[EyeBrock]

Curtman Curtman:

GreenTiger GreenTiger:

Booze is out in Iran, but you can smoke grass?

I never thought to look it up until now, but Wikipedia and a site called "A Traveler's Guide to Getting High" seem to agree that:

webehigh.com webehigh.com:

Legislation: Iran has a very interesting policy towards buds - planting marijuana is legal if planted for food purposes because Iranians still eat the seeds just like sunflower seeds, and there are also companies in tehran that draw the oil from the seed and sell it legally.

The punishment for possesion of marijuana is a fine of Iranian Rials 10000 (US $1.25)for every gram in your possesion and as long as you have less than 10-15 grams they will not even hassle you. Please always use common sense and caution and remember a smile is better than a frown.

Drug taking is tolerated in most Islamic countries Curt. When I was doing Islamic Studies at Manchester Poly (yep, I did actually do this for 2 years) a lot of my class-mates were 1st generation Brits of Pakistani heritage. We had a few debates about weed etc. A lot of the Pak guys used it frequently but a considered opinion from one of the older guys was that it was an intoxicant and therefore haram (verboten).

Wine is specifically mentioned in several Suras as well naughty but another Sura does say any intoxicants are haram but this is a minority view as weed, heroin, opium etc are as widespread in many parts of the Arab world as they are in the West and somewhat tolerated. Booze is not. Khat is another drug of choice in the Horn and East Africa and that seems to be ok within Islam too.

[Curtman]

Dayseed Dayseed:

Curtman Curtman:

The biker gangs are exactly who I am talking about. They'll tell you, and anybody else who studies the issue will tell you that they make money from marijuana, prostitution, and cocain. In that order.

And do you have any sources for that? It seems like you pulled it completely out of your ass. Mostly because you forgo the alcohol/tobacco smuggling, illegal gambling (if you think pot pays, you apparently have made much of a study of illegal gambling. Estimates from legal VLTs show that they make roughly $60,000 each a year. Do you think organized crime has the same high payouts that provinces and states do? Let's not forget bookmaking either. Plus, all gamblers eventually lose to the house, the bikers or the mob, and then take out loans at usurious rates) arms smuggling, protection rackets and last, but not least, good old thefts.

If you've got access to the Hell's Angels ledgers, I'd be interested in reading them.

Really.

http://www.cfseu.bc.ca/cms/node/45

$1:

The significant profits accrue to senior members of known organized crime groups, with the actual growers and tenders receiving very modest remuneration. (In fact many are working off gambling debts, or are recent immigrants “indentured” to criminal benefactors, or are club associates and hangarounds.) Further, the consuming marihuana market is almost entirely American, influenced in no small way by the premium that “B.C. Bud” commands. Distribution systems for this volume of product requires reasonably elaborate exportation and payment systems. Revenue from these types of crimes are frequently used as seed capital for the purchase of other commodities which offer even more lucrative profit opportunities such as cocaine, heroin and weapons. Profits are rolled into real estate, business ventures and stock portfolios.

Canadian Justice Minister Says Marijuana 'Currency' Used To Import Harder Drugs

$1:

"Marijuana is the currency that is used to bring other more serious drugs into the country."

National Overview of Criminal Markets

$1:

Marihuana remains one of the most trafficked illicit drugs in Canada, with extensive organized crime involvement at all levels of production, distribution, importation, and exportation. The domestic market for cannabis is almost entirely supplied by Canadian-produced marihuana. The drug is moved interprovincially from three main production hubs in B.C., Ontario, and Quebec to meet domestic demand and to transport large quantities of marihuana to areas along the Canada-U.S. border for smuggling into American markets. Most exported Canadian marihuana is destined for the United States; however, it only accounts for a small percentage of total marihuana imported in the U.S. Criminals smuggle Canadian-produced marihuana into the U.S. in exchange for cocaine, firearms, and contraband tobacco. Recently, U.S. law enforcement has seen a decline in the number of marihuana seizures along the Canada-U.S. border. This can be attributed to many factors, including the movement of some Canadian organized crime group grow operations onto U.S. soil to avoid border detection.

Dayseed Dayseed:

Curtman Curtman:

The problem with marijuana prohibition is two main things. The amount of profit that it generates for organized crime, and how it is used to draw in youth into organized crime. I'm not really interested in rights for drug users, or generating tax revenue. Those aren't issues that I care about. Reducing violence is.

By God...I agree with the above! At places like Jane/Finch, it's next to impossible to convince a kid that he shouldn't sell pot for a few hundred bucks a week so he can buy himself stuff and rather should get yelled at by a boss for 20 hours a week to make half the money at some retail spot at the Yorkgate Mall.

Excellent. So lets put the pot behind the counter with the cigarettes and alcohol, and stop selling it at high schools.

[putz]

Curtman Curtman:

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

The laid back west coast is a bit of a myth in my opinion. I've never heard of any serious move towards legalization. There's a strong activist underground here, but it's just that--an underground.

Couple that with the strictest alcohol regulation in North America, as well as the highest prices. And tobacco's days are numbered, not just in BC, but in Canada, the way things are going.

http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/dhp-mps/marihuan ... eng.php#a5

Maybe the cops should of asked some more questions. I suck at math but if this douche got picked up on the 1st of the month that means that he smokes 4.5g a day to legally hold that much dope.****edit**** read the you tube article and he's prescribed 20g's a day my bad. But this guys still a douche/attention whore/ cop hater.

[Curtman]

putz putz:

he's prescribed 20g's a day

That's how ridiculous things are. Somehow the health care system has become the way to avoid the black market.

[Yogi]

I'm a wee bit confused here! Some of the posts here advocating the legalization of weed, by some posters who on the subject of cigarette tobacco/smoke loudly advocate for the complete ban of same because it is proven to be 'poisonous-deadly-extremely unhealthy etc.. Are the carcinogens emitted from marijuana deemed to be healthy by comparison???

Bottom line being, I guess, is that if weed is ever legalized, and I give up the demon tobacco, and take up smoking marijuana, no longer would I be considered one of societies misfits.

Inhaling tobacco smoke bad! Inhaling marijuana smoke good!

[andyt]

Yogi Yogi:

I'm a wee bit confused here! Some of the posts here advocating the legalization of weed, by some posters who on the subject of cigarette tobacco/smoke loudly advocate for the complete ban of same because it is proven to be 'poisonous-deadly-extremely unhealthy etc.. Are the carcinogens emitted from marijuana deemed to be healthy by comparison???

Bottom line being, I guess, is that if weed is ever legalized, and I give up the demon tobacco, and take up smoking marijuana, no longer would I be considered one of societies misfits.

Inhaling tobacco smoke bad! Inhaling marijuana smoke good!

I've never read anybody here advocating for making tobacco illegal. Just banning smoking it around people who don't want to partake. The same applies to pot - it's included in the smoking bans currently extant in VAncouver.

So if you can't figure out the difference between legalizing something and not allowing it to be smoked around people who don't want to participate, you better not start up on pot - you're confused enough.

[Public_Domain]

[PublicAnimalNo9]

Yogi Yogi:

I'm a wee bit confused here! Some of the posts here advocating the legalization of weed, by some posters who on the subject of cigarette tobacco/smoke loudly advocate for the complete ban of same because it is proven to be 'poisonous-deadly-extremely unhealthy etc.. Are the carcinogens emitted from marijuana deemed to be healthy by comparison???

Bottom line being, I guess, is that if weed is ever legalized, and I give up the demon tobacco, and take up smoking marijuana, no longer would I be considered one of societies misfits.

Inhaling tobacco smoke bad! Inhaling marijuana smoke good!

The difference is Yogi, the VAST majority of smokers smoke wayyyy more cigs in a day than the average pot smoker smokes joints. I've been smoking weed for over 25 years now. A REALLY heavy day of smoking might entail 6 joints shared with my wife. When I smoked cigs, I smoked at least a pack of 25s a day. Didn't split em either
Heck, sitting around campfires can't be all that healthy either.
One other point. If you take a 25 year heavy cig smoker and a 25 year heavy pot smoker and they both quit at the same time and don't relapse, the pot smoker's lungs will heal up faster and more completely.

[Dayseed]

Curtman Curtman:

Dayseed Dayseed:

Curtman Curtman:

The biker gangs are exactly who I am talking about. They'll tell you, and anybody else who studies the issue will tell you that they make money from marijuana, prostitution, and cocain. In that order.

And do you have any sources for that? It seems like you pulled it completely out of your ass. Mostly because you forgo the alcohol/tobacco smuggling, illegal gambling (if you think pot pays, you apparently have made much of a study of illegal gambling. Estimates from legal VLTs show that they make roughly $60,000 each a year. Do you think organized crime has the same high payouts that provinces and states do? Let's not forget bookmaking either. Plus, all gamblers eventually lose to the house, the bikers or the mob, and then take out loans at usurious rates) arms smuggling, protection rackets and last, but not least, good old thefts.

If you've got access to the Hell's Angels ledgers, I'd be interested in reading them.

Really.

http://www.cfseu.bc.ca/cms/node/45

$1:

The significant profits accrue to senior members of known organized crime groups, with the actual growers and tenders receiving very modest remuneration. (In fact many are working off gambling debts, or are recent immigrants “indentured” to criminal benefactors, or are club associates and hangarounds.) Further, the consuming marihuana market is almost entirely American, influenced in no small way by the premium that “B.C. Bud” commands. Distribution systems for this volume of product requires reasonably elaborate exportation and payment systems. Revenue from these types of crimes are frequently used as seed capital for the purchase of other commodities which offer even more lucrative profit opportunities such as cocaine, heroin and weapons. Profits are rolled into real estate, business ventures and stock portfolios.

Canadian Justice Minister Says Marijuana 'Currency' Used To Import Harder Drugs

$1:

"Marijuana is the currency that is used to bring other more serious drugs into the country."

National Overview of Criminal Markets

$1:

Marihuana remains one of the most trafficked illicit drugs in Canada, with extensive organized crime involvement at all levels of production, distribution, importation, and exportation. The domestic market for cannabis is almost entirely supplied by Canadian-produced marihuana. The drug is moved interprovincially from three main production hubs in B.C., Ontario, and Quebec to meet domestic demand and to transport large quantities of marihuana to areas along the Canada-U.S. border for smuggling into American markets. Most exported Canadian marihuana is destined for the United States; however, it only accounts for a small percentage of total marihuana imported in the U.S. Criminals smuggle Canadian-produced marihuana into the U.S. in exchange for cocaine, firearms, and contraband tobacco. Recently, U.S. law enforcement has seen a decline in the number of marihuana seizures along the Canada-U.S. border. This can be attributed to many factors, including the movement of some Canadian organized crime group grow operations onto U.S. soil to avoid border detection.

Dayseed Dayseed:

Curtman Curtman:

The problem with marijuana prohibition is two main things. The amount of profit that it generates for organized crime, and how it is used to draw in youth into organized crime. I'm not really interested in rights for drug users, or generating tax revenue. Those aren't issues that I care about. Reducing violence is.

By God...I agree with the above! At places like Jane/Finch, it's next to impossible to convince a kid that he shouldn't sell pot for a few hundred bucks a week so he can buy himself stuff and rather should get yelled at by a boss for 20 hours a week to make half the money at some retail spot at the Yorkgate Mall.

Excellent. So lets put the pot behind the counter with the cigarettes and alcohol, and stop selling it at high schools.

I read the report from the RCMP. It didn't say that the bikers make the majority of their money in the following order:

However, I think what really came up from what you did post is that I would believe somebody with a BC perspective would certainly see marijuana as a huuuge money maker, while those in Ontario would not.

Not that marijuana isn't proliferate here, but conventional wisdom says its nowhere near BC levels.

Cool. Unless somebody else says something weird, I think I'm done here.

[Yogi]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

Yogi Yogi:

I'm a wee bit confused here! Some of the posts here advocating the legalization of weed, by some posters who on the subject of cigarette tobacco/smoke loudly advocate for the complete ban of same because it is proven to be 'poisonous-deadly-extremely unhealthy etc.. Are the carcinogens emitted from marijuana deemed to be healthy by comparison???

Bottom line being, I guess, is that if weed is ever legalized, and I give up the demon tobacco, and take up smoking marijuana, no longer would I be considered one of societies misfits.

Inhaling tobacco smoke bad! Inhaling marijuana smoke good!

The difference is Yogi, the VAST majority of smokers smoke wayyyy more cigs in a day than the average pot smoker smokes joints. I've been smoking weed for over 25 years now. A REALLY heavy day of smoking might entail 6 joints shared with my wife. When I smoked cigs, I smoked at least a pack of 25s a day. Didn't split em either
Heck, sitting around campfires can't be all that healthy either.
One other point. If you take a 25 year heavy cig smoker and a 25 year heavy pot smoker and they both quit at the same time and don't relapse, the pot smoker's lungs will heal up faster and more completely.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,326309,00.html

[andyt]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

The difference is Yogi, the VAST majority of smokers smoke wayyyy more cigs in a day than the average pot smoker smokes joints. I've been smoking weed for over 25 years now. A REALLY heavy day of smoking might entail 6 joints shared with my wife. When I smoked cigs, I smoked at least a pack of 25s a day. Didn't split em either
Heck, sitting around campfires can't be all that healthy either.
One other point. If you take a 25 year heavy cig smoker and a 25 year heavy pot smoker and they both quit at the same time and don't relapse, the pot smoker's lungs will heal up faster and more completely.

But smokers don't toke the cigs - they don't hold the smoke in. Plus pot has more tar than tobacco - ie the resin that's getting you off. What decent pot doesn't have is all the additives like formaldehyde and who knows what that commercial cigarettes have. But your consumption sounds like it might be equivalent to a pack of cigs as far as tar is concerned. I don't think enough studies have been done to compare the effects of tobacco vs pot in long term, regular use.

Smoking anything on a regular basis isn't good - so don't kid yourself that your lungs are in great shape. But we don't outlaw tobacco even tho it's one of our biggest killers, so it makes no sense to ban pot. Just don't smoke either around me.

At one point I lived in an apartment where the guy below me was a chronic. It was coming thru the floorboards while i was sitting writing my reports - hard to focus that way. Thank God for pot paranoia - I pounded on his door, but he wouldn't answer. But after that he figured out a way to do it that didn't intrude on my space. Zipster would say I'm supporting the nanny state, but I don't want to have either pot smoke or tobacco smoke billowing into my apartment. Keep your damn smoke out of my lungs.

[Choban]

$1:

I don't think enough studies have been done to compare the effects of tobacco vs pot in long term, regular use.

Because the majority of Pot smokers also smoke cigarettes it would be a hard study to nial down, The difference is your right, the fact that cig companies add all the toxic crap to tobacco.
I'm not saying no harm comes from smoking pot but it's considerably less and there are ways tyo avoid it such as vaporizing or ingesting.

[Curtman]

Yogi Yogi:

Bottom line being, I guess, is that if weed is ever legalized, and I give up the demon tobacco, and take up smoking marijuana, no longer would I be considered one of societies misfits.

Inhaling tobacco smoke bad! Inhaling marijuana smoke good!

Being an advocate for ending prohibition doesn't make you an advocate for drug use. Many of us would point to places like Amsterdam who have shown a decrease in use. Or Portugal which has real numbers supporting a decrease in violence, death, and misery that is caused by prohibition through decriminalization.

5 Years After: Portugal's Drug Decriminalization Policy Shows Positive Results

$1:

Five years later, the number of deaths from street drug overdoses dropped from around 400 to 290 annually, and the number of new HIV cases caused by using dirty needles to inject heroin, cocaine and other illegal substances plummeted from nearly 1,400 in 2000 to about 400 in 2006

...

"Now instead of being put into prison, addicts are going to treatment centers and they're learning how to control their drug usage or getting off drugs entirely,"

...

Drug legalization removes all criminal penalties for producing, selling and using drugs; no country has tried it. In contrast, decriminalization, as practiced in Portugal, eliminates jail time for drug users but maintains criminal penalties for dealers. Spain and Italy have also decriminalized personal use of drugs and Mexico's president has proposed doing the same.

[PublicAnimalNo9]

Yogi Yogi:

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

Yogi Yogi:

I'm a wee bit confused here! Some of the posts here advocating the legalization of weed, by some posters who on the subject of cigarette tobacco/smoke loudly advocate for the complete ban of same because it is proven to be 'poisonous-deadly-extremely unhealthy etc.. Are the carcinogens emitted from marijuana deemed to be healthy by comparison???

Bottom line being, I guess, is that if weed is ever legalized, and I give up the demon tobacco, and take up smoking marijuana, no longer would I be considered one of societies misfits.

Inhaling tobacco smoke bad! Inhaling marijuana smoke good!

The difference is Yogi, the VAST majority of smokers smoke wayyyy more cigs in a day than the average pot smoker smokes joints. I've been smoking weed for over 25 years now. A REALLY heavy day of smoking might entail 6 joints shared with my wife. When I smoked cigs, I smoked at least a pack of 25s a day. Didn't split em either
Heck, sitting around campfires can't be all that healthy either.
One other point. If you take a 25 year heavy cig smoker and a 25 year heavy pot smoker and they both quit at the same time and don't relapse, the pot smoker's lungs will heal up faster and more completely.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,326309,00.html

The funny thing is, the figures and stats in that study are almost identical to a similar study done in the US in the early to mid-90s. I'd swear that Beasely just took that report, and added a few of his own things to make it "his".
The original report was thoroughly debunked by a specialist at the WHO. The same specialist that was eventually fired from his position at the WHO for refusing to back the WHO's assertion that BC bud was a major health risk.
Although it's no surprise that the FOX Propaganda Service would happily run the story.

[bootlegga]

Yogi Yogi:

I'm a wee bit confused here! Some of the posts here advocating the legalization of weed, by some posters who on the subject of cigarette tobacco/smoke loudly advocate for the complete ban of same because it is proven to be 'poisonous-deadly-extremely unhealthy etc.. Are the carcinogens emitted from marijuana deemed to be healthy by comparison???

Bottom line being, I guess, is that if weed is ever legalized, and I give up the demon tobacco, and take up smoking marijuana, no longer would I be considered one of societies misfits.

Inhaling tobacco smoke bad! Inhaling marijuana smoke good!

I'm not sure who you're referring to in this regard, but here's my two cents.

If tobacco and booze are legal, then IMHO, so should marijuana. Tax the fuck out of it just like the other two and cut the deficit is my opinion. I would still expect that similar laws regarding their use in public be maintained, just like booze and cigarettes. I don't smoke, I don't use weed, and I hardly ever drink, but I have no problem with those who do paying taxes to help compensate for the societal problems their vice(s) cause.

Do whatever the fuck you want in your own home and on your own private property, but once you step out into society, follow the ground rules society has laid down for your vice or expect to face the consequences of your actions.

Frankly, I don't want any nasty by-products from anyone's vices in my hair, clothes, lungs, etc., anymore than you want mine (piss from my Coke Zero - or very occasional Corona) in yours.

It's really that simple. The problem is that far too many people think that smoking cigarettes anywhere and anytime is a right (which it is not) instead of a privilege (which it most certainly is).