[Hipfan734]

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They are totally draconian, folks. They are behind by a century. Only the NDP and Green oppose the US style Bush-Nazi war on drugs.

The recent Liberal and Conservative cooperation has brought Republican Fascism to Canada. All pot users who thought Canada was more tolerant, well no, now we are in many ways WORSE than the USA if you consider Colorado, Alaska and California.

[mojo_mattv]

You know what, I'm getting kind of fed up with the stupidity that transcends most of the pro-marijuana marches and rallies. It's of my oppinion that if you want a controlled substance to be legalized or at the very least decriminalized, getting several hundred people together to get high in a park is probably not the best way to go about doing it. If alchol prohibition were still in effect would you take any group seriously if they just got together in large groups and got drunk? I find that people who participate in these large rallies usually do more harm then good for their cause. Rarely does the media interview any of the successful lawyers, doctors or bussinessmen (or women) taking part, it's always some eighteen year old stoner who talks about how he smokes two to three joints a day, and "he turned out alright.". I agree whole heartedly that it should be a legalized substance I just feel that the way alot of people go about attempting to do something about it is pointless. I don't know this is all stemming from an article I read in the Toronto Sun this morning, I didn't even go to the link here, just felt like arguing for arguing's sake. Tell me I'm wrong I don't claim to be an expert just feeling bitter this morning.

[The Darkest Canuck]

F U C K THA POLICE!

[Hipfan734]

You know what, I'm getting kind of fed up with the stupidity that transcends most of the pro-marijuana marches and rallies. It's of my oppinion that if you want a controlled substance to be legalized or at the very least decriminalized, getting several hundred people together to get high in a park is probably not the best way to go about doing it. If alchol prohibition were still in effect would you take any group seriously if they just got together in large groups and got drunk? I find that people who participate in these large rallies usually do more harm then good for their cause. Rarely does the media interview any of the successful lawyers, doctors or bussinessmen (or women) taking part, it's always some eighteen year old stoner who talks about how he smokes two to three joints a day, and "he turned out alright.". I agree whole heartedly that it should be a legalized substance I just feel that the way alot of people go about attempting to do something about it is pointless. I don't know this is all stemming from an article I read in the Toronto Sun this morning, I didn't even go to the link here, just felt like arguing for arguing's sake. Tell me I'm wrong I don't claim to be an expert just feeling bitter this morning.

You do sound bitter, and aggressive. Pot doesn't induce violence, it causes calmness and the munchies. Those rallies are overwhelmingly peaceful. I'd support the right of adults to consume beer, even though alcohol causes rowdy behaviour, 1000's of deaths per year, and severe addiction. Cannabis does not cause fatal overdoses, or lethal liver damage, or severe withdrawal symptoms common to alcohol and tobacco use. It's about tolerance. Do you really believe that Alex Lifeson should be persecuted for cannabis use ? What about all the other musicians who use it to relax or enhance their creativity ? Why pursue the failed USA war on drugs, when the evidence is that the US has the highest incarceration rate on earth, the highest violent crime rate in the western industrialized world, and their harsh drug laws have not reduced use at all, it's merely fueled a bloated and ruthless prison industry. Bush has a 20-30% approval rating - in the more right-wing US, so why even THINK about bringing such divisive and destructive policies to Canada ? There are dozens of possible sane and more balanced ways drug laws can be enforced, rather than such a hardline clampdown.

Simple : if you want to round up all the pot users and imprison them, vote Liberal & Conservative. If you do not, vote Green Party or NDP.

Btw, I never participated in any rallies because they don't aesthetically appeal to me, but let us be reasonable in determining the fate of people's *lives*. Hyper-criminalization is not the answer. IOW, I'd look beyond the impression those rallies leave you with, and look more at the fact that the vast majority of Canadians want Cannabis to be decriminalized or legalized. The larger issue is : should Canada be copying Republican party social policy ?

[mojo_mattv]

You know what, I'm getting kind of fed up with the stupidity that transcends most of the pro-marijuana marches and rallies. It's of my oppinion that if you want a controlled substance to be legalized or at the very least decriminalized, getting several hundred people together to get high in a park is probably not the best way to go about doing it. If alchol prohibition were still in effect would you take any group seriously if they just got together in large groups and got drunk? I find that people who participate in these large rallies usually do more harm then good for their cause. Rarely does the media interview any of the successful lawyers, doctors or bussinessmen (or women) taking part, it's always some eighteen year old stoner who talks about how he smokes two to three joints a day, and "he turned out alright.". I agree whole heartedly that it should be a legalized substance I just feel that the way alot of people go about attempting to do something about it is pointless. I don't know this is all stemming from an article I read in the Toronto Sun this morning, I didn't even go to the link here, just felt like arguing for arguing's sake. Tell me I'm wrong I don't claim to be an expert just feeling bitter this morning.

You do sound bitter, and aggressive. Pot doesn't induce violence, it causes calmness and the munchies. Those rallies are overwhelmingly peaceful. I'd support the right of adults to consume beer, even though alcohol causes rowdy behaviour, 1000's of deaths per year, and severe addiction. Cannabis does not cause fatal overdoses, or lethal liver damage, or severe withdrawal symptoms common to alcohol and tobacco use. It's about tolerance. Do you really believe that Alex Lifeson should be persecuted for cannabis use ? What about all the other musicians who use it to relax or enhance their creativity ? Why pursue the failed USA war on drugs, when the evidence is that the US has the highest incarceration rate on earth, the highest violent crime rate in the western industrialized world, and their harsh drug laws have not reduced use at all, it's merely fueled a bloated and ruthless prison industry. Bush has a 20-30% approval rating - in the more right-wing US, so why even THINK about bringing such divisive and destructive policies to Canada ? There are dozens of possible sane and more balanced ways drug laws can be enforced, rather than such a hardline clampdown.

Simple : if you want to round up all the pot users and imprison them, vote Liberal & Conservative. If you do not, vote Green Party or NDP.

Btw, I never participated in any rallies because they don't aesthetically appeal to me, but let us be reasonable in determining the fate of people's *lives*. Hyper-criminalization is not the answer. IOW, I'd look beyond the impression those rallies leave you with, and look more at the fact that the vast majority of Canadians want Cannabis to be decriminalized or legalized. The larger issue is : should Canada be copying Republican party social policy ?

I believe I did say that I was also for decriminalization, however; I still believe that getting several thousand people together and getting stoned doesn't do much good. Anyways, I'm not gonna get into this anymore then I already have. Did you just join the site to post this or are you actually interested in the hip? I don't mean to sound like an asshole it's just that I've been seeing alot of people joining lately and then promoting their "cause" in their first post and then not posting ever again (or just in response to critisism of their original post). just wondering...

[Hipfan734]

Actually, I was noodling around with the Lydian mode guitar riff for "Ahead By A Century" on my acoustic guitar, when the news came on about Bill C-26, and I thought it was upsetting and regressive.

Music has always inspired activism before, and activism has often inspired music... they are socially intertwined. It's about liberty, tolerance, humanity, peace, love and freedom. These are things antithetical to the US war on drugs.


Sorry if you don't give a damn.

[Daryl24]

i can buy my weed for damn good prices, if it were legal, wouldn't it cost everyone a fortune?

[The Horrible Esthete]

Well, I can grow all the luscious Early Girl tomatoes I can possibly eat in a growing season on just one plant. And it costs about three dollars.

You do the math.

[skippy the wonder dog]

mojo_mattv's complaint is borne out by the argument made here, which revolves around weed's supposed aid to the creative process and around exaggerating its relative safety vs legal drugs.

If we were dealing with grown-ups in the legalization movement, rather than clones of Marc Emery, we'd be talking about how prohibition of a popular drug serves primarily to fund organized crime, which in turn promotes arguably more serious social ills, such as the spread of hard drugs, prostitution, etc. Prohibition is a boon to criminal enterprise.

This is the reason to legalize and decriminalize drugs. It's time to treat drug abuse as a public health problem, not a crime.

[mojo_mattv]

mojo_mattv's complaint is borne out by the argument made here, which revolves around weed's supposed aid to the creative process and around exaggerating its relative safety vs legal drugs.

If we were dealing with grown-ups in the legalization movement, rather than clones of Marc Emery, we'd be talking about how prohibition of a popular drug serves primarily to fund organized crime, which in turn promotes arguably more serious social ills, such as the spread of hard drugs, prostitution, etc. Prohibition is a boon to criminal enterprise.

This is the reason to legalize and decriminalize drugs. It's time to treat drug abuse as a public health problem, not a crime.

Very enlightening Skippy, like I said, I'm not against marijauna use I'm just saying that in order to make a successful attempt at decriminalization one must make the change through legislation rather than getting stoned in a big group holding signs saying "legalize it!"

[Hipfan734]

mojo_mattv's complaint is borne out by the argument made here, which revolves around weed's supposed aid to the creative process and around exaggerating its relative safety vs legal drugs.

If we were dealing with grown-ups in the legalization movement, rather than clones of Marc Emery, we'd be talking about how prohibition of a popular drug serves primarily to fund organized crime, which in turn promotes arguably more serious social ills, such as the spread of hard drugs, prostitution, etc. Prohibition is a boon to criminal enterprise.

This is the reason to legalize and decriminalize drugs. It's time to treat drug abuse as a public health problem, not a crime.

1) Calculate the number of Cannabis induced fatalities per year, and contrast that with the number caused by use of tobacco, alcohol and pharmaceuticals (or even caffeine and aspirin). It's non-lethality is not being exaggerated. It's potential for causing addiction is rated lower (by medical doctors) than most other drugs. Again, it's relatively harmless when you consider the 2 primary medical indicators of harm : lethality and addictiveness.

2) The most prolific songwriter in the history of mankind, Paul McCartney, was and is a heavy potsmoker. Same for Bob Dylan. If those individuals creativity and writing ability is enhanced or in any way augmented by *their* *enjoyment* of Cannabis, why assume that it has no effect on the imagination of *certain* individuals who choose to use it, and enjoy it ?

3) By criminalizing coffee, or alcohol, or tobacco, we'd simply take the industry out of the hands of licensed/regulated companies and hand it over to ruthless organized crime groups. Driving it's use, distribution and production underground would not reduce use, it would merely incarcerate millions of non-violent consenting adults and make organized crime kingpins very rich.

Also, to assume that I am an Emery clone is false. I'm not a libertarian/extremist as he is, and I disagree with many/most of his confrontational tactics and ego-stroking.

But I certainly don't believe it is just for him to have to spend years or decades in an American prison for selling pot seeds, that is severely harsh, unjust, cruel and disproportionate punishment.

[Hipfan734]

mojo_mattv's complaint is borne out by the argument made here, which revolves around weed's supposed aid to the creative process and around exaggerating its relative safety vs legal drugs.

If we were dealing with grown-ups in the legalization movement, rather than clones of Marc Emery, we'd be talking about how prohibition of a popular drug serves primarily to fund organized crime, which in turn promotes arguably more serious social ills, such as the spread of hard drugs, prostitution, etc. Prohibition is a boon to criminal enterprise.

This is the reason to legalize and decriminalize drugs. It's time to treat drug abuse as a public health problem, not a crime.

Very enlightening Skippy, like I said, I'm not against marijauna use I'm just saying that in order to make a successful attempt at decriminalization one must make the change through legislation rather than getting stoned in a big group holding signs saying "legalize it!"

But those crowds are such a tiny fragment of the Cannabis community. Millions of Canadians have used / are using Cannabis. Why keep zeroing in on those protesters as the sole manifestation of the pro-decriminalization/pro-legalization movement ? The issue goes beyond the small crowds of peaceful public inhalers, and their communal antics. Currently, the US is warehousing 1000's upon 1000's of those types of non-violent folks in their prison industry. Do we really want to round them up and pursue such rabid intolerance ?

Sometimes there HAS to be some sort of speaking out, in public, or in print. To just sit passively by while Harper & Dion slide bill C-26 into law means potential serious jail time for those relatively small crowds, and the hundreds of thousands of Canadians those crowds symbolize.

The legislative changes you refer to will not happen unless more NDP and Green Party members are elected to parliament, or unless the Liberal and Conservative MP's change their ideologies (which is unlikely).

Verbally chastizing the justified demonstrators only facilitates bill C-26, so please, try to see the larger issue, and the hundreds of thousands of Canadians NOT at those rallies.

[skippy the wonder dog]

1) Calculate the number of Cannabis induced fatalities per year, and contrast that with the number caused by use of tobacco, alcohol and pharmaceuticals (or even caffeine and aspirin).

Since you've presumably got all those numbers at your fingertips, I'm sure you won't mind sharing the data.

That is, in any case, a specious argument. Death is not the only form of harm. Recent research has suggested that heavy users are four times more likely to suffer from depression and psychotic illnesses than non-users.

There is an enormous amount of misinformation on this subject, both from anti-drug activists who exaggerate the dangers, and from pro-drug activists who claim that cannabis is harmless. The fact is that it is not harmless. Any drug is potentially harmful.

It's potential for causing addiction is rated lower (by medical doctors) than most other drugs.

I'm sure you're about to share all the peer-reviewed research on that, too. Make sure to distinguish between physical addiction and psychological reliance.

The pro-drug side claims that it is completely non-addictive, relying on physical addiction as a benchmark and comparing to nicotine. However, some research suggests that one is as likely to become psychologically dependent on cannabis as one is to become an alcoholic.

2) The most prolific songwriter in the history of mankind, Paul McCartney, was and is a heavy potsmoker. Same for Bob Dylan.

Many great writers (notably Faulkner) wrote drunk, but this is not an argument against prohibiting alcohol. Coleridge smoked opium. The Grateful Dead and Jimi Hendrix took LSD. Hunter Thompson was continually under the influence of alcohol, mescaline, cannabis, and cocaine.

None of that forms an argument for legalization.

3) By criminalizing coffee, or alcohol, or tobacco, we'd simply take the industry out of the hands of licensed/regulated companies and hand it over to ruthless organized crime groups.

How bright of you, to summarize my argument as if you'd made it.

Unfortunately, the pro-cannabis lobby never makes this argument. Instead, they go on about how harmless cannabis is, and how harmful alcohol and tobbaco are, while gathering in public places to show off their dreadlocks. Marc Emery, the poster child for the delusional states associated with heavy use, is the worst possible spokesman for the movement.

Whether you're a fan of Emery is irrelevant: mojo-mattv's point is well taken. The legalization movement is its own worst enemy. We do not see all those people who aren't participating in the protests, because they don't form part of a public movement to legalize cannabis. What we do see is the equivalent of a bunch of people getting together in a park to drink whisky, as if this act is somehow meaningful.

[longseason]

Okay, so the Tories claim that their bill would make it more difficult to produce and traffic drugs, thereby curtailing the involvement of organized crime in the production and distribution of marijuana, among other drugs.

Ultimately, won't this just drive up the cost of marijuana? Putting it on par with harder drugs, ie cocaine?

I've read somewhere — I think in an article about Canadians being the heaviest users of marijuana among industrialized nations — that we consume more than four times the marijuana per capita compared with our neighbours in the US.

Americans, however, trump us when it comes to cocaine usage, with use double that of the average Canadian. Cocaine use is so prevalent, some would argue, because the US war on drugs has simply raised the value of softer drugs.

Won't this simply make the drug trade more lucrative in Canada, by raising margins for those who produce and distribute?

Not only that, but a more aggressive stance on softer drugs is going to get expensive.

The cost to put a single drug dealer in jail is pretty substantial, including the cost for arrest and conviction, housing etc.

Wouldn't the money be better spent providing treatment or education?

Putting a person in prison produces burdens the welfare system. Every dollar spent on treatment and education ultimately reduces welfare costs.

So, let's spend our money on treatment, education and research. Otherwise, we risk copying the failed policy south of the border.

[mojo_mattv]

mojo_mattv's complaint is borne out by the argument made here, which revolves around weed's supposed aid to the creative process and around exaggerating its relative safety vs legal drugs.

If we were dealing with grown-ups in the legalization movement, rather than clones of Marc Emery, we'd be talking about how prohibition of a popular drug serves primarily to fund organized crime, which in turn promotes arguably more serious social ills, such as the spread of hard drugs, prostitution, etc. Prohibition is a boon to criminal enterprise.

This is the reason to legalize and decriminalize drugs. It's time to treat drug abuse as a public health problem, not a crime.

Very enlightening Skippy, like I said, I'm not against marijauna use I'm just saying that in order to make a successful attempt at decriminalization one must make the change through legislation rather than getting stoned in a big group holding signs saying "legalize it!"

But those crowds are such a tiny fragment of the Cannabis community. Millions of Canadians have used / are using Cannabis. Why keep zeroing in on those protesters as the sole manifestation of the pro-decriminalization/pro-legalization movement ? The issue goes beyond the small crowds of peaceful public inhalers, and their communal antics. Currently, the US is warehousing 1000's upon 1000's of those types of non-violent folks in their prison industry. Do we really want to round them up and pursue such rabid intolerance ?

Sometimes there HAS to be some sort of speaking out, in public, or in print. To just sit passively by while Harper & Dion slide bill C-26 into law means potential serious jail time for those relatively small crowds, and the hundreds of thousands of Canadians those crowds symbolize.

The legislative changes you refer to will not happen unless more NDP and Green Party members are elected to parliament, or unless the Liberal and Conservative MP's change their ideologies (which is unlikely).

Verbally chastizing the justified demonstrators only facilitates bill C-26, so please, try to see the larger issue, and the hundreds of thousands of Canadians NOT at those rallies.

People can come up with statistics to help prove any argument, 96% of people know that.
The primary reason for me and many other people "zeroing in on these protestors" is simply because they happen to be the most visible, and as skippy said, they usually do more bad then good. I'm not so naiive as to assume that these are the only people recreationally enjoying marijuana, however; my point stands that as far as I know that majority of people who do smoke are not actively campaigning for legislative change. Rather it is a disproportionate ammount of "stoners" getting together and protesting in these rallies, and by doing this, drowning out the smaller, quieter groups actively campaigning through legislation.