Pubdate: Thu, 1 May 2008 Source: Southland Times (New Zealand) Copyright: 2008 Southland Times Company http://www.southlandtimes.co.nz/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1041 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Marijuana) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion) NASTY FUMES FROM THAT BUS When Maryjane the Cannabus arrived in Invercargill for a protest rally on Tuesday, police made at least one interesting call. They didn't collar any puffing protesters -- instead taking the "run along, sonny" approach -- and they chose not to seize a cannabis plant conspicuously placed inside the bus, writes The Southland Times in an editorial. By contrast, police in Palmerston North had made two arrests for cannabis use, and in Picton a plant was seized. Generally, the public takes the view that what's illegal at one end of the country should be equally illegal at the other; or that what's of insufficient consequence here should be equally so there. Invercargill police say they decided "for operational reasons" not to undertake a search of the bus. Search? In this case it would have amounted to reaching in and grabbing it. And the rather pompous term "operational reasons" invites a three-worded translation, the first two words being "couldn't" and "be" ... The inconsistency of the police approach is, in a small way, testament to an uneven but widening sense of exasperated tolerance for the widely used drug. It is misplaced. The Maryjane tour spokesman Dakta Green (actually Ken Morgan) disregards research saying cannabis has harmful effects. Those reports, he says, were written by opponents of cannabis use. Well so much, then, for the study published less than a year ago in The Lancet medical journal, analysing the world's best and most recent studies linking cannabis use and psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia and manic depressive illness. It concluded that cannabis smokers were 40 percent more likely to develop psychosis later in life, with the most frequent smokers between 50 percent and 200 percent more vulnerable to these conditions. All written by opponents, see? If anything, all that's really in doubt is the point at which Mr Green's description becomes true, because if they weren't opponents when they started the research, it seems great numbers of them were by the end. In truth, we shouldn't lightly dismiss the view in documents released in March showing health authorities support the use of cannabis on compassionate grounds under tightly controlled conditions. Or that statistics suggest almost 20 percent of New Zealanders aged 15 to 45 have used cannabis during the past year -- a figure that can legitimately be seized by those who argue that a controlled system of harm minimisation, as with the also-damaging alcohol and tobacco, is the way to go. But Dakta Green and his jolly band of stoners are rather too celebratory about a hideously damaging substance that peer-reviewed science strongly connects to memory damage and decline in other intellectual skills, increased risk of cancers of the aerodigestive tract, increased risk of leukaemia and birth defects in offspring exposed while in the womb, and an impaired immune system, ovulation, sperm production and libido. Socially, evidence shows a marked decline in occupational performance in adults, and more educational under-achievement in children. Nostalgists should note, too, that the careful attentions of the growing industry present us with dope that is much, much more potent than it was in the supposedly hazy 1960s. By all means, debate on harm minimisation should be undertaken. But the celebratory, wa-hey approach of the Norml (National Organisation for the Reform of Marijuana Laws) protesters isn't helping. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake