Marijuana is, for me, one of the few substances which relieves pain and increases appetite but does not produce untoward side effects. Had I the choice of doing so legally, I would prefer a medicinal marijuana prescription. The few times I have tried it, it had been mixed with a food to make it more palatable (I cannot smoke it because I have COPD and severe asthma, two things which it certainly does not help!) For now, I have to take no less than three pain medications, which I still use sparingly for fear of dependence or addiction, and each of them has their own array of side effects ranging from nausea to dizziness to interference with clotting factors. Without pain relief, I am truly non-functional.
For me, however, marijuana does not appear to have any of the recreational side effects for which people seek it out. I don't get high. I don't see visions. I don't get the munchies. I don't desire more and stronger drugs. It simply relieves pain without the side effects and it kills the nausea somehow, allowing me to at least drink fluids.
That said, I no longer live in a state which allows marijuana to be prescribed and so I cannot and will not use it. Back in Colorado, I noted that various pain clinics have sprung up and many of them do, in fact, have a marijuana pharmacy. I also noted that these are in neighborhoods which used to be bad ones. For whatever reason, their presence seems to have cleaned those places up rather than creating a center for crime as opponents have so often predicted.
I am NOT in favor of making it legal for recreational use in public places but, being a libertarian, I maintain that what people do within their own homes on private property is no one's business. As long as they're not driving while impaired, giving it to minors or others incapable of using with informed consent, and they're not smoking it in my air space I wouldn't worry about it.
Addictions are just that --- a predilection for whatever reason toward the misuse of a substance or thing. In my experience, addicts will just as soon use one thing as another precisely because they have that predilection. There are 'net addicts, gaming addicts, shopping addicts, clothing addicts...and by that, I mean people whose interest in these things becomes so strong it overrides all other activities and they cannot function unless their lives are focused on that thing. For that reason, I don't particularly believe that marijuana is a 'gateway' drug which leads to harder drug use for everyone. For those with addictive tendencies, that's quite likely the case.
I'm also against outright banning something which still has useful medical applications simply because of a tendency toward misuse. The medical benefits of marijuana are well documented and it is currently the only known substance capable of reversing and curing glaucoma.
That, to me, is a weak argument against legalization. Kids get hold of many substances and abuse them whether they are legalized or not. It is not, for instance, legal for anyone under the age of eighteen to drink and yet kids that age can still obtain alcohol. It's illegal for them to have tobacco products too and they still manage to get hold of them. There are a whole plethora of potentially damaging and addicting activities and substances --- video gaming, television shows, movies, books, anime --- which are perfectly legal and obtainable by children and yet we don't make those illegal. Legalities should be based on an evaluation of harm to the general public, not on making a child-safe world. That's a parent's job, not mine and not society's.Xeranus wrote:... If they legalize marijuana, that means that kids will be able to get hold of it and smoke it... It isn't a smart idea, especially since so many kids are vulnerable to the effects of peer pressure.