Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 2:24 am Post subject: Drugs and you.
To what extent have they affected your life?
I haven't tried the "light" ones, e.g. marijuana, ecstasy, heavy-tipped markers, etc. Of those that are legal, the only one that I've ingested is alcohol, which I have yet to appreciate. My stepfather used to smoke very heavily, so until three or so years ago I was exposed to tobacco fumes at an average rate of every two weeks.
I'd say that I don't care which drug someone uses, as long as s/he is at least 1 km away from me. Conversely, anti-smoking ordinances are perfectly fine in my opinion, though prohibition is questionable: your liver can't be clogged by a drinker, yet your lungs can be by a smoker.
I have neither tried narcotic drugs nor more than a few cigarettes in my life.
Just plain alcohol for me.
And as a true native of the Nordic countries I vigorously support bans on narcotic drugs, foul-smelling tobacco (cigars just smell to nice to be banned...) and spirits (what do people need them for!?).
Just beer and wine - that's my prescription for the world! _________________ Wer fremde Sprachen nicht kennt, weiß nichts von seiner eigenen. = Those who don't know foreign languages, know nothing of their own. (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)
Location: San Francisco, Noord-Kalifornië, Noord-Amerika
Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 4:44 am Post subject:
Having gone to college in the late '60s, it seemed perfectly natural to me that I tried most everything except heroine at least once. (I'm sure there are other things I didn't try -- I'll try to come up with a few.) However, the only substances I used on a regular basis were alcohol and marijuana. I didn't try marijuana until my first year in college, and by a year after I graduated, I had stopped smoking it. I'm very much a social drinker, which means that unless I'm with someone else who's drinking, I don't drink. Currently I'm not around people who drink. I recently decided I should try drinking one glass of red wine a day because it's supposed to be good for your heart and other things. That was a couple of weeks ago, and I've managed to get myself to drink a glass of wine 3 times, I think.
I only really drink wine and the occasional brandy. I've been drinking wine on a fairly regular basis since I was about 13 or 14, although I'd had the occasional glass (often diluted with water), especially at Christmas and New Year, for several years before. I remember that I first tasted wine when I was 5, as that is the age that parents can legally give their children alcohol here.
And by the way, I've always seen that experience as totally normal — I'd say that I drink far less alcohol than most people my age here. It surprised that some people here thought it was strange when I mentioned it here before.
Location: San Francisco, Noord-Kalifornië, Noord-Amerika
Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 10:13 am Post subject:
It doesn't seem strange to me, though it's very un-American. And it also makes sens to me that you would drink less than other people, having been brought up that way.
I did think of another drug I've never tried -- cocaine. Actually, once a friend of mine in college shared some supposed cocaine with me, but we didn't feel anything, so we figured he'd paid for nothing. By the time cocaine had become the drug to do, I'd stopped doing drugs.
Well, I went to college in California, and I think bong hits were a requirement.... These days I'll drink socially, but I'm pretty much a lightweight -- a couple drinks and I'm pretty silly. Hey, it makes me a cheap date!
Location: San Francisco, Noord-Kalifornië, Noord-Amerika
Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 12:27 pm Post subject:
Oh, and I've never smoked a cigarette. Once, in college, as part of a costume, I carried a lit cigarette (shame!) and drew some smoke into my mouth so's I could blow it out, but I didn't inhale. I never had any desire to smoke, either. Once my parents divorced, when I was 4, our (my mother's) household was a smokeless one. My mother was way ahead of her time and would ask people to leave the house if they wanted to smoke.
I smoked dagga (marijuana) on two occasions many years ago, and hated it on both occasions. I've never tried any other hard drugs since, never been interested. I smoked cigarettes for about 15 years. As for alcohol, I enjoy a good wine and beer on occasion. ANd yes, I've been drunk on occasion!
It's true that a person drinking too much doesn't directly influence another person's health the way smoking does. But a drunk person is also a dangerous person. Alcohol abuse amongst black and coloured people* is a massive problem in SA. No weekend goes by without people being killed in drunken brawls, women being raped by drunk men, children being abused by drunk parents.
* This is not to say that alcoholabuse doesn't appear in the white community, but it's far less of a problem.
And then there's foetal alcohol syndrome....
Quote:
Foetal Alcohol Syndrome hits crisis proportions
The dry and dusty town of De Aar in South Africa's Northern Cape province is unremarkable in every way but one. It has the world's highest prevalence of Foetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS), the group of physical and mental defects caused by alcohol consumption during pregnancy, according to the Foundation for Alcohol Related Research (FARR), an NGO that carried out a five-year survey of the community's newborns.
More than one in 10 babies in De Aar aged up to 12 months suffered from a severe form of FAS. Just as worrying was the finding that up to 50 percent of children were in some way afflicted by FAS, which is characterised by brain damage, facial deformities and growth deficits.
FARR founder Denis Viljoen maintained that the high prevalence of FAS in De Aar was intrinsically linked to the demise of the town's railway junction, one of the largest in the country.
The community's economic existence was entirely dependant on the railway junction until South Africa's parastatal transport company, Transnet, decided to cut back on operations during the latter half of the last century, causing the unemployment rate to shoot up to 80 percent and creating a depressing environment in which alcohol abuse has become commonplace, said Viljoen.
FARR, which was invited to conduct the survey by the provincial government, examines 100 babies a month in De Aar. "It is more difficult to diagnose the condition in babies than young children," he said. Heart, liver, and kidney defects also are common symptoms of the syndrome, as well as vision and hearing problems. Individuals with FAS have difficulties with learning, attention, memory and problem solving.
To prevent the next generation of FAS babies, FARR is concentrating its efforts on mothers. "In conjunction with the survey, we provide an education programme for the mothers who take part to make them aware that there are dangers to their unborn children if they drink while pregnant," said Viljoen.
FAS has been prevalent in South Africa for many decades, but the scale of the problem among marginalised communities in the Western and Northern Cape provinces has only came to light during the past 10 years as a result of the research carried out by FARR.
De Aar might have the highest levels of recorded FAS in the world, but extreme socioeconomic inequalities, giving rise to an environment in which alcohol abuse thrives, are widespread in South Africa, where the national unemployment rate is an estimated 40 percent.
A FARR survey carried out in the Soweto township of Johannesburg revealed that 25 in every 1,000 seven-year-olds tested had a severe form of the syndrome. By comparison, surveys in the USA indicate a prevalence rate of 1 or 2 per 1,000 births.
According to Viljoen, at any given time 500,000 South Africans are suffering from Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD), an umbrella term describing the range of symptoms that can be manifested by an individual whose mother drank alcohol during pregnancy, including the narrower group usually encountered under FAS.
The disorder can also have larger implications for the society. People living with FASD have an "IQ [that] is low as a result of their stunted brains and, consequently, they can be easily influenced and led astray. Unfortunately, they are more likely to be shoving a knife into someone than paying their taxes," he added.
FAS can be traced back to the illegal "dop" or tot system, in which white-owned vineyards paid their black and mixed race employees in part with low-grade wine as an alternative to cash.
The "dop" system left a legacy of alcohol abuse and dependency. Workers employed in vineyards spent a substantial portion of their salaries on alcohol, according to surveys conducted by the Dopstop Association, an NGO combating the problem.
"Shebeens" or informal bars found in every township in South Africa have replaced the "dop" system. "When coupled with poverty the shebeen system creates a similar environment, where alcohol abuse flourishes. We are discovering extremely high levels of FASD in many other places throughout South Africa - other towns and cities that are not linked to the wine-growing regions but struggle with high poverty levels and unemployment," Viljoen commented.
At last count, Viljeon's research team recorded 99 illegal shebeens operating in De Aar, a town of 28,000 inhabitants, the majority of whom had migrated from the Western Cape to work for Transnet.
Last Wednesday was a public holiday in South Africa, and consequently De Aar's drinking establishments were full for most of the day.
Groups of men and women sat languidly outside the "shebeens" on every street, drinking potent homebrewed concoctions - made from yeast, sugar and bread - out of plastic containers. By late evening dozens of inebriated men and women were either walking unsteadily through township streets or lying in a drunken stupor after having collapsed.
The following morning, when the research team went to collect the mothers who had agreed to have their babies examined, some women refused, saying they were still too drunk.
Anna Marie Kok, 26, who had brought her baby girl to the research team's Joan Wertheim clinic in Sunrise township, said that while she did not consume alcohol, many pregnant women in her community did.
"The problem is poverty - there is no work so they have nothing to do. People know about FASD but they drink anyway; they have so many other problems to deal with that they need to escape. When they drink the homebrew they say: 'We don't need to eat when we drink this'," she explained.
Tackling FASD in South Africa will not be an easy task, Viljoen maintained, even though the disorder is completely preventable if the mother abstains from drinking while pregnant.
"It will take at least 20 years to change the mindset that allows FASD to flourish," he noted, adding that lack of awareness was a major hurdle as it also prevented early diagnosis.
I havn't smoked or tried drugs. It's not allowed for me drinking alcohol, but when they don't knwo sometimes I drink a glass of wine and about 3 times I have drunk a cocktail : I think that they are very pretty and nice.
I am unequivocally against any 'hard drugs' like marijuana or cocaine. Has anyone read the news about the appearance of a spiritual descendent of Jack the Ripper in Suffolk? Most of the victims were prostitutes who were driven into the wretched trade because of their drug habit. _________________ Hillary Clinton is an acquired taste which I have clearly yet to acquire.
It is. Anyone caught smuggling marijuana into Singapore faces the gallows here.
I don't agree with the capital punishment, but I share our government's sense of gravity towards the drug.
Other drugs which might earn the hapless smuggler a date with the hangman include heroine and opium inter alia. _________________ Hillary Clinton is an acquired taste which I have clearly yet to acquire.
It is. Anyone caught smuggling marijuana into Singapore faces the gallows here.
It would definitely be considered a 'soft' drug here. It's still technically illegal, but I see/smell people smoking it on the bus every day and no-one bats an eyelid.
(I didn't realise that the hard/soft distinction was based upon government legislation).
Last edited by Benjamin [inactive] on Wed Dec 13, 2006 8:08 pm; edited 1 time in total
Marijuana has many good effects for people who have diverse symtoms / problems and sometimes doctors agree that for someone, marijuana will be a very good medicine. Nicotine can help some people also, but of course if you will get this from cigarettes there will be negative side-effects.
I think that it's a pity ignorantly generalise that all drugs what are recreational used can't be medicinal.
The Singapore government is wrong : if marijuana's a hard drug, what's a soft drug - coca cola ? Murder someone because they have marijuana is absoltuly horrible and wrong, also ignorant with incorrect prioritys.
Quote:
Has anyone read the news about the appearance of a spiritual descendent of Jack the Ripper in Suffolk? Most of the victims were prostitutes who were driven into the wretched trade because of their drug habit.
but who 's guilty ? The prostitutes = no, the murderer = yes. It's possible he has a drug habit, but we don't know. it would be incorrect blaming drugs for this murders, *probably* the murderer is psychopath ( person who hasn't conscience, empathy etc... : this isn't an illness but a personality disorder ).
Can you know for sure that the protistutes had drug habits ? I think that it would be more sure that they had very difficult lifes, and therefore some of them have drug habits also. It's speculation.
I do not care to know about the subtle distinction between marijuana or opium. Both kinds of drugs ruin lives. They destroy families. They destabilise the basic unit of society. Nobody can plausibly argue that marijuana is 'good for you' - unlike Guinness.
As for the prostitutes in Suffolk, I am just using them as an example to make manifest the adverse effects of having a drug habit. Supporting a drug habit is prohibitively expensive and the craving for a quick fix has pushed many people into doing immoral and illegal work in order to satisfy their habits.
What is a 'soft' drug? Ketamine, I suppose. Most 'party drugs' are soft drugs here. It is still illegal to bring them in here without a valid licence, but the crime does not merit the death penalty.
PS: I reiterate that I am adamantly against the death penalty.
PPS: I am also anti-abortion. _________________ Hillary Clinton is an acquired taste which I have clearly yet to acquire.
Location: San Francisco, Noord-Kalifornië, Noord-Amerika
Posted: Thu Dec 14, 2006 11:58 am Post subject:
loic wrote:
I do not care to know about the subtle distinction between marijuana or opium.
"Subtle"? Again, this shows great ignorance of the effects of marijuana.
Quote:
Both kinds of drugs ruin lives. They destroy families.
Cigarettes do that.
Quote:
As for the prostitutes in Suffolk, I am just using them as an example to make manifest the adverse effects of having a drug habit. Supporting a drug habit is prohibitively expensive and the craving for a quick fix has pushed many people into doing immoral and illegal work in order to satisfy their habits.
That's the result of the criminalization of drug use.
Au contraire, cigarettes do not ruin lives. This shows great ignorance of the effects of tobacco.
If you wish to criminalise anything, do it properly and well or don't do it at all. Benjamin mentioned that marijuana is readily available on the streets despite it being an illicit and hence banned substance. Such half-hearted measures do not work at all. Instead, they give people plenty of loopholes to exploit and to sneak through the legal barriers that were erected by the government. _________________ Hillary Clinton is an acquired taste which I have clearly yet to acquire.
Au contraire, cigarettes do not ruin lives. This shows great ignorance of the effects of tobacco
I disagree. There are negative side effects of smoking cigarettes, for exemple more chance to get lung cancer and heart problems. People who have allergys, lung conditions and other things can experience discomfort when someone near them is smoking. But, on the other side, nicotine can help some people who have illness.
Quote:
Nobody can plausibly argue that marijuana is 'good for you' - unlike Guinness.
Marijuana can help people also for exemple with multiple sclerosis and other things. It's not different in concept that amphetamines : this is recreationally used, but it can alleviate asthma. Now, there are other medicines what are give for asthma, but before, amphetamines was prescribed.Amphetamines are dangerous for the heart and some people think that marijuana can cause schizophrenia but it's not proved. But until there are better medicines without side effects to replace nicotine, marijuana etc.. I think it's cruel to not allow those people getting the help. All drugs - medicinal or recreational have side effects ( some potentially fatal ).
Quote:
I reiterate that I am adamantly against the death penalty.
I agree with you !!!
Quote:
I do not care to know about the subtle distinction between marijuana or opium.
Although opiates have medicinal uses what are valuable, it would be more serious taking this recreationally that marijuana. All drugs will have a different effect, and all people will react other also. This differences subtle or not subtle are always important and relevant. For have an informed opinion, it's necessary know the disctinctions between the drugs and understand that they can be beneficial as well as destructive : the drugs
are not evil, what's important is how we use them.
Loic, maybe one day, you or someone in your family will suffer an illness without cure. You / they will discover that marijuana or opium can make them to feel much better. What you would do ?
I do not care to know about the subtle distinction between marijuana or opium.
I can only repeat what Deborah has said twice — this shows an ignorance of either the effects of marijuana, the effects of heroin, or both. It is not subtle at all. If anything, I'd say that the effects of marijuana (which is arguably less addictive than tobacco anyway) are far closer to the effects of tobacco than to the effects of heroin. What do you think, Deborah? You know far more about this subject than me.
I actually feel that equating marijuana with heroin is potentially dangerous. Someone who has already tried marijuana may be more inclined to try something like heroin if they believe that the difference is merely 'subtle'.
I know quite a few people who smoke marijuana on a regular basis, and I know many more who have in the past. I do not think any less of these people than of people who smoke tobacco. A few weeks ago, when our Polish exchange partners were with us, we (students from school and the Polish students) went to a pub and sat outside. Some people from my school were smoking marijuana. I'd personally prefer that they didn't, but I can tolerate it as long as it's outside (same for tobacco). But if they had been smoking heroin or cocaine, it would have been a completely different story — I'd have left straight away.
loic wrote:
Supporting a drug habit is prohibitively expensive and the craving for a quick fix has pushed many people into doing immoral and illegal work in order to satisfy their habits.
Incidentally, prostitution in itself is perfectly legal here. However, it is illegal to pimp, to advertise prostitution services or to own a brothel (although considering the number of brothels around here, I tend to get the impression that this last law is seldom enforced).
loic wrote:
If you wish to criminalise anything, do it properly and well or don't do it at all. Benjamin mentioned that marijuana is readily available on the streets despite it being an illicit and hence banned substance. Such half-hearted measures do not work at all. Instead, they give people plenty of loopholes to exploit and to sneak through the legal barriers that were erected by the government.
Precisely, which is why I'd recommend that the ban on marijuana be lifted. Thankfully, my overall perception is that Britain will go the way of the Netherlands fairly soon, as the government has been gradually decreasing the 'illegalness' of it.
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These days I'll drink socially, but I'm pretty much a lightweight -- a couple drinks and I'm pretty silly. Hey, it makes me a cheap date! 
and about 3 times I have drunk a cocktail : I think that they are very pretty and nice.