DRUGS: MEDIA TOO LAX

Dear Editor,

Frank Sterle Jr. [Media too lax, Jan. 18 Letters to the Editor,
Langley Advance News] uses as his supporting argument a book written
25 years ago by a man who has been conclusively debunked by subsequent
medical studies on adult marijuana use.

He further suggests that the media "propogates B.S." such as telling
youth that marijuana is harmless.

Nonsense. As someone who professionally tracks media publishings
throughout the world on the subject of drugs and drug policy, I can
definitively state that no one in the media is promoting such a lie.

In fact, marijuana use definitely has risks, just as many activities
in life do. The most commonly abused drugs in our society, alcohol and
tobacco, together kill over half a million people annually in North
America. By that standard, using marijuana is indeed a low-risk activity.

Stephen Heath, Drug Policy Forum of Florida

DRUGS: MARIJUANA LAWS INSANE

Dear Editor,

Thank God the Supreme Court has agreed to hear a Charter challenge of
our country's insanely expensive, unpopular, and futile laws against
marijuana, because all the police PR stunts and tactical squad
home-invasions in the world will have no effect whatsoever on the
price, availability, or usage rates of such a popular recreational and
medicinal herb.

For years, poll after poll has shown that the vast majority of
Canadians favour either legalizing or decriminalizing marijuana, and
no wonder: it isn't rocket science to figure out that, with the police
advertising nation-wide that these home "grow-ops" produce millions of
dollars worth of marijuana with no education or experience required,
grow-ops will remain a rapid-growth industry, as distilling alcohol
was back in the 'Twenties.

Despite dire predictions to the contrary by police, society did not
fall apart when alcohol prohibition was just ended one day, and the
Dutch and Swiss have already proven society will not suffer when we
finally wake up and end marijuana prohibition.

Instead of police PR stunts whose only benefit is free advertising for
every Hydroponic Supply store in the country, we need to legalize,
regulate, control, and most of all, demand proof of age.

The police have better things to do with their time than keep us safe
from greedy home gardeners.

Chris Donald,
Dartmouth, NS

DRUGS: LEGALIZATION AROUND THE CORNER

Dear editor,

Many Canadian court judges, but particularly B.C. justices, are
quickly directing our society toward legalization or decriminalization
of marijuana. As an ex-pot-head, I believe that will result in
increased consumption.

Note the great increase in alcohol abuse following the abolishment of
alcohol prohibition earlier this century. According to health ministry
literature, "Prohibition in both Canada and the United States was
successful in dramatically reducing the extent of alcohol abuse and
alcoholism, at least for the period of its existence."

Furthermore, a health-ministry-funded study on cannabis consumption
reveals that, contrary to pro-pot propaganda, a permissive attitude
towards marijuana results in its increased consumption, and the
detrimental effects of that consumption among youths.

The study, conducted by UBC's Institute of Health Promotion Research,
surveyed illicit drug use among 8,179 B.C. students and later at 20
schools province-wide.

One study supervisor, UVic nursing-school assistant-professor Marjorie
MacDonald, noted, "Kids who said their parents were 'strongly' against
it were considerably less likely to use marijuana than kids who said
their parents were just 'somewhat' against it."

And it was found that the study's findings likely under-represent the
true level of drug use: "The kids who are absent on the day the survey
was done tend to be absent more often," said MacDonald, noting a
relationship between drug use and skipped classes.

Frank G. Sterle, Jr.,
White Rock

DRUGS: GREEN SWEEP IMPACT QUESTIONED

Dear Editor,

Will Operation Green Sweep's use of our tax-dollars to enforce the
prohibition approach to pot policy, which admittedly sells papers,
props up police budgets, and scores political points, actually have
any significant impact on the usage rates, price, or production of pot
[Pot busted, Feb 1., Langley Advance News]?

History says no: alcohol prohibition in North America produced tens of
thousands of news articles and police raids identical to the those
accompanying the Green Sweep PR stunt, and the production and
smuggling of illegal (and often poisonous) home-distilled hooch
increased annually for the entire period.

Replace "pot" with "booze" and "grow op" with "still." If something
easy to produce is made worth its weight in gold by prohibition
policies, and the fact is publicized through the press constantly,
then there is no stopping people from trying to cash in.

Society survived ending alcohol prohibition, despite dire predictions
that are being repeated about pot in the present, and most of Europe
has already ended pot prohibition with no apparent problems.

Only organized criminals will be put out if we end the prohibition on
pot.

The police have better things to do with their time than protect us
from greedy home gardeners, and our tax-dollars have better uses than
providing them with free room and board in prison to the tune of 50G
per year per pot grower.

Chris Donald,
Dartmouth, NS

DRUGS: GOD GAVE US CANNABIS

Dear Editor,

If Operation Green Sweep was like every other day for the local police
officers, [Pot busted, Feb. 1, Langley Advance News] society should
re-examine the concept of caging humans for using cannabis.

Christ God gave us cannabis and put cannabinoid receptor sites in our
brains. Who cages humans for making that connection?

Stan White,
Dillon, Colorado

DRUGS: POT SMOKERS' LIVES RUINED

Dear editor,

Aided in no small measure by uncritical news stories such as yours
[Pot busted, Feb. 1, Langley Advance News], our government continues
to oversee a brutal pogrom designed to distract our attention from
more important issues by ruining the lives of the innocent few who
ingest or sell certain drugs.

Please, don't insult my intelligence by insisting the drug war is
there to protect users from harmful drugs. Banning a drug harms users
(adulterated drugs and jail time) and non-users (murder and mayhem on
our streets) much more than if the drug were freely and legally
available. And if that were the reason, why didn't we ban alcohol and
tobacco, too?

Alan Randell,
Victoria

DRUGS: LEGALIZE POT

Dear editor,

Cannabis should be legalized. Alcohol, tobacco, and medicines are
legal; their risks are played down and they are promoted, while
consumers of cannabis (hashish and marijuana) are still punished and
derided.

Even from excess cannabis consumption nobody has died - which one
can't say about alcohol or tobacco!

The prohibition of cannabis is no longer respected by large parts of
society. Prohibition does not prevent consumption. Cannabis should be
legalized because repressive policies are counterproductive,
ineffective, senseless and expensive.

By a legal regulation of cannabis with controlled sales in special
stores, age checks could be done. The illegal market would collapse
and the state could redirect funds from interdiction into effective
pubic health and drug education.

It does not make sense to have arbitary and discriminatory laws that
cause more damage than, arguably, any harms which are meant to be prevented.

Being labelled as a criminal with all resulting social consequences is
worse than any harms of the consumption of hashish.

The politicians must be required to create rational laws.

Johnny Theisen,
Luxembourg