Pubdate: Thu, 15 Aug 2013
Source: Calgary Herald (CN AB)
Copyright: 2013 Canwest Publishing Inc.
Contact: 
http://www.calgaryherald.com/opinion/letters/letters-to-the-editor.html
Website: http://www.calgaryherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/66
Author: Chris Nelson

THERE'S A REASON MARIJUANA IS CALLED DOPE

Even before they fished our buddy's body out of the stream, we knew 
sniffing glue was not a smart thing to do.

But, being 15-year-olds in search of cheap kicks, we sniffed it 
anyway - sneaking off to the toilets during woodworking class to 
snort whatever solvent we could steal.

The effect was brutal, as was the aftermath, and thankfully, that 
phase of life was short-lived - literally in the case of our one 
friend who passed out, rolled into the water and drowned. The police 
found the tube of EvoStik clasped in his dead hand.

Society shows little sympathy or understanding for anyone who 
believes there's nothing wrong with carrying a handkerchief soaked in 
gasoline to sniff away those mid-morning blues. It didn't back then, 
40 years ago, and it doesn't now.

It is daft, desperate and dangerous. Ask anyone.

Sadly, when it comes to marijuana, such straightforward judgment has 
gone up in smoke, as the weed is caught up in both legalities and 
politics. Where once it was a counterculture symbol, it's now so 
prevalent, its sickly, sweet pong has replaced body odour as the 
dominant smell of the school playground.

That sheer prevalence - not just among kids, but across all levels of 
society - has made pot smoking, as Eric Idle once intoned, a "nudge, 
nudge, say no more, say no more" part of everyday life.

The trend is toward legalization. South and Central American 
countries, which have watched so many citizens get slaughtered or 
criminalized as the drug flows northward, wonder if it would be 
simpler to make the stuff legal.

It is understandable. Just as it is understandable why Canada - as 
well as certain U.S. states - is making similar noises.

After all, the so-called war on drugs is starting to resemble the 
longevity and eventual pointlessness of the English-French conflicts 
of the 14th and 15th century. As a Canadian reference point, it was 
underway before Paul Henderson slapped in that winner against Russia 
back in 1972.

Does that mean we accept that smoking dope is fine and dandy? No, but 
if a problem you've been fighting so long is getting worse, it is 
time to change tactics.

And threatening to throw vast swaths of otherwise reasonable people - 
the smokers, not the vicious ones who traffic this stuff - into jail 
is an approach looking as outdated as chopping off hands for stealing.

What is needed is a change in attitudes, just as we slowly changed 
our views on tobacco smoking.

Hard as it is to understand nowadays, back in the 1960s, many still 
believed cigarettes weren't dangerous to health. People puffed away 
merrily on planes, in pubs, in doctors' offices, in cancer wards, and 
they'd light up without a moment's thought as a visitor to your home. 
Try that now.

But back then, it was cool. People grew up watching movie stars who 
wouldn't be seen dead without a cancer stick stuck in their gobs. 
Virtually everyone smoked. My mother bought me a pack when I was 15 - 
maybe she thought that would keep me off the glue.

Such actions now are unfathomable. Anyone smoking past age 20 is a 
figure of disdain - a weak-willed, smelly outcast. It's taken a long 
time to get here, but that image war has been much more effective in 
reducing smoking levels than its drugs' legal counterpart.

So put aside the legal fight and instead start drumming the messages 
home - cannabis usage affects memory, attention, learning and reaction time.

In teens, it lowers their eventual IQ. In pregnant women, it lowers 
birth weight. In drivers, it doubles the likelihood of crashing a 
vehicle. It has twice the carcinogenic hydrocarbons as tobacco smoke. 
Heavy smoking causes depression and anxiety. It stays in your system 
for a month. Surely that's enough raw materials to start with?

Anecdotally, there are few more depressing sights than watching a 
bunch of middle-aged people sitting around giggling while sharing a 
joint with the windows closed, both figuratively and literally. I 
know such usage is now passe, with bongs and other paraphernalia the 
method of delivery, but the effect is the same. If there had been a 
cannabis plant around, we'd never have left the caves. This stuff is 
called dope for a reason.

So use the fight against cigarettes as the guide to demolishing this 
cool image. Instead, let it become the new glue.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom