Does Marijuana help autism? does it help you connect w/ppl?

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My experience has been that it "made my autism worse", i.e. it exacerbated my social discomfort and anxiety, made it harder to carry on a conversation, which would make me even more self conscious than I already was, and it made me come off as less intelligent than I am as it slowed my thinking.

While I do not encourage drug use nor condone illegal activity, if we're going to have on open discussion on the subject I'll mention that there have been studies conducted on the effects of psychedelics on " high-functioning" autistic people. I'm not too keen on the results, and I will review some of the studies, but from what I recall they seemed to yield promising results.

First off, as psychedlia goes, cannabis is pretty benign, yeah it can cause pseudohalucinatory effects, no it can not distort one's situational awareness when used in any reasonable quantity. Your opinion of science has no bearing whatsoever on hard science and I would strongly discourage you from voting on such whims. You can call me a Guinea pig, and I'll attest to my own experience; the remedial effects of medicinal marijuana on my anxiety, information overload, occupational hazards such as RSIs & occular strain and chiefly my HFA/associated insomnia have enabled a rock solid beginning to my engineering and scientific career, with any luck I'll work fast enough to earn the chance to study & travel in space. So you don't like ganja. Now, please coherently explain to me why that grants you the right to ruin it for everyone else.

_________________
"Standing on a well-chilled cinder, we see the fading of the suns, and try to recall the vanished brilliance of the origin of the worlds."
-Georges Lemaitre
"I fly through hyperspace, in my green computer interface"
-Gem Tos

Swing and a miss.

Wouldn't say it makes it worse or better for me, just different. Easier to find what other people are saying interesting but harder to formulate an appropriate response.

I meant that as in you missed the point completely, not as in taking a figurative swing or punch toward me, which your response clearly affirms. If you can take a deep breath and bring this back to an open, healthy discussion on the subject I will be happy to clarify any points of confusion.

People want to use drugs they'll use drugs, who cares? That is their decision and doesn't affect me. I don't think any part of your response was intended to be hurtful toward me, nor am I hurt by any aspect of your response, just baffled.

Telling me I missed the point in describing my own life and then telling me you're baffled. I guess I'll redact my observation of hypocrisy and simply point out that what we have here is an antipodal oxymoron; I never closed off the discussion, closed mindedness has practically never been the result of herbalism dude.

_________________
"Standing on a well-chilled cinder, we see the fading of the suns, and try to recall the vanished brilliance of the origin of the worlds."
-Georges Lemaitre
"I fly through hyperspace, in my green computer interface"
-Gem Tos

I'm saying you missed the point of my initial post, not describing your own life. There may be some confusion, perhaps on my part, as the lack of a quoted field in your post immediately following mine left ambivalence as to whom you were responding, however the mention of pot's trivial psychedelic properties led me to believe you were responding to mine. I have no reason to believe that you would miss your own point, nor have I encountered anyone who has.

I'm baffled as to where exactly we are in disagreement. I agree with your statement "either smoke weed or don't". It's an individual decision. If someone finds that it is beneficial for them, using your example of "pensive introspection and fulfilling downtime ", anxiety, sensory overload, et cetera than that's great that someone reaping such benefits naturally has found a solution. I find natural remedies preferable to stimulant drugs like Adderal or Ritalin when effective. It's a quality of life issue. In that same respect, when one's choice to self medicate is not beneficial my own beliefs are that one should rethink their choices. I know plenty of people who can't "handle their pot" and have let it have too much of an influence over their lives. Medicine of any kind can be both helpful and harmful, depending on how it is used.

We are also in agreement that cannabis is pretty trivial in psychedelic properties when compared to other psychedelics. I had stated that studies have been conducted using substances which higher psychedelic properties, two in particular being LSD-25 and phenethylamine analogs. From what I recall, the studies conducted by Dr. Charles Gobb yielded very promising results as far as being a possible treatment to improve the lives of people with Asperger's.

My personal view on the so called "war on drugs" is that it's a complete waste of time and money on the part of the state, not only because as a result we are disregarding the medical potential of many compounds simply because Nixon was afraid of hippies, but because incarcerating benign individuals because they wanted to temporarily alter their state of consciousness is to me absurd and going after the easiest target. I believe it is an overreach of government into the private lives of citizens when it is the manufacturers and traffickers that they should be targeting, especially considering the millions in possible tax revenue legalization and standardization would bring into our ponzi-scheme of an economy and terribly indebted nation. I'm a Libertarian at heart.

Having said that, when I said I don't encourage or condone criminal behavior, while I have made choices in my own life that may have been in violation of the law, I accepted the risk and responsibility for my actions. My central motivator is quality of life, so I don't encourage anyone to engage in activity that would have a negative impact on their quality of life, e.g. arrest on record, possible conviction, or the stigma associated with a drug charge on record regardless of the actual offense. While I disagree with the law, I do believe people should take it into consideration when making their choices and should they find themselves in legal trouble, accept responsibility for their actions. Beyond that, as you said, either smoke weed or don't. I don't care what others do and expect the same courtesy in return. My only objections are when their habits affect themselves or others negatively and/or become a hindrance in their lives.