Asperger's and Marijuana

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20% of habitual pot smokers complain of chronic bronchitis. "Marijuana likely increases the risk of testicular cancer, prostate cancer, cervical cancer, a type of brain tumor, and the risk of leukemia in the offspring of women who use it during pregnancy."

Sure, alcohol is bad too: can wreck your liver, but let's not pretend pot is good for you--it isn't.

But that isn't why I am telling you to avoid it. You get busted for possession, it could lead to a felony offense, and that could haunt you and limit your job prospects for the rest of your life. Get caught with enough dope on you and that is "intent to distribute"--then they throw you in jail. If a teacher gets caught with pot, that teacher loses her license. If a cop gets caught, he is thrown off the force. I could go on and on ...

I have nothing against people smoking dope: people should be able to do whatever they want with their bodies. I am just letting you know that what appears to you as a simple thing ("everybody does it!") is not simple at all: the US government and local authorities have declared war on dope smokers, and becoming a casualty in that war isn't worth it. It's all fun and games until you get pinched.

I've been doing a bunch of research into this recently and there is literally no reason whatsoever why weed should not be legalised.

The reasons it was made illegal in the US in the first place were purely political and largely racist, and the reason it was made illegal in most of the rest of the world was because of Islamic law (I s**t you not).

The herb itself has no long term negative effects. If you smoke loads of it then it can cause reduced sperm count and short term memory but stop smoking it so much and all that goes away.

It has a lot of valid medical uses and for this reason the pharmaceutical companies want to keep it illegal and stop medical marijuana - after all, you can't patent a plant can you? Big Pharma has created pills which use cannaboids to be sold as medicine, but they're nowhere near as effective as the actual plant. So governments claim it has no valid medical use yet medicine is being made from it, eh?

As has been discussed in this thread, autism is just one condition which it can help with.

Additionally, hemp can be used to make loads of stuff, from paper to panels stronger than steel. This was made illegal in the US because of the interests of paper companies who were losing money to it.

Anyone talking about all these so called health risks... I implore you to do your own research instead of listening to the propaganda released by those who have a monetary or political interest for keeping it illegal.

Lets break down the commonly quoted negative effects one by one shall we?

Overdoses - It is literally impossible to OD on weed. It has never ever happened in the history of anything ever. You would need to smoke something like over 1,000 joints in an hour for that to be possible, and if you successfully do that you'll go down in history.

Death rates - Hundreds of thousands die from perfectly legal tobacco every year, tens of thousands die from perfectly legal alcohol every year, and thousands even die from f**king caffeine every year too. No one in history has ever died from pot. Ever.

Schizophrenia - During the past few decades, use of marijuana has exploded. Within that same time period, diagnosis of schizophrenia has remained flat. No increase at all. In fact, it's actually decreased in some cases. And patients with schizophrenia can in fact be helped by medical marijuana where it's available too. Here's a little science behind that claim though: if you are already genetically predisposed to schizophrenia then you're essentially a ticking time bomb, waiting for what's called a "psychological break." This can be caused by any number of things, commonly stress. Now, cannabis can in fact trigger this psychological break in people who are already genetically guaranteed to get it, but it cannot and has not ever caused the condition in someone who was not already genetically predisposed.

Cancer - Marijuana does not cause cancer. Smoking it can increase your chances slightly, because smoking anything is bad for you, but marijuana smoke is still a lot better for you than tobacco smoke. If you vaporise or eat it, marijuana cannot contribute to any form of cancer at all. In fact, it has very well documented cancer killing properties; that is, it can actually kill cancerous cells and help to cure cancer.

Addiction - The herb itself has no addictive properties whatsoever, and because the THC is stored in fat, there's no withdrawal symptoms either. Anyone who claims to know someone who's addicted to marijuana is talking about a psychological addiction... The same thing that anyone can get to porn or eating or watching TV or whatever... Literally anything. Not a valid point against this specific plant.

It's a gateway drug! - You know they're getting desperate when they're reduced to saying "It could make people use different things!" Well this is a BS argument if it's being used to support prohibition. When you walk into a newsagent to buy booze and cigarettes, does the shopkeeper try and sell you crack? No (and if your answer was different, I'd like to know what shop you use ). This is an issue created by prohibition, because it's leaving the job of selling weed to the black market drug dealers who will also sell the harder stuff, and a few of these people will indeed try to push that on their customers. I should note, however, that only very few people who start doing weed go on to do harder drugs regardless. Most stick to their pot.

But the law says it's bad! - The law also used to say that being gay made you unnatural and owning African slaves was okay. The mere fact that the law says something is bad does not make that thing bad unless it's backed up with actual facts. And hey, I bet most of the music on your iPod is illegal too

There's loads more claims and even more data to debunk them but I'd do a post bigger than this forum's database if I addressed them all. Point is, marijuana is in fact less harmful than pretty much any legal drug including prescription stuff. There is no scientific or medical reason for it to be illegal whatsoever.

Educate yourself, people!

I first started smoking marijuana just over a year ago. At first as I was unfamiliar with it on a first-hand basis, I told myself I would just smoke a little bit from time to time. Now, I smoke every day and I cannot even begin to tell you how much it has helped me both socially and with my anxiety. Smoking can help calm me when I am upset and can't come down from it and it can help me just have conversations with my boyfriend that normally I am uncomfortable discussing. I am much more relaxed around my boyfriend's friends as well. I used to not talk at all and just observe and now I will put in occasional to moderate input into the conversations. I won't smoke before going to work ever but work remains the biggest stressor in my life so sometimes I wish that I could.

Actually it is possible to 'overdose' on weed, but that usually just involves vomiting or passing out long before you've actually consumed enough for it to be fatal.

It's all a matter of responsibility. I've known people who do nothing but sit around and smoke weed all day. Yet I've known people who drink alcohol daily and run a multi million dollar company. It all comes down to the individual. Both are extreme examples, but weed just like alcohol is something that if beneficiary to a person in moderation, and with responsible use. I smoke pot every once in awhile, but those times seem to be getting rarer because I have less interest in it. To be honest the most it's done for me as of late is make me insanely horny. I've never had a drug give me that sort of reaction. I've done ecstasy which is supposed to make you insanely horny, and I didn't feel one bit horny. I honestly can't stand the type of stoner who lounges in front of the TV all day smoking blunt after blunt, because they give weed smokers a bad name. These unproductive people who often argue for the legalization of marijuana due to their lifestyle just end up hurting the cause.

I love smoking pot. I started reluctantly when I was 21 and gradually became a total pot head, which I still am at 41. I'll take a joint over a drink any day.

Am I the only one who just doesn't get the point of drugs? Seems like pretty much everyone is just arguing about which drugs are good and which drugs are bad. Alcoholics are like come on, drink up, it will make feel good. Stoners are like, no man don't do alcohol. That's bad for you. Just smoke a little weed. Thats all you need to solve your problems. And the psychiatrists say, no, no, no don't do any of that. Just take your medication.

To me, all drugs are pretty much the same. No matter what I take, it just makes me feel like crap. Right now the only thing I take is my antidepressants. And thats only because they are pretty much forced on me. So I usually don't even take the full dosage, to try and minimize the effects.

What every positive effects come from drugs, seems to generally be greatly out weighed by negative side effects. At best it's just a trade off. What ever you take, you are altering your entire mental state. Which seems like a very unnatural way of living, to me. You are not seeing the world as it actually is, when you are taking drugs. As far as I'm concerned most all types of drugs are just a crutch to avoid dealing with life. IMHO.

I normally try to stay far away from these threads about cannabis use, as they tend to be two sides unwilling to have an honest discussion, and myself I'm firmly in one camp and just as guilty as the rest Doesn't mean the threads shouldn't happen or exist, just my reason for usually not engaging in the discussions.

I did want to add food for thought, as I noticed the posts several above mine that discussed paranoia and strong THC levels.

A lot of current research is pointing to the wonderful effects of CBD in cannabis, not only for other medical applications, but also for balancing out the effects of THC to induce more relaxation, and less tendency for psychotic effects (paranoia included). This will peg me for which side of the discussion I fall on, but myself I regularly strive to find varieties with high CBD levels, as they reduce my agitation, help me relax, and cope after a long day of work and socializing, without leaving me couch locked and unable to function coherently.

Specifically the strain most noted for high CBD levels is Harlequin, with several other lesser known strains boasting moderate CBD levels as well.

CBD and THC are antagonists of one another, and vie for the same receptors in our nervous system as well. And CBD is non psychoactive in and of itself, so illicit drug production over the years has selctively bred out a lot of the higher CBD strains, as well as improved horticulture methods have concentrated on effectively producing high THC varieties, with little to no CBD.

Its not that our pot now is really all that better than what was around in the 1960s, 70s and before, its mainly that the primo sensimilla and its availability have reached out to many more people. Sensimilla for those wondering what it is, is growing seedless female flowers which not only make for a more enjoyable end product, but also increase the Cannibinoid production of the plant, as they are not devoting energy resources to producing seed.

I've rambled on enough, just thought I'd chime in