Marijuana vs. cigarettes

[Zygote]

not according to recent harvard studies. aside from that, marijuana is an introduction to the illegal world. you can only illegally purcahse marijuana so you are liekly to be buying from someone who is invovled in other illegal endeavors. if marijuana was legal it would hurt the illegal community as a whole and relieve marijuana of the "gateway-drug" status.

I believe I treated this subject very well in this post, see what yall think

Weed legalization post from SMP

Look, bottom line is that no one on the anti-weed side is coming up with anything new. It's all tired rhetoric, and the reasons it will never be legalized are because of the incredibly closeminded religious right, and because of the size of the cigarette and alcohol industries.


Oh, not to mention the fact that nearly no one who opposes it has ever tried it, or researched it themselves.

[slamdunkpro]

Interesting post, but I'm missing the relevance of this bit:

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March 29, 1937: The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upholds the National Firearms Act.

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What's the connection?

[BCPVP]

search function is your friend...

[MMMMMM]

I think pot should be legal or at least decriminalized.

Regarding health effects, a friend of mine who is a chemist and also quite knowledgeable about health matters told me something interesting way back in the late 70's about the effects on the lungs of weed vs. tobacco. (By the way, this friend also told me way back then about cellular free radical damage due eating char-broiled foods, and he is well ahead of the common knowledge curve on a lot of such things, so I give his opinion some substantial weight).

He said that a joint is about ten times as bad for your lungs as a cigarette, but people typically smoke far more cigarettes than they do joints;-) My guess is that the reason it is worse is the very high content of sticky resin in pot--plus maybe nowadays, all the bad chemicals that weed may be grown with or have sprayed on it (sometimes by governments mass-spraying high-growth areas in attempts to eradicate it with herbicides).

Well, I haven't researched it or even read about it since those days, but if you consider the resin content alone it would not seen unlikely that it is quite bad for the lungs. Heck as I recall the film builds up and coats the interior of a bong pretty quickly. Another friend from those days who used a chamber pipe to resinate his weed was fairly quickly able to produce some of the STICKIEST brown weed you ever saw, simply by having the smoke pass through a small quantity of weed trapped in the chamber.

Well that crap builds up in your lungs too, so moderation is strongly advised;-)

I guess no one read my post.

First of all, a joint isnt the only way to smoke. Over half the carcinogens in marijuana are water soluble, and so smoke inhaled through a water bong is technically healthier than walking through my city's downtown.

Then, to take it further, vaporized weed contains less than 5% of harmful gases found in a joint. Tobacco can even be smoked that way... but who's that lame?

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If pot was legal and available at 7-11 it could certainly be taxed. Most people would prefer to buy from a corporate supplier that used quality control methods rather than from a dude on a street corner selling God knows what.

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I wasn't saying it could never be taxed. I was saying you can grow it on your own, unlike tobacco, which might be one reason why it was criminalized. Imagine if you could just grow tobacco in your back yard (or closet, as my parents did) and easily smoke it. How many people would grow their supply instead of buying it?

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Marijuana is a gateway drug, unlike alcohol and tobacco.

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I really want to know if this is just some anti-weed talking point or if you have something with more substance to put forth. I was really looking for some intelligent discussion and I was really hoping to understand the other side. I'm afraid your statement means nothing to those (like me) who know it to be false.

[MMMMMM]

[ QUOTE ]
First of all, a joint isnt the only way to smoke. Over half the carcinogens in marijuana are water soluble, and so smoke inhaled through a water bong is technically healthier than walking through my city's downtown.

Then, to take it further, vaporized weed contains less than 5% of harmful gases found in a joint.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sure it's better for you after passing through the water, but it still contains a LOT of resin or whatever that sticky crap is, like tar. And it will film or coat anything it touches including your lungs.

Actually, no, the resin is not there in vaporized weed, as the weed isn't burned, it is heated.

I suggest you look more into it.

Honestly I think you'd be surprised.