Forums > Social Discussion > Bad news for cannabis smokers

Posted: 20th Mar 2005
"BUT i still think driving under influence of cannabis is a bad idea "

So like alchemohol?

Posted: 20th Mar 2005
lol drink driving is a REALLY stupid idea
driving under the influence of any drug is a bad idea as is driving when tierd or after a massage (your tooooo relaxed)

*grins* if your gunna get stoned do is somewhere you dont have to leave for a while or get someone to move you (hell wish that'd happen to me generally would be so much easier)

back

Posted: 20th Mar 2005
lucky for me I live in texas where they just upped it to 2 oz. is only a misdemeaner when it used to be only 10 g

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Posted: 21st Mar 2005
Glad to see you retracted the coma comment...

Yes, any study is going to be biased when you are looking at this sort of thing unfortunatly. Of course we could get into all kinds of ethical considerations about being in control of your own body and what goes in it... but whatever.

As for the driving under the influence thing... I agree that driving under the influence of anything is a bad idea, but you have to take this kind of thing in perspective. Driving drunk is like driving tripping. I won't do either because THAT is impairment. However I refuse to agree that driving under the influence of marijuana is similar at ALL to alcohol. Its closer to the kind of impairment talking on a cell phone or eating while your driving gives you. Im not saying go out and do it mind you... but from personal experience I am much more inclined to believe this way.

One thing I don't understand is that they group marijuana in one category without giving any stats on what kind of weed is being used. Is this skunk, or crap? There's a big difference in effect... different weeds have different effects.

Spanner makes a good point. Of course those of us who use it are going to defend it and anyone whos actually done the research into it will find an abundance of information in support of our views, and actually there are several that WERE funded by government organizations, etc. that found things they would rather have not... If I knew where my copy of the Emperor was I would actually start quoting studies... but unfortunatly some forgetful pothead borrowed it and never gave it back... I agree with Spanner though that the number of people who use marijuana ONLY in a responsible manner are very rare. So are alcohol users. Its a human problem of an inability to use things correctly more than the substances available. Long term use will have effects... like the memory thing unfortunatly... and in a perfect world no one would want to use drugs because the world wouldnt suck so bad. Unfortunatly...

Spanner however I can respect because he obviously has extensive experience (not that others here dont). I agree with a lot of the stuff he says also having extensive experience. Most people have serious issues that drugs wont help. Pot IS a hallucinagen, it is just a very minor one. Hash will get you closer to smoking yourself tripping, but your never gonna be traveling to wonderland on it. Gonna smoke yourself retarded long before that. If you can really smoke and not get all lazy and apethetic then its likely pot wont have as many negetive effects on you. In my experience the worst thing pot does to you is make you lazy and your thoughts fuzzy...

Now as for enforcement... I think its an utter load of bull. The war on drugs is an utter failure because you cant change the fact that people are going to want it, and that others are going to supply it, probably because they like it and believe in it, if not for just making money. At least the people I deal with anyway... I love how people blame everything on the drug and dont worry at all about the reasons people use them... Utter blarney.

Posted: 21st Mar 2005
(Spanner is a she... and is particularly wise )

Cannabis is a drug. Like all drugs, it is not good when consumed all day every day.

But like most drugs, moderation is not going to cause serious injury.

The government are talking about raising the classification as a vote getter.

Getting to the other side

Posted: 21st Mar 2005
Oh.... well see that shows you how much I know... sorry MISS Spanner...

Posted: 21st Mar 2005

Written by: Moondance

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People get drunk because their sugar gets way too low.

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funny you say this...because sugar makes the body absorb alcohol faster....hence why things like daquiri's only have 2 shots of rum but can get people very buzzed, very quickly

same goes with margaritas, hurricanes, grenades, etc



oh! edit time...

and by saying it pot doesnt effect the mind is total bs...i can name 2 or 3 people who have essentially smoked themselves retarded, and another acquaintance who whenever is high becomes paranoid to the point of having panic attacks
EDITED_BY: darkpoet (1111422253)

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Posted: 21st Mar 2005
Smoked themselves retarded??????? I think if you dig a little deeper you'll find their mental state wasn't caused by cannabis.

It's all about establishing a good relationship with a drug, and cannabis is an easy drug to establish a good working relationship with, as opposed to something like crack, or alcohol. The key is in the dosage.

Posted: 21st Mar 2005
perhaps....smoking so often has awakened some impressive artistic talent in him.....but yeah..didnt know him before he was smoking almost 1lb a month or so...

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Posted: 21st Mar 2005
So - back to the article (as opposed to a "is cannbis good debate")...

My girly does psychology - and judging by the tests they do before suggesting a hypothesis - i.e. smoking weed increases the risk of psychosis - they always do reverse tests to cancel out the "people likely to develop psychosis smoke weed" possibility.

The trouble I have with this article is no-one ever states to what level a "regular" smoker is... I know people who smoke joints throughout the day and call themseleves "regular smokers". I smoke about twice a week and consider myself a "regular smoker". I'm sure there are people who smoke less than this who call themselves regular smokers.

One thing of note - alot of the "cannabis is harmful" studies were conducted back in the 60s and 70s - especially the long-term studies which are only coming to light now. The 20-30 year old's of those days are now the ones getting the long-term effects. But weed nowadays is up to 30 times stronger than it was when the original tests were carried out. My concern is that if smoking what we'd pretty much call "bush-weed" or "grass" is mildly dangerous - smoking these super-strong strains that are around now can't do anything to improve their "healthiness".

I can think of several people who've smoked themselves into the ground by the way - as with all things in life - it's not good to over-indulge in anything

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Posted: 21st Mar 2005
Oh I don't deny at all that it has an effect on the mind that, when carried out non-stop without moderation, will begin to manifest certain "pot head characteristics". Yes, there are people who keep smoking and smoking until they crash... but I don't believe that pot is the CAUSE of this, rather it is just a faster vehicle to preexisting instability in the psyche of the individual. So is ANYTHING taken to extremes, and to pigeon hole marijuana is as foolish as saying that all women are terrible drivers, lets say.

Yes, a good deal of these studies were conducted in the 60's / 70's, but there are a good deal of others conducted more recently that are more reliable (and less...). Durbs puts out a lot of my problems with this sort of thing. Our weed is COMPLETELY different from those tests, having been genetically altered through unnatural selection for quality over the past few decades to form the new super strains we smoke. The thing is these super strains have been bread for enhanced THC production, which is the main chemical in question. Thus any health concerns based on cardio-vascular, etc. are not really effected, though the interaction of THC with the brain is highly enhanced.

Of course, I have not talked to a lot of people who were around smoking in the 60's about weed quality... so I am only speculating about actual effect. And in addition those I can talk to have usually moved on to other harsher drugs and thus it is difficult to gauge weed's effect verse, say, the acid, coke, meth and other things that have been going through them.

Now here's my thing... your friend smokes a POUND a month? See THAT is overindulgence. That means non-stop smokin from morning to dusk. In alcohol terms, that would make them an alcoholic, and CLEARLY something is not right. Like Durbs, I smoke about twice a week and consider myself a regular smoker. The most any of my friends smoke is an eighth to a quarter a day at the EXTREME outlier. None of these studies give figures on type of weed used, amount used, etc. which makes me question the study outright.

Psychological testing... bah. I am a psych major and all of the studies I look at I can;t help but snicker. We portray this image to the outside world of "See! People who do this usually do this too!", but in reality all we are talking about are meaningless statistics. Reverse studies as you mention, Durbs, are not the rule. Dont assume that such a study would go through the trouble of testing itself. It doesnt take a psych student to conjecture why a lot of people who smoke pot also have mental or emotional instabilities. I know so many people who smoke, and yet the inbalances existed long before they ever started smoking pot.

I love how people read something is "scientific" and instantly believe it to be true. Ya know there was this psychologist who everyone hated once... just for the hell of it he went out in a lab coat and started telling people what to do. Most did it without question. Science majors take themselves and their "discoveries" way to seriously. I think they would all be better off if they ever took a philosophy of science course...

Everything in moderation...

Posted: 22nd Mar 2005
People need to practice moderation too much anything is a bad thing. Think about it too much money,drugs,work,exercise,bananas, anything it all has adverse affects on our brains or bodies you just need to balance everything out.
Having said that some people just shouldn't smoke it at all becasue i've seen so many good friends spiral into deep deep depression because of it and i'm only seventeen. Funny thing is it depresses me to see them depressed so i smoke. Crazy stupid brain!!!

Does this site actually exist? Or am i talking to all my other personalities?

Posted: 22nd Mar 2005
I got tired of speculating so went out and actually found the research article in question...

The study included 2437 people aged 14 to 24 who were monitored by University of Maastricht researchers for four years. The study found that those who used marijuana had a moderately increased risk of psychotic symptoms. That risk was much greater among people with a predisposition for psychosis (as should be expected).

"[The study] gives support to the emerging understanding that a predisposition to psychosis combined with the early abuse of cannabis has an increased likelihood of triggering a psychotic illness," Dinah Morley of the charity Young Minds

In addition, cannabis use at age 18 might be a consequence of emerging psychosis (that is, psychosis precedes cannabis use, not vice versa) (Taken from https://www.health.vic.gov.au/drugservices/pubs/cannabis.htm)

For example, some evidence suggests that substances such as alcohol and amphetamines have a greater effect than cannabis in the development of a psychosis. (same source)

That page has a long list of "further readings" that are especially relevant.

Directly from the reasearch in question:

Design: Analysis of prospective data from a population based sample. Assessment of substance use, predisposition for psychosis, and psychotic symptoms was based on standardised personal interviews at baseline and at follow up four years later.

Participants: Already described acuratly above...

Main outcome measure: Psychotic symptoms at follow up as a function of cannabis use and predisposition for psychosis at baseline.

Results: After adjustment for age, sex, socioeconomic status, urbanicity, childhood trauma, predisposition for psychosis at baseline, and use of other drugs, tobacco, and alcohol, cannabis use at baseline increased the cumulative incidence of psychotic symptoms at follow up four years later (adjusted odds ratio 1.67, 95% confidence interval 1.13 to 2.46). The effect of cannabis use was much stronger in those with any predisposition for psychosis at baseline (23.8% adjusted difference in risk, 95% confidence interval 7.9 to 39.7, P=0.003) than in those without (5.6%, 0.4 to 10.8, P=0.033). The risk difference in the "predisposition" group was significantly greater than the risk difference in the "no predisposition" group (test for interaction 18.2%, 1.6 to 34.8, P=0.032). There was a dose-response relation with increasing frequency of cannabis use. Predisposition for psychosis at baseline did not significantly predict cannabis use four years later (adjusted odds ratio 1.42, 95% confidence interval 0.88 to 2.31).

Conclusion: Cannabis use moderately increases the risk of psychotic symptoms in young people but has a much stronger effect in those with evidence of predisposition for psychosis.

The above being taken from https://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/abstract/bmj.38267.664086.63v1

What is important to note here, is that the "moderate increased risk" for smokers without a prior predisposition toward psychosis is 5.6%. Those with a predisposition were the "moderates" with 24% greater liklihood...

Further, this is a REGRESSION MODEL STUDY which does NOT show causation, only corelation.

Further, how exactly one CONTROLS for all of the things which this study claims to is beyond me...

Some responses from peers:

The authors claim that "Cannabis use moderately increases the risk of psychotic symptoms in young people". While this is a compelling argument, this is not demonstrated by their study. There are two major points. The authors need to consider a major confounding factor in their study, which is that the participants with a predisposition toward psychoses may be more likely to take the risk to try cannabis and/or enjoy it. The groups in this study were not randomly assigned, and the authors fail to acknowledge competing explanations.

This is an example of where science fails to appropriately inform the public. While researchers who read this paper will certainly recognize the unsubstantiated claim, untrained readers may not. Future work should be held to this higher standard.

- Andrew S Fox


All studies of the association between psychosis and cannabis use are faced with a serious problem in trying to untangle cause and effect. Henquet et al’s method of adjustment for prospectively measured predisposition to psychosis strikes me as an ingenious attempt to solve this problem.

- Adam Jacobs

More at https://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/eletters/bmj.38267.664086.63v1#88907

Anyway, I gotta go, class time.

Posted: 23rd Mar 2005
nice work i8beefy2.

Josh

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Posted: 23rd Mar 2005
Yay. A pro/con cannabis/hemp arguement that doesn't include 'rope'.

That's my least favorite pro-hemp arguement.

"We need to leagalize hemp so we can make the rope out of it! ROPE! What will we do without the hemp rope! We'll all die! ROPE! What if you're climbing a mountain and they ban hemp, there will be no rope! ROPE!"

Sorry, maybe I'd been living in California for too long.

Well, shall we go?
Yes, let's go.
[They do not move.]

Posted: 23rd Mar 2005


I you NYC.

Posted: 23rd Mar 2005
You think I'm kidding?



https://www.allpot.com/tdmt/rope.html



I also learned that Christopher Columbus used Hemp Rope on board his ships! So by banning hemp you are banning Christopher Columbus and America and are worse than Al Qaeda!



I had no idea.

Well, shall we go?
Yes, let's go.
[They do not move.]

Posted: 23rd Mar 2005
thats like the crazy propaganda scare stories at www.freevibe.com er...org...or gov...one of those..anyways its completely daft

Jesus saves sinners and redeems them for cash and
prizes

Co-Founder of Keepers of Light

Educate yourself about the Hazards of Fire Breathing STAY SAFE!

Posted: 23rd Mar 2005
Rope is a rather weak argument... now replacing lumber cutting of our old growth forests for paper when a completely annually renewable resource is right at our fingertips... that's a better argument... So is the argument for textile production which would give us much better (meaning stronger, longer lasting) clothes.

I'll admit a lot of the little arguments that seem silly are... well silly. But they are meant as support for the much better arguments. In the industrial field, rope and a lot of other things are meant to support the paper and textile arguments. Then there's the nutritional arguments, the fact that you can make plastics out of it that are as strong as steel (and won't dent... Ford motor company built a car body out of it once... took a sledge hammer to it... no dents... wouldnt that be nice?), and the fact that hemp seed oil is the brightest burning oil on the planet, AND wouldn't hurt the atmosphere (theoretically, because of it wouldn't release the same bad molecules as ground oil) so could replace our petrol industry if actively persued... in theory anyway. I really havn't looked into that one...

Just because smaller supporting evidence is used, don't judge the entire argument on the basis of the weakest points which in this case, are purly additive and not inclusive. The basic argument would be something along the lines of this, and I'll pull from the latest craze in teenage stupidity to support it. Don't illegalize something that can vastly improve a good deal of the things we do, in addition to lowering harm to ourselves and our world, just because some people don't know how to use it correctly. Take for instance inhalents. Lots of kids are misusing things that you can inhale and DIE from because it gets you high. Should we make gasoline, spray paint, parafin, etc. all illegal because of that? No, because it would be utterly foolish. So is the ban on marijuana.

Posted: 23rd Mar 2005
NYC said: “ What will we do without the hemp rope?”



Sorry NYC, you obviously don’t use rope or else you wouldn’t ask that Call that plastic stuff rope it slips and stretches, and you cant tie proper knots.



There is virtually no THC, in hemp varieties used for fibre. Environmentally, hemp is a thousand times more desirable than the water and fertiliser hungry, genetically modified cotton.



One of the first things Captain Cook and Sir Joseph Banks did when they visited Terra Australis was plant hemp (very important for sailing ships, you see). Then the hemp grew wild along the Hunter river in NSW until the mid 60’s when authorities were alerted by the number of Kombi vans frequenting the area, and the hemp was eradicated over the next few years.

If we as members of the human race practice meditation, we can transcend our fear, despair, and forgetfulness. Meditation is not an escape. It is the courage to look at reality with mindfulness and concentration. Thich Nhat Hanh

Posted: 6th Apr 2005
beefy - gasoline and spray paint don't stop you working or increase the risk of mental illness

the popular conception is that cannabis is a soft drug. this is wrong: the malign side-effects just take a lot longer to show up, in most cases. i've experimented pretty widely, and i'm convinced that weed is widely underestimated.

ture na sig

Posted: 6th Apr 2005
we still use hemp rope at Guildhall (theatre), the term for the fly floor ropes is actually 'hemps'!

nothing else is strong and non-stretchy enough to hold up bits of set and stuff safely.......it's the best!


go hemp! wooooo!

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strong-bad pop up book,
it was the book of my dreams.

Posted: 6th Apr 2005
v quiet: when you say you have experimented, do you mean you have conducted studies into the conceptions ppl hold RE weed, or are you referring to studies of your own experience? I assume the later, so I respond in kind.



In my experience, almost every weed smoker has a relatively accurate opinion of the harm caused by weed*, whereas in comparison many tobacco smokers say 'it wont happen to me' or 'I'm not addicted' - a far less informed opinion. Additionally, weed smokers are far more likely to discuss possible health effects of smoking - whereas smokers tend to laugh it off.



how do you justify saying that weed is not a soft drug? can you give us some examples of drugs that you classify as soft drugs?



*It can lead to mental illness in people who have a predisposition to mental illness and that inhaling smoke has a negative effect on your health - both short and long term. Smoked in moderation however - the vast majority of people experience little to no long term negative health effects.



Obviously the real danger is for people who would otherwise have kept their potential mental illness as only potential if they didnt start smoking weed before getting out of bed in the morning.



--------



I see the current attention that weed is getting as a return to the Reefer Madness properganda of the 1930s - 50s sponsored by right wing moralists. It wasnt true then and its not true now.




EDITED_BY: Pyrolific (1112849815)

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Posted: 7th Apr 2005
ok, i have no statistics or evidence, but i do have personal experience. i know a lot of people with mental illnesses, some smoke or have smoked in the past, some don't/haven't. i know several who believe that their psychotic episode/ schizophrenia/ depression is related to them smoking. now there's no way of knowing whether if they had never smoked whether they would experience the same mental health problems. i have known people with mantal helth issues that, once they started smoking, developed much worse symptoms, and people who are relatively stable after stopping smoking for a few months of years whose symptoms are exacerbated when they start again.

needless to say, i know a lot of people who smoke regularly without any issues. one confusing point is that it is common for people to begin smoking in their teens and twenties, and the teens/twenties is the most common time for people to experience their first period of mental illness.

i guess what i'm saying is that there it's too difficult to determine whether smoking directly effects occurance of mental illness, but there is definitely a link, and it's great to say don't smoke if you're predisposed to mental illness, but you're going to have a hard time trying to figure out whether you're predisposed without actually becoming mentally ill. (i'm not sure whether that made sense or not, i hope you guys can figure out what i mean).

i think all human's have a certain amount and type of stress they can put on themselves mentally before it becomes too much, for some simply existing in society is stressful enough to trigger mental illness, for some traumatic situations will trigger it, some people can go through extreme situations before they crack. and for some, i think smoking is a stress mentally.

this is all just my own perceptions and opinions, so keep that in mind if you're going to tear through it

Posted: 7th Apr 2005

Written by: myco

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... it's great to say don't smoke if you're predisposed to mental illness, but you're going to have a hard time trying to figure out whether you're predisposed without actually becoming mentally ill.

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good point Myco

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Posted: 7th Apr 2005
so yea, can it cause psycosis? is this all just propaganda? i remember reading something about this a while back and in the article it observed that the 'weed' most people smoke now is equivalent to what used to be known as superskunk in the 60s. superskunk is something that no longer exists because most of what we get is hydo, pumped full of chemicals and is some large amount of 100s of percent stronger than what was being grown in the days of flower power. so already in terms of the concentration of the drug i would say that the increase in strength of the chemicals now could well cause people to flip the script. skunk is also far far more psychoactive than it used to be, due again to the ridiculous strength. ive seen a guy take two drags off a joint and hit the deck, cracking his head on the floor. he woke up able to move but with no sensation in his body, sat against a radiator on full power for 5 minutes and then realised he was hot. if a drug can do that to someone who has smoked before (although granted not that much) then it aint a soft drug.
personally i dont touch skunk anymore because it makes me trip out, but then i used to do a lot of mesc and acid. proper bush weed on the other hand, or rocky, causes me no problems. but its also, like many people have said, i agree that if youre depressed, dont smoke. because it accentuates your state.
i also saw some tv programme about the effects of some part of either thc, or another chemical from canabis, on fighters. in some tribe somewhere in africa (i think) they used to have a method of separating the stoner chemical from the buzzing chemical. when you give the buzzing chemical (yea, i know hardly a technical term) to someone it made them more or less invincible. not in that the felt invincible but they became better fighters. they did a modern scientific test and put up two martial artists of equal skill and scored them in a competition. they came out equal. then they gave one the chemical and he whipped the other guy about. anyway, i found that very interesting....

did i leave the iron on?

Posted: 7th Apr 2005
"pumped full of chemicals"

Like what?

If they are Hydroponicly grown, then its only bathing in rooting solution...

Posted: 7th Apr 2005

Written by: Parliament Of Peace

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hmmm, i think to make people smoke it on site seems like a bad idea... that way you make it into a closed scene, you'll brand them as social outcasts. they should be free to use (not abuse) it where ever they feel comfortable to do so... just like alcohol or cigarettes. as long as it doesn't bother those around them (I don't like people smoking in public places).

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Sorry to make the debate jump around... some good points here I thought, but I feel it will be a more difficult issue than alcohol or cigarettes on the social front, if only because someone drinking beer next to me will not make me passively drunk, and cigarette smoke has a much less noticable effect than the person next to the smoker becoming stoned. Any ideas on how this could be effectively handled? ( I know I've had to avoid most of the rooms at a house party on plenty of occasions, being relegated to the kitchen with the door open, thus effectively being the social outcast )

If bans on smoking in public places become more widespread and enforced, if cannabis does become legalised, smokers or any kind may be 'outcast' from public places anyway. Hmmm


Ooh, iBeefy- Can you give me a reference for that 'monkey study', please? I'd like to read that

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Posted: 7th Apr 2005
"cigarette smoke has a much less noticable effect than the person next to the smoker becoming stoned."

Cannabis affects you more than tobacco does....

Posted: 7th Apr 2005
That was my point... did I word it badly? Sowwy

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The pessimist fears this is true.

Always make time to play in the snow.