cannabisnews.com: Reefer Madness: This Is Your Brain on Drugs





Reefer Madness: This Is Your Brain on Drugs
Posted by CN Staff on July 02, 2007 at 06:01:42 PT
By Jordan Smith
Source: Austin Chronicle
Texas -- When in doubt, go old-school – or, at least, why not give it a shot, especially if you don't have anything – and I mean anything – else going for you? But remember: Retro isn't always hip – and when it comes to the sad, sad (and ever more sad) White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, "retro" is just plainass embarrassing. Case in point: Now that summer is here, so is the ONDCP's latest attempt at scaring you into believing that drugs – no, rather, marijuana, is bad, bad, bad. According to the new ONDCP youth anti-drug media campaign report released by the feds this month, kids (that is youth, ages 12-17) who smoke pot are "at least" four times as likely to join a gang as their nontoking brethren. Yes! Gangs!
Pot smoking leads kids to gangs! And if you don't know what that means – OK, the ONDCP is here to point you in the right direction if you're confused. Kids who smoke pot are more likely to be violent, to get into fights, and – gasp! – to steal. Steal! Sound familiar? Are you looking around for clues that you're actually in the 21st century and not stuck in, say, 1936? Perhaps you're recalling a certain bit of black-and-white cinematic propaganda, in which the evil weed causes good boys to go bad – to rape, to kill, and to go completely insane. Yes, I'm talking about Reefer Madness (originally known as Tell Your Children) – the most boring, grainy piece of government-championed propaganda ever released on the big screen. Just when you thought that piece of shit was gone (except for the occasional reappearance on cable, complete with utterly awful sound quality), the ONDCP has conjured its ghost, distilling its smoke-dope-and-die message into a neat little five-page report. Whereas the B&W Reefer took a painful 66 minutes to detail the horrors of the "assassin of youth" (a phrase coined by William Randolph Hearst, king of the yellow-bellied sensation mongers, whose ulterior motive – money – prompted him to hop on the hophead train, spewing – err, publishing – a litany of fiction alleging that pot did actually cause madness and violence), the ONDCP has consolidated its propaganda into a tidy little five-pager. (OK, perhaps that's a blessing in disguise.) Although it is not published under a Hearst paper banner, it is no less inflammatory. In fact, it is as baseless a work of fear-mongering propaganda as was its predecessor, the infamous Reefer Madness. Congrats, ONDCP! According to the new report, teens who use drugs, and "particularly marijuana," are nine times more likely to use other drugs (the feds' beloved, yet completely unsubstantiated "gateway theory") and are five times more likely to steal; 39% of teens who report having used drugs recently, the report asserts, have also admitted to stealing, or trying to steal, something worth at least $50 at some point during the past year. (And, no, I don't think they're talking about stealing pot out of a sibling's sock drawer – though that could easily be worth $50, depending on how swank your sib is.) Worst of all, though, is the ONDCP's assertion that "children" who use marijuana are "nearly" four times more likely to join a gang than drug-free kids are. Interestingly, the ONDCP backs up this "fact" with the following information: 94% of gang members are male; 49% are Hispanic; 37% are black; and just 8% are white. In other words, according to our federal government, pot smokers are predominately minorities. Now do you understand their whole "violence" angle? No? Neither do I. And neither does Matthew B. Robinson, a criminal justice professor at Appalachian State University in North Carolina, who is the co-author of the recently published Lies, Damned Lies, and Drug War Statistics. To Robinson, this kind of propagandistic crapola is par for the course. The ONDCP, desperate to hold on to its incredibly large (and amazingly unjustifiable) $12 billion-plus budget, has to come up with ways to reassure us that it's on top of this whole war on drugs thing. (Bless their little cold, black hearts – the bureaucrats at the ONDCP may be the only sad saps hanging on to this pathetic notion that the drug war is actually something that you can "win.") And, if that means resorting to an unfounded racist stereotype, then so be it: "They have to promote a fear of drugs in order to continue the drug war," says Robinson. "What's amazing about it is that they're making two claims that don't fit together. The vast majority of [marijuana users] are white. But the majority of gang members aren't white?" Robinson muses. In order to protect the agency, Robinson says, the ONDCP and its leader, the drug czar John Walters, "sells fear." They tell us we should be "afraid of drugs and afraid of people of color," he says. "Link the two together, and you've got your budget." Well, that sounds pretty familiar, doesn't it? Engage time machine: During the Great Depression of the 1930s, lawmakers in the Southwestern states – including Texas – were in a pickle. During the preceding decades of prosperity, Mexican immigrants were welcomed to the Southwest as a needed source of labor. By the time the Depression set in, however, this same immigrant population was now viewed with suspicion and fear, seen as a threat to remaining American jobs. The problem, of course, was what to do – or, plainly, how to get rid of them. Pot was the key. Mexicans were known to grow and smoke pot, lawmakers reasoned; making pot illegal – demonizing it, linking its use to violence – would certainly help move those Mexicans back south across the border or, just as good, lock 'em up in jail. Either way, problem solved! And so it was, thanks in no small part to Hearst and his newspapers. The pages of his papers were filled with the same sort of unsubstantiated crap that the ONDCP has now regurgitated into its current report. Same old lie, new day; shame on you, ONDCP. Note: ONDCP goes old-school. Source: Austin Chronicle (TX)Author: Jordan SmithPublished: June 29, 2007Copyright: 2007 Austin Chronicle Corp.Contact: http://tinyurl.com/ys6nrfWebsite: http://www.austinchronicle.comCannabisNews -- Cannabis Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/cannabis.shtml
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Comment #17 posted by ekim on July 03, 2007 at 20:07:40 PT
whig --love that song
have not been able to see youtube but love that songdon don don don crazy------------------cannabis prohibition needs a song to bring all the people together--- a song for ending this un american war on the people -- a song that will unite, and reignite the power that has made this great country what it is.Happy Fouth Of July to all -- where every human being is equal and that truth - will prevail if and only we stand tall
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Comment #16 posted by Hope on July 03, 2007 at 18:05:35 PT
Right, Kap!
Plus...you're "allowed" to defend yourself against those other gangs...but not the government sponsored ones.That SWAT team business and Dynamic Entries and crap have to be stopped. It's wrong.
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Comment #15 posted by kaptinemo on July 03, 2007 at 13:40:21 PT:
The Feds are worried about gangs?
What about the DrugWar gangs?They attack often at the break of dawn or the dead of night. They break down your door like Stalin's thugs (after a barely perfunctory knock on the door), screaming and shouting epithets, waving automatic weapons in your face, demanding that you prostrate yourself before them like extras in a bad religious epic, threatening all and sundry regardless of age, sex, physical ability - or lack thereof. They ransack your home, destroying priceless valuables...and often shoot family pets incapable of doing more than urinating themselves out of fright and attempting to flee. And if they find nothing? They laugh at their own incompetence as they depart your trashed home, leaving slaughtered pets, frightened children, injured elderly and unnerved and humiliated innocents behind...if they are lucky, that is."Gangs"?. How many gangs engage in that kind of behavior? When have you heard of the Bloods or the Crips or any other the other less known gangs behaving like that? There's only one kind of gang I know that regularly engages in that kind of behavior...and they wear badges and sidearms. 
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Comment #14 posted by The GCW on July 02, 2007 at 18:06:47 PT
SWATSTIKA brain.
This is Your brain.This is Your brain on ONDCP. Any questions?
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Comment #13 posted by josephlacerenza on July 02, 2007 at 16:39:57 PT:
How Harsh!!
Bush Spares Libby From Prison Time
By BEN FELLER,AP
Posted: 2007-07-02 19:31:14
Filed Under: Nation, Politics
WASHINGTON (July 2) - President Bush spared former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby from a 2 1/2-year prison term in the CIA leak case Monday, delivering a political thunderbolt in a highly charged criminal case. Bush said the sentence was just too harsh. Here we see the real truth of the world, it is not what you know it is who you know. 
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Comment #12 posted by whig on July 02, 2007 at 16:02:13 PT
Crazy redux
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zSfZ9juF3MIf anyone likes the song Crazy by Gnarls Barkley, this one is an interesting variation.
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Comment #11 posted by whig on July 02, 2007 at 15:59:31 PT
mayan
Did you see this one?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIgoXQWiSlMSeptember 11th Revisited
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Comment #10 posted by mayan on July 02, 2007 at 14:04:57 PT
Gangs
My gang, the Scorpions, is going to rumble with the Dragons tonight. That's only if we can find some good herb first!Yeah, right.
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Comment #9 posted by whig on July 02, 2007 at 11:54:29 PT
jmoran
It would almost seem like gang members wouldn't want to smoke pot because it would encourage them not to be so violent, but as a society we should hope they would smoke pot for that very reason.
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Comment #8 posted by jmoran on July 02, 2007 at 11:18:03 PT
Gangs and Pot
Well if anyone was more subject to Gangs then me it would have to be all my other friends that I grew up with. We all went to school together in L.A. San Fernando Valley. Our school was in the North Hollywood district. We also went to school during (Prop 13) busing kids from Downtown Los Angles and every other scary place with really bad gangs. So you could say most of my classmates were from the Bloods, Cripps, C14, 18th Street and a lot of other less popular Gangs. My friends and I are all white middle class. I tried smoking Pot when I was in 6th grade (11 years old). When I got to Junior high I got to try more but never got it from any Gang member. Just the friends that I grew up with smoked pot. Please do not get me wrong we were friends with a lot of different gang members but none of them smoked pot with us or had any or said they smoked pot. Well as it turned out we didn’t hang out with them that much because of that.The thing I did not realized or my parents was all that hyper activity was killing me in school and it was putting me in special learning classes in elementary school. Maybe I had ADD or something like that. When I got to junior High school I started smoking pot pretty often and my school grades starting getting better and my parents were so happy to see me get Bs and As instead of Ds and Cs. Of course I did not relate the pot smoking to my better grades until I was much older.One thing is and all my friends will testify that the pot we had when we were 16 years old was the best and strongest we have had yet today or ever (lived in Switzerland for 2 years and have been to Amsterdam many times). Oh yea my friends and I still have not joined a gang yet and we smoke a lot. I am 40 years old and have not stopped smoking Pot for the last 29 years (except for 1 to 6 months breaks for building to much of a tolerance). I do not drink alcohol or take any chemicals. I have never hade any lung problems and I owe all my learning and success to smoking pot. I have been happily married for 13 years and successful Real Estate Agent for the last 15 years.   
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Comment #7 posted by Sam Adams on July 02, 2007 at 10:32:43 PT
get it while it's hot y'all
Get YOUR Fox "24" wallpaper now!http://www.fox.com/24/profiles/wallpaper/24_wallpaper_1152x864.jpgSick, totally sick IMO. If O'Reilly's looking for the moral breakdown of the US, he can start right with the above link.
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Comment #6 posted by Sam Adams on July 02, 2007 at 10:11:27 PT
1930's
It's interesting that the 1930's marked the beginnings of the mass media.Consider the fact that for hundreds of years, NYC had over dozen different daily newspapers, all with different editorial bents! I think the rich elite recognized that the old means of control, mostly religion, was on its way out & technology would be the new paradigm.  Technology provided a new vehicle for brainwashing & control.  The shift to our current "mass society" was on.Look how quickly they were able to change everything. The most important thing was to gradually change people's perception of free will. Nowadays, people see government and corporations as some kind of huge untouchable monolithic entity. No sense trying to fight back, what can I do against the huge govt off in Washington? The controlling elite realized the technology of movies & TV was going to replace religion & reading. Look how quickly they pounced on Hollywood. Again, censorship started in the same period, 30s and 40s.  Beside the nudity & sexual themes, they also made Hollywood's products apolitical.  If you watch TCM and see movies from before WWII, there's much more talk about political affiliations. People would say stuff like "oh yeah, my friend Bob, the crazy socialist" Or "oh, he's off at his unionist meetings again". One of the censorship codes was to ban mention of politics, and of course it lasts through till today. When was the last time you heard the word "Democrat" or "Republican" in a movie or TV show?  And what a surprise, sex and nudity are totally censored, but violence is welcomed with open arms by the corporate elite. Look at Hostel, a sick, twisted torture movie, rated R, while other films that show a woman having an orgasm are rated X. Torture's even on prime time now - 24 - where showing a woman's breast will get you a $500,000 fine.  (it's interesting, the current plague of colds and allergies is probably a result of all of us not breast feeding long enough)I highly recommend "this film is not yet rated". It's a brilliant movie.
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Comment #5 posted by Hope on July 02, 2007 at 10:07:05 PT
Jmoran
They didn't make much use of the mouse and bird studies that I thought were telling. The study where they taped the tails of mice to a metal rod. The mice who had consumed cannabis did not give up on getting their tails loose, long after the cannabis deprived mice just gave up. Aha!And the bird study, that showed that birds would keep looking in the same old places for food, regardless of not finding any there...they didn't give up their "habits". The birds fed cannabis and hemp explored new places to find food...and did.
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Comment #4 posted by jmoran on July 02, 2007 at 09:50:27 PT:
linking its use to violence and joining a gang
Well I was taught when I was younger (40 now) that pot made you lazy and made you just sit around and want to do nothing and not be productive at all. In fact in the 50s 60s and 70s they said we can not have Americans smoking pot because everyone will be non productive and will be too lazy to fight any Wars and Russia will take us over. So I am confused does pot make you lazy or crazy.
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Comment #3 posted by Sam Adams on July 02, 2007 at 09:27:16 PT
ONDCP
It's interesting that we all know the awful lying and terrible damage from ONDCP's propaganda. But the scariest thing is that this is only like 1% of the evil that the US "national security state" (police state) inflicts on the us and the rest of the world. This is a great column from today's paper:http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/07/02/cias_darkest_secret/
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Comment #2 posted by Storm Crow on July 02, 2007 at 09:21:16 PT
I'm not being racist, but what about....
The Asian gangs? According to the west coast news, THEY are the ones doing the big in-house grow-ops around here! I guess the ONDCP only counts Mexican and black gangs- "no Asians need apply". Hey! Maybe there are NO Asian gangs! Maybe they are a figment of our imagination! Or maybe the ONDCP is just full of manure! I kind of suspect it is the latter, since even in my little rural town, we have a "wannabe gang" of Asian kids. (We also have the Mexican, black and skin-head "gangs"- just to be fair.)The ONDCP must be getting desperate to bring up these 1930's scare claims! Reefer Madness, indeed! Well, the government wants us to be good little scared sheeple, and ONDCP is certainly doing their part!"Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."-- Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials
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Comment #1 posted by OverwhelmSam on July 02, 2007 at 06:41:11 PT
In Conclusion
Do you mean that all those teenagers out there who have been trying in vain to get into a gang can just start smoking marijuana and they'll be asked to join? Or how about the teenagers who want to see what it's like to go mad and become violent? Marijuana is the gateway to these activities, and now that the illustrious ONDCP has informed our teenagers of these facts, I predict an uptick in marijuana demand. Way to go ONDCP!You know, if they really wanted to reduce marijuana use, all they have to do is reduce the stress and paperwoek involved in living in a civilized society, and people would not have to anesthesize themselves so much. But Americans have to do everything backwards until it hits them in the ass. Wel, I say let's come up with a way to hit ONDCP in the ass in a big, terminal error way.
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