Lying to Teens about Marijuana does more harm than good.
I think it's wrong for society to lie to teenagers about smoking
marijuana. I find it frustrating when I hear ads from places like
"Partnership for a Drug Free America" running commercials against Pot
that just aren't true. I don't like it when people warn teens about
using "Marijuana and Cocaine" when Pot is almost harmless and Cocaine is
a dangerous drug. When people lie to teens about Marijuana then teens
assume they are lying about other drugs too and I think they are more
likely to do drugs they shouldn't do. So I think it's time to come clean
and tell the truth. If teens are going to do drugs, they should have
truthful and accurate information. So I have decided to tell it like it
is. Best decisions are made when the real facts are presented.
For those parents who are reading this in horror, I am not trying to get kids to smoke Pot. What I am doing here is trying to tell them the truth, and tell you the truth about a widely misunderstood substance. This is an opportunity for everyone to have a better understanding of reality. If you can't handle reality, stop reading this web page. There are plenty of other web sites that will tell you what you want to hear. This is not one of them.
How bad is Marijuana Really?
As compared to most drugs, Pot is the least dangerous. Pot is not an addictive drug. For those who claim it is, anything is theoretically addictive, and there are some people who can become addicted to spring water. So to put it in perspective, Pot is less addictive than coffee. I have become addicted to coffee myself and have broken the habit. You get mild headaches for a few days. I have never had any symptoms for withdrawal from Pot.
Pot will cause some short term memory loss. It's harder to remember a 10
digit phone number. Beer causes the same memory loss as Pot. The effect
is temporary and wears off completely. Pot has no long term affects on
the brain. I have been smoking Pot for the last 25 years and I still
test as a genius on IQ tests. My mental abilities have increased over
the years.
Pot will give you the Munchies. You may eat more than you would normally. If you are on a diet, you should factor this in when deciding to smoke Pot. It could cause you to gain weight.
Pot is a sexual stimulant. It removes a persons inhibitions. You are more likely to agree to have sex when you are stoned. You are also more likely to not use birth control while stoned. Sometimes people get others stoned to try to get them to have sex when they normally wouldn't. If you are getting stoned with members of the opposite sex, be aware of this and realize that it can have this effect on you.
If anyone asks if you smoke Pot, Just say No! |
Smoking Pot increases your risk of cancer. But most people smoke very little Pot. If you use Pot moderately you don't have anything to worry about. Moderate means a joint every few days.
Pot will give you dry mouth. Have something to drink when smoking Pot.
The most dangerous thing about Pot is getting caught with it. You can go to jail. People get very weird about Pot and you can get in a lot of trouble over it. So if anyone asks if you've been smoking Pot, Just Say No!
Benefits of Marijuana
Marijuana is the safest of all drugs. It is far safer to smoke a joint
than to have a beer. Pot is the drug of choice for people who want to
get high, but be responsible in getting high. There are people who do no
drugs at all, and that's fine. But for those of you who want to get high
and be responsible, Pot is a very good choice.
Marijuana make most people more relaxed. It relieves the clutter and tension after a hard days work or school. It mellows you out and makes you more relaxed. It heightens the imagination and improves creativity. If you have a problem with anger, Pot is usually a good drug to reduce it.
Marijuana has other medical benefits. It helps reduce problems with glaucoma. If you have cancer, it reduces nausea from chemotherapy. I had a close friend who died of cancer. His doctor prescribed Pot even though it wasn't legal. I gave him some and it allowed him to eat food again. This was three weeks before he died. I think the Pot gave him another week of quality life.
Marijuana is also safer, more effective, and has less side effects than many prescription antidepressants. Shortly after my divorce when I learned that I got a judgement for more that 100% of everything I owned, my doctor put me on Pamalor, a common antidepressant. Pamalor turned me into a zombie and made me practically impotent. I merely existed and felt nothing, had no motivation, couldn't accomplish anything, and became basically useless. After two weeks of that I got off it. Getting stoned and laid a couple time a week had a much better result. I was alert, motivated, effective, sharp, got better sleep, happy, and alive. Not all antidepressants have this same effect. However, these drugs are overperscribed and in many cases I think that an occasional joint is a better alternative to antidepressant drugs.
Marijuana is especially good for those with high stress lifestyles. The brain has a tendency to lock on to a problem and your mind gets into a mental loop where you can't stop thinking about work or some other problem. Pot can help you break the cycle and see the problem from a different perspective, or allow your mind to move on and rest allowing you to enjoy life so that you can recover and have a fresh perspective for the next day.
Marijuana can make you Smarter
Marijuana enhances certain mental abilities. Although it cuts into short
term memory, it reallocates mental resources allowing you to become more
imaginative and to come up with new solutions to problems that you
wouldn't normally think of when you're not stoned. Much of my creative
writing starts from things I though of while smoking Pot. For example,
my web page on Teen Cigarette Smoking is a
very effective web page that has resulted in thousands of kids decided
to not smoke cigarettes. I wrote most of it while I was stoned. And I
came up with the concepts as to why it would work as a result of smoking
Pot. My smoking Pot has resulted in a decrease in teem smoking.
When used correctly and responsibly, Pot can actually increase your ability to find new and innovative solutions to problems. |
Marijuana helps you think "outside the box". This concept of thinking "out of the box" is an ability sought after by corporations who want to hire people with new an innovative ideas and actually invent a better mousetrap. However, by having drug testing policies the corporations are actually excluding the very people who they seek to hire. I believe that if some of these corporate policy makers were to smoke some Pot themselves, they would realize that Pot, when used responsibly, actually enhances a persons ability to make strategic decisions.
Going back to my anti-smoking page and thinking outside the box, I want
to now describe the mental processes behind developing this web page
while smoking Pot. While I was stoned I wondered why anyone would want
to start smoking cigarettes. Although cancer and addiction were reason
enough for me to not smoke, obviously there were a lot of people who are
not like me. If everyone thought like I do, no one would smoke. I
considered the idea that perhaps there were people who didn't know about
cancer and addiction and quickly dismissed that. It seem pretty obvious
that everyone has got that message. Therefore, I reasoned that to
continue to repeat the same argument isn't going to gain ground among
those who have already rejected it. It was logical that in order to gain
ground, I needed to come up with other reasons to not smoke than those
that everyone already knows.
People who think "in the box" would conclude that cancer and death are the strongest arguments and that if that doesn't work then other issues wouldn't be important. But what these in the box thinkers don't realize is that they are coloring things from their perspective. They are for the most part non-smokers who have bought the cancer and death argument and wrongly assumes that everyone else thinks like they do. But smokers see things differently. Most smokers don't even know why they started smoking because they can't remember a rational process that caused them to decide to start to smoke. That's because most people smoke because of instinctive forces which are more powerful in humans than we would like to admit. People are herd animals, and the instinct to be part of the herd is more powerful than reasoning. And those who advertise tobacco product know this all too well.
My approach on my anti-smoking web page was to address the social and
lifestyle issues involved in smoking. To expose how the tobacco
companies are manipulating your mind and taking advantage of you. My web
page creates mental defenses in the mind of the reader so that in the
future when the reader is being seduced by tobacco, that their brains
are programmed to recognize the seduction and to branch to a mental
process that causes outrage that they are being manipulated and results
in them not deciding to smoke. In addition, I made strong argument about
the smokers lifestyle that add many new strong arguments as to why to
not smoke in addition to cancer and death. The problem with cancer and
death is that those are long term arguments and many young people don't
respond to it. My additional arguments are short term effects that will
start immediately and are more relevant to young people.
Am I saying that my web page is better than the addiction, cancer, and death web pages? No. I think those reach most people. But my Pot inspired web page reaches a significant number of additional teens that the cancer and death pages don't reach. My point in this and I hope you as the reader have understood it, is that Pot inspires this kind of analytical thinking that results in being able to think outside the box and to come up with new approaches to problem solving that compliment traditional solutions. I hope that I have made it clear by example that Pot, when used correctly and responsibly, has a mind enhancing effect. But I want to stress to all you read this that any drug, legal or not, prescription or not, from coffee to LSD, should only be used correctly and responsibly.
Marijuana can make you Dumber
Pot affects everyone differently. Just because Pot has some beneficial
effects on me doesn't mean that it will do the same for you. Everyone is
different and drugs affect different people in different ways.
Obviously, if you have tried Marijuana and it had a bad effect on you,
don't continue to use it.
Marijuana use has been associated with turning teens into mental zombies who lose all motivation. They claim that it makes it so that all you want to do is lay around and get high, that you will become like Cheech 'n Chong. There is a real correlation with lazy dopers and Pot but I'm not sure if the Pot makes you a lazy doper or if you are a lazy doper type first and are therefore attracted to Pot. Some people experience fear and paranoia while high on Pot. Some people get headaches. Marijuana does compromise certain mental abilities on a short term basis. You don't want to smoke a joint before taking a test. Therefore, if Pot is messing up your life, or you don't have the self control to use it moderately and appropriately, don't use Pot.
Drug Abuse is a Bad Idea
Marijuana is a drug to be used, not abused. Just because Pot isn't
addictive doesn't mean that you should get stoned every day. It doesn't
mean that it's totally safe. It doesn't mean that you should go out and
start smoking Pot. And just because it makes me more mentally effective
under some circumstances doesn't mean that it's going to have the same
effect on you. There are a lot of people who experiences the opposite
effect and if your one of those, Pot isn't for you. Pot affects
different people in different ways and if Pot is having a detrimental
effect on you, you should not smoke it.
Drugs of all kinds have varying degrees of danger. You have to be mature and responsible when experimenting with any drug. You should never do a drug that you don't know what the effects are. And drugs should be used in moderation and under the right circumstances. You should never do any drug while driving a car, especially alcohol. If you are a teenager, one beer can make you wreck your car.
Many drugs out there are highly addictive. The most addictive drug that kills more people than any other drug is Tobacco. This drug is to be avoided at all costs. The addiction to Tobacco is much harder to break if you get hooked at a young age. Besides cancer and death, Tobacco will totally change your lifestyle. Your whole life will revolve around scheduling when and where you'll be able to smoke next.
LSD is not an addictive drug but it is very mind altering. It can be viewed as having similar characteristics as Pot by much more powerful. Mushrooms, Mescaline, and Peyote are also in the non-addictive psychedelic class of drugs. They are similar to the neurotransmitters in the brain and are more mind altering than any other drug. The experience can have a profound effect on you and should be used only with extreme caution.
Once you become addicted, you can't just quit. You become a slave to the drug. Your life revolves around getting it. This includes cigarettes. |
I personally avoid all addictive drugs except Alcohol. I like to drink
some Beer and Wine, but I don't like to get drunk. Other people have a
different reaction to Alcohol than I do and enjoy getting drunk. Those
who enjoy it are more likely to become alcoholic than those who don't.
Addiction makes you a slave to the drug and controls your life. I never
met an addict that was glad they got addicted. If the people who are
hooked wish they weren't, what would you want to start?
Teens usually have a stronger tendency to follow the crowd than adults do. You may find yourself in a situation where everyone else is doing a drug that you don't want to do. You find yourself tempted because you don't want to go to the trouble to not go along. What you may not realize is that it's kool to say that you just don't want to do whatever everyone else is doing, and not make a big deal out of it. Usually the others will just say OK and it's no big deal. In other words, you really can "Just say No." If you don't want to do a drug, don't do it. If someone gets pushy about it, tell them to fuck off!
It's your Life! Be Responsible!
Most people will bullshit you about the truth about drugs. I have been
honest about it here. In fact I'm being honest at great personal risk
because there are a lot of people out there who would persecute me
personally for saying the things I'm saying here. But what I'm saying is
the truth and I'm standing by it. I'm sure that the government,
particularly the moralists would like to classify this page as "harmful
to minors" under their new censorship laws, would like to see me shut
down and probably jailed. This page not harmful to minors, it's helpful
to minors. Telling minors lies about drugs is harmful to minors.
What I want to make clear to you who read this is that people make choices in their lives that affect who they are and who they will become. If you make the right choices you are more likely to have a better life than if you make the wrong choices. Although you can make all the right choices and still be killed in a car accident because someone else ran a red light. But if you are smart about what you do then the odds are in your favor.
The most important thing a Teenager needs to learn is how to say NO and mean it. |
These choices are yours alone and it's your responsibility to make good
choices and make your life meaningful. You may have had a hard beginning
and you may have to work hard climbing up the ladder of life to become
successful. But ultimately you become who you decide to become and you
can choose to be better than what you are raised to be. The choices you
make are ultimately yours and you have to be responsible and take your
choices seriously. If you smoke cigarettes, you will become a smoker. If
you get pregnant, you will become a parent. If you get hooked on Meth,
you will become a drug addict. It's your choice and if you choose to
fuck up your life, it's your fault. But if you want to become great then
you can be great, even if you come from unfortunate conditions. And the
difference between those who become great and those who don't is that
great people take control of their lives, take responsibility for their
decisions, and through pure force of will, looking into the future, and
through self discipline, lift themselves up and achieve greatness. And
every one of you who read this can do the same thing.
It's your life. If you screw it up, you've screwed it up. It's your fault. |
There was this kid born to a single mother. His father died in a car
accident a few months before he was born. The lived in a trailer in a
small hick town in the south. His mother went to nursing school and left
him to his grandmother for a few years. Then his mother married a drunk
and had another kid. The father would often get drunk and get violent.
The younger brother grew up and became a Cocaine addict. But this kid
decided that he was going to rise above his upbringing as a poor
southern white trash stepson of a drunk and make something of himself.
He worked hard and got good grades in school and in 1962 his class went
on a trip to Washington where he shook hands with President Kennedy. At
that moment that poor kid from Arkansas decided that some day he was
going to be President of the United States, and he went out and did it.
If this kid could become President, surely you can decide to grow up and
not get hooked on drugs. It's your life, and you can be what you want to
be.
Why Marijuana should be Legal
Legalizing Marijuana would be a benefit to society. We as a nation would
be improved by it. There are several reasons I make this claim. Although
Pot has it's problems, it's benefits for outweigh it's consequences.
If Pot were legal, many people would switch from alcohol to Pot. I think that a lot of Alcohol abuse come from the fact that it is the only legal drug and therefore is overused. Alcohol is highly addictive, physically and psychologically destructive, and is a severe drag on society. I think that if Pot were legal that many people would switch to Pot and be much better off. I think one side effect of legalizing Pot would be a major reduction in the abuse of Alcohol and that the number of traffic deaths would drop dramatically.
The only reason Pot isn't legal is because there are a lot of people making money because it's not legal. |
Another reason is to save the huge cost in tax dollars wasted in
prohibiting Pot and enforcing drug laws that have no benefit to society.
If Pot were legal you immediately eliminate the illegal Pot market and
get rid of crime associated with Pot money. You could also release from
jail all those convicted from Pot related offenses and cut the costs of
having to build new prisons to incarcerate normal people. Because of
mandatory drug sentencing laws, many states have to release violent
offenders to make room for Pot smokers. That's stupid! Pot has many other uses. Before the lumber industry lobbied Congress to make Pot illegal, Marijuana (known as Hemp) was the primary source of fiber for the production of paper. The United States Constitution is printed on Pot. With today's technologies this fiber can be processed into construction materials that would replace wood products saving our forests and lowering the costs of construction while producing byproducts useful in making fuels to run cars and generate electricity. Hemp is a very hearty plant and would be a good cash crop for our nation's farmers.
Who opposes legalizing Marijuana and why
There are many types of people who oppose legalizing Marijuana for a
variety of reasons. Many of these groups have some very strange reasons
and selfish interests. Many are just ignorant of the facts. Here's some
of the opposition:
Important People for Legalizing Marijuana
There have been several people who have come out in favor of legalizing
marijuana in the last year or so. These people have shown courage in the
face of this artificial drug hysteria.
Oppressing Pot Smokers is the Real Crime
The time has come where We the People have to stand up to the government
and tell them that we are no longer going to put up with the jailing and
oppression of pot smokers and this artificial war on drugs. They teach
you that there are three branches of government by in fact there are
four branches. The fourth branch of government is
the people. The time has come for reasonable people to rise up
against the government and to force them to justify the reason for
oppressing pot smokers and drug addicts. People in America have been to
complacent for to long and the time has come to stand up and get in
their faces and demand satisfaction.
Myths about Marijuana
The most common myth is that "Marijuana Leads to Harder Drugs."
Critics say the medical marijuana movement promotes drug abuse and
criminal behavior by ushering young people into what one judge has
called "the kindergarten of the drug industry". They call Pot the
"gateway drug" and say that once you do Pot that you will need to move
on to harder drugs like LSD, Heroine, and Cocaine to get the same
"thrill". Sounds good, but it just isn't so.
Marijuana does not lead to harder drugs! |
Marijuana on the other hand is the choice of the responsible drug user.
A person who wants to get high on something that isn't addictive and
doesn't have any long term health effects for the moderate user would
likely choose to smoke Pot. This is the drug of choice for those who
don't want to be on the path of drug addiction.
Another common myth is, "there is no official proof to back the contention that marijuana can help ease symptoms of AIDS, cancer, multiple sclerosis and other serious diseases." But the reason there is no proof is that the government is actively avoiding the funding of medical research into medical uses of Marijuana because they are afraid that they will indeed discover what doctors already know and it would undermine the laws criminalizing Marijuana and lead to legalization. If you want to read something amusing, read the study from National Institute of Health. Here's pages and pages documenting the results of doing nothing to research the medical benefits of smoking Pot. I've never seen such a long paper documenting what the government hasn't investigated or tested. If the government weren't afraid of legalizing Pot they would test it. The fact that the government won't do medical tests on Pot proves that they don't want to know the truth.
What's more outrageous is the claims that the government makes about
Marijuana when they refuse to make any medical or scientific tests. They
claim that smoked Marijuana damages the brain, heart, lungs and immune
system, but they don't know that. There have been some tests done
indicating that Marijuana can cause lung cancer, even more so than
cigarettes. But those test don't take into account that the usage isn't
100th as much as cigarette smokers. If the government wants to make
medical claims about Pot they should test it and look at the scientific
data. I challenge the government to do the research and then we'll talk
about reality.
Twisting Logic
I find it amazing how the anti-pot organizations twist logic to try to justify their positions that pot is a dangerous drug. And these people wonder why teenagers don't take their message seriously. Teens just aren't that stupid. And when you try to pull stupid logic tricks on teens they resent it and ignore you. If they are going to accuse us of being brain damaged, the sure aren't setting a very good example of what "normal" is supposed to be. Here some examples of tortured logic:
Wow! This is really brilliant. Based on that reasoning, 99% of drug
addicts attended church before becoming a drug addict. Therefore going
to church leads to harder drugs. What else did over 90% of drug addicts
do first? Over 90% of drug addicts smoked a cigarette, most still do.
They drank alcohol, most still do. How about watched television, voted
for a Democrat, had a pet, had sex, owned a bicycle, chewed gum,
participated in sports, celebrated Halloween, had a religious
experience, took something that didn't belong to them, voted for a
Republican, told a lie, wondered if they might be homosexual, or ate too
much white sugar. Using the same reasoning, all these activities must
also lead to harder drugs.
There are over 400 chemicals in every plant. There are over 700 chemicals added to American cigarettes.
I suppose I'm addicted to aspirin. When I get a headache, I need aspirin
to feel well. Everything that feels good is addictive and there's a 12
step program out there for every one of them. And if you don't believe
it, you're in DENIAL! Since they know that Pot isn't addictive, they try
to redefine the word "addiction" and try to make Pot fit the new
definition. The fact that the need to twist the definition indicates
that they know that Pot doesn't fit the traditional definition of
addiction.
Drug addiction occurs when the drug affects the body in a way that causes the body to become dependent on the drug and causes a negative reaction when the drug is removed. Marijuana, LSD, and magic mushrooms are examples of non-addictive drugs. Cocaine, Heroine, Methamphedamine, Alcohol, Tobacco, and Caffeine are examples of addictive drugs. Telling lies about what drugs are addictive is not going to help solve the drug problem.
Anti-Marijuana Web Sites - Read Both Sides of the Issue!
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