A couple of weeks ago, the local weekly paper, in the column written by the owner/publisher, was gleefully reporting the newest anti-marijuana study by Professor Wayne Hall. The paper's owner has long had a bee in his bonnet about marijuana, believing it to be a good thing to prohibit, and apparently, cage and kill people over. This "news" was exactly the sort he loves to find and pass along.
The thing is, this professor's "findings" are exactly the same sort of things the prohibitionists have been saying for decades.
And, the professor doesn't seem to understand that correlation is not causation, which means he isn't doing science, but only propping up propaganda.
His assertion "it could double the risk of severe psychiatric disorders, including schizophrenia" seems to ignore the fact that people with psychiatric disorders are more likely to self-medicate, with whatever they can find, to relieve their discomfort. Even I can figure this out.
According to Hall, "those who try to stop taking the drug can often suffer anxiety, lower appetite, depression and insomnia, and less than half of people who stop taking it can stay off it for six months". And, he says "The important point I am trying to make is that people can get into difficulties with cannabis use, particularly if they get into daily use over a long period."
OK. Anything you get into a habit of doing on a daily basis can get in the way of life, and can be extremely hard to stop doing.
And, there was more bad "science" of the same kind all through his findings. Almost everything he "discovered" as a researcher working as an advisor to a Big Government group (the World Health Organization of the United Nations) is what prohibitionists want to be discovered.
And, guess what: even if everything he claims were absolutely true, it STILL wouldn't invent a right to tell other people what they are allowed to eat, drink, smoke, or otherwise consume. It's totally irrelevant. That "right" doesn't exist, can't exist, and can't be invented. It doesn't matter if it's Nanny Bloomypants trying to forbid you from enjoying salt or a super-sized soft drink, or some dogwhistle trying to kill you so you can't inject heroin. No one has that right, so no one can delegate that nonexistent right. To attempt to do so is evil.
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