House votes to decriminalize marijuana at federal level

[Leadeye]

I'm talking about your actual work experience. How much difficulty do you have spotting impairment when an employee pops a valium/xanax/percocet/chugs a bottle of cough syrup/etc? How are those different than MJ? Except that MJ smells much more.

So if legality doesn't really matter, why bother keeping it illegal?

Like I said... my only actual work experience was with an MJ problem, and that's germane to this thread. I wouldn't consider myself qualified to say how people react under those prescription drugs as I have no experience with them. When the company tested for drugs we all had to produce documentation if we were taking prescription medicine, and other than cough syrup I've never had any of the ones you mentioned.

Legal is what the law says it is, for whatever reason leadership chooses to use. They are involved in the MJ question for thier own reasons.

 

[BugI02]

But they're already doing it when its a banned substance, both by HR/management and .gov. So obviously making it illegal and against the rules didnt stop them.

So obviously prohibition isnt the answer.

No, firing them is. Getting high is more important to them than maintaining QC standards or even maintaining their employment

 

[Leadeye]

So when alcoholics show up drunk, we go back to prohibition?

I think some are conflating legality with company policy. Company policy doesnt have to change just because the legalities changed.

And obviously making it illegal didnt stop them...

Policies and legalities aside, my issue was just one of amateur evaluation. Drunks I could spot and send home before they did damage, MJ users I couldn't. Drunks got one Mulligan and then termination, if there was an issue I could certainly call a cop and have a breathalyzer done. I'm not sure about MJ detection, maybe one of the LEO guys could weigh in here with better info about spotting MJ impairment.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

Recreational drugs suck. There is only one purpose and that is to change your mood. People need to find good avenues to make themselves feel better.

 

[BugI02]

 

[churchmouse]

I would be seriously interested in hearing the downsides to providing something on a voluntary basis to otherwise violent prisoners to reduce violence. Less violence in a prison saves one hell of a lot more money than they'd ever spend on the cannabis to obtain this preferred result.

I'll go ahead and say upfront that any claims of creating drug addicts is more regurgitated D.A.R.E. ********. About the only significant trait cannabis shares with the harder drugs is it's legal status and stigma. Programmed, brainwashed, misled, however you want to phrase it you've been convinced of truths which aren't.

Man, there is so much I can add to this from life's experiences. Growing up in the age of Aquarius had a direct effect on my views and actions in that time frame. I have seen a lot. Experienced probably more than most average folks just due to where I grew up and the choices I made.
So I would say to anyone listening, unless you have either been in the trench's with an addict or been one at some level yourself your opinions mean squat to me and others who have. No offense intended but until you have wrestled the demon yourself you have no way of knowing past what you have heard. If you have OK. But some of the responses in here and other threads just make me take pause. We all have the right to see things as we do. Thats a given.

 

[churchmouse]

Describes so many people I know or knew. And possibly me at one low point in my life.
The issues come when we can't see the damage we are doing to ourselves and to those around us.
To wake up one day and see this is not the way you need to live your life.

 

[BugI02]

Describes so many people I know or knew. And possibly me at one low point in my life.
The issues come when we can't see the damage we are doing to ourselves and to those around us.
To wake up one day and see this is not the way you need to live your life.

It took my brother from 21 to 58 to finally hit bottom, all years spent alternately trying to save him and hating him for being what I considered 'weak'

I glad he got there, and especially that he did so while my Mom was still alive

I am and will always be an implacable foe of living one's life just for the next high

 

[churchmouse]

It took my brother from 21 to 58 to finally hit bottom, all years spent alternately trying to save him and hating him for being what I considered 'weak'

I glad he got there, and especially that he did so while my Mom was still alive

I am and will always be an implacable foe of living one's life just for the next high

As am I sir.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

Man, there is so much I can add to this from life's experiences. Growing up in the age of Aquarius had a direct effect on my views and actions in that time frame. I have seen a lot. Experienced probably more than most average folks just due to where I grew up and the choices I made.
So I would say to anyone listening, unless you have either been in the trench's with an addict or been one at some level yourself your opinions mean squat to me and others who have. No offense intended but until you have wrestled the demon yourself you have no way of knowing past what you have heard. If you have OK. But some of the responses in here and other threads just make me take pause. We all have the right to see things as we do. Thats a given.

Been there, done that, as an observer and a participant. Buried two of DoggyMama's daughters over it. Helped perform CPR on one daughter when she OD'd in her truck in our driveway. Still think MJ should be legalized (it wasn't MJ that killed her daughters). Firmly in the "legalize it" camp.

 

[Cameramonkey]

It took my brother from 21 to 58 to finally hit bottom, all years spent alternately trying to save him and hating him for being what I considered 'weak'

I glad he got there, and especially that he did so while my Mom was still alive

I am and will always be an implacable foe of living one's life just for the next high

Pot, or hard stuff?

 

[The Bubba Effect]

BUGOI02, straight question.

Do you support the cops kicking my door to dictate which flowers I may or may not grow on my property?

 

[churchmouse]

Been there, done that, as an observer and a participant. Buried two of DoggyMama's daughters over it. Helped perform CPR on one daughter when she OD'd in her truck in our driveway. Still think MJ should be legalized (it wasn't MJ that killed her daughters). Firmly in the "legalize it" camp.

I remember we talked about this.

 

[phylodog]

I am and will always be an implacable foe of living one's life just for the next high

I think everyone in this thread is.

 

[bwframe]

 

[phylodog]

The vast majority of people who drink are not alcoholics.

The vast majority of people who utilize cannabis are not addicts.

At some point catering to the lowest common denominators is only gonna drag everyone down. Oh and waste trillions and trillions of dollars, cause hundreds of thousands of deaths and turn Mexican and Columbian citizens into violent billionaires in the process, all to see the success we've seen thus far.

Full steam ahead says I

 

[rrschooter]

I seek to refute the anecdote that all of the people who use weed are pure as the driven snow and just hopefully waiting for legalization

I will allow that people who like to toke but still obey the law away from home are probably in general law abiding citizens and of little or no worry

But as far as legalization doing away with the criminal element, some time ago I posted about the cartels sending representatives across the border to establish growing operations on public land out west in order to sell direct to 'consumer'. That is just one example of the unicorns and rainbows narrative of the Neo-Rastas, and being immersed in drug culture certainly plays a part in the progression to other, less 'benign' drugs for more than a few people. I still have difficulty fathoming why so many people risk their livelihood, and perhaps jail, under current conditions just to get high. IMO they should take a good, hard look at that reality, because it doesn't support the idea that they are in control of their habit

Did the end of prohibition result in the end of organized crime? I think not

The part of your post I highlighted, the inconvenient truth for more people than folks here are willing to admit

That's a little disingenuous. The grows on public lands in California are explicitly exercising loopholes in the law, where california has extremely lax penalties for illegal grows because of their legalization scheme, but allows for borderless transport to states where it's still prohibited. None of that public land weed ends up in the california market because there are simply better options available to people in california.

If you do away with the patchwork of laws, then that's no longer a loophole worth exploiting, because you've removed a substantial portion of the black market for them to sell into. Basically, changing the risk reward dynamic does drive out a substantial portion of the criminal element, and relegates the black market to smaller local players who do experience a slight benefit by operating outside the law.

I'll use festivals with free and anonymous testing testing of less benign substances as an example. In those places, you saw a substantial change in behavior and market dynamics, where unscrupulous dealers were generally driven from the market because the consumers were provided with more information about the risk profile of the substances they were consuming. the folks selling "laced" narcotics were generally run out of town on a rail, while the people selling a quality product were allowed to continue operating by the community. I expect you'd find much of the same attitude if things were broadly legalized, as availability would no longer be the key driver in sales. Prohibition creates all sorts of crazy distortions in the operation of the marketplace, altering the consumers behavior for the worse because information can't be freely exchanged for fear of reprisals and violence by their government. From a strictly economic point of view, prohibition is terrible for society on almost every front, in part because the only financial incentives it provides are to people who brazenly defy the law. remove that, and things start to operate more like the craft beer or artisanal distillery market than the current marijuana market in prohibited states.

 

[rrschooter]

The vast majority of people who drink are not alcoholics.

The vast majority of people who utilize cannabis are not addicts.

At some point catering to the lowest common denominators is only gonna drag everyone down. Oh and waste trillions and trillions of dollars, cause hundreds of thousands of deaths and turn Mexican and Columbian citizens into violent billionaires in the process, all to see the success we've seen thus far.

Full steam ahead says I

but what good is it if you can't legislate for the lowest common denominator? how will you ever keep the peasants in line?

 

[Ingomike]

Did not read this whole thread but it seems to me this topic may be due to business wanting to be able to hire those that smoke pot and are instructing their minions in government to get it done…

 

[Timjoebillybob]

Did not read this whole thread but it seems to me this topic may be due to business wanting to be able to hire those that smoke pot and are instructing their minions in government to get it done…

There are very few businesses that can't hire someone that smokes pot if they want to. And even if legalized at the federal level I don't see that changing. CDL/pilots are the two I can think of, perhaps DoD contractors but I have no idea on that. And I don't see that changing, in the bill they can still regulate those.