instead of tobacco, the lifestyle is giving you a net health gain. It's just still dangerous to your health.

You dodged a bullet by qualifying your post "(exaggeration)". Not everyone who smokes weed is an obnoxious poster boy for weed culture. As far as weed itself, I don't think smoking it has actually changed anything for me at all. It's just nice to get high once in a while.

I used to be adamant about never smoking weed ever, as I bought into all the anti-weed propaganda and was so put-off by burn outs at my school. Then I realized I was being a huge fucking wiener, and that like atheism, it is possible to be part of something without also coming off as a huge douche.

Your friends are fucking idiots and you probably need new ones (especially if they like McDonalds.) I tend to avoid people like that because they're the kind of folk that don't do anything productive at all. I enjoy a chat about grass, specifically the grass I'm smoking at the time, and it never turns into a cock measuring contest about who's the most stoned.

But yeah, another point that I want to make is that if grass is legalized you probably find that the police will, at least over here, do something if you are seen getting stoned in public. I think it will be treated the same as alcohol in a sense and confine it to "coffee shops" and your own home, which I think that's the way it should be. Amsterdam is renowned for it's stance on cannabis but it's still known for its museums and other touristy stuff. On that note I heard that 'dam is trying to change it so that tourists can't visit to smoke or illegalizing it or some other silly nonsense, and that's a stupid move.

I say that legalizing it would cut crime and in doing so cut the cost for the police, not too mention that it will generate more jobs for people. Honestly, the only downfall I can think of it being legalized is that it's going to be taxed but really, the thought of going to a place where you can enjoy a nice stinky smoke with tea/coffee and a bun with a nice atmosphere without the chance of being harrassed is tantalizing.

Maybe I'm biased and not seeing the bigger picture but the country would definitely benefit if they did legalize it.

Amsterdam won't illegalize pot if they care at all about their tourist revenue. That is the only reason people go there.

Actually we're well on our way on making it more illegal. We used to have a lot of drug tourism in our southern provinces. People driving from Germany, Belgium and even France. Across the border, get some weed and drive back.

Since last month you need a so called Weed Pass. Only Dutch residents can apply for one, making it pretty much impossible for foreigners to get weed 'legally'. It's only in effect in the 3 most southern provinces right now though and most weed deals have been pushed to the (unsupervised) streets. Street dealing has more than tripled down there since this new measure was put into effect.

It wouldn't surprise me if this is going to be pushed into the rest of the country until it's eventually illegal. The EU really really doesn't like that we're the only Euro country where it's still 'not illegal' and our politicians really like to lick that Brussel ass..

Politicians still maintain their secure foothold on the stupid mountain.

And we don't even have mountains here!

Medically it should be legal everywhere, it can help certain people. Frankly, after hearing Mitt Romney or some other Republican shithead suggest someone go to synthetic marijuana, I'm certain they don't even know why its illegal anymore.

That sucks, Havoc, you have no idea how akin the Netherlands are to Sugar Candy Mountain amongst most people I know precisely for your tolerance towards cannabis.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by that?

Sugar Candy Mountain is an allegory for Heaven in Animal Farm.

It's just like, I honestly think there's a lot of respect for the country because of the tolerance towards weed, and the fact that (until recently according to what your saying) your politicians have stuck two fingers up to the EU about the matter.

So it'd be a shame for them to take a step back and make it illegal.

I'm sure there's a few politians shaking their head at the very thought of restricting the use of cannabis. But even so they'll be alienating quite a few people who go to the country who goes to there for the country and happen to have a few smokes over their stay.

i think it should be legalized for a number of reasons, none of which i can be arsed to go into at the moment. but that's my basic stance.

I like smoking it. I'm all for it being legalized but I wouldn't be overly upset if it didn't. Like Sekto said, I can get it either way, so it doesn't really effect me.

But that's the thing, getting it other ways can land you in trouble over here and I'm not entirely sure about Canada's stance on the subject. I think it's a bit shit that people get criminal records, even prison time, over something that should really be treated in the same light as alcohol.

Give everyone the right to grow five or less plants at a time and you'll cut out a load of the bullshit around obtaining the drug, so long as you're not selling it and I think that even that isn't even a bad thing.

We are muchmuchmuch more lax about it, both in terms of laws and the social aspect. Cops don't give a shit about white people wandering down the street clearly passing a joint amongst themselves, or people toking on a porch (I love porches) or that kind of stuff. But your ass is arrested if you're black. It just is. No other actual context. Black? Get out of Canada. Fast. It's not actively used as an incriminator unless the person is involved in violence or meth.

To be fair, even in this country the police are more likely to just confiscate weed from you rather than take you to the station or file any sort of report against you.

They sort of have better things to do, or worse things depending on the area.

I live in the Shires, there's nothing for the police to do before 10 PM. For God sake I once got the police phoned on me for standing outside a flat for 20 minutes waiting for some friends, two police cars and a fucking police van turned up and one of the police asked me to move on. I did, they followed me for ages. They haven't got anything to do! XD

When I think 'The Shires' I think middle to northern england, not the southeast.

When I think 'The Shire' I think Middle-Earth