MARIJUANA GATEWAY THEORY NOT CORRECT

I think it is ironic that the only problem that Cassie Hartzell's Feb. 26
letter ("Pot not that bad?") could find with marijuana is that it is a
gateway drug, and then go on to tell a story about someone who began
drinking, and then tried marijuana. We have all heard stories about people
and drugs, but anecdotal evidence won't help us understand the problem.

Let's get squared away on the gateway drug theory. There is nothing in the
chemical composition of one drug (like pot) that automatically leads a
person to progress to a different drug (like heroin). The reason people go
from drug to drug is not because of the properties of the chemicals, but
because of the way the person perceives the drug.

A lot of people do smoke pot before they do harder drugs, but as Cassie so
effectively pointed out, rarely do drug users actually start with
marijuana, because almost everyone that tries marijuana has already tried
alcohol or tobacco. What people mean when they label marijuana the gateway
drug is that marijuana is the first illegal drug that people try. But if
marijuana were legal, perhaps kids wouldn't feel the need to experiment
with harder stuff, because maybe they would be better able to distinguish
between hard and soft drugs. Forget being legal. If our government would
only try to give kids real information about illegal drugs (like, for
example, that it is impossible to die from a marijuana overdose, but that
it is easy to die from a heroin overdose), maybe that alone would make less
kids try harder drugs. The truth is that when kids hear "Just Say No," and
then smoke pot and find out how relatively benign it is, they are then
informed enough to make their own decisions about it.

The way to end the gateway from one drug to another is information. All
drugs are different and the dangers each represents are different. If kids
and adults know this, they will be better able to make smart decisions
about drug use. Parents should tell their kids that alcohol and heroin
overdoses cause death, that tobacco and marijuana smoking causes lung
cancer, and that drugs like ecstasy cause brain damage. For good or bad,
people will always use chemicals recreationally, so instead of saying "Just
Say No," lets try to give people real facts and science that will help them
help themselves.

Raymond Banz
Upperco