cannabisnews.com: Marijuana Helps Many





Marijuana Helps Many
Posted by FoM on April 11, 2000 at 09:42:57 PT
Letters To The Editor
Source: Anchorage Daily News
In addressing Tess Forbush's article ("Smoking pot is a choice, one with consequences," April 5), I should first correct that smoking pot is not a choice. It should be. Smoking pot is illegal. As for its consequences, I believe President Carter said it best: "Penalties for a drug should not be more damaging to an individual than the use of the drug itself." 
No one has ever overdosed from marijuana use. Last year nearly 700,000 Americans were arrested for marijuana possession. Tess' bold statement "Marijuana is harmful to all users of all ages" might be challenged by those she mentioned in her next paragraph (those with AIDS, seizure and spasticity disorders, severe chronic pain, severe nausea or cachexia) who have found relief in marijuana use. The suggestion that using marijuana will cause a person's family to begin using it, or cause a person to begin trading sex for it, is absurd. People can think for themselves. Marijuana can be used responsibly. Marijuana prohibition or legalization is not the cause nor the cure for this country's problems with child abuse, STDs, criminal activity, unproductive employees or deadbeat parents. Tess suggests that marijuana is linked to all these problems. She does not mention that marijuana is often linked to nonviolence, peace and love. … John Clarke Anchorage Alaskans Should Vote for Hemp:I would like Miss Tess Forbush ("Smoking pot is a choice, one with consequences," April 5) to know that voting is a choice with consequences, too. This November's election will determine whether Alaskans have the proper education about the issues before them. As clear as the glass that can be made from hemp, the choice is whether to establish a renewable, sustainable, natural, economic resource for Alaska, or continue on the destructive environmental path industry has chosen instead. The "real danger of marijuana" is that ignorant people, such as you portray yourself, Miss Forbush, fail to see past the one, nontoxic hemp product called "marijuana" and realize the other 49,999 products that comprehensively cover fuel, fiber, food and medicine. Children in Alaskan villages are dying from sniffing gasoline, and I don't hear you spouting statistics to incarcerate gasoline users. Being a teenager, I'm sure you'd rather have your friends on Prozac, Ritalin, Valium, or beer than use marijuana. Just realize that more people died from aspirin last year than from marijuana use. But even if using marijuana never killed anybody, not using marijuana environmentally may kill us all! It's a choice Alaskans can vote upon in November. … R.L. Marcy, chair HEMP2000 Wasilla Pot is a Recreation for Many:Where to start? Ten years ago I was about columnist Tess Forbush's age ("Smoking pot is a choice, one with consequences," April 5) and would no doubt have written an article much like the one she wrote. Her ability to still see things with black-and-white clarity certainly reminds me of a naivete I miss. I know it's practically pointless to tell a very young person anything about what the future might hold for them, but I'll give it a go. Some people have found on this particular issue that you can't trust all statistics and stories. Check your sources. Do they have anything (money/funding) to gain? Tess has no idea yet how many well-respected members of any given community actually use marijuana for recreation. There are smokers in law enforcement and smokers presiding over courts. There are smokers in the law-making bodies that keep it illegal. It's a hypocritical system that puts nonviolent pot smokers in prison where many horrible things can happen to them. Unless things have changed recently, I know the people of California voted to legalize medicinal marijuana use. I think Maine did too. There are also two governors who want to legalize all drugs (New Mexico and Minnesota). I could pick apart the article's "faulty logic," but this letter already looks too long. - Vanessa Peters Fort Richardson Published: April 11, 2000Copyright © 1998 The Anchorage Daily News CannabisNews Articles On Alaska - Over 150 Items:http://google.com/search?num=10&q=cannabisnews+alaska+site:www.cannabisnews.com
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