cannabisnews.com: Marijuana Reform Groups Focus on Rights Marijuana Reform Groups Focus on Rights Posted by CN Staff on December 02, 2003 at 07:15:58 PT By Tiffany Witte Source: Daily Illini Your marijuana rights: Two marijuana reform groups' local chapters will sponsor a workshop Wednesday on marijuana rights, as well as a forum on Thursday evening.The University chapters of National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws and Students for Sensible Drug Policy will host the "Know Your Rights" workshop from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Wednesday at 311 Gregory Hall. Americans for Safe Access will direct the workshop, which is aimed at "educating communities across the nation about their rights and how to successfully interact with law enforcement," according to a Nov. 18 press release.The Thursday forum will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Illini Union Ballroom, and will feature marijuana expert Ed Rosenthal, former medical marijuana user Brenda Kratovil, marijuana reform activist Caren Thomas, and Illinois NORML director Bryan Brickner.Both Kratovil and Rosenthal have been arrested for growing marijuana for medical purposes, according to the press release. The panel will discuss their efforts to change state law to allow marijuana usage for medical purposes.Source: Daily Illini, The (IL Edu)Author: Tiffany WittePublished: December 02, 2003Copyright: 2003 Illini Media CoContact: opinions dailyillini.comWebsite: http://www.dailyillini.comRelated Articles & Web Sites:SSDPhttp://www.ssdp.org/Illinois NORMLhttp://www.illinoisnorml.org Americans for Safe Accesshttp://www.safeaccessnow.org/Ed Rosenthal's Pictures & News Articleshttp://www.freedomtoexhale.com/trialpics.htmCould Marijuana Be Legal in Illinois?http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15443.shtmlResident To Bring Marijuana Message Home http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread13471.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #3 posted by Dankhank on December 02, 2003 at 10:14:22 PT: Cozy ... I've met Steve, but don't know much about him ...Haven't knowlingly met any DEA, but am sure I actively dislike all of them ... 'cept for Judge Gray ...Hard for me to imagine a jovial tour-de-farce such as this ...I guess it's more fun than a real job ...BTW ... send your friends to my links page to register to vote ... and see other new stuff ...Peace Lots O Links [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by FoM on December 02, 2003 at 07:35:18 PT UPC Sponsors Debate on Marijuana Legalization Published on Tuesday, December 2, 2003 Scott A. Seel, Kansas State Collegian The debate over the legalization of marijuana rages on, but tonight, K-State students will be able to play a first-hand role in the argument.If You Go: What: "Heads vs. Feds" legal forum on the legalization of marijuana.When: 7 tonightWhere: Union Main Ballroom The Union Program Council is sponsoring a debate "Heads vs. Feds," between prominent figures from both sides of the issue.Dusty McDonald, graduate assistant program adviser for UPC, said the debate will feature Steve Hager, former editor-in-chief of High Times magazine, where he has worked for more than 12 years, and Robert Stutman, a 25-year veteran of the Drug Enforcement Agency and current drug consultant for both PBS and CBS.McDonald said Hager has been an enthusiastic supporter for reform in the U.S. legislation concerning marijuana for more than a decade and still plays a major role in both High Times and other counterculture endeavors."(Hager) created Freedom Fighters, a national marijuana legalization group," he said. "He currently edits all video content for High Times Magazine and just recently released a book called 'Adventures in Counterculture,' which was released in August of 2002."Stutman is a retired DEA agent who also authored an autobiography titled "Dead on Delivery," which has appeared on the New York Times Bestseller list, McDonald said.He said Stutman was the head of the New York office of the DEA, which is the largest DEA office in the world.McDonald said UPC was excited to bring this event, which is part of a national tour, to K-State."We thought this was something which would be relevant to both students on campus and to people in the community," McDonald said. "It's interesting to know that these two gentlemen are actually very close friends, despite how heated the debate can get."Greg Bura, an agent for Wolfman Productions, the promotions company which promotes this event and others like it, said debates like this are important because they give audience members different perspectives on the issue."Debate stimulates intellectual conversation, and that is one of our goals," Bura said.McDonald said the event will be extremely interactive."It will be a typical debate in that they will each be given a 15-minute opening remark and there will be comments and questions from the audience that follow," McDonald said.He said the event is successful in part because the topic is timely."Steve does an amazing job as far as arguing why it should be legalized," he said. "But he is makes sure to say that it is not cool to be smoking pot in college. He believes students should be focusing on academics."http://www.kstatecollegian.com/stories/120203/new_pothe.shtml [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by FoM on December 02, 2003 at 07:26:56 PT News Article from Pravda.Ru Cannabis: Legalize or Leave Prohibited? December 02, 2003Cannabis, Mary Jane, reefer, sinsemilla, ganga, gangster, chronic, marihuana etc etc. This "safe drug" (as many claim), which became a symbol for freedom of self-expression and rebellion between the youth, in fact hide many more dangers than synthetic drugs. A legalization propaganda of late signifies the question has to be answered firmly: legalize or leave banned?Cannabis policiesSociety opinion and policies in regards to cannabis are discussed heavily these days, and can differ greatly, even if the societies" cultural traditions may be close. Some states are very rough to the drug, others are easy-going with it. But there is no civilized country, where smoking or any other "fun" use of cannabis was welcomed by people or the power. Even in India and Holland the state allows the use of it, but trying to minimize the number of uses with all possible means. (In Netherlands, in fact, the law is somewhat in conflict with itself: the main law prohibits any operations with cannabis, but the sub-law acts allow use, selling and possession in limited amounts)At the given time in Russia all operations with cannabis are illegal, and persecuted (more on this below). This irritates some groups, they think that the money spent on fighting the cannabis can be better spent somehow else. Which policy is to be chosen?Epidemiological reasonsNiels Beyerut"s theory claims that all forms of psychoactive substances use can be divided into three groups:"Singular": a given drug is abused by few people. Dependence occurs as a result of medical misuse (overdose of sleeping pills for old people, opiates for seriously wounded or after a long break). "Professional abuse" is also possible (constant paint smell inhaling for housepainters). For singular use involvement of other people is not usual.Second type is "epidemical", characterized by a "fashion" for a given drug. An abuser "infects" the people who are in contact with him. An example would be heroin, spreading between the youth these days. The third type is "endemic", or traditional. This type of drug abuse is characterized by traditions of use of the drug in national culture. A greater part of population than in the two previous example uses the drug. An example for our society would be alcohol and tobacco. Such use is very stable and can hardly be annihilated. Use of cannabis in India falls under this third type. Smoking marihuana is in the culture of the country, and so can not be simply prohibited: this would lead to similar reaction as Gorbachev"s attempts to ban alcohol in Russia.The two factors influence possibility to become dependent on a drug: and individual predisposition and pressure from the individual"s subculture. In other words, if a drug in not widely used in the society, and its use is condemned, only small number of marginal individuals can become dependent. Individual predisposition depends on a combination of biological, psychological and other individual characteristics. A state policy can not influence them. So if a government wants to lower the number of drug abusers, it has to lower the subculture influence, in other words, lower the availability of a drug.Presently, in most regions of Russia use of cannabis is epidemical, spreading from one smoker to another, hence the tough prohibition measures are, most probably, justified (unless we want it to transform into traditional, endemic). Such measures greatly lower the availability. Availability and prevalencePrevalence of marihuana will depend also on two interconnected factors: legislations and the price. The weaker the laws against cannabis, the easier it is to buy and hence the price is lower. This can not, however, be proved by research yet, although it is true in regards to alcohol.Possibility of complicationsOnce again, there is not enough research done on cannabis, but if we are to make parallels with alcohol, the evidence of Royal scientific society proves that when use of alcohol rises X% per capita, there will be more than X% abusers (alcoholics) and death rate from alcohol-related diseases grows more than X%. The Royal scientific society predicts the same for cannabis and conclude that its use rate adversely influence the nation"s health.An attempt for historical comparisonThere was a time when smoking tobacco was condemned in Russian culture. Peter the First in a desire to get it closer to European culture, started promoting (sometimes with force) smoking between elite. It gave no results in his lifetime, but as the state did not oppose this later on, tobacco spread at all levels of society and became a part of national culture by the end of the XIX century. We can see what gave us the policy of no-prohibiting tobacco: millions dependent, millions of rubles turn into smoke and spent of smoker"s healing, thousands of deaths every year. Tobacco smoking became endemic, and it is difficult to lower its level. And to quit smoking is difficult for an individual when nearly everyone around is a smoker.Do we need legalization?Now we"re said to "look at Europe" and "use Holland"s experience" (it is curious that Peter the First used the Holland experience too), and legalize cannabis. Cannabis is a drug, at least to the same degree as alcohol. Maybe in the case of legalization we should expect as many cannabis addicts in a while as we have alcoholics now. Surrounded by other abusers, it would be more difficult for them to quit. Consequences to society can be very sad. http://english.pravda.ru/main/18/90/360/11421_Cannabis.html [ Post Comment ] Post Comment