Earlier today I posted a blog about how I thought that marijuana should not be legalized. A close friend of mine read the blog and told me what she thought. And she may have actually changed my mind. Something about the way in which she articulated her point drove me to reconsider the subject.
" I totally disagree with you about legalizing marijuana. It absolutely should be legalized. I don't think people are interested in legalizing marijuana just to get high, because those people, in all likelihood, already smoke pot. I have never even considered smoking pot and I think it should be legalized.
Marijuana is about as harmful as alcohol (possibly even less so, since it doesn't cause liver damage or addiction). There absolutely should be laws against driving while high, but this is a different thing than actually smoking pot. It does not distort your judgment to the point where you're like, 'Hey, you know what would be a good thing to do, now that we're totally baked and Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle has just ended? Go driving!'
What legalizing marijuana would do is the following:
--stop making criminals out of people who smoke pot
--organize the selling of pot. If people were allowed to purchase marijuana through stores, they'd be less likely to buy it through drug dealers. This would cut down on drug-related violence and other crimes.
--help the economy. The war on drugs currently has a budget of $30 billion. Legalizing marijuana could lessen that economic strain. Furthermore, the government could tax the purchase of marijuana and use it for health care, national security, whatever."
It's funny how someone you know saying the similar words to people you don't can be a lot more affective. Thanks Jaime!
Btw though, my mind is not going to change on the subject of changing the drinking age. I still believe that should stay at 21. I think what happened with this issue was that I thought that I should be against the legalization of marijuana, but I didn't really have much of a reason aside from just thinking it was the right side to be on. Now that I've heard from other people about the subject I understand why I was wrong.
I'm not really sure how I feel about the subject...on one hand I think it should be...it would be a huge, taxable industry and with the proper regulations could work well...but on the other hand even if is only as harmful as alcohol it is ranked up there with cocaine and other narcotics and legalizing one would push to legalize others..but I think this is a good blog that brings up a valid perspective
First off loved Harold and Kumar reference, hilarious movie! Ok, I don't think that smoking should be legalized. You can find pot actually quite easily, there isn't a lot of drug related violence from that, its mostly the more hardcore, expensive drugs. Despite the fact that a lot of people smoke, it does more than screw with your heart, lungs and brain, it zapps up all your ambition. Do people really not have anything better to do than sit around for hours and hours and smoke pot?
It also causes not a physical addiction but a mental one. Imagine if it became legal, you would get tons of school kids completely lazy, getting high off the mary jane constantly because they think they need it.
We've tried making alcohol illegal, that didn't work. And smoking really is a bad addiction, that millions of people are hooked on.
And then if they would legalize it they would have to have an age minimum, so what's the point? Kids smoke so either way it will be illegal.
I believe that it should be legal for recreational use, as well as for hemp, which is a very useful and cheap commodity. I do not smoke, but I have smoked, for some years(17-23) or so. I think its dangers have been skewed to make it appear monstrous. It does affect judgement in some cases, but not necessarily badly. Some people smoke all the time and seem like morons, others smoke all the time and you'd never know. The point I'm driving at is that pot is just a symptom of an underlying problem. Personal Responsiblity. I think this is a problem which stems to many, many facets of our daily lives, and has led to some dangerous legislation(as far as our personal rights are concerned).
There seems to be a decline in people taking responsibility for themselves and their actions, and some prominent psychological theories tend to nurture this. When people believe they aren't responsible for themselves, they are more inclined to act like asses. Take for instance, this issue. There are factions who wish to keep it illegal, and those who wish to make it legal. Both make reasonable points, and both have ridiculous propaganda they spew out to support their issue. This makes it very difficult to find the real facts. The danger begins here. Now you have people polarizing on an issue, doing so with opinions based on misinformation, getting riled up and retaliating(playing the escalation game, more or less) causing more dramatic polarization and tension on both sides. Eventually sense flies out the window, and they are akin to a couple of neighboring dogs, barking angrily back and forth just because they don't know better than to do anything else. At this point, I'm curious how any real solution can be reached. This problem stems all over our society. You need only turn on your tv and flip to a news station to see the effects. Fox news vs ABC news, etc. Biased news is a terrible thing, and that seems to be all that's out there anymore. The news doesn't take responsibility for what it says, people don't take responsibility for their own search for the truth, and it creates this clusterfuck of nonsense. But I digress, sorry for the spiel, I tend to tangent.
I just think the truth is lost i the confusion, and we as a people, and ultimately, in tandem, our government, make bad decisions based off of nonsense. Teach responsibility, then facts.