Welcome back... I've been away... Twitter...y'know.
So, I committed to writing an article about cannabis, Marc Emery and about the laws in Canada. I knew when I committed that it would be a huge endeavour to compile all of that into 1200 words. I didn't succeed by the way. I'm at 1500 and something and there's a book left to write.
If you've been reading me for a while you may have caught a shift in my thinking. It happened about 2.5 years ago when my friends son (My Son That I Stole) was living with me while he was at school in our city. He's a regular toker and I, not knowing my ass from a hole in the ground on the subject of pot, was on a mission to prove to him that he was killing his braincells and himself from smoking weed.
After five hours of research, I had to go to him and apologise because everything I thought I knew was utter, unmitigated garbage.
Since then, I've read and read and read and the more I read, the more angry I am at the 'establishment' and what they're doing to people in my country. It's worse in the US but at least Hilary Clinton has admitted - this week in fact - that the US war on drugs is a colossal failure. Good. She's dead right about that.
Today I spoke to Jodi Emery, Marc Emery's wife. Marc's being extradited to the US, not for selling pot and not for selling seeds but for conspiracy. The Canadian Government had the option of keeping this man, a Canadian citizen, in Canada post sentencing (which, by the way shouldn't be happening at all***). But they declined and now a Canadian is going to the US to be tried under US law. HOW does THAT happen???
After speaking to Jodi, I was not only pissed off - not at her: she's a fighter - but at what's happening in Canada now but what the Harper 'government' has planned. Mandatory minimums. If those are established, you, YES YOU, could be charge with trafficking pot for something as simple as passing a joint or a baggie to someone else. Yes, passing it. AND you would then be subject to a minimum sentence of ? 18 months?
AND, the government then has the right to take your stuff - your house, your assets and your kids. I know. Sounds impossible but it isn't.
Now, for all of you who are sitting there going "well, if you smoke pot, you deserve what you get," Stop.
Cannabis has been used for eons and centuries. Until the US and Canada wanted to get rid of certain immigrant populations, it was legal in both countries. It wasn't even on the radar until the Mexican itinerant workers in the US in the '30s and the Chinese, who came to build the Canadian trans continental railway, started to bug the politicians in the respective countries. Then? WHAM! Criminalise pot. Since then, the machine has done everything it can to demonise a plant.
Well, it's addictive you say? No, it isn't. It may be habit forming for some, but so is having a glass of wine a day or two beers a day. Oh, wait; that's not correct. Alcohol IS addictive. Pot is not. (www.drugwarfacts.org)
Well, it's a gateway drug you say? No, it is not. in a US study that is now four or five years old, over 147,000,000 (yes, that's million) people in the US admitted to having used pot and a large percentage of those were 'last month' users. If pot were a gateway, then one would assume an equally large percentage of people would be using heroin or coke but they aren't. A very small portion of the population uses those drugs. If there's a gateway, it is nicotine or alcohol, both of which have a median first use age of 16 years. Pot? 17.5 years. (www.drugwarfacts.org)
It's cancer causing you say? Nope. Wrong again. If it were, the cancer industry would be on it like a pack of hounds and police forces everywhere would be hauling out the corpses. There aren't any. None.
Well, people die from it you think. No, they don't. A study on www.drugwarfacts.org clearly shows a ZERO for deaths from pot.
There are 5 recorded deaths in the UK between 1998 and 2004 (I'm pulling dates from memory; stats on www.drugwarfacts.org). It is not clear at all, however, what part, if any, cannabis played in those deaths. It looks like none.
Well, pot's way more dangerous than alcohol, right? No. Stoned people don't drive, don't fight, don't beat their wives (OK or their husbands or partners), aren't aggressive, don't commit crimes. In fact, people who are drunk but think the can still drive won't drive if they consume some weed. For some reason, weed even gives drunks enough clarity to keep them out of a car. Other studies also say that stoned drivers are more cautious, have much greater following distances, drive more slowly and are, well, paranoid and less likely to get behind the wheel at all anyway.
Did you know that the chemical composition of Ritalin is very, very close to cocaine? Yeah, like a couple molecules different. We give Ritalin to kids!!! Children are consuming a cocaine-like drug to keep them calm? What the F?
Did you know that over 1000 people die in the US annually - from Tylenol?
Did you know that some 45,000 people are killed due to alcohol in the US annually and that 15,500 of those are killed by drunk drivers? Yes. Killed by a stoned driver? NONE.
Well, pot kills brain cells! Yes, perhaps, but so does sitting in traffic, breathing disgusting exhaust fumes; so does drinking a couple pints; so does falling on your head when you're skiing; so does lack of sleep; so does blowing your nose too hard. What's your point? The brain has an almost unlimited capacity to regenerate cells and dendrites and nodes. There are a bunch of documented cases of people losing half their brain tissue and still leading perfectly fine, functional, use-of-all-appendages lives.
Well, pot sucks up your motivation drive. No, whatever is that hellishly wrong in your life that you want to be stoned 24/7 sucks your motivation and drive. Pot dulls the pain but the problem isn't pot. It's not solving the problem that's the problem.
OK. I'm done. I'm tired and I'm angry and I'm disappointed that so many people default to what they think they know rather than finding out.
So. Read.
WWW.DRUGWARFACTS.ORG This is a searchable database of studies.
It's the oracle. Ask questions. Go search. Please educate yourself; so many in power won't
www.theunionmovie.com
Woody Harrelson's "Grass"
Who funds "Partnership for Drug free America?" - The tobacco and liquor industries.
Prohibition creates crimewaves.
So, I committed to writing an article about cannabis, Marc Emery and about the laws in Canada. I knew when I committed that it would be a huge endeavour to compile all of that into 1200 words. I didn't succeed by the way. I'm at 1500 and something and there's a book left to write.
If you've been reading me for a while you may have caught a shift in my thinking. It happened about 2.5 years ago when my friends son (My Son That I Stole) was living with me while he was at school in our city. He's a regular toker and I, not knowing my ass from a hole in the ground on the subject of pot, was on a mission to prove to him that he was killing his braincells and himself from smoking weed.
After five hours of research, I had to go to him and apologise because everything I thought I knew was utter, unmitigated garbage.
Since then, I've read and read and read and the more I read, the more angry I am at the 'establishment' and what they're doing to people in my country. It's worse in the US but at least Hilary Clinton has admitted - this week in fact - that the US war on drugs is a colossal failure. Good. She's dead right about that.
Today I spoke to Jodi Emery, Marc Emery's wife. Marc's being extradited to the US, not for selling pot and not for selling seeds but for conspiracy. The Canadian Government had the option of keeping this man, a Canadian citizen, in Canada post sentencing (which, by the way shouldn't be happening at all***). But they declined and now a Canadian is going to the US to be tried under US law. HOW does THAT happen???
After speaking to Jodi, I was not only pissed off - not at her: she's a fighter - but at what's happening in Canada now but what the Harper 'government' has planned. Mandatory minimums. If those are established, you, YES YOU, could be charge with trafficking pot for something as simple as passing a joint or a baggie to someone else. Yes, passing it. AND you would then be subject to a minimum sentence of ? 18 months?
AND, the government then has the right to take your stuff - your house, your assets and your kids. I know. Sounds impossible but it isn't.
Now, for all of you who are sitting there going "well, if you smoke pot, you deserve what you get," Stop.
Cannabis has been used for eons and centuries. Until the US and Canada wanted to get rid of certain immigrant populations, it was legal in both countries. It wasn't even on the radar until the Mexican itinerant workers in the US in the '30s and the Chinese, who came to build the Canadian trans continental railway, started to bug the politicians in the respective countries. Then? WHAM! Criminalise pot. Since then, the machine has done everything it can to demonise a plant.
Well, it's addictive you say? No, it isn't. It may be habit forming for some, but so is having a glass of wine a day or two beers a day. Oh, wait; that's not correct. Alcohol IS addictive. Pot is not. (www.drugwarfacts.org)
Well, it's a gateway drug you say? No, it is not. in a US study that is now four or five years old, over 147,000,000 (yes, that's million) people in the US admitted to having used pot and a large percentage of those were 'last month' users. If pot were a gateway, then one would assume an equally large percentage of people would be using heroin or coke but they aren't. A very small portion of the population uses those drugs. If there's a gateway, it is nicotine or alcohol, both of which have a median first use age of 16 years. Pot? 17.5 years. (www.drugwarfacts.org)
It's cancer causing you say? Nope. Wrong again. If it were, the cancer industry would be on it like a pack of hounds and police forces everywhere would be hauling out the corpses. There aren't any. None.
Well, people die from it you think. No, they don't. A study on www.drugwarfacts.org clearly shows a ZERO for deaths from pot.
There are 5 recorded deaths in the UK between 1998 and 2004 (I'm pulling dates from memory; stats on www.drugwarfacts.org). It is not clear at all, however, what part, if any, cannabis played in those deaths. It looks like none.
Well, pot's way more dangerous than alcohol, right? No. Stoned people don't drive, don't fight, don't beat their wives (OK or their husbands or partners), aren't aggressive, don't commit crimes. In fact, people who are drunk but think the can still drive won't drive if they consume some weed. For some reason, weed even gives drunks enough clarity to keep them out of a car. Other studies also say that stoned drivers are more cautious, have much greater following distances, drive more slowly and are, well, paranoid and less likely to get behind the wheel at all anyway.
Did you know that the chemical composition of Ritalin is very, very close to cocaine? Yeah, like a couple molecules different. We give Ritalin to kids!!! Children are consuming a cocaine-like drug to keep them calm? What the F?
Did you know that over 1000 people die in the US annually - from Tylenol?
Did you know that some 45,000 people are killed due to alcohol in the US annually and that 15,500 of those are killed by drunk drivers? Yes. Killed by a stoned driver? NONE.
Well, pot kills brain cells! Yes, perhaps, but so does sitting in traffic, breathing disgusting exhaust fumes; so does drinking a couple pints; so does falling on your head when you're skiing; so does lack of sleep; so does blowing your nose too hard. What's your point? The brain has an almost unlimited capacity to regenerate cells and dendrites and nodes. There are a bunch of documented cases of people losing half their brain tissue and still leading perfectly fine, functional, use-of-all-appendages lives.
Well, pot sucks up your motivation drive. No, whatever is that hellishly wrong in your life that you want to be stoned 24/7 sucks your motivation and drive. Pot dulls the pain but the problem isn't pot. It's not solving the problem that's the problem.
OK. I'm done. I'm tired and I'm angry and I'm disappointed that so many people default to what they think they know rather than finding out.
So. Read.
WWW.DRUGWARFACTS.ORG This is a searchable database of studies.
It's the oracle. Ask questions. Go search. Please educate yourself; so many in power won't
www.theunionmovie.com
Woody Harrelson's "Grass"
Who funds "Partnership for Drug free America?" - The tobacco and liquor industries.
Prohibition creates crimewaves.
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