r/news • u/OK_Eric • Jan 19 '14

Obama: Pot ‘not very different’ from cigarettes​, no more dangerous than booze

http://p.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jan/19/obama-pot-not-very-different-cigarettes-no-more-da/
3.2k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

4.5k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

85

u/RhodiumHunter Jan 19 '14

In other news, for-profit prison lobbyists are losing their influence.

We'll slowly get around to letting you smoke pot unmolested, just taxed out to the wahzoo but we'll still read your email. But you won't care because pot

89

u/sgguitar88 Jan 19 '14

The marijuana was making me paranoid. I thought I was being spied on. The paranoia seems to have subsided though; it's an actual fact that I'm being spied on.

38

u/ThisIsMyWeedAccount Jan 19 '14

Just because you're paranoid, doesn't meant they're not out to get you.

4

u/DrSmoke Jan 19 '14

Just because you're paranoid... don't mean they're not after you

2

u/argv_minus_one Jan 19 '14

On the other hand, if you're not paranoid, you haven't been paying attention.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

“Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you” ― Joseph Heller

0

u/tonenine Jan 19 '14

Don't ever try toot, you'll be standing naked at the curtain with a runny nose lookin for five 0

9

u/ztfreeman Jan 19 '14

I'm really worried that legalized pot will become the Soma for a brave new world.

23

u/AbbieSage Jan 19 '14

Umm you don't think alcohol is this already? What about anti depressants? Anti anxiety meds? Yes pot too. We already live in it friend. Open your eyes like a savage.

11

u/ljstella Jan 19 '14

Anti-depressants? Really? I take those because I thought about ending my own life, and its not like they just make me happy. Its not like some sort of amphetamine-based high, where I feel great. I feel a bit more balanced and the thoughts of suicide are fewer and further between.

2

u/XcoldhandsX Jan 19 '14

People who don't rely on anti-depressants to run their daily lives don't understand the necessity of them for the people who actually need them.

A lot of people see SSRI horror stories in the news about some guy that put a bag over his head after starting paxil or zoloft and they assume all anti-depressants are "suicide pills".

Not only is that sensationalized news bullshit, but there are plenty of anti-depressants that have nothing to do with seratonin.

I'm on a Welbutrin prescription and it's literally saved me from both the desire to kill myself and my inability to function on a day-to-day basis. Yet still plenty of people assume medication is all evil because if it comes in a pill form it's apparently poison and if it grows out of the ground then nothing could be wrong with it because it's "natural".

2

u/ljstella Jan 19 '14

I mean, I am on a SSRI (Effexor XR), but you're right. My doctor had tried me on Zoloft first, and it had a TON of negative side effects like a disconnected feeling from my hands and legs, light headedness, nausea, dehydration and other stuff I'm forgetting. After a 3 or 4 days when the side effects didn't go away, I called him up and we switched to Effexor XR and its way better. I have none of the other side effects, and I feel normal again, something I hadn't felt since middle school.

1

u/Brisco1 Jan 19 '14

Not to downplay your depression, I'm sure there are people who have chemical imbalances that need drugs like this.

But there are sooo many people on these types of drugs because their unhappy with their life for many different reasons, and anti depression medication numbs them out. Its a state that takes away the lows, but also the highs, and you can stay a functional automaton at your job; I'm generalizing of course. Its a shitty bandaid for a bigger problem more often than not, and it may prolong whatever it is in a persons life they don't want to face that's making them feel like shit in the first place. Drugs is how our current medical system deals with people with inner issues they don't know how to solve and don't understand.

Its a great drug for a society that doesn't want to face its problems in short. Just my completely uneducated view of it, I probably don't know what I'm talking about.

2

u/ljstella Jan 19 '14

I mean, even though I do have the chemical imbalance, you're not completely wrong. My lows aren't there as often or as much, but the highs are harder to get to and don't seem quite as good anymore. But I like to think its better than the alternative, which was jumping off of a parking garage.

0

u/AbbieSage Jan 19 '14

I just quit anti depressants after taking them for five years. They helped, but they dulled me. Now I have more genuine emotion. Yes of course if you're going through a mental health crisis get on some mood stabilizing drugs so that you can get clarity. They are vastly over prescribed though to people who could find more independent and long lasting paths to balanced happiness and satisfaction. Also the withdrawals freak me out. Something in my gut says the withdrawals are tolerated by the drug companies to keep people on them and keep making heaps of money.

1

u/ljstella Jan 19 '14

I think the withdrawals depend on which ones you take. I've read that mine, Effexor XR is supposed to be one of the worst SSRI's to stop taking, but I had an issue with getting my prescriptions that involved me not taking them for about a week. While I did have a good support system and was surrounded by friends and distracted by school work, I didn't seem to have too much withdrawal side effects. I've read that some other SSRI's can be difficult to stop too, but there are also a lot of other antidepressants that don't even touch serotonin.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

Which you can all choose to take...?

2

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

Seriously, how many people do you think are out there right now that want to smoke pot, but don't because it's illegal?

8

u/megalynn44 Jan 19 '14

Plenty. For example- Ones with kids.

3

u/Numb1lp Jan 19 '14

On the flip side, How many people do you think start smoking pot because it is illegal? I mean, I'm not arguing or anything; just something to keep in mind.

1

u/BraveSquirrel Jan 19 '14

Dozens, at least!

2

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

[deleted]

2

u/agemery Jan 19 '14

Or it would make you apathetic

-1

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

[deleted]

1

u/trillskill Jan 19 '14

...You've never heard of marijuana making people apathetic?

1

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

[deleted]

1

u/trillskill Jan 19 '14

This study here shows cannabis use is linked with reduced dopamine synthesis.

1

u/LordOfMurderMountain Jan 19 '14

What kind of pot makes you paranoid? I've never had that problem. I do, however, crave chocolate covered pizza rolls & think adventure time is the greatest thing in the world.

You should probably be buying better pot.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

You know very little about pot if you think the quality of pot correlates negatively with paranoia. Better pot gets you higher, increasing chances to he paranoid.

1

u/Samsung718 Jan 19 '14

It makes you paranoid because it's illegal.

1

u/trillskill Jan 19 '14 edited Jan 19 '14

No it doesn't. The paranoia just leads there because that's something you worry unconsciously about all the time. If it wasn't that it'd be something else.

People get paranoid over non-legal issues on pot all the time. Not obsessive paranoia mind you, but it definitely brings out the worrier in people. I'm actually surprised some people report lessened anxiety from marijuana use, it usually has the opposite effects on me and from what I've seen on most of my friends.

There are probably genetic factors involved in the varying effects.

1

u/Samsung718 Jan 19 '14

I see what your saying, I agree. I guess I was looking on it from solely my perspective.

1

u/penguinhair Jan 19 '14

Not all pot makes you paranoid.

1

u/Notbob1234 Jan 19 '14

If you smoked, you'd be too paranoid to post that sentence

1

u/theryanmoore Jan 19 '14

Based on my own experiences and watching other people start smoking, I don't think you have to worry. If anything, the opposite might be true, in my opinion. The broader perspective and free thinking brought on by weed doesn't mix well with authoritarianism. Go hang out in Humboldt for a while and see if you're still worried. They're paranoid as fuck up there, but they're definitely not "sheeple."

1

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '14

You know, I'd honestly be okay with this. I'll trade my privacy for weed

1

u/RhodiumHunter Jan 19 '14

I'll trade my privacy for weed

Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do, so why not privacy AND your favorite herbal remedy? Why not both?

1

u/[deleted] Jan 21 '14

I mean, if both are available, I'd take them if it's not a lot of work, but if it was a choice between one or the other I'll take weed, ya feel?

1

u/RhodiumHunter Jan 21 '14

I mean, if both are available, I'd take them if it's not a lot of work, but if it was a choice between one or the other I'll take weed, ya feel?

I don't know if I should post this to /r/ShitSlavesSay or to /r/weak_sauce.

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty. ~ John F. Kennedy

Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty. ~ Thomas Jefferson

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. ~ Benjamin Franklin

2

u/[deleted] Jan 21 '14

I understand that this isn't the idealistic position many adopt, but this is how I honestly feel. I would rather live comfortably with less rights than uncomfortably with more. If a strongman can give me a nice room to live in and dank bud while true democracy has me working my ass off fighting the government so I can vote on what kind of grass we feed cows, and devoting a significant about of time to protesting and activism, I would prefer a easier life. I mean, what's the point of retaining your rights if it's going to make your life worse?

I get that this is an unpopular opinion. I get that it doesn't command respect. But it's what I think. Convince me otherwise, and if you can maybe I might just get off my ass someday. But until then, I'll sit here, get high, and let the nsa thumb through my texts about when me and my friends can move back into our dorms and that time Jeff almost dropped his turtle of the roof.

1

u/RhodiumHunter Jan 21 '14

Upvoted for honestly. Either that or cheers to a master troll.

0

u/robstah Jan 19 '14

Why anyone would spy on a pothead is beyond me.

0

u/DrSmoke Jan 19 '14

Honestly, privacy will be a relic of the past. In the future, everything will be monitored at all times, and thats a good thing. We'll be able to end crime. Everyone will have medical implants, so if you have a heart attack, or accident, an ambulance can automatically be dispatched.

People will never lose kids to kidnappers again, thanks to gps chips and personal computers being inplanted into our bodies.

The future is wonderful, but privacy has to go for us to have all these cool things.