Chump!!

chicorytip

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/spotlight/arid-40926812.html

This eegit. Smoking the sh--e on a regular basis and over a prolonged period of time is the most effective method possible of giving yourself lung cancer and possibly triggering severe mental health issues such as Psychosis and Schizophrenia. If this fellah thinks it's so great he ought to have no reluctance revealing both his identity and "profession".

I can't believe a national daily newspaper is publishing this tripe.

Gloomtastic!

How far away from a mirror are you?

Kimbot

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058257284/chump

So hes an eegit for choosing to smoke it?

What do you call those that drink all the time, take heroin etc.

Cannabis has a lot of medical benefits that should be explored legally. Think about it for a moment, someone suffering from pain could spend hundreds a month on Tablets or could grow a plant of two to manage their pain if it was legalised correctly making it cheaper and more manageable for the patient.

Let me ask you this OP, have you ever smoked it? If you have how did it make you feel etc?

MrStuffins

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058257284/chump

The most effective way of giving yourself lung cancer?

Source?

Count Dracula

It is just a herb that certain members of society enjoy using. It has been also proven to have health benefits for certain individuals. It is also a great laugh when dosed correctly.

There is no defining connection between lung cancer and smoking marijuana.

I think taking the control of its' supply away from gangs of greedy strung-out skangers, who spend more time shooting and murdering each other, than actually providing a nice quality of product to their customers, is definitely a good idea.

Curse These Metal Hands

A lot of people say it's completely harmless but a lot of people I know that smoked it often in their late teens ended up struggling with mental health issues later in life. A disproportionate amount of them are conspiracy theorists now too.

dxhound2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423262#Comment_119423262

That would be private companies with the product being regulated by the government? Like alcohol and tobacco, where there are rules about premises, trading hours, and age. And severe levels of tax. And the private companies trying their best under advertising rules, to recruit more users.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423282#Comment_119423282

Nothing is "completely harmless". It all comes down to context and useage patterns. Even water - one of the core substances of our life - is toxic to us in the wrong quantities. Was it "E" that more people died not from taking that drug - but from taking on too much water after taking the drug? Even exercise is dangerous if you do too much of it - yet that would not stop us recommending more people do more exercise.

So anyone who tells you this drug is "completely" harmless is taking complete crap. But so too are the people who say it must be bad because it is not completely harmless.

We as grown consenting adults need to be educated on harms and benefits and then decide for ourselves if the upsides are worth any potential downsides. And it is then up to us as consenting adults to use is responsibly and intelligently. Why do we need government laws to dictate this to us?

I think more and more evidence suggests that any drugs - including alcohol - that affects the brain in any way should be kept away from people in their "late teens" as you mention anecdotally. But that users in their "late teens" allegedly (we can not verify your anecdotes) suffered later in life should not inform the entire conversation of the drug - about certainly not conversation about adult usage.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058257284/chump

Yay! Sensationalist trolling!

Also yay freedom to do something that effects no one else other than yourself and comes with a slight risk, but then what doesn't?!

Plenty of other Nanny States on the planet for people if Ireland hasn't got enough restrictive laws for them.

dxhound2005

One American study shows that tobacco smokers are seven time more likely to use cannabis that non smokers. One of the reasons that makes it difficult to determine what is the relationship between cannabis smoking and lung cancer. But what is not in dispute is that any sort of smoking causes lung damage and respiratory problems. Including to those who inhale the secondary smoke. Whatever health benefits are claimed for cannabis, smoking is a bad way to go about getting them.

BaywatchHQ

I can't get hold of that sort of thing anyway due to having no social contacts. I am sure the depression/anxiety meds the doctors hand out cause long term problems anyway.

play4fun1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423282#Comment_119423282

would suggest to look into alcohol damage to developing brain - maybe start crusade to ban/make it illegal?

play4fun1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058257284/chump

it's a fvck leaf

Count Dracula

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423919#Comment_119423919

Recruit users?

I cannot see the problem of private companies getting involved?

Listen doggy, let me feed you a bone here.

A regulated marijuana industry would be fantastic for users, producers, the government coffers and even the advertising companies.

Everyone wins, happy days.

Curse These Metal Hands

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423977#Comment_119423977

Late teens can also be adults, and they should be part of the discussion. That's when most people are experimenting with substances.

Alcohol is destructive no doubt, but definitely those that smoked in school/college within my circle are suffering with mental health issues more so than those of us who preferred drinking.

All anecdotal as you say, I'm sure other people's experiences are the polar opposite. I would be very surprised if smoking pot wasn't linked to mental health issues though. But you do get people saying it's harmless, even on this thread you have the "it's just a leaf" line, as if nothing that grows naturally can be harmful to humans.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119424609#Comment_119424609

Part of the discussion sure - I would never say otherwise. But what I was pointing out is that there are people who will focus in on the effects of children using it - and then extrapolating that to a general comment that it is a drug we do not want in our society. So a distinction has to be made between teen and adults - and why we are discussing either, and how.

"Late teens can be adults" is a contextual statement too. Some teens are certainly more mature than others. But it seems our science is telling us more and more that no matter how mature they may be - the brain goes through developmental stages over our life time and it may not be safe to call a brain fully formed or "adult" until early or mid twenties. So drugs like alcohol and weed and so forth - may not be recommended for kids or even young adults.

A second issue with your anecdotes which I did not mention in the previous post - is the causality order. On the outside we can often see someone take up something - like alcohol or weed or gambling or something - and then end up with mental issues. So we assume X led to Y. But we rarely see the full picture of other peoples lives. It can in fact be Y that led to X. Which is to say that people developing mental or emotional issues - turn to some drug to self medicate it. Which generally fails in the end. So we get left with the impression their drug use led to later mental issues. But it was actually existing or developing mental issues that led to their excessive drug use. So it is hard to generalize.

A third issue then is correlation-causation. It is perhaps not X that led to Y, or Y that led to X. But there can be some third factor in a persons life that caused both X and Y at the same time. We on the outside see a correlation between the mental issues and the drug issue. But they might simply be incidental and unconnected results of some unseen factor.

Finally another issue is that illegal underground "cuts" of these drugs tend to contain other things they shouldn't. Or the THC levels have been skewed. "Molly" for example. Just drug strengths being messed with in an underground and unregulated product. So even if we ignore correlation causation issues, and reverse causality issues, and so on - we still have the issue that mental issues might not be being caused by this drug per se so much as it is being caused by underground unregulated forms of it! Or it exacerbated already existing mental issues rather than actually causing them in any way.

But over all you are correct. Nothing is entirely "harmless". Even water. Anyone who claims this is pushing the party line and does not know what they are talking about. What it absolutely is however is relatively harmless. As a drug compared to most other drugs, even legal drugs like alcohol, it is relatively very harmless indeed. And a regulated legal product will likely be even more relatively harmless again compared to street bought underground products.

chicorytip

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423220#Comment_119423220

I would have similar views regarding those who abuse alcohol. Heroin addiction is more complex because it's more difficult to treat. Don't take it in the first place, that's all. Why do Cannabis users attribute all these magical medicinal properties to it. It's because their stoned on it, literally feeling no pain. No wonder your arthritic hip feels better. Cannabis is curative of nothing. It's just downright dangerous and should never be legalised here. Just look at the experience of Holland, Portugal and Switzerland if you need to understand why that should be .

chicorytip

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119424050#Comment_119424050

Buying weed - from a drug dealer - is a cause of societal harm in itself.

growleaves

To quote Robin Murray, Professor of Psychiatric Research at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London:

"It is crystal clear that people with schizophrenia use more cannabis than the general population; there is no dispute about this. The question is whether the use of cannabis contributes to the onset of psychosis including schizophrenia in a causal manner. Here the evidence, although not yet conclusive, has been mounting steadily over the past six years.

Professor Nutt contrasts a 2.6 fold increase in risk of psychosis carried by using cannabis with a twentyfold increase in risk of lung cancer if one smokes cigarettes. Unfortunately, he is not comparing like with like. The twentyfold increased risk is not carried by just being a cigarette smoker but rather by being a long-term heavy smoker. For cannabis, the risk of psychosis goes up to about six times if one is a long-term heavy cannabis smoker."

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2009/oct/29/cannabis-schizophrenia-classification

growleaves

You would have to be utterly desperate to hang on to "correlation is not causation" as a justification, which tobacco companies strung out for decades in the late 20th century.

Anyway not interested in a back and forth. The hard evidence of massive harm is there, you can choose to see it or to obfuscate it.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423220#Comment_119423220

Why would they not think the same about someone who uses heroin/drinks heavily? Not really a counter argument.

And surely smoking cannabis in tobacco does significantly increase the risk of lung cancer?

It's unwise to be smoking a lot of it, like frequently every day, but it's no harm recreationally, and much has been discovered in terms of pain relief from cannabis oil.

Only smoked it the odd time when younger, but always drank with it so just got terribly sick each time. Preferred MDMA.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119424752#Comment_119424752

Making the choice to do anything is a cause for societal farm if you want to go down the totalitarian route.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119424736#Comment_119424736

Ya see, there's the problem - you're suddenly using the words "abuse","addiction" and "stoned" - which means you're not actually talking about the drugs any more, you're talking about the behaviour; and as such, your aim is behaviour modification. Which again, is totalitarian.

The misuse of terms like dictatorship, fascism and totalitarian have gone through the roof since Covid. I recommend reading about Eritrea. We've won the lottery being born here.

maccored

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119423282#Comment_119423282

do they drink coffee, or wake up in the morning or exercise or in fact do anything as you seem to be blaming one thing for issues that could be caused by many things

Curse These Metal Hands

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119425299#Comment_119425299

Not sure. But Growleaves shared some useful information above. And after looking up some stuff myself there seems to be ample research linking it with mental health issues.

I'm not against legalising it or anything, just sick of people saying it's harmless because it's a plant.

buried

It makes people lazy as f**k. A lot of people that I know that smoke it can't enjoy anything without taking some, like watching a movie or listening to music. Then they just slouch about not saying a word or doing a tap. If the authorities are going to legalise it, then they better legalise MDMA and other amphetamine's that actually get people off their arses to go with it.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119425141#Comment_119425141

No, just people complaining about the useage of such terms in order to hide the fact they aren't actually making an on-topic point.

In any case, I did advise the OP to try a totalitatian jurisdiction, I never said he lived in one. You were the one who made a specific suggestion.

Why would exercise or waking up in the morning cause mental health issues? I guess coffee in excessive amounts could cause anxiety.

I'm not "anti drugs" but there are weird equivalences being resorted to on this thread when people criticise cannabis.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119424261#Comment_119424261

Why would they start a crusade to ban/make alcohol illegal? They never implied they wanted to do that with cannabis.

If someone questions something, it isn't really grounds for "that other thing is bad too", as it's not particularly relevant. I'm sure we all know that alcohol abuse leads to terrible mental health issues. Does excessive longterm cannabis use also? Perhaps.

whisky_galore

Alcohol was placed into the hands on criminal gangs when they banned that.

That ban was a failure and the ban/war on drugs has also been a failure only the Nancy Regans of this world don't know it yet.