Medical vs Full legalization

Medical vs Full legalization if it came down to it you could only have one or the other..... which would you choose and why?

i'd have to vote for medical marijuana legalization...

theres already enough bullshit going on...

im for full legalization for many reasons BUT not any time soon - theres too many people out flaunting marijuana use as look at me look at me and wayyy too much public intoxication which does send the Wrong message

to many people are taking advantage of the Medical Marijuana laws and need to be punished HARSHLY !
growing 100000 plants instead of 4 just to make money you scumbags need to rot in hell (( no dont freak the fuck out im talking about the assholes who have 40000000 plant grows ...fuck them i dont give a fuck ))

we need to stand together and get rid of the i have a headache every 6 months gimme a card and the Posers like them
we need to stand together and promote RESPONSIBLE Adult use of Marijuana

we need to stand together and make a difference

as it should be, legal for any purpose. whether you use it to relieve pain or wtfever, just to get high, legal! every-fucking-where!

I suppose full legalization.

There will always be idiots and other kids who just want to get fucked up whichever way they can, with no regard for what they're using, how it got there or any of its background. I suppose I'd rather what they're abusing be cannabis than hard drugs or alcohol.Maybe legalization will make marijuana seem less glamorized and the people who smoke for the sake of looking cool or to be rebellious will stop.

I worry that People who just like to get high and have no productivity will continue abusing the MMJ system and make all recreation or recreation+medicinal users look bad. If people see Medical Marijuana as synonymous with an easy ticket to getting fucked up 24/7 the assumption will be that marijuana has no real medical benefits, people who actually use it for those reasons will be suspected of wanting a 'free ride'. Yes, I like to get high for fun but if I tell someone I use it for medical reasons they immediately think 'yeah right'- it takes a few minutes to win them over.

I would love to see coffeeshops everywhere, with the staff taking the time to talk customers through the suitability of different strains and educate the public. At least educate the public more about MJ than alcohol; I worry about the amount of people who don't even know how most types of alcohol are made, or can't tell you how much a Unit is.

Any sustained substance use should be an informed decision.

Many kids at my old school turned their noses up at weed because of the bad press they heard, or the vigilance of security /police/teachers watching anyone smoking a cigarette to see if it was a joint. They were so busy making sure no one was blazing they completely missed the 14 years old shooting up in the toilets.

Legalize it, and maybe less people will resort to harder drugs they don't really want, need or know how to handle.

I don't like the question. If cannabis is legal for all purposes, its legal for medical purposes.
So let me rephrase the question:

Do you want non-medical use of marijuana legal or illegal?

My answer is that there is a huge spectrum of legal options between "legal" and "illegal". Its not a binary choice, and putting it that way is really not painting a complete picture.

At one end of the spectrum, cannabis could be entirely unregulated, like basil, and you could possess, smoke, sell or grow as much as you liked.
On the other end, you have the Japan model where cannabis is considered like heroin, and even possession of a small amount carries steep criminal penalty.

Needless to say, I don't really support either extreme.

I'll just start with the premise that nobody should ever go to jail for possession of a small amount of cannabis or cultivation of a few plants. So I favor a decriminalization model.

My ideal model is a decriminalization model basically like current medical marijuana law in states where legal, but without needing a prescription.

So I propose a model where any adult should be allowed to cultivate a small number of plants for personal use, and possess up to a certain amount in public without penalty.
You could argue the numbers, but I'll start with 6 plants over 12" high and/1 ounce.
You can possess more cannabis than that, but only in private.
Seeds become unregulated, as do recognized strains of low-THC hemp cannabis.

Under this model, commercial sale of cannabis would be legal, but heavily regulated and taxed (in terms of who could sell it, how much, to whom, when, where, etc), in a manner not dissimilar to cigarettes or tobacco.

I have nothing against anyone wanting to get stoned. I don't smoke for pain relief or glaucoma, I smoke to get high! So I say completely legal! Why should I have to have some kind of medical card to grow MJ? I know the guys growing meds for peeps don't want any competition so they would hate to see the public be able to grow. But thats just not fair. I want to get high too, and I want to grow my own weed!
Most of the decriminalization laws in the d-crimed states seem about right to me. I think it should be regulated to a certain amount you can grow and possess, but I think anyone who wants to should be able to grow and posess it.

Maybe one should be earning a certain amount, have been in education for a certain amount, be doing an apprenticeship, volunteer work or just giving back to society to some degree and proving they are sensible in some standardized way, shape or form to get a recreational growers' card or something? xx

i get real pissed at the thought of sick people being denied relief. the way it's scheduled and treated in the us sickens me. it should be available to anyone who needs it.

i really think the push for recreational legalization is hurting the movement in general because it doesn't seem like the people are caught up with the times just yet. i would love for it to be completely legal, but medical legalization is a higher priority for me.

My problem with provisional or conditional legalization is that it can be "spun" by legislators, attorneys, news editors et al. Full legalization is less ambiguous and not such a good environment for the loophole jockeys. Jmo. cn

xKuroiTaimax said:

Maybe one should be earning a certain amount, have been in education for a certain amount, be doing an apprenticeship, volunteer work or just giving back to society to some degree and proving they are sensible in some standardized way, shape or form to get a recreational growers' card or something? xx

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That's just inviting elitism when you bring money and education into ANYTHING.

cannabineer said:

My problem with provisional or conditional legalization is that it can be "spun" by legislators, attorneys, news editors et al. Full legalization is less ambiguous and not such a good environment for the loophole jockeys. Jmo. cn

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What do you mean by "full legalization"?

The question isn't legality, its regulation.

For example, whisky is "legal" (ie you won't go to jail just for having a bottle at home), but you can't buy it if you're under 21 anywhere, there are jurisdictions where you can't buy it after sunset or on Sundays, you can't consume it in public, you can't have an open container of it in a motor vehicle (even if its in the hands of someone not driving), you can't legally distill it yourself at home, and you have to pay Federal and State excise taxes on any you purchase. In some States, you can only legally purchase it through a State-run or State-authorized dealer.

So whisky, "legal?". . .yes. "Free?" (or "unregulated?"). . .no.

Thinking that we're going to go back to the 1920s when you could grow, possess, smoke, sell, concentrate or distribute as much cannabis as you like with no government interference is a "pipe dream". Whether or not it "should" happen, bluntly, its not going to happen. Those days of freedom are gone.

We live in an era where the Federal gov't just banned 100 watt light bulbs.
The EPA regulates what fertilizers you can use on your crops.
You can't buy cigarettes without an ID card and an 80% or higher tax bite.
The overwhelming majority of useful medications aren't available without a Doctor's prescription.

I could go on and on, but you get the point.

In this day and age, you're simply not going to get the freedom to grow ten acres of cannabis, make ten kilos of hash, and sell it out of your truck. Whether or not you "should" enjoy that right is debatable, but if we Americans ever get that ability again, its going to come with a heck of a lot of stipulations about how much, where, how, what kind, etc, etc. That's the world we live in.

I think the best thing you can realistically hope for right now, is the decriminalization model I mentioned above, where you can grow or possess the stuff, with certain restrictions. Basically, I'm describing the current medical marijuana model in some the States that have it, just without the need for a prescription. No, that's not ideal from a true freedom standpoint, but it effectively would let any individual grow/possess/and smoke all the MJ they wanted privately, free of gov't interference.

Another viable model is what they have in Spain right now. You can grow, smoke, possess, etc, all the cannabis you like on your own property. But sell it, or take more than a small amount at a time off your property, and you're subject to criminal sanction. IMO, its a better model from a "freedom" standpoint, but for reasons I won't get into here, I don't think this will fly here.

Poll: Medical vs Full legalization - which would you choose if it was one or the other


Be advised that this is a public poll: other users can see the choice(s) you selected.

• Make Medical Marijuana Legal for ALL states
• Make Marijuana Legal for ALL states

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This is also not a politically realistic distinction.
Its a bit like asking whether all unicorns should be white, or whether we should allow black ones too!

The President of the USA and the Congress could remove ALL laws against marijuana restriction tomorrow, but State law would still apply.

Short maybe of a Constitutional amendment granting people the right to grow it (think of it as a first or second amendment for weed!), there is no legal model I'm aware of that would, for example, compel the State of Alabama or any other State to tolerate marijuana sales or cultivation within its borders.

Needless to say, this kind of "420 amendment" ratified by 2/3 of the States, isn't coming any time soon. If 2/3 of States were ready for it, marijuana would probably ALREADY be legal in most states, and that's simply not the case.

I suppose theoretically there could be a "Roe vs. Wade" type of Supreme Court decision, suddenly "discovering" a heretofore unrecognized right of people to grow and smoke weed, but bluntly, I don't see that happening either. So far as I know, every time someone has tried to raise a legal challenge like that ("I have a natural right to cultivate whatever I like"), on a State or Federal level they've ended up in prison.

So, in that respect "legal" marijuana is still a bit like gay marriage. Individual States can . .and would. . .do what they like, determined by the preferences of voting pluralities within that State, and unencumbered by Federal regulation or what's going on in other States.

In a Democracy, the way to make marijuana legal in every state is to do what the gay marriage advocates have been doing. You work on a person-by-person and State-by-State basis, demystifying marijuana. Ultimately, attitudes change, and the law changes to reflect them.

It isn't going to happen all at once, legalization. Just like it's baby steps with states, so will it be nationally. There will be a tipping point of states with mmj laws and the feds will have little choice but to catch up. But there will be federal mmj before outright legalization. Along the way there may be states that vote for leglization, putting further pressure on federal laws.
In my mind, the scheduling of mj is more important than its legal status at the moment. Its schedule I status is absurd of course, but if they make it schedule II or III, then it paves the way for control of mj by big pharma. That's my understanding, anyway.
As for the original poster, if their main beef is with people with large grows making money then they should be for full legalization. Those folks would be pretty much out of business, wouldn't they?

Jogrow, I wasn't being (or trying to be) very deep. Just given the option between "more permissive" and "less permissive" I will choose "more".

Imo the hurdle is the Controlled Substances Act.
Neither alcohol nor tobacco/nicotine are scheduled.
Yet pot and its actives are.
As long as that situation remains, I have very little hope of an equitable regulatory regime of any sort evolving.
Si I say "make it fully legal!" primarily out of spite for the Controlled Substances Act and its inbuilt demonization of Cannabis. I want to see an end run around that! I might be milking a unicorn but it is MY unicorn to milk. cn

Full on legalization as I would like to throw a seed in the pot and let it grow without getting my balls cut off by the cops. Ban booze that shits bad.

Above 18 should be 100% legal. I think MMJ is a joke because there are certain people in MMJ states that can't use it still due to the possibility of being fired. I think most who live in MMJ states know that the system is abused (for good reason) Alcohol is legal and it is involved in thousands of deaths. I really can't think of one good reason why it should be illegal. I you read the reasons marijuana was intiatlly made illegal you would laugh. I know people who actually think people have died from smoking too much, what a joke.

I think this topic should have been more about whether or not you have arguements for MMJ only, 100% illegal, or 100% legal

i say make it legal....why should sick people have all the fun...........

Make it legal for all states. Like CN said going medical will undoubtedly create loopholes. "Sure you can grow marijuana for your medical condition. What you need to do though is buy this stamp...". History repeats itself.

Full legalization with minimal regulations. Have to be 18 or older to posses or cultivate. I would like to see storefronts disappear too. The medicinal scene is a joke.

Full legalization, of course.