The Politics of Cannabis and Color

[iamthezenmaster]

Originally Posted by B-movie

Stand down, holmes--you're taking this too hard.

maize works on my nerves with stupid statements....

[B-movie]

You've done nothing but emote here, and now you're insulting people--and taking the insults into other, dead threads. I just don't think that many people here agree with you, and your method of arguing (by getting progressively angrier) isn't really doing anything to help your case. Just chill--and stop insulting people for contesting your opinions.

[anthony]

I didn't read all of this, so forgive me if these points are moot at this point.

I honestly believe that weed, (and heroine, and crack, and everything else) should be legal. This is actually where I become quite conservative. Not neo-con george w shit, but like, legit conservative. Small government, personal freedom, personal accountability, etc.

While the leftist in me fears/hates/and distrusts most large corporations, I still feel that dis-empowering drug dealers does more good, than the legalization could theoretically cause harm.

Weed may be legal where you are, and you may see large amounts of 'weed addicts' or whatever, and that's sad. And shitty. Dont get me wrong, I FUCKING HATE DRUGS. but what I also hate, and this is antidotal, is reading about the little girl, 11 years old, lived within a mile of my house in the projects- DEAD. shot 4 times in the back, running away from a shooting between dealers that resulted in guns spraying into a playground.

That shit bothers me. A lot. As much as I hate drugs. I hate illegal drugs even more. And as shitty as alcohol and cigarettes are. As much as I hate the industries that produce them, I haven't read about people walking into a playground - a mile from my house- and opening fire on a crowd hoping to kill one other drug dealer, over a pack of cigarettes, or a bottle of booze. (they missed by the way, 3 dead, none of which were the target.)

so fuck the drug war. legalize it all. let cruel, cruel, darwian logic sort out humanity. people will "OD" on pot, or just become really-really dumb.

i'd rather people become dumb, then little kids become dead.

i'd rather invest my energy into helping addicts, and speaking out against drugs, than spend resources locking up people with a disease. (addiction IS a disease).

illegalizing drugs fight the symptoms of a disease. They address the symptoms of serious social problems while ignoring the cause of the problem. (institutional racism, poverty, generational poverty, depression, classism, shitty education system, etc etc.)

so yeah, sucks you have a bunch of people 'addicted to weed' where you live. but i'd take a 100 stoners over one dead little girl.-any day.

[maize]

Originally Posted by iamthezenmaster

maize works on my nerves with stupid statements....

3. Right Speech

Right speech is the first principle of ethical conduct in the eightfold path. Ethical conduct is viewed as a guideline to moral discipline, which supports the other principles of the path. This aspect is not self-sufficient, however, essential, because mental purification can only be achieved through the cultivation of ethical conduct. The importance of speech in the context of Buddhist ethics is obvious: words can break or save lives, make enemies or friends, start war or create peace. Buddha explained right speech as follows: 1. to abstain from false speech, especially not to tell deliberate lies and not to speak deceitfully, 2. to abstain from slanderous speech and not to use words maliciously against others, 3. to abstain from harsh words that offend or hurt others, and 4. to abstain from idle chatter that lacks purpose or depth. Positively phrased, this means to tell the truth, to speak friendly, warm, and gently and to talk only when necessary.

[iamthezenmaster]

Originally Posted by B-movie

You've done nothing but emote here, and now you're insulting people--and taking the insults into other, dead threads. I just don't think that many people here agree with you, and your method of arguing (by getting progressively angrier) isn't really doing anything to help your case. Just chill--and stop insulting people for contesting your opinions.

so all the sneers at my screenname, statements about handling dope or watever, statements about my way of arguing (not yours but by others, and, i'm not getting angrier, just tired), wearing trousers or something, about expressing myself, totally disbelieving everything I state about a country they never heard of but were i am born and raised are not insulting??

*edit*

read above post by maize....this stuff feels like highschool or watever...back in the day if anyone tried to annoy me like this I would just throw a couple. Maybe not ethical, maybe not fair, but it sure as hell shutted everybody up, even tough I lost a couple of times.

[B-movie]

Good luck doing that over the internets.

[iamthezenmaster]

....

[iamthezenmaster]

maybe I am wrong....but NOBODY can question the wisdom of Alfa the Robot...

all arguments overruled....strike one, two, three ur all out,

Alfa the Robot is the alfa and the omega so....

http://www.ep.tc/problems/ten/

[iamthezenmaster]

Even in the seventies they allready knew lol

http://www.ep.tc/problems/eighteen/index.html

[blue]

not prosecuting people for minor possession of weed is the solution.

legalizing it, so that corporations will have one more thing to make money off of is not the solution. fuck legalization.

it's bad enough the things that go on in this world because of the drug trade. i don't want that shit becoming legal.

getting high doesn't make the world a better place. it just makes it easier to be complacent.

[James]

no.

[iamthezenmaster]

Originally Posted by blue

not prosecuting people for minor possession of weed is the solution.

legalizing it, so that corporations will have one more thing to make money off of is not the solution. fuck legalization.

it's bad enough the things that go on in this world because of the drug trade. i don't want that shit becoming legal.

getting high doesn't make the world a better place. it just makes it easier to be complacent.

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

+50 to everything....

[James]

Jesus Christ, I give up.

[dredd]

I'd like to put my two cents on this thing:


wouldn't that be a a problem to have people smoking weed all over the place? I mean, usually, tobacco smokers don't smoke in public places, cause it's the law, and they tend to be respectful of the law; tobacco doesn't have any effect on their behaviour. However, when they are drunk, like for new year's eve, smokers don't care anymore, and they start to smoke every fucking where, wich causes quite a big nuisance; the alcohol and partying affects their behaviour, and that makes them not caring anymore about the law or the fact that they are annoying people.

My question is: since weed affects the behaviour (more than tobacco), wouldn't you have, if weed was legal, people smoking weed in public places since, because they're high, they don't give a fuck about the fact that it is forbidden and that they annoy people?

This may sound like a dumb question, but it really is what stops me from advocating legalization.

[James]

People drink alcohol in public but it's still legal.

[dredd]

It ain't legal to be drunk in public, at least here. So, yeah, what about getting high in public? Would marijuana be legal but not in public cause you wouldn't have the right to get high in public?


But anyway, my point was more about the smoke. Alcohol does not have bad smell, and is not beathable.

[maize]

you can be drunk in a private business(bar,private party in a hall, private home) but you cant be recklessly drunk in a public area (sidewalks,parks,streets) or in most areas carry around an open container.

im sure the same would be enforced with weed.

with regards to smoking tobacco, i think it should be off limits to public gathering areas that are tax-financed, but if a private business wants to allow it then thats fine.

[James]

I agree with Maize.

[dredd]

Isn't that typically what's happening in Amsterdam in fact? I'm not too familiar with it, but I think you can't smoke pot in public areas but have to go to coffee shops, or your own place?


Well that would probably work with good regulation.

[littledrummerboy]

I say legalize it, and tax it. Then they don't have to keep trying to tax food, and beverages like that jerk off in New York Governor Patterson. A state like Jersey would be helped out TREMENDOUSLY by the legalization of marijuana. Governor Christie just imposed a property tax cap of 2.0 percent a year. Where the property tax won't exceed 2% a year. The taxes are the highest in the country. Mine aren't so bad. We have some of the lowest in the state, and mine this year is something around $2750. It averages out to about $228 a month. Now on the other side of the town by the beach the taxes are way higher, but those houses are worth at least 5 times what mine is so it's to be expected. Though 2009s property tax bill for my house was under $2400, but that was before I owned it. Back in 2005 according to the records it was only $2000 bucks a year. The property taxes at my place in Florida is like $4500 this year[Thats a different story] so I'm not complaining. Where my mom is up in North Jersey where I grew up the taxes are right under $7000 a year. When my parents bought the house in 86 I think they were under $1500 a year. So you can see how things have skyrocketed. I talked to a guy who lives in Elizabeth which is right next to Newark. He lives in a 100 + year old house, and it's in the ghetto, and he pays $14000 a year. Granted it's a 3 family house, but still you gotta see this place.


Anyway Christie seems like he's screwing teachers, and the educational system, and cutting police pay, and not giving teachers raises, and things like that. Hardly anyone has gotten a significant raise in the last 3 years so it's no shocker. With the legalization of marijuana states like California where the property tax is lower than Jerseys on average, but I thought I heard they raised the sales tax which was already like 8.25%?, and Jersey is 7%. New York is only 4.5%, but the income tax is higher there, and even for people who are poverty level as well. So this could generate a lot. I really think marijuana legalization is the answer. It would look awfully underhanded if teachers, and police, and other government pay comes from marijuana sales, but fuck it who cares? I think it's gonna benefit everyone. If they plan this thing right, and do it correctly, and use it where it should be used it's gonna make things easier for you, it's gonna make things easier for the state, and it's gonna make things easier for the 80 year old couple on every block who is being taxed $8000 a year on a home they have owned for 50 years who have to live off of the $1200 a month between the both of them that the government gives them for social security.

[iamthezenmaster]

Originally Posted by James

Jesus Christ, I give up.

I gave up first anyways....so it's oke