REEFER MADNESS!!!!!!

[BadBeast]

It is my belief - my opinion - that he has accepted some bad signal, and has built a belief system based on that.

Specifically: That prevention is and must be tied to prohibition.  All of the things he believes that I disagree with stem from that.

Then I'd say that it's no different than the belief that legalization will ultimately lead to education that prevents debilitating addiction to everything BUT MJ.

Prohibition is not the answer, but neither is willful ignorance of the fact that the people who become long term pot smokers will eventually come into contact with drugs that have a much higher chance of fucking their lives and families all to shit.  Whether they get involved with them sometimes comes down to a few second decision while they're high on whether they'd like to be more high.

Not always, but sometimes and those sometimes are, with statistics to back it, really fucking debilitating.

Balls. I've never been so stoned on pot that I thought that maybe trying heroin would be a good idea. People who make that decision were always going to make that decision.

No. Neither have I.  I've been around both for long enough to see that the two drugs are rarely  marketed together. Heroin addicts don't have money to waste on Pot, and Heroin dealers (at least at street level) don't bother selling it because their clientele spend every last penny on either heroin, or rocks. Pot dealers don't sell heroin, because it's far too on top to risk having class A's around, in case they get a spin.

Selling Pot is about £150 fine. Selling Class A's, you can be looking at 4 months on remand before your trial even comes up. If you offer a spliff to a heroin addict, he'll usually refuse it anyway, because it takes the roll out of his buzz, and brings his rattle on quicker.

Pot is a wide spectrum, socially acceptable drug, by and large. Heroin isn't.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

It is my belief - my opinion - that he has accepted some bad signal, and has built a belief system based on that.

Specifically: That prevention is and must be tied to prohibition.  All of the things he believes that I disagree with stem from that.

Then I'd say that it's no different than the belief that legalization will ultimately lead to education that prevents debilitating addiction to everything BUT MJ.

Prohibition is not the answer, but neither is willful ignorance of the fact that the people who become long term pot smokers will eventually come into contact with drugs that have a much higher chance of fucking their lives and families all to shit.  Whether they get involved with them sometimes comes down to a few second decision while they're high on whether they'd like to be more high.

Not always, but sometimes and those sometimes are, with statistics to back it, really fucking debilitating.

Why do they come into contact with those drugs, DP?

Is it because pot is illegal and people who deal pot often deal other illegal drugs?

Is that issue one that might be adequately addressed via legalization?

If pot was not a black market product, would that reduce the pot user's exposure to the ability to purchase illegal drugs?

[Telarus]

IMO hallucinogens do not belong in a discussion of addictive drugs.  Feel free to correct me on that if you think otherwise.

Also, when did this become a discussion of addictive drugs?  Last I checked, we were talking about weed.

fuck I'm staying awake for this..  hate you soooo much Dok

So in you're mind, weed is not addictive, at all

there's never been a weed addict.  ever?

I've known a few.  But in all honestly, they'd be just as likely to get addicted to Cheese Whiz.

Funny you should say that Dok (SCIENCE!):

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/332253/title/Fats_stimulate_binge_eating_

Eating fatty foods may give you the munchies. A new study shows that when rats taste fat, it stimulates the same cellular buttons triggered by the active ingredient in marijuana, telling the body to keep on eating.

Uncovering the events that lead to this molecular "eat, eat" missive will make it easier to develop drugs that curb binge eating and other weight related-problems, says pharmacologist Daniele Piomelli, who led the new work.

Piomelli and his colleagues were interested in compounds known as endocannabinoids — the body's version of the active ingredient in marijuana — and the role they play in overeating. Several kinds of endocannabinoids are released in the brain and body, but researchers are still discovering the nitty-gritty of where and when these compounds regulate mood and behavior.

So the researchers fed rats one of four liquid diets: fat (in the form of corn oil), protein, sugar or a nutrition shake combination of fat, protein and sugar. To ensure that the body's digestive signals wouldn't interfere with the experiments, a surgically implanted valve in the rats' upper stomach drained the food once eaten. Then the team measured endocannabinoid activity in the brain and other tissues. Compared with rats eating sugar or protein alone, rats on the fat diet had a surge of endocannabinoid activity in their gut, the team reported online July 5 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. And these rats wouldn't stop slurping their corn oil. When given a compound that blocked the cellular buttons that the endocannabinoids typically hit, the fat-eating rats immediately stopped eating.

"It was a very striking effect," says Piomelli, of the University of California, Irvine and the Italian Institute of Technology in Genoa, Italy.

That a feedback loop in animals encourages bingeing on fats makes sense, says Angelo Izzo of the University of Naples Federico II in Italy, who was not involved in the work. From an evolutionary point of view, fats were once a valuable, rare commodity that played a pivotal role in survival.

The new research is exciting because it suggests blocking endocannabinoid activity in the gut might curb overeating, says Izzo. A drug designed to do just that turned out to also interfere with endocannabinoid activity in the brain, making some people anxious and irritable. But in the new work, the fat-triggered activity was localized to the gut. Piomelli's team hopes to generate new drugs that wouldn't enter the brain.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

It is my belief - my opinion - that he has accepted some bad signal, and has built a belief system based on that.

Specifically: That prevention is and must be tied to prohibition.  All of the things he believes that I disagree with stem from that.

Then I'd say that it's no different than the belief that legalization will ultimately lead to education that prevents debilitating addiction to everything BUT MJ.

Prohibition is not the answer, but neither is willful ignorance of the fact that the people who become long term pot smokers will eventually come into contact with drugs that have a much higher chance of fucking their lives and families all to shit.  Whether they get involved with them sometimes comes down to a few second decision while they're high on whether they'd like to be more high.

Not always, but sometimes and those sometimes are, with statistics to back it, really fucking debilitating.

Balls. I've never been so stoned on pot that I thought that maybe trying heroin would be a good idea. People who make that decision were always going to make that decision.

No. Neither have I.  I've been around both for long enough to see that the two drugs are rarely  marketed together. Heroin addicts don't have money to waste on Pot, and Heroin dealers (at least at street level) don't bother selling it because their clientele spend every last penny on either heroin, or rocks. Pot dealers don't sell heroin, because it's far too on top to risk having class A's around, in case they get a spin.

Selling Pot is about £150 fine. Selling Class A's, you can be looking at 4 months on remand before your trial even comes up. If you offer a spliff to a heroin addict, he'll usually refuse it anyway, because it takes the roll out of his buzz, and brings his rattle on quicker.

Pot is a wide spectrum, socially acceptable drug, by and large. Heroin isn't.

IME heroin addicts often also smoke pot if they have it, and also drink alcohol.

Coke addicts won't as often smoke pot, but they will drink alcohol

Meth addicts will usually drink alcohol.

Potheads are somewhat less likely to drink alcohol or use harder drugs unless you count hallucinogens

Alcoholics will often use any drug placed within their reach

The main trend I have seen is that the more destructive the drug, the more likely the addict is to use other highly damaging drugs. I think this points to a self-destructive tendency in the addict. This reverts to an earlier point I tried to bring up but which was ignored, which is that the #1 most reliable predictor of substance abuse is a history of physical, sexual, or psychological abuse.

[BadBeast]

And I don't buy into that "Gateway Drug" myth either. Pot is nothing like a gateway drug. It's got no noticeably addictive trigger for a start. Saying it's a Gateway drug, makes as much sense as saying that a Mars bar is a gateway food that leads to morbid obesity. There is a gateway drug, that triggers every dopamine receptor you've got, really quickly. But the focus gets shifted to the more politically volatile scapegoat of Pot. Purely because there's far too much money involved in legitimate shareholders businesses to make Tobacco look any worse than it already does.
Tobacco is the gateway drug that makes people far more vulnerable to other addictive substances. It's the one that people usually try first, stay with the longest, and are most likely to die from. There's a whole multinational industry, just grown up around the cancers that tobacco causes. And that's secondary to the sales and tax involved.

Two thirds of people who try cigarettes go on to be regular smokers, compared to around 20% of people who try heroin who going on to be habituated users. And just about everyone who uses any kind of recreational or habit forming drug, smokes tobacco as well.

LMNO's time and effort, admirable as it is, would be far better spent, discouraging kids from smoking tobacco, than toking on weed.
All the over exaggerated dangers that people have attributed to weed over the years, that have turned out to be at best spurious, at worst completely untrue, are patently obvious when applied to tobacco.
That's the one that should be ringing bells, not pot!
But where are the dedicated teams of outreach and support workers for those unfortunate youngsters  addicted to smoking? Where are the governmental lobbyists campaigning to ban smoking?  *Listens*  It's all gone quiet all of a sudden. Wonder why?   Got a light, Lucifer?

ETA; Nigel, Heroin addicts will virtually never mix alcohol with heroin. Not more than once anyway. It's the quickest way to go over. They might use it as a substitute when they've given up, but the two do not mix at all well. 

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Curiously, the #1 predictor for cigarette smoking in women is also childhood abuse.

Go figure.


Also, I know heroin addicts won't mix, but they often drink when they can't shoot.

IME anyway (as the once squeaky-clean 18-yo gf of a heroin addict and his friends)

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Oh, and they ALL smoke cigarettes... except the pot smokers. A few pot smokers I have known will smoke tobacco, but most of them haven't, and a lot of them think it's really gross, damaging, and addictive.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

A PS... my first husband, who quit heroin, was never able to quit tobacco. He said it was much harder than the horse and even though he tried many times, the last time I ran into him (ten years ago) he was still smoking Camels.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

IME heroin addicts often also smoke pot if they have it, and also drink alcohol.

Coke addicts won't as often smoke pot, but they will drink alcohol

Meth addicts will usually drink alcohol.

Potheads are somewhat less likely to drink alcohol or use harder drugs unless you count hallucinogens

Alcoholics will often use any drug placed within their reach

The main trend I have seen is that the more destructive the drug, the more likely the addict is to use other highly damaging drugs. I think this points to a self-destructive tendency in the addict. This reverts to an earlier point I tried to bring up but which was ignored, which is that the #1 most reliable predictor of substance abuse is a history of physical, sexual, or psychological abuse.

THIS.

Besides, these people band together with people who have the same drug of choice, and different types of addicts look down on other kinds of addicts. Heroin addicts hate tweakers. Tweakers hate junkies. Alkies hate everybody, except when they love everybody. 

[BadBeast]

Oh, and they ALL smoke cigarettes... except the pot smokers. A few pot smokers I have known will smoke tobacco, but most of them haven't, and a lot of them think it's really gross, damaging, and addictive.

Yeah, although tobacco is more addicting, and I've smoked for over 30 years, I've never found myself on my knees in shop doorways sucking old men off for cigarette money.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Oh, and they ALL smoke cigarettes... except the pot smokers. A few pot smokers I have known will smoke tobacco, but most of them haven't, and a lot of them think it's really gross, damaging, and addictive.

Yeah, although tobacco is more addicting, and I've smoked for over 30 years, I've never found myself on my knees in shop doorways sucking old men off for cigarette money.

Yes, but people talk about "gateways" more than they talk about "predictors", partly because they don't understand the difference and partly because they're looking for things to punish rather than for avenues of prevention.

[BadBeast]

Oh, and they ALL smoke cigarettes... except the pot smokers. A few pot smokers I have known will smoke tobacco, but most of them haven't, and a lot of them think it's really gross, damaging, and addictive.

Yeah, although tobacco is more addicting, and I've smoked for over 30 years, I've never found myself on my knees in shop doorways sucking old men off for cigarette money.

Yes, but people talk about "gateways" more than they talk about "predictors", partly because they don't understand the difference and partly because they're looking for things to punish rather than for avenues of prevention.

True enough. "Gateway" is easier to sell to a public who are generally pretty uninformed, and who like to think that they are protected from nasty things like addiction, by their own superior moral fortitude.  

[AFK]

Was checking PMs.  (Thanks for the support guys!)  Couldn't resist the Monkey urge to leave this little nugget I found on Cracked. 

http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-pro-marijuana-arguments-that-arent-helping/

Anyhoo, I'm sure I'll be back at some point.  Hotel California and all that. 

But I'm vamoosing for awhile.  But because I'm sure someone will notice and say, yeah, I'll probably lurk here and there. 

Trip Zero's a mighty good punner and I can't resist a good pun. 

Eris-speed to everyone!

-RWHN

[maphdet]

Was checking PMs.  (Thanks for the support guys!)  Couldn't resist the Monkey urge to leave this little nugget I found on Cracked. 

http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-pro-marijuana-arguments-that-arent-helping/

Anyhoo, I'm sure I'll be back at some point.  Hotel California and all that. 

But I'm vamoosing for awhile.  But because I'm sure someone will notice and say, yeah, I'll probably lurk here and there. 

Trip Zero's a mighty good punner and I can't resist a good pun. 

Eris-speed to everyone!

-RWHN

Hey If I ever said anything to sway your decision-sorry RWHN.

I dig your postings. Hope to see them again.

[Disco Pickle]

If the argument is that pot is the safer choice, then by that rationale, it's also safer than deep-throating a cactus or mouth-fucking a rattlesnake. Is someone obligating you to choose between the two? There's not a third option of just not doing either of them? That has baffled me for years, and I still don't understand it. But I've heard it. A lot. As if the legalization of one unhealthy activity obligates us to legalize every single thing that's less lethal than that.

god damn if that part of that article didn't make me laugh until I pooped a little.