STATS did it for me so that I don't have to. The past week in the UK has consisted of a newspaper flame war leading to more prohibitionists demonizing marijuana AKA skunk. First, we had this story in The Independent apologizing for previously calling for the decriminilization of cannabis. It was a masterpiece of reefer madness propaganda. On Monday, The Telegraph ran a story about the tragic death of a young boy caused by cannabis.
STATS is a great site, dedicated to debunking unscientific claims made by the media. For their fabulous debunking of all that reefer madness, they have earned a link on my shabby little web site.
But I will pretend that you were too lazy to click the link and visit STATS for the scoop on cannabis-induced psychosis. I will even pretend that all the claims made in The Independent and The Telegraph are true and that cannabis causes psychosis. I will even concede, just for the sake of argument, that all cases of schizophrenia are caused by the use of cannabis. Does it then logically follow, that cracking down on cannabis is the best strategy? In order for that line of thinking to make sense, we would have to believe that cracking down on cannabis would lead to a decrease in cannabis users. If it were true that the number of cannabis users was directly proportional to the legal status of the drug, then the Netherlands should be awash with drug-using teenagers. Read it and weep, drug warriors. Prohibiting drugs does not stop people from using them and it will not prevent a single case of schizophrenia.
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
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