Dream Poetry Visions
Dream Poetry Visions

I am convinced that there are genuine and valid levels of perception available with cannabis (and probably with other drugs) which are, through the defects of our society and our educational system, un-available to us without such drugs.

…The illegality of cannabis is outrageous, an impediment to full utilization of a drug which helps produce the serenity and insight, sensitivity and fellowship so desperately needed in this increasingly mad and dangerous world.

There is a myth about such highs: the user has an illusion of great insight, but it does not survive scrutiny in the morning. I am convinced that this is an error, and that the devastating insights achieved when high are real insights; the main problem is putting these insights in a form acceptable to the quite different self that we are when we’re down the next day.”

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— Carl Sagan, published in Dr. Lester Grinspoon’s Marihuana Reconsidered (1971)
Posted 2 years ago
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Tagged: carl sagan, marijuana, cannabis, drugs, insight, .
Source: en.wikiquote.org
What the pot legalization campaign really threatens: A far more harmful drug that causes hundreds of annual deaths and contributes to violent crime is already legal - Drugs - Salon.com

Here’s a fact that even drug policy reform advocates can acknowledge: California’s 2010 ballot initiative to legalize marijuana does, indeed, pose a real threat, as conservative culture warriors insist. But not to public health, as those conservatives claim.

According to most physicians, pot is less toxic — and has more medicinal applications — than a legal and more pervasive drug like alcohol. Whereas alcohol causes hundreds of annual overdose deaths, contributes to untold numbers of illnesses and is a major factor in violent crime, the use of marijuana has never resulted in a fatal overdose and has not been systemically linked to major illness or violent behavior.

So this ballot measure is no public health threat. If anything, it would give the millions of citizens who want to use inebriating substances a safer alternative to alcohol. Which, of course, gets to what this ballot initiative really endangers: alcohol industry profits.

That truth is underscored by news this week that the California Beer and Beverage Distributors is financing the campaign against the legalization initiative. This is the same group that bankrolled opposition to a 2008 ballot measure, which would have reduced penalties for marijuana possession.

By these actions, alcohol companies are admitting that more sensible drug policies could cut into their government-created monopoly on mind-altering substances. Thus, they are fighting back — and not just defensively. Unsatisfied with protecting turf in California, the alcohol industry is going on offense, as evidenced by a recent article inadvertently highlighting America’s inane double standards.

via salon.com

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Posted 2 years ago
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Tagged: alcohol, beer, business, california, cannabis, drugs, health, industry, law, lobbying, marijuana, profit, prohibition, prop 19, proposition 19, safety, salon, united states, .