Thursday, July 05, 2012

Legalize marijuana?

Should marijuana be legalized? Does society really need it, and who would benefit from it? What are the cons of weed being legal? Are people really ready for it to be legal or, will legalization lead to some sort of abuse? Are the studies AGAINST weed fair? Are they credible, properly studied, and scientifically proven? Are the studies FOR weed fair? Are they credible, properly studied, and scientifically proven? Your views on legalizing marijuana?

Brent

21 comments:

English student said...

This issue has a lot of gray area to it.
Personally, I think that once something becomes legal, people will have no interest in doing it because there is no longer the thrill of breaking the law, which was associated to it when it was illegal. Yet, this drug can have harmful side effects just as all drugs can, such as altering the brain chemicals of the user’s brain which could lead them to commit, or be the victim of, various crimes. Anything that can make you go “loopy” or “crazy” is not something you should want to mess with unless you want to wake up in a jail cell with no recollection as to how you got there. Honestly, I have read an article about this, and it says that long-term abuse of marijuana can cause psychosis. Also, it says that men can become sterile after abusing the drug for years and years.
http://www.drugfreeworld.org/drugfacts/marijuana/the-harmful-effects.html
The above link is something wonderful to look at if you want to know more about the side effects hat marijuana can cause. Even if it may have “good” health benefits, there still is a chance that the mind-altering parts of the drug can lead to abuse of the said drug. So, no I don’t feel it should be legalized for even if people might stop using it because they feel it is no longer fun to do when its legal, the negative health aspects of it, outweigh any good it could potentially do.
Lauren Smith

English student said...

I think it marijuana should be legalized in United States. Marijuana isn’t more harmful than alcohol and cigarettes. There are many benefitted to legalizing marijuana, such as government would earn more tax money, prize for buying marijuana would be less, marijuana related theft and crimes would be reduces, and more. By legalizing marijuana, Drug dealers (including some terrorists) would lose most or all of their business, there would be medical benefits for cancer patients. Besides these reasons, people already break the law and smokes weed, why not just legalize it.

-Nilay

English student said...

I believe marijuana should be legalized or at least decriminalized or regulated in some sort of safe way. The way drug dealers deal with this drug illegally is ridiculous. It seems as though a lot of people think of it as a drug that's bad for you, but it's not. It has great medical value with treating all sorts of diseases and disorders. The main reason they made marijuana illegal in the first place was because they realized that they plant could be used for making goods such as paper, clothing, and fuel. Most paper companies and cotton industries didn't like this idea back then because it would run them out of business. The people that could really benefit from this medicine are suffering and even in the states that do have medicinal marijuana legalized in, the Federal government can still come into the state to punish the people using the drug. People getting punished for taking medicine that helps them with their illness? Doesn't seem right to me. I say legalize and regulate.

John

English student said...

I not real sure about the marijuana issue as a whole but it seems to me that over the years the drug has gotten stronger and stronger. This makes it very hard to prescribe a set amount and the side effects can be very different depending on the strength of the drug, the patient, and the route of administration. However there is a synthetic form for pain, nausea, and lack of appetite called Cesamet that is used in the US as a last resort.
To sum this up the plant itself is to iffy to use in a reliable and responsible way in the medical setting. It is not safe to legalize.

FYI: many forms bought on the street contain other ingredients like boot polish and even other prescription drugs. when you smoke this you really do not know what your putting in your body.

Rebecca Spellmeyer

English student said...

Yes marijuana along with all drugs should be legal. It is a testimony to the ignorance of the American people and the corruption of our government the war on drugs continues. It is a waste of money and a complete failure in every sense of the word. Although I think that other harder drugs like meth or crack are terrible the fact is junkies will always exist. By declaring war on drugs all the government waste trillions of dollars (that don't belong to them) and created a prison industrial complex in a nation that claims to be "the land of the free".

Marijuana however is completely different than any other drug that is illegal. Weed has never in the entire recorded history of the earth dating back 10,000 years been responsible for a human death. Additionally it is never been proven to be physically addictive. So why would something not harmful result in thousands being thrown in jail a year? Why is a product like tobacco with will kill 1 billion (1/6 of the current worlds populations) this century, not only legal but is given government subsidies?

Mainly, because they cannot effectively tax marijuana because it can be produced so easily. Also the more police, DEA agents, judges, lawyers the government can hire the more control it can exert over its people, slowly taking away your civil right using laws like the "patriot act", or executive orders to rewrite our constitution to use people as modern slaves.

The government fears marijuana because they are afraid of people using drugs like marijuana because they fear people thinking outside the box; People who can realize what they have done to our country, why they have spit on our past, robbed us blind, and will leave nothing behind.

Quick note the first marijuana law in the United States was actually telling farmer that then need to grow hemp, additionally all the founding father used hemp, and pretty much every recent president has admitted to using weed in the past(which makes them a piece of shit hypocrite with no backbone, a coward, not a real leader, but I think everyone deep down knows that about all presidents in our lifetime).

Schnitzel

English student said...

I really don’t think marijuana should be legalized. Marijuana is a drug. A DRUG. Yes, it can be used as a prescription drug, but that is in rare cases for cancer patients or people glaucoma. Otherwise, this is a recreational drug, and it gets abused. Not only do I think it is a recreational drug, but I think it is a gateway drug as well. Once people use this drug, they get a certain high for a while, but then this high isn’t enough, so they eventually move on to harder stuff. (I have had a friend who has done this, so I know it happens.) I don’t really need to read studies about weed. I have been to enough parties to see how dumb weed makes people act. In high school, a lot of my friends didn’t have a place to smoke weed, so they would drive around smoking and acting stupid. On one occasion, one of my friends got busted while smoking and driving and got so many tickets and fines that will always be on his record. Also, people say that they don't get addicted to this drug, but then they have huge withdrawals when they stop smoking it for a long period of time. It really doesn't make sense. This drug makes people make dumb decision, and it doesn’t really benefit anyone, so I don’t see any point in legalizing it.

Chelsey

English student said...

This is a very hard to say we should fully legalize marijuana because there are some benefits as well as problems with this drug. I think we should legalize it but regulate how it is sold and produced in order to keep this drug from getting miss used. Marijuana has many psychological and medical uses for many different symptoms. it can help patients with glaucoma, reduce stress and can help with cancer patients, but many individuals miss use this drug out of pure satisfaction and for profit. Every person has their own view on this matter but I believe society is becoming excepting of this idea just like gay marriage and freedom of speech.

Josue

English student said...

Some may think that legalizing marijuana would be a good thing. I did at once as well but after all it is a drug. I believe that the real reason why they want to legalize it is because then it would become taxable . They have caught on you how much money is really in marijuana .If weed became legal the only good thing would be that smokers could smoke with no penalty. However I do believe that it would just be more difficult to do anything. rules and frug policeies wont change. They will just get stricter and soon they will drug test for everything.

missolo

English student said...

Legalize it. You can either draw the line and make EVERYTHING from Benadryl and Nyquil, to cigarettes, to alcohol, all into illegal/prescription medications, or you can legalize them, regulate them, educate people with the TRUTH about them, and reap the economic benefits. By economic benefits, I mean the billions of dollars the government would make via taxing them, and all the job opportunities having them legal creates. This is not to say that the government doesn't already make plenty of money off of marijuana and other things being illegal; the ethics of how they obtained these profits would just be better.

Alcohol is much, much worse than marijuana; the withdraw from alcohol can literally kill you. Weed has never killed anyone. Its side effects are less severe than the side effects noted on your Tylenol bottle, yet Tylenol can be purchased by anyone. Weed isn't going away, the taboo of things being illegal can be the sole reason for people to try them, weed is a 100% natural plant, and the picky-choosyness that we seem to have that says one terrible thing is okay, yet this pretty-harmless thing is not okay doesn't make sense at all.

English student said...

Addison

English student said...

I feel that marijuana should be legalized and if not, decriminalized in all 50 states. I think by doing this, it would decrease the number of people in jail for minor charges. It would also create a safer means of obtaining marijuana for those who use it, since the stuff you buy from John Doe down the street may be laced with a nasty surprise, for all you know. It’s unfortunate that those who could benefit medically are not able to attain it for symptom and pain management for conditions where it’s been proven effective, including glaucoma, cancer, nausea or severe weight loss. It’s controversial because it’s a mind altering substance and like all substances, it comes with its own set of faults. It impacts the brain, so can have an effect on functioning and motivation. It’s not a good thing for young brains that are still developing. I also believe that many factors, including fear tactics, racism, power hungry tyrants and yellow journalism have prevented legalization. If my memory serves me correctly, marijuana became illegal around the late 20s or early 30s due to the fact that major corporations could not profit from it. Now, progressive states like California are more likely to make it legal because they are willing to look beyond the bad publicity it received due to “reefer madness” and such misleading propaganda on the topic.

-sam

English student said...

For me, I can really go on either side of the fence when it comes to this matter. Obviously there is an on going effert to keep marijuana illegal for many of their long list of reasons. But on the other hand, many if not all of us knows or knew some body that smoked weed. With all the of friends that I have that smoke, you would never know they smoked if you were just hanging out with them talking to them. Some of the smartest people I know smoke weed all of the time and they get all A's in college so when people say that it isnt good for you brain I some times have to hesitate to buy into their argument. On the other hand many people that are not for legalizing marijuana state that weed is the infamous "gateway" drug and is a stepping stone to other, more serious narcotics which I can also see being a very resonable statement for a compelling argument. Im not saying I want or dont want it to be legalized, but if it was, I know that it wouldnt really bother me too much.

English student said...

For me, I can really go on either side of the fence when it comes to this matter. Obviously there is an on going effert to keep marijuana illegal for many of their long list of reasons. But on the other hand, many if not all of us knows or knew some body that smoked weed. With all the of friends that I have that smoke, you would never know they smoked if you were just hanging out with them talking to them. Some of the smartest people I know smoke weed all of the time and they get all A's in college so when people say that it isnt good for you brain I some times have to hesitate to buy into their argument. On the other hand many people that are not for legalizing marijuana state that weed is the infamous "gateway" drug and is a stepping stone to other, more serious narcotics which I can also see being a very resonable statement for a compelling argument. Im not saying I want or dont want it to be legalized, but if it was, I know that it wouldnt really bother me too much.

Nolan

English student said...

I don’t think Marijuana should be legalized because while it does have very few positive effects (for medical reasons), negative effects outweigh the positive effects. If marijuana is legalized then people will become dissatisfied with that and they will push to get the next drug legalized and then the next drug legalized creating a downward spiral in the drug world and in America as a whole. People already act out and are ignorant enough without being under the influence of drugs, why should we make drugs legal and easier for more people to get their hands on?

Elizabeth Luke

English student said...

I say yes to the legalization of marijuana. There have been many arguments over the topic, and I just say LEGALIZE it already. People are still going to keep selling and buying the drug, so why not do our government a favor and just legalize it. there would be less drug affiliated arrests I believe. Also I believe that the people who do need to be prescribed medicinal weed should have the right to be treated for their illness.
-Samantha

English student said...

I don't smoke personally, but know many people that do for both recreational, and health benefits. I do think that it should be legalized then maybe they would keep our streets clear of the crack, and cocaine.

Natoka

English student said...

Marijuana barely does harm to the user while they are smoking, but it can lead to the hindering of a person’s short term memory and their brain functions. Another problem is that marijuana is something that is smoked, meaning the scent will linger. The smoke can unintentionally affect a large amount of other people. If smoking marijuana became legal, then more people would smoke, both tobacco and marijuana. What people should do is create a marijuana clinic. Where marijuana is in a controlled environment and used responsibly. Otherwise, marijuana should remain illegal.

-Charlie

English student said...

i think marijuana shouldn't be legalized. if you legalize weed the government will be able to tax it making it impossible to for people to carry around the exact change because they are so high.the weed for medical purposes should stay how they are but if any thing besides that would only help the government in funding things that we don't need.
-Christopher Hodges

English student said...

Legalizing would be best; decriminalizing it would be the alternative. If there was no ban on weed, there would be less inmates in prisons and a lot more happy people. It would no longer be a problem with our society. There would be no drug wars and no behind the counter selling. Marijuana is a drug that does no more harm than cigarettes do, so why should it matter?

Katherine

English student said...

I'm just going to go ahead and say what I said on the other blog with this subject; I do not understand why marijuana is illegal. There are many different ways to take it; you don't just have to smoke it. You can put it in food, use marijuana chapstick, take marijuana pills, etc. If you smoke it, it's just like cigarettes - use at your own risk. But I can't see why other forms of weed are illegal when it is nothing but beneficial.

Andi

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