Marijuana users: Just picture them as lemmings, rushing toward the cliff …
“Drugs are modern slavery, just ask any addict! Then ask them what was their first illegal drug. Nearly every time they will tell you marijuana. Mere coincidence? Yeah right!” Dan Bent, Former U.S. Attorney for Hawaii
Users’ anti-social behaviors, confirm their anger and resentment at their plight, yet they continue to disassociate themselves from their having made the initial bad choice of using. For some, marijuana is psychologically addictive. Some get out; others cannot.
The most convincing reason why potheads must remain criminals, why marijuana must remain illegal, is their targeting of children. That behavior in and of itself reveals that they suffer from a deep psychological insufficiency, a need to draw children into becoming like them – whether it’s a need to justify their own beliefs or some other motivation, it doesn’t matter! They’re damaging future generations and doing so intentionally.
Becoming victims of their own propaganda, they slip farther down that slippery slope of drug use, their anti-social behavior solidifying their position among the criminal element where they and their families, their offspring must live and continue to suffer. The criminal part of this is that they’ve blindly and irresponsibly relegated their children to this same life.
Wenn Cannabis der Seele schadet
Hilfe bei Sucht und psychischen Störungen
by Lisa Lindberg / Christian Haasen.jpg)
The risks caused by the use of Marijuana and hashish, widely regarded as “mild and harmless recreational drugs” are far greater than presumed, especially for the sensitive souls of young people: Anxiety, depression and even psychosis result from the use which sometimes continued for several years.
This book gives founded and easily understandable advice on the connection between addiction to cannabis and mental disorders - a difficult combination which is often detected much too late.
Lisa Lindberg and Dr. Christian Haasen, a psychiatrist, psychotherapist and expert on addiction give advice and information about a wide variety of important issues. They provide valuable guidance and orientation for parents, teachers, self-help groups and social workers.
“Legalize it? After reading this book some of those who have a liberal attitude towards pot smoking should reconsider their position. Lisa Lindberg and Christian Haasen are dealing with the connection between addiction to cannabis and mental illness such as schizophrenia, depression and anxiety disorders - a connection which is publicly hardly known. Case reports and comprehensive advice for the family make this book equally valuable for anyone seeking information or help.”
“Gehirn & Geist”, a leading German Journal of Psychology
Wenn Cannabis der Seele schadet
by Lisa Lindberg / Christian Haasen
2005, Duesseldorf
ISBN 3-530-40177-3
http://www.eurad.net/reading/Wenn%20Cannabis%20der%20Seele%20schadet.html
For more info: Please see:
http://www.examiner.com/x-11932-Portland-Drug-Policy-Examiner~y2009m6d11-Marijuana-and-risk-of-psychosis, http://www.examiner.com/x-11932-Portland-Drug-Policy-Examiner~y2009m6d28-Stopping-drug-use
Comments
Hi John, I am the Portland Civil Rights Examiner and I found an article that will interest you.
It's at: www(dot)livescience(dot)com/health/090203-marijuana-brain(dot)html
Have a fantastic 4th of July!
Dianna
"Then ask them what was their first illegal drug. Nearly every time they will tell you marijuana." Uhh, hello?!? Did you even read that? It says, "what was their first ILLEGAL drug" did you bother to even mention that before they started with ILLEGAL drugs they started with the LEGAL alcohol and tobacco? I don't know 1 person who started their substance use with marijuana, they start with alcohol, so how come we don't call alcohol a gateway drug??? BECAUSE THERE'S NO SUCH THING! The gateway theory is a prohibitionist's wet-dream, nothing more. Get over the lies, John. And for your info, there is a new study just released (regarding cannabis use and mental health), maybe you should try researching for once, eh?
"Assessing the impact of cannabis use on trends in diagnosed schizophrenia in the United Kingdom from 1996 to 2005... this study did not find any evidence of increasing schizophrenia or psychoses in the general population from 1996 to 2005."
Where are all the crazy people, John? You say marijuana use results in mental illness... Well... We have lots of marijuana use in this country... Last I read it was something like 47% of the population that has tried it, and many of them smoke regularly. If what you say is true, we would see a resulting rise in mental illness in this country that coincides with the rise in marijuana use. If marijuana caused mental illness or cancer or any other of the problems they (and by they, I mean people like you) say it causes, wouldn't the media be parading sick, emaciated, cancer patients all across the news? How come we don't see them? Where are all these poor patients who have gotten cancer from smoking pot? I've never seen one, have you? You either need to get your facts straight and start reporting the truth, or find a different job. Your "Reefer Madness" beliefs might fool the ignorant, but the new generation of adults in this country isn't as foolish as your gullible generation.
John, you just don't get it! The prohibition of marijuana is causing an average of 17 murders every day by the drug cartels.
Not only that, but keeping it illegal removes all competition from market - the drug dealers have it all to themselves! With the price of marijuana driven up so high by the prohibition, these people will NEVER stop coming into our neighborhoods selling weed to our kids!!
And every arrest our police make just clears the way for new people to move in and sell more weed to our children.
Isn't that clear to you? The prohibition you love so much is harming the very people you claim to be trying to protect. Ending the prohibition isn't about encouraging marijuana use, it's about ending the harms being inflicted right now by the prohibition.
Read the news sometime John - home invasions, massive pot and arms busts, cartel grows on our public land - all of these are being caused by your beloved prohibition.
You don't have a right to put our kids in danger l
And another thing John. It's fine to point out the dangers of marijuana and encourage people to limit the amount they use. It's quite another thing to make the leap to saying that the prohibition is the best way to achieve this. It is NOT.
The prohibition does NOT reduce the amount of marijuana used in our society! If that's its goal then it's a total failure.
Stop advocating for this failed and deadly policy! You are harming our society and putting MY family in danger.
When *your* door gets kicked in and drug dealers put a gun to *your* head maybe you'll realize exactly what you're doing!
I would love to see the brain scan when John is going off....I bet it looks just like the brain of a religious zealot when they are professing their scriptures...The 'high' you get from your own brain is leading you down a dangerous path John. Face it your an addict, plain and simple. Your addicted to your own self grandeur. Were you this mental over the locks you once guarded? You sir are a menace..Thank you, I need the teaching tools for my own kids. I am begging them not to become like you. An open minded, inclusive, non-judgmental, contemplative, caring individual is what I am raising. Both my children simply laugh at you. I my self cannot laugh any more...Too many people are locked up over the MORAL crusade to control other peoples actions. The only thing dangerous about cannabis is what prohibition is causing, not the cannabis itself. Thanks again for the cannon fodder..... You are the best at blatant REEFER MADNESS.......
This is so freaking AWESOME! All you commentors out there. It really makes me feel that I live in a wonderous time. Nobody is buying this fear mongering cr@p anymore.
Hey sure, all drugs need to be respected and addiction needs to be treated. Maybe, just maybe, if we stopped spending billions a year on this failed social experiment, we could get around to treating the addicts and educating the populace ...not to mention give people opportunities to turn their lives around ...and all without killing anyone or violating their constitutional rights.
Just maybe this screwed up economy can be turned into something good. Maybe it's time to reassess and assert our true values of life and liberty? Maybe it's time to reconsider the support for a "War on whatever offends you" both at a personal and a national level.
...maybe...
"Addiction to cannabis" is an oxymoron.
John English is right. I know I am a doctor. However, I followed his advice and got the book he recommended and it wasn't "easily understandable" it was in German. I know I am a doctor.
Alright, John. You're wrong on every single aspect of your article. YOU should be the one rotting in a Federal prison, not the 870,000 "marijuana offenders" arrested each year; what a waste of billions of tax-payer dollars.
"Lisa Lindberg and Dr. Christian Haasen, a psychiatrist, psychotherapist and expert on addiction"
Also this is a poor sentence. I don't know which one is the psychiatrist, which one is the psychotherapist and which one is the expert on addiction. If they are both all three it should have read "Lisa Lindberg and Dr. Christian Haasen, who are psychiatrists, psychotherapists and experts on addiction"; if it some were applicable to one of them it should have read Lisa Lindberg, a psychiatrist, and Dr. Christian Haasen, a psychotherapist and expert on addiction".
I know I am a doctor.
Oh and every single comment is wrong. To everyone who said marijuana isn't that bad for you and should be legal: you are wrong. I know I am a doctor. And to Dianna: you told him you are "the Portland Civil Rights Examiner" but you also say your name is Dianna: how can you have to separate names? And if one is your middle name you should clarify it; I know, I am a doctor and am experienced with things like that.
I don't care if you're the head of all doctors around the globe. You are wrong, considering that the health and economic benefits of marijuana completely outweigh the negative side effects of using it. Just stop posting on here because nobody wants your opinion.
When someone's life is empty they will cling onto the only thing they know. In this case, John is clinging on to the past and can't see through the propaganda he has been fed. No matter what evidences is provided he will never be able to break through the years of brain washing, and will restort to what he know - lies, lies and more lies.
Wow this guy is a moron.
This guy must be an idiot or a drug dealer.
I would say paid per article by a prison union, Brian.
Hey? Weren't the Nazis: German, control freaks, and fascists?
Are you serious?!? John you need to do some better research and update your information. Morals and ideals are one thing, but your lies are another. Why do you hate cannabis so much? Who is paying you to spread this reefer madness?
We have engaged in the criminal prohibition of Cannabis for DECADES. High School students today find MJ easier to get than Alcohol or Tobacco and there are an estimated 1,000,000 drug-dealing minors in this country. MJ is also generally more popular and available and of a higher quality today than any time in history.
It's the PROHIBITIONISTS policies that have FAILED the people of this contry and it's children and I blam this STUPID, THOUGHTLESS and ILLEGAL policies of the past.
If YOU support and have supported prohibition than YOU are to blame for the crisis in Mexico and YOU are to blame for the failed Drug War.
Why do you love drug dealers so much johnny? Why are these people so special that you would want to support there luxury life styles and there endless flow of cash? Why do you want school kids to have easy access to drugs? Is it so they get hooked young so you can try and prove some moral point?
Your the only one pushing drugs onto our kids, your no better than a drug dealer! If it cannabis was legal not only would it be harder for kids to get but they would find it boring, I mean it makes you tired and Hungary.
Keep the stories coming mate! The blackmarket really needs you especially with all this "harm reduction" and "legalization talk, next thing you know your little mates (drug dealers) will go broke. But I suppose everyone could use a bit of support at the moment, with the economy and everything.
I do believe the first drug I tried illegally was alcohol. Thank goodness I gave that stuff away and started smoking Cannabis.
Bloated and obnoxious whilst demonising peaceful people may be a good look from your eyes John but not everyone share's your enthusiasm. Wake up!
You self righteous, ignorant, brain washing imbecile.
You make many statements about the affects on young people cannabis has, and it is the biggest load ever!
I myself am 17, I've been going through depression for 3-4 years, prescription pills do they help? no, psychiatrists? no. Last year my first year of college, and the start of this year, i was skipping school almost 3/5 days a week on average!, and during high school years, my attendance wasnt that great either...
Then during this year, when i started smoking cannabis MEDICINALLY because its proven to HELP with depression, instead of cause depression as you state, and well the outcome?, well...its been simply amazing, i dont skip school anymore, im doing assignments and handing them in on time, i dont have suicidal thoughts and all of the other things i would be going through if it werent for cannabis.
Theres a little story for you.
Ignorance is bliss with you it would seem.
You John have absolutely no idea. I have been smoking cannabis for fourty years, yes that is right FOURTY years.
I have run my own successful business for 20 of those 40. I am president of our local tennis club, I help the community as much as I can. Cannabis smokers are not pot heads, cannabis does not lead to harder drugs. Keeping it illegal leads to harder drugs and increases crime. Get out into the real world and have a long hard look and for Gods sake start telling the truth. Where is your research? Where is your proof?
You want to make criminals out of people who go about everyday life in a peaceful and normal way. Why not ban alcohol and tobacco they kill and destroy more families than cannabis ever will. It appears to me John that you and your ilk are very scared that we are correct in our beliefs and all this anti cannabis propaganda is money driven by the huge pharmacy corporations. PEACE.
You're seriously delusional John. Rant 'n Rave like you do without providing any evidence, shows that your comments carry no weight. You are doing society a dis-service with you're biased niave opinion, and It's quite clear that you're a lunatic on the loose.
Seek Help John
Better listen to Jamie, he's seventeen he knows everything. Kids that age think they know it all, but they don't. He's wrong. I know I'm a doctor.
Charles, what did I tell you about posting on here? Can't you clearly see that every... single... comment... completely disagrees with what you and this old hag, John has to say? Just admit it: YOU ARE BOTH WRONG. Doctor's are irrelevant here. You don't have any evidence proving that Cannabis is harmful, yet you continue to project these selfish, preposterous LIES! You probably haven't even SEEN a bud in real life, much less even know what it's like to use it. IT HELPS. Not harms. Stupid "doctor."
You, sir, are a menace to society and every single human being that only wishes to do their own thing. If you wish to try and strip away their Constitutional freedom, go right ahead. But just know, when Cannabis finally gets legalized, I'll be the one laughing it up with the fatty, and YOU'LL be the one crying in a corner because you finally realized you've lost all along.
Charles...anyone who has to keep saying "I know I'm a doctor" is like the pimply faced loser say "I'm not a vigin". Your probably lying through your hypocritical selfrightous godwad teeth. You can't even get the puncuation right in your statement, a REAL doctor should at least be able to constuct a proper sentence.
John...try writing an article titled "Addiction to self rightousness and mental disorders", now there's a subject you have some real experience with.
John is a pathetic clown who recycles the same column over and over again.
The guy is an idiot.
Charles the supposed doctor is just John writing under another name
Now that I think about it Charles may actually be a doctor. Doctor of theology, aka John's pastor. They like to run off at the mouth telling people how to conduct their lives Just like John.
This is America, land of the free, I can do what I want in a private place...if it does not hurt thee.
How successful is John English? Are we supposed to listen to him because he is a qualified commentator? Thanks Mr. English for providing humor for my day.
Out of these choices, which is the one that you cannot overdose on?
- ALCOHOL
- CANNABIS
- WATER
- TYLENOL
Answer: Cannabis
Cannabidol is a compound in Cannabis that has been proven to fight cancer so what could be wrong with letting people fight cancer? Even with out chemo or people can use it to prevent cancer as my family has a high tendency to get testicular cancer, why can't I prevent that?
Funny article, but so far from reality.
Please GTFO this site okay John?
Nothing you say is backed up by the scientific evidence of today. You're livin' in the past maaaan! HA! Funny how you are what you say we are....
I love irony.
Oh yeah and anyone who says it harms the 'soul', doesn't deserve to voice their OPINION!
Ah, the gateway theory. Never mind that the Institute of Medicine debunked this in 1999, as has the World Health Organization, and every governmental and scientific study carried out on the topic since then. If anyone can resurrect this shibboleth, it's Johnny English.
If you time traveled back to 1928 and asked any drug addict "what was their first illegal drug", they would tell you "alcohol". Did alcohol make them do heroin? No, alcohol and heroin just happened to be illegal and alcohol is much more popular.
Gateway believers are looking through the wrong end of the binoculars. Yes, nearly every heroin addict used pot. However, there are 22 million annual pot smokers and only 135,000 monthly heroin users. Some gateway; looks more like a tiny hole in strong fence.
Ask any cocaine addict what was the first white powder he used and it will be sugar. So what?
Alcohol isn't considered a gateway, why? Because it isn't sold on the streets by drug dealers.
You, Johnny boy, sound like a religious person of some kind. The twisted morals taught by religion do much more harm to a child's brain and social development than cannabis ever will. Yet you, religious people, continue to shove your stupid teachings to children worldwide, causing terror, hatred and intolerance disguised as a misconstrued notion of love---things this world really doesn't need more of. Ban religion first, then we'll talk.
John, I usually don't comment to the kind of 'reefer madness' you seem to enjoy spreading, but your un-educated rambling's prompt me to do so..
Before ever speaking or exercising your freedom of such speech, may I suggest you gather some education with respect to the issues around marijuana. You spread lies and deception, and should be ashamed of yourself. I am embarrassed that there are people like you out there that believe their own lies. It is people like you that help weaken this country with lies like this and others you have written. Again sir, you should be ashamed of yourself.
A brilliant piece of obfuscation and flawed logic John. I find your medieval sense of compassion toward medical cannabis users (my brother who died at age 39 from smoking the legal, lethal, addictive tobacco, used cannabis during his last few months to allay the nausea, lack of appetite, and pain) most refreshing. Your merciless sense of justice is wasted on a modern, enlightened society. You would have went far as Torquemada's right hand man during the Spanish Inquisition.
" a need to draw children into becoming like them – whether it’s a need to justify their own beliefs or some other motivation, it doesn’t matter! They’re damaging future generations and doing so intentionally."
This guy is trying sooo hard he absolutely cancels himself out with contradiction and inflammatory hyperbole!
In John's state we have a liberal MMJ program. We have legalized cannabis twice, it is currently a decrim state. Salem just past the comprehensive hemp farming bill legalizing industrial hemp, Asset Forfeiture laws have been gutted, The Mayors of Eugene and Portland have declared May annual MMJ awareness month.
Oregon's largest cash crop is [you guessed it] cannabis.
I think is is fair to say John that what you have in common with another more well known John is, you both were crying out in the wilderness!
If this swill is the best you can do I think our movement forward is safe!
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