Feds: Teen use of pot can lead to dependency, mental illness

[Not Impressed]

Well then the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, once again proves they are complete idiots spraying our money in the wind.

It should not come as a surprise that ...

"A teen who has been depressed at some point in the past year is more than twice as likely to have used marijuana as teens who have not reported being depressed -- 25 percent compared with 12 percent,...."

It would though be a huge surprise to find out that happy well adjusted high on life kids were more likely to use drugs then those kids with a reason to escape.

So says Mr. John Walters, director of the office.... "This is not just youthful experimentation that they'll get over as we used to think in the past."

Right... those with mental health problems are not experimenting, they are escaping, and they will not get over their drug problems until they get over their mental health problems. Unlike the untold millions of healthy kids who did experiment with drugs and did get over it.

What we really need is a study as to why the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy refuses to accept reality or reason, and insists on trying to pass a certain brand of fundamentalist spin as science.

For a party that claims the aim of smaller government, they sure do want to micro manage our social lives in a big government sort of way. Gives me hives!

[Sandy]

I think our elected officials should be drug tested too! After all, they are making "our" decisions and should be tested for drugs periodically. Are they any different? Hummmm.

[Unreal]

Boys use pot to get girls horny. This just leads to more teen sex, pregnancies, and STDs!

[shy ted]

Unreal wrote:

Boys use pot to get girls horny. This just leads to more teen sex, pregnancies, and STDs!

Is this a testimony from personal experience and do you still have STDs?

[ninetailedfox]

Newsgroups: alt.drugs,talk.politics.drugs, alt.hemp
From: "Paul Hager"
Subject: The FINAL corrected version of "Marijuana Myths" (20-July-93)
Message-ID: <1993Jul20.222126.820@news. cs.indiana.edu>

MARIJUANA MYTHS
by Paul Hager
Chair, ICLU Drug Task Force

1. Marijuana causes brain damage

The most celebrated study that claims to show brain damage is
the rhesus monkey study of Dr. Robert Heath, done in the late
1970s. This study was reviewed by a distinguished panel of
scientists sponsored by the Institute of Medicine and the National
Academy of Sciences. Their results were published under the title,
Marijuana and Health in 1982. Heath's work was sharply criticized
for its insufficient sample size (only four monkeys), its failure
to control experimental bias, and the misidentification of normal
monkey brain structure as "damaged". Actual studies of human
populations of marijuana users have shown no evidence of brain
damage. For example, two studies from 1977, published in the
Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) showed no
evidence of brain damage in heavy users of marijuana. That same
year, the American Medical Association (AMA) officially came out in
favor of decriminalizing marijuana. That's not the sort of thing
you'd expect if the AMA thought marijuana damaged the brain.

2. Marijuana damages the reproductive system

This claim is based chiefly on the work of Dr. Gabriel Nahas,
who experimented with tissue (cells) isolated in petri dishes, and
the work of researchers who dosed animals with near-lethal amounts
of cannabinoids (i.e., the intoxicating part of marijuana). Nahas'
generalizations from his petri dishes to human beings have been
rejected by the scientific community as being invalid. In the case
of the animal experiments,**** that survived their ordeal
returned to normal within 30 days of the end of the experiment.
Studies of actual human populations have failed to demonstrate that
marijuana adversely affects the reproductive system.

3. Marijuana is a "gateway" drug -- it leads to hard drugs

This is one of the more persistent myths. A real world
example of what happens when marijuana is readily available can be
found in Holland. The Dutch partially legalized marijuana in the
1970s. Since then, hard drug use -- heroin and cocaine -- have
DECLINED substantially. If marijuana really were a gateway drug,
one would have expected use of hard drugs to have gone up, not
down. This apparent "negative gateway" effect has also been
observed in the United States. Studies done in the early 1970s
showed a negative correlation between use of marijuana and use of
alcohol. A 1993 Rand Corporation study that compared drug use in
states that had decriminalized marijuana versus those that had not,
found that where marijuana was more available -- the states that
had decriminalized -- hard drug abuse as measured by emergency room
episodes decreased. In short, what science and actual experience
tell us is that marijuana tends to substitute for the much more
dangerous hard drugs like alcohol, cocaine, and heroin.

[ninetailedfox]

4. Marijuana suppresses the immune system
Like the studies claiming to show damage to the reproductive
system, this myth is based on studies where animals were given
extremely high -- in many cases, near-lethal -- doses of
cannabinoids. These results have never been duplicated in human
beings. Interestingly, two studies done in 1978 and one done in
1988 showed that hashish and marijuana may have actually stimulated
the immune system in the people studied.
5. Marijuana is much more dangerous than tobacco
Smoked marijuana contains about the same amount of carcinogens
as does an equivalent amount of tobacco. It should be remembered,
however, that a heavy tobacco smoker consumes much more tobacco
than a heavy marijuana smoker consumes marijuana. This is because
smoked tobacco, with a 90% addiction rate, is the most addictive of
all drugs while marijuana is less addictive than caffeine. Two
other factors are important. The first is that paraphernalia laws
directed against marijuana users make it difficult to smoke safely.
These laws make water pipes and bongs, which filter some of the
carcinogens out of the smoke, illegal and, hence, unavailable. The
second is that, if marijuana were legal, it would be more
economical to have cannabis drinks like bhang (a traditional drink
in the Middle East) or tea which are totally non-carcinogenic.

[ninetailedfox]

Sandy wrote:

I think our elected officials should be drug tested too! After all, they are making "our" decisions and should be tested for drugs periodically. Are they any different? Hummmm.

get this, Mike Blumberg smokes pot, and he is trying to criminalize it for everyone else in NY. Thank you and **** you you Hypocrite!

[ninetailedfox]

Not you, Mike Blumberg.

[Not Politically Correct]

never fails wrote:

lucky AAAARRRRGGHH , LOOKS LIKE YOU SMOKE THE GOOD STUFF.VERY PROUD OF THAT GPA.I WILL BURN MINE BECAUSE YOU HAVE ONE.HYPOCRITE ?YOU SAY TO A
GUY /GAL WHO LOOKS SIMPLY LIKE HE IS NOT DOWN FOR DRUGS, TEENS OPEN WIDE ,LETS MAKE MORE KIDS.POT IS A PROBLEM SIMPLE!!!!!! SORRY TO SAY WE LOST YA.I WORK IN ER , MANY ACCIDENTS ALL START FROM A LITTLE LINE IN THE SAND LIKE LITTLE HARMLESS WEED. REAL DEAL YOUR OK.KEEP THINKING AS YOU DO,YES WE ALSO THINK YOUR GRAMMAR/SPELLING IS FINE.

Man - undo the capslock! If you work in an ER please let us know where because you seem a little... ah ... insane.

[Unreal]

shy ted wrote:

<quoted text>
Is this a testimony from personal experience and do you still have STDs?

Yes and no. Pot definitely seems to put liberal babes in the mood to get banged, especially at Berkeley! I never had an STD, because I always used bullet proof condoms.

[bad daddy]

Unreal wrote:

Boys use pot to get girls horny. This just leads to more teen sex, pregnancies, and STDs!

you again? weren't you spouting this nonsense on another board?

i think you are just a 13 year old boy hung up on sex

[Sandy]

Yes, and watching these clowns campaign for almost two years causes depression!!

[shy ted]

Unreal wrote:

<quoted text> Yes and no. Pot definitely seems to put liberal babes in the mood to get banged, especially at Berkeley! I never had an STD, because I always used bullet proof condoms.

I've never met or known a cold Liberal woman. I've never found any attraction in conservative women, too many hang ups.

[jsd]

shy ted wrote:

<quoted text>
I've never met or known a cold Liberal woman. I've never found any attraction in conservative women, too many hang ups.

good observation!:-)

[Sean]

Come on you know Ann Coulter is hot.....

shy ted wrote:

<quoted text>
I've never met or known a cold Liberal woman. I've never found any attraction in conservative women, too many hang ups.

[x0x0x]

More BUSHIT from a BUSHITTER.

The guys in office 8 years and NOW he decides to make some decisions.

I guess skyrocketing gas prices are less pressing
than pot.

And the housing crisis.
And the quagmire in Iraq.

It's good to know that Bush has his priorities in order.

[Hazmat]

And here I thought that it was eating those darn M&M's that ccaused all the mental problems.

Memo to the Politicians.

The USA has proven over tens of decades that PROHIBITION just doesn't work. Yet we go on the merry way of spending billions of dollars on drug enforcement and incarceration; none of which has a chance at ever being successful.

DeCriminalizing Marijuana would save billions of dollars, make prison space available for real criminals, and eliminate much mental depression.

[jsd]

Hazmat wrote:

And here I thought that it was eating those darn M&M's that ccaused all the mental problems.
Memo to the Politicians.
The USA has proven over tens of decades that PROHIBITION just doesn't work. Yet we go on the merry way of spending billions of dollars on drug enforcement and incarceration; none of which has a chance at ever being successful.
DeCriminalizing Marijuana would save billions of dollars, make prison space available for real criminals, and eliminate much mental depression.

so true. if you should ever decide to run for public office i would vote for you even if you have mental problems. just dont bogart the m&m's!