Two Sides To Marijuana

[superjoint]

By Tim A. Dueck
Source: Grand Forks Gazette

A couple of weeks ago, we took a look at the extent of the marijuana business. This week, we wanted to look at views on the harm or benefits of the drug. Marijuana is part of Canadian culture whether you are for it or against it.
The fact is that marijuana farming, distribution and use is here and it's not going away. It is being grown, sold, bought, smoked and even eaten by more and more Canadians. According to federal statistics 600,000 Canadians have criminal records for marijuana possession.

In comparison there are 100,000 registered Canadians playing our national summer sport of lacrosse. Marijuana culture is as much a part of Canadian identity as beaver pelts and western alienation.

Marijuana is best known as a psychoactive substance that is generally smoked in order to experience an alteration of mood or consciousness. This can lead to feelings from pleasant euphoria to intense paranoia depending on the individual and amount ingested. People's attitude about altered mental perception is likely the biggest reason people either endorse or decry marijuana use. Proponents point to the relaxing effects of marijuana use as a good thing. Opponents worry that a person's impaired judgment can lead to a variety of undesirable actions ranging from prolonged apathy to safety concerns.

What is generally accepted is that smoking anything is not a great thing to do to your lungs. Regular marijuana smokers will experience the same respiratory disease as tobacco smokers. Marijuana smokers counter saying that because a lesser amount is smoked, the harmful effects are reduced.

This summer, Canada's house of sober second thought - the Senate - is looking at the factors underlying the use of drugs in Canada. A report is due out in August and if May's preliminary report is any indication, we can expect further steps down the road of decriminalization.

So far the report has offered an opinion that marijuana is not a "gateway drug." For years marijuana has been identified as the thin edge of the wedge, a step down the path leading to the use of much more harmful drugs like cocaine and heroine. While this concept is going up in smoke, the residue remains.

Brian Taylor of the Cannabis Research Institute in Grand Forks says it is confusing for kids who are being told that marijuana is part of the same genre of drugs as crystal meth and crack. "Kids are off guard because they are told marijuana is really bad. They smoke it and it's not so bad so they are confused about hard drugs."

Taylor is a vocal advocate of using marijuana medicinally and points to stacks of reputable research into the medicinal use of cannabis sativa. The most common and successful medicinal uses include addressing nausea associated with some cancer and AIDS treatments, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis, chronic pain and epilepsy.

However, like any antidote, too much cure can be just as harmful as the disease.

Like all drugs cannabis comes with side effects - the most noticeable is a "high." It is this high and its associated use that make cannabis unlike any other drug Health Canada examines. However, armed with a five-year budget of $7.5 million that is exactly what the Office of Cannabis Medical Access is doing.

Marilyn de Wynter has been a drug and alcohol counselor in Grand Forks for over 20 years. She is cautious about the medicinal use of marijuana. She says some of the good qualities of any substance can be duplicated for medicinal use without the side effect.

"Marijuana has been used as an anti-nausea agent," she says. "But there are probably much better drugs we can use to affect glaucoma."

De Wynter says that the major problem of chronic marijuana use is apathy. "Marijuana use is tricky. Some people use it from the time they are 14. When they are 30 they suddenly realize that they haven't done anything. The problem is that chronic users see themselves as being just as successful as anyone else."

Source: Grand Forks Gazette (CN BC)
Author: Tim A. Dueck
Published: July 3, 2002
Copyright: 2002 Sterling Newspapers
Contact: gfgazedt@sunshinecable.com
Website: http://www.sterlingnews.com/Forks

[roach]

"I would have put a finer point on several statements ,had I any 'personal' knowledge of the substance I am writing about."

At least that was one impression I drew from the article.

A finer point might have been ,"That strains of marijuana are (like their effects) nearly as varied as the users who..........use them."
People abuse food ,(number 1 killer = obesity ) people will abuse snot if you let them......people 'will' abuse marijuana. And if that point 'had' been made ,I then might have added a reply in agreement..

'Living' contributes directly to death ! And It can also be addictive. Now theres confusion.

Pot alone will not kill you any faster (or better) than alot of other things you've learned to deal with in your life.

Remember too there are and probably will always be 'some' people created ,who simply cannot deal with 'anything' in their life with or without marijuana.


...............thought provoking.


roach

[Mandisa]

Hello all,

This being my first post and all, please be gentle.. I currently don't, nor have I ever used pot. My mother has however, and seen some pretty incredible medicinal effects from it. (she's got high blood pressure, and the pot puts her bp back to virtually normal within 5 minutes). This is where I come in. I recently had a double-lung transplant, I'm in a fair amount of pain, and the stupid pain killers are doing SFA for me. Also, it'd be very nice to find something that could let me relax long enough to fall asleep at night, without having to take several different kinds of sleeping pills/relaxants. I know that pot could help me with this, but the problem is, given my new lungs, I can't/won't smoke it. I do know that other methods exist, like ingestion, but is it as potent than smoking it? Could I make a tincture out of the leaves? (you know those echinacea drops you can buy in the stores? Those are tinctures)

I am really hopeful that they'll de-criminalize pot, as I think the medicinal side of that plant need to be used to it's full potential...

[CheebaLaGanja]

www.yahooka.com try looking here for ways to cook pot, it's a lot better than smoking it