Wilbur
New Member
Several weeks ago, a downtown Toronto church was raided. Police confiscated marijuana, hashish and drug smoking paraphernalia. They claimed there was more marijuana onsite than allowed by a Health Canada permit for medicinal use. Weekly, in this city and across Canada, marijuana grow house operations are busted; kids are arrested in parks as they smoke grass — the war on "drugs" marches on. So lucrative is the business of selling marijuana that drug dealers kill each other to stay on top, often also killing or maiming innocent bystanders in the process.
And in the midst of all this, on any given Saturday night, the elite of this country — including doctors, lawyers and journalists — puff away on marijuana and sip red wine as they exchange pleasant conversation at dinner parties. Anything wrong with this picture?
Well, for one thing, it might help if we started being honest about marijuana, who consumes it and just what kind of a health risk it is. Forty one per cent of the population admits to having tried it, 32 per cent, more than once. That’s a fair number of people. I’ve watched lawyers and businesspeople smoke joints, just as kids at rock concerts do. It’s definitely not a back alley thing.
Strangely though, while the people of my generation were big pot smokers, they freak out when they discover their kids are smoking pot. While some shake their heads and remember their youth, others put their kids in rehab for marijuana "addiction", fuelled by "professionals" happy to feed on their fear. The reality is somewhat different. David Wolfe, a psychologist with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, says marijuana isn’t considered a gateway to harder drugs. "It’s considered low-risk compared with others. Smoking marijuana is a rite of passage for the average teen."
One friend of mine comments, "Marijuana leads to Doritos, not harder drugs." Several years ago, the head of security at a major Canadian university told me her biggest worry on Friday nights was the drinkers, because they were the ones who became violent. The dope smokers sat in the corner laughing and eating chips.
In 2004, 67- thousand people were arrested in Canada for cannabis offences, three quarters of those for possesion. Often kids who are arrested end up having to partake in drug treatment programs. University of Victoria associate professor Dr. Bendikt Fischer says, "A judge may sentence a nineteen-year-old kid busted with a joint at a party to treatment rather than jail. The problem is, he’s only considered to have served his sentence if he undergoes treatment, which he doesn’t think he needs. So he fails his conditional sentence order, can be charged again and a problematic cycle begins."
A number of people smoke pot for medical reasons already — to help them deal with everything from multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, cancer and HIV, to severe arthritis and spinal cord injuries. Cannasat Therapeutics, which sells "medical marijuana" says only 500 people use it through Health Canada, although the company estimates 200,000 could be. The company says Health Canada hasn’t educated doctors or patients about how to enroll in a legal program, and that the program is too cumbersome. Doctors are often reluctant to prescribe a medication that has to be smoked and yes, smoking anything is bad for your lungs. But cigarettes are legal, and most pot smokers would find it difficult to make their way through as many joints in a day as the average smoker does cigarettes.
An Ipsos Reid poll conducted last year shows Canadian and American adults feel penalties should be more lenient for the handling of cannabis. Even if our American neighbours feel that way, their legislators don’t. That also is a huge factor in keeping marijuana illegal in this country. The Conservatives apparently like to stay in step with what the Americans are doing.
Dr. Fischer says, "If we had fiscal conservatives in power, we could have been closer to decriminalizing. They would have put a cost benefit analysis together that showed what enforcement costs and what we’re getting out of it, but these conservatives [the current government] are morally conservative."
It wasn’t until gay men and women came out of the closet and revealed their sexual preferences that homosexuals gained a level of respectability and acceptance in society. I also remember years ago seeing a list of women who had obtained abortions, their names published in the newspaper, in the hope it might help the pro-choice movement.
So where are all the marijuana smokers of this country? Why is our generation — and I’m speaking about the baby boom — so reluctant to be upfront about this? Many of us grew up smoking marijuana through high school and university. Why are only a few people fighting a battle that should have been won years ago?
For example, pot activist Mark Emery is fighting extradition to the United States, which wants to jail him for selling seeds. He’s pushed the issue for years, but older and influential marijuana smokers in this country, who could actually change the laws, hypocritically sit there puffing away and doing nothing.
Osgoode Hall law professor Alan Young says, "People who smoked marijuana in the 60s or 70s as parents have fallen prey to some of the hysterical claims to keep their children abstainers. This is the generation that should be moving for law reform, but they’re almost forsaking their past and taking this very hypocritical position that what was good for them is not good for their children. I’m one of the few people carrying the burden of still being a pot smoker because all of these productive businessmen, politicians, lawyers and judges I know who partake refuse to say anything about it."
Myself, I stopped smoking it 20 years ago because I got sick of the way I felt. But I have a number of friends who smoke, some of them to get to sleep, others to relax and still others to get high. I have nothing to benefit from seeing it decriminalized. I just happen to think it’s time the influential people in this country who smoke pot every weekend #8212; the businesspeople, lawmakers and professionals — came out of the closet and tried to change the law.
Newshawk: User - 420 Magazine
Source: CBC News
Pubdate: 25 November 2006
Author: Georgie Binks
Copyright: 2006 CBC
Contact: CBC.ca - Contact Us
Website: https://www.cbc.ca/news/viewpoint/
And in the midst of all this, on any given Saturday night, the elite of this country — including doctors, lawyers and journalists — puff away on marijuana and sip red wine as they exchange pleasant conversation at dinner parties. Anything wrong with this picture?
Well, for one thing, it might help if we started being honest about marijuana, who consumes it and just what kind of a health risk it is. Forty one per cent of the population admits to having tried it, 32 per cent, more than once. That’s a fair number of people. I’ve watched lawyers and businesspeople smoke joints, just as kids at rock concerts do. It’s definitely not a back alley thing.
Strangely though, while the people of my generation were big pot smokers, they freak out when they discover their kids are smoking pot. While some shake their heads and remember their youth, others put their kids in rehab for marijuana "addiction", fuelled by "professionals" happy to feed on their fear. The reality is somewhat different. David Wolfe, a psychologist with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, says marijuana isn’t considered a gateway to harder drugs. "It’s considered low-risk compared with others. Smoking marijuana is a rite of passage for the average teen."
One friend of mine comments, "Marijuana leads to Doritos, not harder drugs." Several years ago, the head of security at a major Canadian university told me her biggest worry on Friday nights was the drinkers, because they were the ones who became violent. The dope smokers sat in the corner laughing and eating chips.
In 2004, 67- thousand people were arrested in Canada for cannabis offences, three quarters of those for possesion. Often kids who are arrested end up having to partake in drug treatment programs. University of Victoria associate professor Dr. Bendikt Fischer says, "A judge may sentence a nineteen-year-old kid busted with a joint at a party to treatment rather than jail. The problem is, he’s only considered to have served his sentence if he undergoes treatment, which he doesn’t think he needs. So he fails his conditional sentence order, can be charged again and a problematic cycle begins."
A number of people smoke pot for medical reasons already — to help them deal with everything from multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, cancer and HIV, to severe arthritis and spinal cord injuries. Cannasat Therapeutics, which sells "medical marijuana" says only 500 people use it through Health Canada, although the company estimates 200,000 could be. The company says Health Canada hasn’t educated doctors or patients about how to enroll in a legal program, and that the program is too cumbersome. Doctors are often reluctant to prescribe a medication that has to be smoked and yes, smoking anything is bad for your lungs. But cigarettes are legal, and most pot smokers would find it difficult to make their way through as many joints in a day as the average smoker does cigarettes.
An Ipsos Reid poll conducted last year shows Canadian and American adults feel penalties should be more lenient for the handling of cannabis. Even if our American neighbours feel that way, their legislators don’t. That also is a huge factor in keeping marijuana illegal in this country. The Conservatives apparently like to stay in step with what the Americans are doing.
Dr. Fischer says, "If we had fiscal conservatives in power, we could have been closer to decriminalizing. They would have put a cost benefit analysis together that showed what enforcement costs and what we’re getting out of it, but these conservatives [the current government] are morally conservative."
It wasn’t until gay men and women came out of the closet and revealed their sexual preferences that homosexuals gained a level of respectability and acceptance in society. I also remember years ago seeing a list of women who had obtained abortions, their names published in the newspaper, in the hope it might help the pro-choice movement.
So where are all the marijuana smokers of this country? Why is our generation — and I’m speaking about the baby boom — so reluctant to be upfront about this? Many of us grew up smoking marijuana through high school and university. Why are only a few people fighting a battle that should have been won years ago?
For example, pot activist Mark Emery is fighting extradition to the United States, which wants to jail him for selling seeds. He’s pushed the issue for years, but older and influential marijuana smokers in this country, who could actually change the laws, hypocritically sit there puffing away and doing nothing.
Osgoode Hall law professor Alan Young says, "People who smoked marijuana in the 60s or 70s as parents have fallen prey to some of the hysterical claims to keep their children abstainers. This is the generation that should be moving for law reform, but they’re almost forsaking their past and taking this very hypocritical position that what was good for them is not good for their children. I’m one of the few people carrying the burden of still being a pot smoker because all of these productive businessmen, politicians, lawyers and judges I know who partake refuse to say anything about it."
Myself, I stopped smoking it 20 years ago because I got sick of the way I felt. But I have a number of friends who smoke, some of them to get to sleep, others to relax and still others to get high. I have nothing to benefit from seeing it decriminalized. I just happen to think it’s time the influential people in this country who smoke pot every weekend #8212; the businesspeople, lawmakers and professionals — came out of the closet and tried to change the law.
Newshawk: User - 420 Magazine
Source: CBC News
Pubdate: 25 November 2006
Author: Georgie Binks
Copyright: 2006 CBC
Contact: CBC.ca - Contact Us
Website: https://www.cbc.ca/news/viewpoint/
