ScratchMonkey

Anyone see South Park this week with the addictive cat urine?

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Xen

[quote=Kerostasis;954309] Since most users never get close to the LD range of either MJ or Alcohol, the behavioral impacts of non-lethal usage are much more significant.QUOTE]

I completely disagree with this statement about people getting to the LD of Alcohol. Someone pounds a fifth of everclear in an hour will get to the LD quite quickly. Ambulances get called on "binge" Drinkers all the time, cause they are nearing the LD of alcohol. On the other hand, you'd have to smoke a litteral ton of THC in 15 minutes to get near the LD of Pot. You can thank the Dutch for doing the only real research on the subject.

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Kerostasis

The behavioral impacts of alcohol kill about 17,000 people per year in car accidents alone. According to the link Buck Fush put up, the LD effects of alcohol kill maybe 50 people per year. (Both death rates consider US deaths only).

Sure, the LD50 point of alcohol is much easier to reach than the LD50 point of THC, but its still a drop in the bucket compared to the behavioral impact. So how does the behavioral impact of THC compare to alcohol?

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Fenian420

Whats this LD talk everyone knows so intentively about?

Kerostasis

LD = Lethal Dose, that is, how much alcohol do you have to drink to kill you? But since the same amount isnt always equally dangerous to all people, LD50 is the amount that would usually kill off 50% of the population, giving you a pretty good approximation of the danger.

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Greflin

Did the bong resin on your brain show you a reference to beer or alchohol being a good thing in my post? One may not be able to OD on pot but you can OD on the case of cheezits the pot made you eat.

ScratchMonkey

It's my understanding that pot is a substitute drug for alcohol: One tends to use one or the other.

I think most of us have seen people get argumentative and even violent under the influence of alcohol. When was the last time you heard of anyone getting violent under the influence of pot?

The behavioral impact I see is from reduced capacity, such as operating machinery (eg. cars) under the influence. But I haven't heard of problems from the likes of the personality changes I see in alcohol users.

Hence, I'd rather that we re-legalize pot (remember that it was once legal) just to divert some drunks to a less violent drug.

(It's also my understanding that pot was criminalized under the FUD that it was used as a date rape drug by hispanics going after "our innocent young white daughters". Similar to opiates being outlawed as a measure taken against Chinese immigrant workers.)

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Switch

LD50 for THC:
Researchers have used mouse and rat models to approximate the LD50 for marijuana. Scaling up to humans is an approximation since animal models are NOT 1:1 analogs. That said, most researchers agree that it would be nearly impossible to OD on THC due to the very high LD50. The sedative quality of THC will stop people from continuing the physical activity of smoking/eat/etc required to reach LD50 doses. Additionally, blood lipid saturation provides a buffering effect for THC, increasing a persons capacity to consume THC without having it actually reach the brain until the previously introduced THC has been cleared.

Add to all of that the fact that canniboid receptors do not play a substantial role in the regulation of life support functions for the cardiovascular and respiratory systems. THC is perhaps the safest possible drug in existence. Far safer than any prescription or recreational substance. At least in terms of lethality. Consistent long term THC use may certainly produce some cognitive side effects, depending on what stage of development an individual is in when they first start using (adolescent, late teens, early 20's etc) but they are not deadly. Additionally, a slew of potential positive results may occur and the therapeutic potential is enormous.

Alcohol, on the other hand, routinely kills people directly due to poisoning and indirectly through accidents caused by inebriated individuals. On top of that, high rates and of alcohol abuse have created tertiary harms for friends and family.... not to mention the costs related to treatment for a behavioral disease with an enormous recidivism rates.

As far as alcohol and thc being 'substitute drugs' for each other: many of my friends who smoke do not like to drink. They would much rather avoid drinking all together.

The thing that I take issue with as far as THC prohibition is concerned (and it is a prohibition with no difinitive legal grounds) is that back when they wanted to make alcohol illegal they knew that the constitution had to be amended since the government had no right to impose upon the personal choice of an individual. They didn't even bother to do that this time around, completely circumventing the liberties that are supposed to belong to the people...

I don't smoke and never have bothered to try. I have plenty of friends who have. Many of them are 'over it' and don't smoke with any kind of regularity. I just don't see any substantial harm in it -- and even if their was, its still a matter of personal choice.

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Better known as:
That noob who crashed the chopper.
That noob who ran over the mine.
That noob who TK'd me with a sniper rifle.
That noob who hit that APC at 300m with light AT! Our APC...

Kerostasis

I haven't really studied the constitutionality of drug prohibition, but I was under the impression that a State can regulate either alcohol or drugs to its hearts content, and the Amendment was only required to give the Feds the ability to do the same. Without an Amendment the Feds are limited to using their funding power to try and browbeat the States into passing legislation.

That said, I know there's a few states that have de facto decriminalized marijuana, but it remains a federal crime, so I'm not particularly sure how that works. I'm not aware of any federal prosecutions in those states yet though.

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El_Gringo_Grande

The story I have heard about pot is that they made it a catch 22.

You can't grow/distribute pot unless you have a tax stamp. You can't get a tax stamp unless you show you are growing pot. If you show up with pot then you grew it illegally because you can't grow it without the stamp.

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Switch

Its a bit more complicated than that now adays... i think that may have happened a very long time ago when pot was still a cash crop along side tobacco.

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Better known as:
That noob who crashed the chopper.
That noob who ran over the mine.
That noob who TK'd me with a sniper rifle.
That noob who hit that APC at 300m with light AT! Our APC...

GlobalWarmin

Marijuana Called Top U.S. Cash Crop
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=2735017&page=1

Switch

I meant when it was a legal cash crop...

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Better known as:
That noob who crashed the chopper.
That noob who ran over the mine.
That noob who TK'd me with a sniper rifle.
That noob who hit that APC at 300m with light AT! Our APC...

Fenian420

Props.. Im assuming you graduated college with a high/good degree?
I swear some politician needs to bring the topic back to the supreme court using everthing thats been gone over in this forum so far...

Plude220

I am a firm believer in god and that everything he creates is for a good reason and I dont understand how the goverment thinks they can play god and say that something that grows from the ground naturally that god made "NOT MAN" is illegal.

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Plude220 |TG|