• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Should weed be legalized?

Should weed be legalized in the US?

  • Weed should be legalized for those whose religious beliefs dictate otherwise (like Rasta's).

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    56

kaya'08

DP Veteran
Joined
Nov 25, 2008
Messages
6,363
Reaction score
1,318
Location
British Turk
Gender
Male
Political Leaning
Centrist
The debate on legalizing weed in the White House continues...but would this be a good idea? Could it prompt further debate on the legalization of other class C drugs? Why should weed be made acceptable and other class C drugs not? Would this be a good idea for a productive work force in the US?

Share your opinions.
 
The debate on legalizing weed in the White House continues...but would this be a good idea? Could it prompt further debate on the legalization of other class C drugs? Why should weed be made acceptable and other class C drugs not? Would this be a good idea for a productive work force in the US?

Share your opinions.

Yes it should. If alcohol is legal I see no reason to not make weed legal as well. I think it would cause far less problems then drinking does as the person becomes more lay back. Mellow.
 
Yes it should. If alcohol is legal I see no reason to not make weed legal as well. I think it would cause far less problems then drinking does as the person becomes more lay back. Mellow.

Absolutely agree.
 
Yes it should. If alcohol is legal I see no reason to not make weed legal as well. I think it would cause far less problems then drinking does as the person becomes more lay back. Mellow.
Even from the standpoint of alchoholics. It is good for an alchoholic to smoke weed. It tends to allow them to drink less thus possibly avoiding at least some of the destructive effects of constant alchohol consumption.
 
This will be unpopular, but to me it's just not worth the effort that legalizing it would be. There is no compelling reason that I can see to legalize it, and out of all the issues that I think face the country and need attention, it is about the least of those issues.

Note, it would not bother me in the least if it was legalized. My argument is not that weed is bad(it is, but that is not the argument), only that the time it would take politicians to do it would be better spent elsewhere.
 
Yes, weed should be legalized. The fact that the government jails over one million non-violent drug users each year is absolutely asinine. The Drug War has failed miserably. 86% of high school seniors polled in 2005 said it would be "very easy" or "fairly easy" to obtain Cannabis*. Cannabis is also, by far, the most used drug in the world and is relatively harmless when used by a responsible adult. I hope to see weed legalized in the next decade.


*Source: Monitoring the Future national survey results on drug use, 1975-2005
 
This will be unpopular, but to me it's just not worth the effort that legalizing it would be. There is no compelling reason that I can see to legalize it, and out of all the issues that I think face the country and need attention, it is about the least of those issues.

Note, it would not bother me in the least if it was legalized. My argument is not that weed is bad(it is, but that is not the argument), only that the time it would take politicians to do it would be better spent elsewhere.

Mexican drug cartels get 70% of their revenue from marijuana, so legalizing it would absolutely cripple them and would be an important component to our Mexican foreign policy.

The war on drugs has absolutely devastated our inner cities, so legalizing marijuana would be the first step towards completely ending such a destructive war on our own people.

And taxing marijuana could bring in billions of dollars to the states in tax revenue.
 
Last edited:
The debate on legalizing weed in the White House continues...but would this be a good idea? Could it prompt further debate on the legalization of other class C drugs? Why should weed be made acceptable and other class C drugs not? Would this be a good idea for a productive work force in the US?

Share your opinions.

Hopefully it would prompt debate on the legalization of other drugs, when it becomes obvious that society didn't suddenly collapse after it was legalized.

I don't think it would have much impact either way on how productive the work force is. Businesses could (and likely would) continue to ban workers from showing up to the office stoned.
 
Mexican drug cartels get 70% of their revenue from marijuana, so legalizing it would absolutely cripple them and would be an important component to our Mexican foreign policy.

The war on drugs has absolutely devastated our inner cities, so legalizing marijuana would be the first step towards completely ending such a destructive war on our own people.

And taxing marijuana could bring in billions of dollars to the states in tax revenue.

And debating it would tie up congress an ungodly amount of time because it is somehow "controversial". Then congress would do it wrong somehow.

I am not suggesting that there would not be some positives from legalizing weed. There would be some negatives as well, but that is not the issue to me either. I just don't think it is worth the time and effort of congress to do it. Ten, twenty years from now, maybe, but right now there would be a ****storm if congress tried to legalize weed.
 
And debating it would tie up congress an ungodly amount of time because it is somehow "controversial". Then congress would do it wrong somehow.

I am not suggesting that there would not be some positives from legalizing weed. There would be some negatives as well, but that is not the issue to me either. I just don't think it is worth the time and effort of congress to do it. Ten, twenty years from now, maybe, but right now there would be a ****storm if congress tried to legalize weed.
About 50% of Americans are in favor of legalization. Seems like a no-brainer to me.

A majority of Americans, in a poll released Wednesday, say it "makes sense to tax and regulate" marijuana. The Zogby poll, commissioned by the conservative-leaning O'Leary Report, surveyed 3,937 voters and found 52 percent in favor of legalization. Only 37 percent opposed.


A previous ABC News/Washington Post poll found 46 percent in support. In California, a Field Poll found 56 percent backing legalization

Majority Of Americans Want Pot Legalized: Zogby Poll
 
Those numbers are not far off from the numbers on the abortion issue. That should give you an idea how controversial it would be.
I agree that it would be controversial. However, I think that now is an opportune time discuss the benefits of Cannabis and the merits of using hemp to help rebuild the economy.
 
About 50% of Americans are in favor of legalization. Seems like a no-brainer to me.



Majority Of Americans Want Pot Legalized: Zogby Poll

Thats probably because 50% of the American population are stoners. :2razz:

I just dont like the idea of an entire country and its citizens having complete access to weed and being able to get hammered so easily. There should be a limit otherwise it could be dangerous for the US. There is health hazards attatched to weed and the fact that you can get high from it should make us pay more attention to the danger factors. Im a big fan of weed myself but from a rational perspective even i dont agree it should be legalized. I mean, if it was legalized where i am, i would be a total vegetable right now if it was as easy as walking to the corner shop and buying it hassle free.
 
Last edited:
I agree that it would be controversial. However, I think that now is an opportune time discuss the benefits of Cannabis and the merits of using hemp to help rebuild the economy.

I have no problem with talking about it.
 
Yes, it should be legalized. I don't use the stuff, but I know some who do and when comparing the effects of marajuana vs alcohol on behavior, the evidence I've seen points to pot being the less destructive of the two.
 
Marijuana laws in this country are the product of racist and basically wrong thinking. Anyone believing otherwise needs to do a Google on Harry Anslinger and the Federal Bureau of Narcotics.

Drug laws are ineffective, irrational, and ultimately un-Constitutional. Every last one of them should be repealed. Immediately.
 
The effects of the war on drugs :

On Race :

Race and the Drug War

Although African Americans comprise only 12.2 percent of the population and 13 percent of drug users, they make up 38 percent of those arrested for drug offenses and 59 percent of those convicted of drug offenses causing critics to call the war on drugs the "New Jim Crow." The higher arrest rates for African Americans and Latinos do not reflect a higher abuse rate in these communities but rather a law enforcement emphasis on inner city areas where drug use and sales are more likely to take place in open-air drug markets where treatment resources are scarce.

On Crime :

Crime | Drug War Facts

The chart at the right illustrates the homicide rate in the United States from 1900 to 1998. It is important to note that each of the most violent episodes in this century coincide with the prohibition on alcohol and the escalation of the modern-day war on drugs. In 1933 the homicide rate peaked at 9.7 per 100,000 people, which was the year that alcohol prohibition was finally repealed. In 1980, the homicide rate peaked again at 10 per 100,000.

Modifiedmurderchart.gif


On Public Health :

Many of the problems the drug war purports to resolve are in fact caused by the drug war itself. So-called "drug-related" crime is a direct result of drug prohibition's distortion of immutable laws of supply and demand. Public health problems like HIV and Hepatitis C are all exacerbated by zero tolerance laws that restrict access to clean needles. The drug war is not the promoter of family values that some would have us believe. Children of inmates are at risk of educational failure, joblessness, addiction and delinquency. Drug abuse is bad, but the drug war is worse." See What's Wrong With the Drug War?

Simply speaking the war on drugs is an abomination. It has caused racial disparities in our justice system. It is responsible for MORE crime then it has stopped and finally it has aided in the spread of life threatening deceases. There is no reason to continue it. And if there is. At the very least make marijuana legal and go after really dangerous **** like meth.

---------------------------------------------------------

The best part about the people who support keeping weed illegal is that a lot of them say it makes you lazy. Like that is a bad thing when I work 60-70 hours a week and just want my body to relax without taking nasty government approved FDA supported **** that will get rid of my headaches but give me a million disgusting side effects.
 
Last edited:
This will be unpopular, but to me it's just not worth the effort that legalizing it would be. There is no compelling reason that I can see to legalize it, and out of all the issues that I think face the country and need attention, it is about the least of those issues.
No compelling reason?

Prisons stuffed to overflowing with drug crime convicts, a near civil war south of the border because drug gangs are greedy to gather their slice of America's underground economy, the potential to boost state and federal revenues by attaching sin taxes to drugs, and you can't find a compelling reason?

The compelling reason is this: Neither America nor Mexico can afford much more of an ill-conceived and largely illegal (or at the very least unconstitutional) "War on Drugs."
 
Those numbers are not far off from the numbers on the abortion issue. That should give you an idea how controversial it would be.
Bad analogy. Drug laws aren't held hostage by an insane and idiotic Supreme Court ruling like Roe v Wade.
 
The war on drugs is a failure and waste of our tax dollars:(
 
Bad analogy. Drug laws aren't held hostage by an insane and idiotic Supreme Court ruling like Roe v Wade.

You are reading too much into my comments. Abortion is a contentious issue. Abortion rights have a similar level of support as legalizing weed. Nothing more intended.
 
You are reading too much into my comments. Abortion is a contentious issue. Abortion rights have a similar level of support as legalizing weed. Nothing more intended.
I suspect you are misreading me.

Yes, abortion is contentious still, but it is contentious even at this late date because Roe v Wade pre-empted the state-level dialogs that were taking place on abortion, stopping then and preventing now the achievement of any lasting consensus on the issue.

Drug legalization is contentious now, but like all issues of the moment, it should be. People have differing opinions, and differing levels of passion about those opinions. However, a series of Congressional hearings and debates on drug legalization legislation would be a natural evolution to the contention, and provide the means by which the national consensus that is denied abortion could be reached.

Abortion is the controversy that will not die. Drug laws are a controversy that, handled properly, could die quickly and easily.

(Besides, don't I at least get some props for disagreeing with you again and preventing an unravelling of the space-time continuum?)
 
Last edited:
Thats probably because 50% of the American population are stoners. :2razz:

I just dont like the idea of an entire country and its citizens having complete access to weed and being able to get hammered so easily. There should be a limit otherwise it could be dangerous for the US. There is health hazards attatched to weed and the fact that you can get high from it should make us pay more attention to the danger factors. Im a big fan of weed myself but from a rational perspective even i dont agree it should be legalized. I mean, if it was legalized where i am, i would be a total vegetable right now if it was as easy as walking to the corner shop and buying it hassle free.
The entire nation would not have access to it. If pot were legalized, it would be regulated like alcohol with age restrictions. As to people becoming vegetables, that is their choice. It should not be the Government's job to make sure I'm making good choices regarding my health. It's my body and my choice.
 
I suspect you are misreading me.

Yes, abortion is contentious still, but it is contentious even at this late date because Roe v Wade pre-empted the state-level dialogs that were taking place on abortion, stopping then and preventing now the achievement of any lasting consensus on the issue.

Drug legalization is contentious now, but like all issues of the moment, it should be. People have differing opinions, and differing levels of passion about those opinions. However, a series of Congressional hearings and debates on drug legalization legislation would be a natural evolution to the contention, and provide the means by which the national consensus that is denied abortion could be reached.

Abortion is the controversy that will not die. Drug laws are a controversy that, handled properly, could die quickly and easily.

OK, I see what you are saying. I do not disagree with that part of it. yes, it would be contentious in a much shorter run. My argument is that to me the priority for that contentions debate is so low that it would not happen soon.
 
The policy is too expensive and it is having the opposite of the desired effect.

Legalize it. Regulate it. Control it. Tax it. And then pass and enforce draconian laws against anyone intoxicated in public, intoxicated while driving, and intoxicated while being the sole supervision of a child. Treat deliberate intoxication of a child as felony child abuse, and levy massive fines against anyone found providing marijuana or other intoxicants to minors.

This is still subject to my belief that the age of adulthood ought to be fifteen. But as long as the laws are structured the way they are now, the age for legal purchase and consumption of marijuana should be set at 21.
 
Back
Top Bottom