cannabisnews.com: Our Marijuana Policy is a Joke Our Marijuana Policy is a Joke Posted by FoM on April 12, 2001 at 06:58:01 PT By Brian Kappler, The Gazette Source: Montreal Gazette Great news for all you baby-boomers who are hitting your 50s and getting a bit achy in the, err, joints: tie-dye an old T-shirt, dig out your Joan Baez LPs, dust off the bong, and we'll have a teach-in against arthritis! Somebody bring a case of Oreos. Ottawa announced this week that victims of severe arthritis, along with people with certain life-threatening ailments, will be free to smoke up, legally, if other medications don't provide suitable relief of pain or nausea. Of course, there'll be rigorous safeguards: would-be users will need to get a couple of medical professionals to sign a piece of paper. There's a forbidding requirement. There's something all too Canadian about this: it's OK to get stoned, as long as you're not doing it to have fun. Well, nobody should object to pain relief for the dying. But this new system does seem open to easy and widespread abuse. And even if it were enforced perfectly, it's yet another asymmetrical right: what's illegal for one person to do to himself in the privacy of his own home will be state-sanctioned in the privacy of the home next door. This absurdity was required because of an Ontario Court of Appeal ruling last summer: Canadians have the constitutional right to smoke marijuana, it seems, if it provides relief of symptoms of certain ailments. Ottawa had to get these new regulations into force, or the court would have struck down the whole law against grass. And after all, nobody would want to live in a country where you can find marijuana in any school yard, where violent criminal gangs bring the stuff in wholesale, where you can smell it at any rock concert, where sometimes even mothers allegedly. ... You get the point. Our current marijuana law and policy are just a joke. The obvious comparison is with prohibition of alcohol in the U.S. in the 1920s; what people said then was that laws which can't be enforced tend to bring all law into disrepute. In 1973, when Pierre Trudeau's Le Dain Royal Commission called for "de-criminalization" of simple possession, the uproar was enormous; society wasn't ready. But by November of 1997, 51 per cent of respondents told Angus Reid pollsters that simple use should not be a crime. That was up from 39 per cent in 1987. And 83 per cent thought medical use should be legal. Full legalization of simple possession would solve some problems, but create others. Why allow one more substance that makes people stupid? Isn't alcohol bad enough? But, in fact, marijuana is today almost as well established in Canadian society as booze or cigarettes. Nobody proposes banning those, though either may well be more damaging than marijuana, to both health and our social fabric. Governments love liquor and smokes, actually, because there's so much revenue in them. Nor is it crystal clear that "sin taxes" reduce usage; they may actually reduce consumption of fruit and vegetables and milk, as users make bad choices about how to spend available cash. In an ideal society, these products would all be legal and sin taxes - all taxes, in fact - would be much lower. People would be free to "sin" their own "sins" and would pay the consequences - smokers would have to pay for their own lung surgery. The society we have isn't like that. And even if it were, there would remain the problem of young users. Almost certainly high prices and legal controls on access do limit, at least a little, the use of alcohol, tobacco and marijuana by young people. And Ottawa has taken a good step in making sure that more sin-tax revenue goes to enforcing existing laws - many depanneurs will sell cigarettes to a child of 8, marijuana can be almost as easy to get, and teenagers don't seem to have any trouble getting a drink. The current half-hearted enforcement of controls on all these substances neatly reflects the divisions in society, between the stop-the-rot mindset and the libertarian view. If legalization of marijuana is going to come in Canada, as eventually it will, look for it to come through the courts, not through Parliament. (Gerald Le Dain, after all, was a judge.) As with abortion, there are some items just too hot for legislators to handle. Source: Montreal Gazette (CN QU)Author: Brian Kappler, The GazettePublished: Thursday, April 12, 2001Copyright: 2001 The Gazette, a division of Southam Inc.Contact: letters thegazette.southam.caWebsite: http://www.montrealgazette.com/Related Articles:Arthritis Society Lauds New Drug Ruleshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread9299.shtmlOttawa Unveils Rules for Medical Use of Pot http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread9290.shtmlDrugs: Should We Go Dutch?http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7086.shtml END SNIP --> Snipped Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #7 posted by jAHn on April 12, 2001 at 14:55:39 PT Marijuana "makes" people dumb?? I love it when someone argues, over a Computer, that Potheads can't operate a Tv remote changer! As if we didn't learn about computers on our own and what not!?! Some of us have, some of us have learned just through a friend. (Which many Prohibitionists tend to think that we have little support from.!) Jes, You're reallyWrong! Lol! Ha ha !aHHHH!! Pot makes u stupid! ha ha h!! That's the funniest thing i've heard all week!! Is Boxing Safe?Probably to the managers who are pitting a Black & Latino, a Black & Black... Why do I have to provide so many examples of Inhumanities' Reign over Freedom?!?! The REAL people don't need to be reminded, hint hint... "The thin line between Entertainment & War!" -R.A.T.M. You people who Pit Pot vs. Liquor need to Give It Up!!! The herb is the word and I'm beat like Bob Marley!Boo! ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Drug Warriors are just a bunch of childish Trouble Makers who only live War, breathe War, and Excrete War....Therefore all they are is War! America is a big Joke!!! I can't wait to leave! Drug War On Trial!!! [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by observer on April 12, 2001 at 09:37:15 PT With Cannabis Why allow one more substance that makes people stupid?Did taking cannabis make these people "stupid" ?http://www.marijuana-uses.com/examples/Carl Sagan:``. . .I am convinced that there are genuine and valid levels of perception available with cannabis (and probably with other drugs) which are, through the defects of our society and our educational system, unavailable to us without such drugs. Such a remark applies not only to self-awareness and to intellectual pursuits, but also to perceptions of real people, a vastly enhanced sensitivity to facial expression, intonations, and choice of words which sometimes yields a rapport so close it's as if two people are reading each other's minds. . . ''http://www.marijuana-uses.com/examples/Mr_X.htm [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by dddd on April 12, 2001 at 09:20:25 PT Exodus,,Movement of JAH people >" Why allow one more substance that makes people stupid? Isn't alcohol bad enough? "This writer proves that it doesnt necessarily take a substance to make someone stupid.dddd [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by Cuzn Buzz on April 12, 2001 at 08:36:28 PT: BOINK! I like the word boink.The word boink can make me smile just about anywhere it's used in place of any other word.Anybody that thinks marijuana prohibition is going to survive the migration of political power to we who know better is out of their BOINKING mind. [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by RAS JAMES RSIFWH on April 12, 2001 at 08:24:48 PT It works stupid. I suffer from mild arthritis; and when I smoke pot the pain vanishes and i find myself walking, working, etc., etc. Yes! Enjoying these activities with no awareness of my arthritis.So who's stupid? Not the marijuana smoker!Who wrote and sang the greatest album of the 20th century according to Time Magazine?Who was the most influential artist of the second half of the 20th century according to the New York Times?Who wrote and sang the Anthem of the 20th century according to the BBC?Who is the Symbol of Freedom in every country in the world according to the Head of International Amnesty?Barry if you're still out there...No! It is not George Washington. No! not you either.It is the man who bought two pounds of Marijuana a week. One was for him to smoke and the other was for his friends who came to visit...bob marley.By the Way! The album was "Exodus"..."Send us another Brother Moses to lead us across the Red Sea...We're leaving Babylonia...headed for the Promised Land"...in this Exodus."Stupid stays in Babylonia where pot is illegal!Give All Praise and Honor To Jah Rastafar-I who livith and reignith in I and I. [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by kaptinemo on April 12, 2001 at 07:29:34 PT So, cannabis = stupidity, huh? Back during alcohol Prohibition, one of the supposedly sly little wink, wink...nudge,nudge jokes was that ethanol was purely for 'medicinal purposes'. Everybody knew exactly what that really meant. The media always played along. In the movies of the period, there was always the knowing look, the gestures, the smiles. "Medicinal purposes', uh-hunh.This pattern of the obligatory condescension has carried through until today: the oft-lamented 'giggle factor'."Great news for all you baby-boomers who are hitting your 50s and getting a bit achy in the, err, joints: tie-dye an old T-shirt, dig out your Joan Baez LPs, dust off the bong, and we'll have a teach-in against arthritis! Somebody bring a case of Oreos.""Why allow one more substance that makes people stupid? Isn't alcohol bad enough?Again, the condescension. The a priori assumption, never proved, that cannabis use leads to stupidity. Never, oh my, never a serious study of the effects of cannabis prohibition upon society! (Snigger, giggle, nyuk-nyuk-nyuk!) That's way too much for the Great UnWashed to handle.Perhaps this is why pols fight tooth-and-nail to exempt themselves from the piss-tests they merrily saddle the rest of us with; they're are rightfully afraid that the true reason why so few sensible laws emanate from their hallowed chambers might be found out.I can't take it anymore. To calm my nerves, I'm gonna watch my old tapes of that (incredibly beautiful and awe-inspiring) cannabis-induced idiocy called Cosmos produced and written by that brain-damaged and immensely stupid pothead, the late Carl Sagan. [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by Ethan Russo, MD on April 12, 2001 at 07:14:41 PT: Not Easy "But this new system does seem open to easy and widespread abuse."I do not agree. The forms posted by Health Cannada (sorry, couldn't resist) are quite detailed in their questions. Interestingly, the space provided for answers is very small. I feel that the existing safeguards are rigorous, enough so that few people will be able to negotiate them falsely. Medical professionals are extremely cautious when signing forms of this type, and no one is going to risk their license or integrity creating a "medical marijuana mill." The real issue is whether the whole affair is not a waste of time and effort when legalization and regulation are the only reasonable policies with respect to cannabis. [ Post Comment ] Post Comment Name: Optional Password: E-Mail: Subject: Comment: [Please refrain from using profanity in your message] Link URL: Link Title: