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Post by Don on Nov 2, 2018 4:50:08 GMT -5
Victory for Cannabis Day is coming soon. With personal recreational consumption now "legal" on both borders, it's all over but the angst. I find it more than ironic that the so-called "land of the free" is lagging behind both Canada and Mexico (Mexico!!!) when it comes to personal freedom. Mexican Supreme Court Issues Binding Ruling Against Pot Prohibition
Rumors are that the incoming Mexican president will legalize production and sales as well, to help with a number of issues.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2018 5:29:57 GMT -5
Though I personally am not a pot user (and indeed dislike the smell of it), I think full legalization of marijuana is long overdue. Few things are sillier than the way our country has historically treated all things to do with marijuana. Can you say "expensive, useless, pointless, and counterproductive"? I knew you could!
(I am also thinking we should be re-nicknamed "Land of the Batshit Blusterer", but that's another story.)
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Post by Don on Nov 2, 2018 5:56:58 GMT -5
Calling the War on Cannabis "silly" is one of the major understatements of the 21st Century. It will one day be recognized as a crime against humanity on the order of the Holocaust... the deaths and destruction that can be laid at the feet of this war are virtually endless.
Many of our problems today with petrochemicals, plastics and medicine are directly tied to the protection of Big Oil from hemp. The microplastics in our ocean can be directly attributed to Harry Anslinger, DuPont, and the conflation of Cannabis and Hemp. Hemp could also have contributed greatly to preventing the problems of deforestation. Hemp plastics, unlike petroleum-based plastics, are biodegradable and in many cases stronger. Much of the environmental destruction caused by petrochemicals are a direct result of the demonization of Hemp. I could continue...
Then we can talk about the vast number of medical conditions that are mitigated by Cannabis, conditions that could have been helped for decades if not prevented by politicians, and the as-yet undiscovered cures for other diseases that have yet to be made because research was forbidden. Another topic that's almost endless...
And we haven't even touched on the destruction of millions of lives, the deaths of thousands, the laying to waste of our inner cities, the militarization of those who are supposed to "protect and serve" and the incarceration of millions for doing nothing but disobeying their "betters." Not to mention the impact of clogging the legal system and encouraging law enforcement to waste their efforts there instead of on real crime. We could go on with this topic for days, too.
As an Atheist, I can still hope there's a hell and a special ring at the bottom for all the "leaders" who caused this damage in the name of getting elected and collecting donations to their campaigns.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2018 6:12:02 GMT -5
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Post by Amadan on Nov 2, 2018 9:34:08 GMT -5
Calling the War on Cannabis "silly" is one of the major understatements of the 21st Century. It will one day be recognized as a crime against humanity on the order of the Holocaust... the deaths and destruction that can be laid at the feet of this war are virtually endless. Let us not call criminalizing a drug equivalent to creating death camps and attempted genocide, okay? I agree with you that the war on cannabis has been stupid and it can't end soon enough, but "crime against humanity on the order of the Holocaust" is way, way overstating things.
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Post by robeiae on Nov 2, 2018 9:57:44 GMT -5
For sure. I'm okay with legalizing pot--especially for medical use--but the fact that many bad things can be associated with the illegal drug trade in this regard is as much on the people who want to get stoned as it is on anyone else.
Holocaust?!?!? That's so over-the-top, it's counter-productive, really. It you're spouting nonsense like that, Don, there's zero reason for anyone to take you seriously when it comes to any aspect of legalizing pot, even if you have valid points.
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Post by Don on Nov 2, 2018 14:41:48 GMT -5
This is not just about recreational cannabis.
How many people have died from the War on Drugs? How many families and neighborhoods destroyed? And over how many decades? How many countless millions more because drug research was forbidden for decades? How many more do you care to assign to petrochemical pollution? Opiod addictions that could have been easily prevented? The still-growing environmental disaster of microplastics? And all to give good ol' Harry an excuse to get his racist jollies, give Nixon something to use against equal rights and anti-war movements, and give the military-industrial complex a domestic market.
Yeah, I'll stand by my statement. The damage we see now is just a tiny tip of the iceberg.
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Post by Don on Nov 2, 2018 14:46:33 GMT -5
I'll concede one major difference. The perpetrators of the Holocaust were recognized as the evil men they were, stopped as soon as humanly possible, and held accountable for their crimes.
Many of the perpetrators of the War on Cannabis are still in office and/or lauded as heroes.
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Post by robeiae on Nov 2, 2018 15:14:21 GMT -5
Crap.
It IS just about recreational cannabis, along with recreational cocaine, recreational heroin, and so on. And it's about the money that can be made preying on dimwits who are willing to break the law just so they can get high.
You stand by your ridiculous, over the top statement. I'm sure it will stand the test of time. And I'll be sure to let the people at the Holocaust Museum know that they're remembering a second-tier tragedy, at best.
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Post by Amadan on Nov 2, 2018 15:25:32 GMT -5
This is not just about recreational cannabis. How many people have died from the War on Drugs? How many families and neighborhoods destroyed? And over how many decades? How many countless millions more because drug research was forbidden for decades? How many more do you care to assign to petrochemical pollution? Opiod addictions that could have been easily prevented? The still-growing environmental disaster of microplastics? And all to give good ol' Harry an excuse to get his racist jollies, give Nixon something to use against equal rights and anti-war movements, and give the military-industrial complex a domestic market. Yeah, I'll stand by my statement. The damage we see now is just a tiny tip of the iceberg. If you want to play Connections, you can tie just about any major social, technological, or cultural institution, especially a negative one, to some huge number of deaths, our failure to have Mars colonies, and the fall of an empire or two. I get it, Don, you really like your weed and you really resent the government interfering with your weed supply, but it's not the fucking Holocaust, and this comparison is possibly the most retarded thing you've ever posted.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2018 16:06:45 GMT -5
This entire forum could use some weed today...
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Post by Don on Nov 3, 2018 6:20:40 GMT -5
Nice factual rebuttals, at least. Interesting how I've gone from an intelligent, thoughtful participant to nothing but a pot head in one thread. That marijuana reefer I smoked with that black jazz musician must have destroyed my logic circuits.
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Post by mikey on Nov 3, 2018 8:23:05 GMT -5
Nice factual rebuttals, at least. Interesting how I've gone from an intelligent, thoughtful participant to nothing but a pot head in one thread. That marijuana reefer I smoked with that black jazz musician must have destroyed my logic circuits. Get a haircut while you're at it. Hippie ((Grinie face))
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Post by Deleted on Nov 3, 2018 8:37:45 GMT -5
To be honest, what I saw in this thread was Don using a bit of hyperbole, a couple of you being irritable and extra intolerant of it, and then everyone doubling down.
For my own part, I agree with Rob and Amadan that the war on drugs, however many victims it has, is not the Holocaust because it was not a deliberate and terrifyingly successful attempt at genocide.
However, I agree with Don that it's batshit and has unnecessarily devastated a lot of lives, which I think was Don's actual point.
Perhaps it's midterms; it seems everyone is extra cranky lately. That obviously includes me. Maybe all the white-hot crazy making extremists boil over is affecting the rest of us too. I dunno.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 3, 2018 9:22:16 GMT -5
To be honest, what I saw in this thread was Don using a bit of hyperbole, a couple of you being irritable and extra intolerant of it, and then everyone doubling down. For my own part, I agree with Rob and Amadan that the war on drugs, however many victims it has, is not the Holocaust because it was not a deliberate and terrifyingly successful attempt at genocide. However, I agree with Don that it's batshit and has unnecessarily devastated a lot of lives, which I think was Don's actual point. Perhaps it's midterms; it seems everyone is extra cranky lately. That obviously includes me. Maybe all the white-hot crazy making extremists boil over is affecting the rest of us too. I dunno. To add to this, at the risk of making everyone on the forum angry with me: Most of us here, if not all of us, have at least one topic that provokes us to extra passion, in a way that seems completely appropriate to us, and perhaps sometimes seems disproportionate to others. The war on drugs. Migrants. Race. SJWs. Title IX. I submit that when each of us with our extra passion get up on our horse, we generally do have a point, even if that point doesn't resonate as much with others (who have their own horses). And I do get why that passion is irritating to others. I get irritated, too, sometimes, when people seem disproportionately upset about things that seem to me less important than a lot of other things. I think it's reasonable to point out that, e.g., the drug war is different from the Holocaust. But one thing I really DON'T get is the knee-jerk reaction to automatically diss anyone who has some passion on a subject and reject, disregard, or ignore the substance of what they are saying merely because they have emotion about it. They are emotional or angry; ergo, they are wrong and may be safely dismissed and ignored. Their emotion becomes the topic. And never mind if perhaps there is some justification for their emotion or anger (even if it seems disproportionate, from our point of view).
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