..

Ok, who had 41 in the how many posts until this gets thread jacked to a guns right discussion? You won!

Oh, that's just timalkin. He love guns, but is scared to death of the prospect of the government not protecting him from potheads.

No, no...wait. I see a segue....

Maybe restrictions on medical MJ should be loosened up across the country. That way, there would be far less need for "restricted types" of guns. You know, a kind of program of medial MJ for the paranoid, stressed out, etc.

Well, here's another segue - at least we know all the illegal marijuana distributors own guns. It goes with the job.

Legalizing marijuana won't affect gun laws; but it would certainly affect gun use.

All's a lot... and I happen to know you're wrong. I know at least three illegal growers in Wash. and Ore that don't believe in guns or violence, kind of a hippie thing.

I agree. Medical Marijuana is really a misnomer for most cases. Liberally prescribing for any kind of disease/pain/condition when there can be better drugs available is not professional.

I don't think I'd like to have to lie to a doctor, or make up some bullshit condition. I don't need a drug to help me with a critical health or psychological condition, I use MJ for recreational reasons. If it's legalized, it'd have to be as a potentially safer alternative to alcohol, the most popular legal mind-altering substance.

Maybe just like drinking, smoking it in public would have to be illegal? That might curb underage use, I'm not sure.

I'd think the act of legalizing it alone would lower underage usage.

Back door dealer doesn't care if you're 15 or 50. Bartender/convenience store owner/whoever is licensed to sell is legally obliged to check ID.

The idea that legalizing marijuana will cause underage usage to increase presupposes that illegal marijuana isn't readily available to minors. I believe that's a flawed assumption.

And I've never met an armed pot dealer, although that might be related to living in Canada, where Guns Are Bad.

Okay - perhaps I'm guilty of hyperbole, but track most pot back to its source, and I guarantee you that guns and drugs go hand in hand.
Back in my younger days, I knew a lot of pot dealers - and they were all armed.

For every hippie growing a stand in Oregon; there's a thousand armed gangbangers moving the stuff north through Mexico and spreading it around.

Now - if you go back to my really younger days - nobody was armed. Pot was a lifestyle then; not a business.

I know someone who would be considered a prime candidate for medical MJ. This is one who has suffered years of pain that cannot be adequately described, and it is a constant battle (24/7) just to manage it to a level that is bearable. This is one who hasn't had a full night's sleep, not because they don't need it or don't have the capacity to sleep, but because the pain won't let them. This is one who cannot find comfort for more than a few minutes in any one position, whether lying down, sitting, or standing, and has spent many late nights leaning and occasionally falling down, having fallen asleep. This is one who's had countless single-dose hits of morphine that could literally kill a healthy horse.

They've had a morphine pump installed and then removed. They've missed far too many social events involving friends and family because their mood or the pain would be too disruptive. They've been unemployable for more than a decade, not because of an employer's lack of faith in their capacity to do even a basic office job, but because of their own.

I could go on, but what's the point? I think you get it.

If medical MJ can alleviate even a fraction of the suffering that people like this go through...even if it is just a tiny bit....if you've seen what I've seen in people like this---being helpless to do anything---you too just might support the idea.

When all else has failed, the social stigma of certain alternatives become ridiculously trivial.

Physician assisted suicide might be a better course of action at that point.

You think rather then help alleviate the pain they should off themselves?

---------- Post added at 04:59 AM ---------- Previous post was at 04:58 AM ----------

This person sounds like they have RSD.

Dunno, I'm not a genius, but that "constant intense pain and suffering" bit sounds like a huge quality of life issue to me.

Somebody help me: Are we alive to just consume O2 or to actually interact with our environment in a meaningful fashion?

It's funny that people value their lives so much that they'll continue to torture themselves mercilessly out of simple fear of the end.

If I can't sleep at night and my hours are a constant battle just to be in bearable agony 24/7... you can expect me to clock out.

/threadjack

...

Something tells me that pot isn't going to help that person any more than opiates, booze, or a bangin' stripper in their birthday cake.

No, but the perceived outcome is the same. They have a severe form of arthritis throughout the entire skeleton, with much of the focus on an onset injury in the spine.

See, this is the thing: this person does enjoy many of life's moments, including involvement with children and grandchildren. And I suspect this has something to do with a little MJ here and there.

:expressionless:

Well I've been there. Years of pain. Pain to the extent that just sitting would cause tears at times. Sleep near impossible. One day I'm up walking around doing my thing the next I'm laying on the ground with a large beam on my leg and foot. Years of surgeries, nerve blocks and fucking pills. Pills, fucking pills and more fucking pills. At one point I was taking some crap to off set the side effects of some other crap. Booze? To drink enough to subdue the pain you'd just end up throwing up. Then you'd be in pain and hung over. I remember asking my doctor if we could just cut the leg off. According to several specialists since the pain is nerve based removing the limb wouldn't stop the pain. I tried pot, didn't help me. But I know people who swear it helps, who am I to disagree? They seem more mobile and social when using. Just because that wasn't the right thing for me doesn't mean it's not the right thing for someone else.

As for banging strippers... you know when you're in so much pain that walking and sleeping isn't really an option I can assure you sex isn't high on your Christmas wish list.

And I don't see it a quality of life issue. I see it as an existence of hope issue. Hope that someday you'll beat it, that someday you'll be able to walk your dogs on the beach at sunset and enjoy yourself again.

I'm a firm believer that hope is not a policy.

...

I suppose we should start a different thread if this instant discussion is to continue so as to not disrupt the topical pothead discourse.

I'm a firm believer that suicide is for quitters. Hope may not be any official policy but it certainly was my personal policy for about 5yrs. Certainly glad I didn't decide to eat my service side arm.

I don't see how discussing the effects of pain and whether or not medical MJ is a useful tool derails this thread.