Why is marijuana poorly understood?

They are coming around,it just takes time.
Years upon years of society saying how bad it is doesn’t go away over night.

People rarely have any interest in learning anything that’s easier to be frightened of than educated about. Facts take more effort than fear.

Because you can grow it yourself.

Plus, what do you mean by misunderstood? For medical use? Or, for getting hi?

The problem is also on the side of people who are for it, making ludicrous claims like it “cures cancer”.

Meme culture hasn’t helped this at all.

I don’t understand what you mean by “poorly understood.” There are plenty of folks that certainly understand the “benefits” and other “experts” reaping enormous economic rewards from that understsnding.

With the exception of the few people who still believe Reefer Madness is a scholarly source, in not sure what you’re talking about.

Because the mainstream media creates a sort of over dramatisation of all recreation drugs in general. Sometimes resorting to scare tactics. There is an incredibly large amount of misinformation and ignorance in regard to drugs. Because of this we have this big taboo on any sort of recreational drugs.

You’ll notice that the very few more commonly legalised drugs (tobacco and alcohol) have less of a taboo on their sale and consumption. Which is ironic, because the effect of tobacco and alcohol abuse are much more lethal to the human body.

PS I choose not to smoke or consume illegal drugs out of choice. Its just not for me. Although I will occasional have some alcohol in some social settings. I usually have a few drinks once a month. The point is though, I support the choice of others who want to consume other substances if they can moderate their usage and not hurt others.

@NerdyKeith “Illegal” is defined a little differently in some places. Around here, we have an annual Hemp Fest and the cops who do crowd control hand out snack-sized bags of Doritos. While we have pretty strict laws about smoking in public period, it’s no less legal than tobacco here.

For a long time the medical community to snub natural cures and treatments. People would often perish treating themselves. That began the stigma. When peace, love, and freedom to grow hair long persons used various herbs and chemicals for recreation, conservatives saw it all as part of a package, and hated all the behaviors and trends of those persons. Things got out of hand, and again people perished through mishandling, so, medical and law enforcement both got involved. Rather than be selective, they went all inclusive to avoid confusion.
There are those with stigmas so firmly implanted, they cannot be convinced of anything else.

I understand that inhaling toxic marijuana smoke into the lungs is harmful to a healthy body and mind.

@gondwanalon The same could be said of anyone living either in or downwind of a city, yet that doesn’t stop people from living in/near urban areas.

I think in order to understand the current attitudes towards marijuana and cannabis, it helps to know a little of the history of the use of Cannabis in the US (and in the Colonies).
As early as 1619, King James I decreed that the Virginia Company require each colonist to grow 100 cannabis plants for the specific purpose of export for fiber. During the 18th and 19th centuries hemp became a widely cultivated crop for industrial use. In 1839, William Brooke O’Shaughnessy (an Irishman, by the way, @NerdyKeith) who had worked and studied extensively in India, introduced its use to Western Medicine.
During the 19th century, use of cannabis in patent medicines, as well as recreational use spread to virtually every state and area in the US. Hashish parlors competed with opium dens for recreational customers. In the 1850’s, marijuana was listed as a fashionable narcotic in an article in the New York Times.

Around that time laws started to spring up regulating the use of certain drugs and requiring that they be sold only through pharmacies. These laws were generally aimed at opiates, but many included hemp-based drugs in the regulations.

The Pure Food and Drug Act was then passed by the United States Congress in 1906 and required that certain special drugs, including cannabis, be accurately labeled with contents. This was in response to the great wave of Patent Medicines. The vilification of the herb continued on up into the 1930’s, when the Federal Bureau of Narcotics published this flyer, and Reefer Madness.

In 1970 Cannabis was listed as a Schedule I drug as defined by the US Controlled Substances Act.

@jerv Why intentionally stick your hear down a smokestack?

Why climb a mountain?

Because it’s there, Spock.

@gondwanalon Why intentionally deprive yourself of doing anything that makes life more than just having a pulse, at least so long as the benefits outweigh the risks/costs? Why be such a stick in the mud that you insult those who do not share your fanatical abstinence?

Your posts here are nothing more than a turd in the punch bowl since you didn’t even answer the question? All you’ve done here is incite unrest.

However, given your stance, you could justify your presence here by answering the question and telling us all why you are such a buzzkill that you have nothing to offer but derision? If all you’re here for is to insult everyone who disagrees with your puritanical teetotalling, you aren’t doing anyone any favors here, not even yourself.

So how about instead of being a troll who has no business in a General thread, you display your misunderstanding of marijuana answering the fucking question? Is that too much to ask?

Geez @jerv , grunt here, toke up and chill. cough

heh, buzzkill. This thread is harshing my mellow, bro.

Sorry about not answering the question. I honestly thought that I was being helpful by reminding folks that smoking marijuana is an unhealthy and dangerous thing to do to your body.

Of course many fun activities can cause injury and death but with smoking marijuana the benefits are tiny compared to the risks

Never been called a buzzkill before. You are such a kind person. Good health to you brother!

@gondwanalon I agree with you on the smoke part, smoking ANYTHING isn’t good for your respiratory system.
I do think marijuana has medicinal purposes ,such as people with cancer, or sight problems,I don’t condone taking any drug other than alcohol for recreational needs.

@SQUEEKY2 @gondwanalon For the sake of ideological consistency, I hope you have just as strong opposition to internal combustion engines. It would be rather hypocritical if you didn’t have the same opinion on cars as you do on smoking.

Getting back to the OP, cannabis is misunderstood due to 100 years of propaganda.

They are improving the exhaust on vehicles all the time @jerv , and I don’t sit and suck the smoke at the end of the tail pipe either.
ANY type of smoke inhaled isn’t good for you,and that makes me against combustion engines?
While I don’t condone the use of any drug recreationally ,if you must there are other ways to do it without smoking such as tea, or baking.

@SQUEEKY2 Given that the average human breathes half the volume of air every 3 seconds that the average car engine does in 0.1 seconds, it’s kind of moot once you get a few tens of thousands of cars around. But if you wish to refute that ten thousand pennies adds up to $100 and think that smoking is the ONLY atmospheric pollutant, then there is no way I can sway you. Good day.

@jerv did I say I thought smoking was the ONLY atmospheric pollutant?
But for the most part I try to avoid smoke that I can, and are you saying pollution standards are not improving for autos?
Are you saying smoking is not harmful to your respiratory system?
If you must use pot for recreational purposes they are less harmful ways to do it such as tea, or baking, smoking is not the only way.

@SQUEEKY2 No, you merely heavily implied it by dismissing far larger dangers. Considering what else we do to ourselves on a daily basis, that attitude is not unlike washing down 20 Big Macs with a Diet Coke because you’re watching your weight.

Also, it seriously seems that you not only fail to understand how drugs (not just recreational ones) work, but also that you have never really been in pain in your life. I’m not talking the sort of pain that just makes you want to curl up in a ball and cry either. I’m talking the sort that makes you seriously consider ending your own life and that normal pharmaceuticals like Vicodin just won’t put a dent in. Because if you understood either of those things, you’d understand why waiting 20–60 minutes for it to kick in just is not an option. Medibles may work for more low-level chronic pain or give such a slight buzz that you can’t even really tell you took anything, but for either recreational use or acute pain, you want (or NEED) the quick onset that only smoking and injection can offer.

@jerv At present there is no cost effective alternatives to the internal combustion engine. I will happily and gladly drive an electric or fuel cell car when they’re developed to the point where they perform adequately.

All drugs that I know of have positive and negative aspects. The big question when considering taking a drug is: Does it help more than hurt? There are people suffering with various diseases that benefit from using marijuana in various forms. I also would consider using marijuana if it could relieve suffering from a terrible health condition.

For the most part of 13 years I took a cardiac drug (amiodarone) that was so strong that my cardiologist referred to it as “the atomic bomb of cardiac drugs”. Why? Because it works very good at keeping the heart beat normally but there is so much collateral damage (very harmful to liver, thyroid, lungs, eyes, nerves, shin). I was very thankful to have this drug as it allowed me to function more normally. Thankfully I no longer need it. I would be crazy to take amiodarone if I didn’t need it.

Do normal healthy young people need to smoke tobacco or marijuana? A reasonable person would say no. Because the brief benefit of feeling good is tiny compared to the long term possible harm.

Do healthy people need to climb mountains, go skydiving, surf, scuba, mountain biking, take up boxing, skeet shooting, etc?

I mean, all of those things have a non-zero mortality risk, and no one is proposing making those recreational activities illegal on a federal level.

The difference is, of course, all of those things have proven to directly cause death.

I don’t care if adults engage in unhealthy activities such as smoke or do extreme sports. I’m just suggesting that it’s a good idea to look at the cost/benefit and risks involved.

@gondwanalon
When there is no significant evidence of harmful effects, shouldn’t we at very least let adults make that cost/benefit analysis for themselves?

@Leadfoot By all means let 21 year old adults smoke marijuana if they want. They can smoke dried cockroaches if that rattles their cage. I don’t think that anyone has done any studies of the harmful effects of cockroach smoking yet.

The questions about the adverse health impacts of marijuana are especially critical right now as marijuana is legal in two states (and more to follow). This very likely boosts even wider use in teenagers and young adults.

FYI:

Ammonia levels are up to 20 times higher in marijuana smoke than tobacco. Ammonia is considered a high health hazard because it is corrosive to the skin, eyes, and lungs. Exposure to 300 parts per million (ppm) is immediately dangerous to life and health.

Hydrogen cyanide (not good) and nitrogen-related chemicals (can irritate our lungs and cause bronchitis and other lung diseases over time) are three to five times higher in marijuana smoke than in tobacco smoke. Of course there are many many more harmful chemicals in marijuana smoke that are too numerous to discuss here.

Also we all know that alcohol can ruin lives. Yet the Federal Drug Agency denies that marijuana is less toxic the alcohol.