...The views today on Marijuana are not the same as the views in the 70’s.Due to the approval of 27 states, medical studies, and cost of consequences on those convicted from use of the most common illicit drug in the world, the United States of America has began to rethink its stance on the matter. The question of this country seems to be the underlying argument about Marijuana in this country is: should Marijuana continue to be prohibited to citizens based on its health effects, medicinal values, and costs to the country? This argument seems to be a great topic in the U.S. Marijuana is the most commonly used illegal drug, not only in the United States, but the world, and because of this the laws connected with this drug hold great influence. It is because of this and the immergence of new evidence, that the justification behind prohibition of this drug is being rethought scientifically, socially, and economically. Twenty seven states have approved the use of marijuana for medical purposes, but the users can be prosecuted, and placed into prison according to federal law. I cannot began to understand this, but currently, 830,000 people a year are in trouble with the law in regards to Marijuana (Business Insider, 2012) and numbers seem to be on an uphill trend . The money tax payers are paying for the war on marijuana places a dent in our society. This money could be used for many other things such as education, care for elderly, and funding for U.S. soldiers. Marijuana comes...
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...today. Approval of Marijuana by 27 states, new medical studies, and its consequences on those convicted from use of the most common illicit drug in the world, is forcing the United States of America to rethink its stance on the matter. In general, the underlying argument about Marijuana in this country is: should Marijuana continue to be prohibited to citizens based on its health effects, medicinal values, and costs to the country? The reasons why this argument is so important are great. As previously stated, Marijuana is the most commonly used illegal drug in the world, and with millions of people using it regularly and almost 100 million that have ever used it in this country, the laws behind this drug hold great influence. It is because of this and the immergence of new evidence, that the justification behind prohibition of this drug is being rethought scientifically, socially, and economically. The use of Marijuana as both medicine and a recreational drug is being thoroughly questioned in the US. 27 states have Marijuana approved in some form, many of those for medical purposes however those users can still, and do get placed into prison by federal law. Currently, 830,00 people a year are in trouble with the law in regards to Marijuana and numbers seem to be on an uphill trend . Furthermore, the US invests 30 billion a year into the drug war, half of which is dedicated to Marijuana. Many are questioning its success all together. Both imprisonment and the war cost our country...
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...the attitude of my audience towards the legalization of marijuana being best for our country. Thematic Statement: There are many reasons for why marijuana should be legal but due to lack of time I will only be discussing marijuana’s health risks and how it compares to alcohol, the government’s financial gain from legalization, and popular oppositions and myths about marijuana. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I. Introduction: Hi my name is Good Student and I’m going to talk to you about some facts on Cannabis or marijuana. A. Attention: I would like to ask a favor of everyone, because I am discussing something slightly controversial I would like you to keep an open mind or try to about what I have to say and realize that I am only stating well-researched facts. B. Audience connect/credibility: With that said, I do not condone smoking. I am an objective person and feel that the pros greatly outweigh the cons when it comes to legalizing marijuana. I believe the best strategy for persuasion is presenting the facts and researched statistics on the topic at hand. C. Thematic Statement: There are many reasons for why marijuana should be legal but due to lack of time I will only be discussing marijuana’s health risks and how it compares to alcohol, the government’s financial gain from legalization, and popular oppositions and myths about...
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...Legalization of Marijuana Do you think the legalization of marijuana is all positive? Can there be some negative factors? Based on politics, health, and peoples point of view it is a widely recognized, highly controversial, and common issue in the United States. Many politicians believe it should be legalized and others disagree, especially during the presidential primary. In David Sheff’s article “Marijuana Should Be Legal, but …” in time magazine he proposes that marijuana should be legalized even though it can be harmful to adolescences. Through Sheff’s article, appeals of logos, pathos, and ethos, and knowledge about the subject has an impact on the article as a whole. They help develop his argument that weed is great thing, and it should be legalized. Sheff believes the benefits of adding marijuana to the United States' economy outweighs the dangers it can cause, but that they should be recognized also. Especially those dangers that involve minors. Sheff affectively and ineffectively persuades his audience by using ethos, pathos, and logos. Sheff does this by using some persuasions over zealously and some not enough. Sheff's article develops the ideas of how marijuana has negative impact on adolescence, but a positive impact on society as a whole. This article published on August 4, 2014 strives to inform everyday people on the effects of marijuana and persuade them to understand how marijuana usage and proper regulation are a positive attribute in the everyday outlook...
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...sixteen states having medical marijuana laws already in place and seventeen states with pending legalization legislation (http://medicalmarijuana.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=002481); many communities are split on the issue due to misinformation and stigmas. Even though marijuana is stigmatized as a gateway drug that leads children to harder drugs, marijuana should be legalized for medicinal use because it is incredibly expensive to keep marijuana illegal and adults deserve freedom to use marijuana as medicine without having to deal with the criminal element or fear of being unjustly prosecuted. The gateway effect states that marijuana acts as a stepping stone, or a gateway, that leads people to harder drugs. They support their argument with statistics that show that most people who use hard drugs have tried marijuana before (http://www.mjlegal.org/gateway.html). What though is the gateway theory? Is it based on facts brought to light by years of scientific study? No, in fact the gateway theory does not explain anything at all. It is simply an observation that has been vague at best and dispersed by media outlets and the governing body. It is true that many people that use hard drugs such as heroin, cocaine, or LSD did in fact use marijuana before they tried the harder drugs. The true reason for this is marijuana is much more accessible due to its popularity than other illicit drugs (http://www.mjlegal.org/gateway.html). In fact the Institute of Medicine agrees that the...
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...or whether it’s a gateway drug. This question may never truly be solved but there have been valid arguments for both sides. I would like to delve in on the topic by analyzing what the effects of marijuana are, what the positive and negative aspects of the drug are, and whether or not cannabis should be illegal. The first topic I would like to discuss is what the effects of marijuana are when it is used. The article Marijuana in Medicine: Past, Present and Future in the Western Journal of Medicine wrote about an experiment where marijuana was tested on animals. One reason why they found a lot of variability of reactions among the animals tested was because: “different batches of cannabis derivatives vary greatly in strength” (36). They go on to explain “there is a wide variation among humans in their individual responses to cannabis” (36). This brings light to a very important effect of marijuana, which is that it varies in strength from batch to batch. This is important to know when using the drug because it can affect people very differently based on the strength of the drug. Another effect of marijuana discussed by the Western Journal of Medicine is that cannabis “mildly stimulates, and then sedates the higher centers of the brain” (36). The article continues on to say that “this condition is probably associated with the other well-known symptom produced by the drug, namely, the prolongation of time”. This is essentially saying that when you use marijuana your perception...
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...titled "How a Far-Right Icon came to Embrace Marijuana Legalization." The other day, we got solid proof that the media is biased toward the left. On a cable-news show seen by millions, a white-hair host declared that although the U.S. has 5%of the world's population, it detains a quarter of the world's prisoners. "I just think it's shocking to see how mony of these young people wind up in prison", he said. "And then they get turned into hard-core criminals because they have possession of a small amount of a controlled substance. The whole thing is crazy." It's a sensible position. Strikingly, it came from the host of the Christian Broadcasting Network's "700 Club" - right-wing icon Pat Robertson. He went on to say that mere possession of pot should be decriminalized. The 40 year old "700 Club" isn't known for advancing liberal cause. In fact, four days after Robertson, 81, called for the legalization of marijuana, he said on his show that "if enough people were praying" Jesus Christ might have "stilled" there recent tornadoes that destroyed lives and homes in the Midwest and South. Robertson has crep slowly into his pro-legalization position on marijuana. In 2010, he said on the "700Club" that people shouldn't get long prison terms for taking " a couple puffs of marijuana." shortly afterward, his New York City- based spokesman, Chris Roslan, issueda statement saying Robertson "unequivocally" oppose the use of any drugs. And yet when I spoke with Roslan on Thursday, he told...
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...I am not writing about the legalization of weed. In fact, I am addressing the economic argument of if marijuana is the productive economic stimulus the United States has been looking for. Marijuana as of right now is an illegal banned substance in most states, yet without many documented negatives, is left out and unable to bring most state revenue departments hundreds of millions of dollars per year, further helping this country and keeping it out of another economic recession. In this argumentative piece, I am going to address if marijuana is actual an economic benefit in the states that do allow it, or if it is just a myth. Now we must first address the elephant in the room. There is a certain stigma with Marijuana. It has been said by many that the legalization of marijuana is not in hopes of revenue and economic gains, but instead our troubled generations excuse to legalize a substance that as of now is still widely illegal. It is important to note the now cultural norm marijuana’s widely gained. On the Expanded Academic ASAP Gale, Ventrell Marvin goes into depth on Colorado’s land mark experiment of Marijuana. The author of the scholarly source explains a run in with a Colorado pharmacist when it pertains to the country wide stigma of the substance. He asked, "Does your industry really think people who wanted to smoke before Jan. 1 chose not to because it was illegal? Do you seriously know anyone who said, 'No, I better not, it's illegal'? Do people understand that marijuana...
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...1)a. Summarize the pros and cons of legalizing marijuana. b. Opponents of the legalization of marijuana argue that marijuana is a gateway drug, because to leads to the use (and abuse) of other, more serious drugs. Research marijuana as a gateway drug. Based on your findings, do you believe marijuana leads to the use of other drugs? Why or why not? Explain your answer. c. Offer your position on this topic: Do you think marijuana should be legalized? Why or why not? Use facts (i.e., sound research) to support your answer. Do you think marijuana is a gateway drug? Levinthal (2014) expressed the pros and cons of legalizing marijuana. When it comes to cons, Levithal stated that the use of marijuana works as a gateway for the abuses of illicit drugs. Moreover, he also mentioned “marijuana users tend to undermine traditional values of school achievement and long-term aspirations” (p.187). In the other hand, Levithal also mentions that smoking marijuana and having small amounts of it has become more accepted in today’s society. Also, marijuana has been approved to be used as medicine, creating a more acceptable...
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...Marijuana Legalization The legalization of marijuana is something that I have always been interested in. In high school, I heard about people first smoking marijuana, and I thought it was so bad because of everything that I was taught in elementary and middle school. Kids always pledged to stay away from any type of drug. Once I knew friends that were smoking and I talked to them about it, they made it seem so harmless, and that’s when I really got curious about it. Then I started to find out more information about marijuana and its effects, and I started to wonder whether marijuana should be legal for recreational use? After all my research I have come to the conclusion that marijuana should be legal for recreational use in the United States. Lets start by looking at the economical perspective. The United States has a national debt of trillions of dollars, and a huge financial problem is how much our law enforcement and Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) are spending to enforce the prohibition of marijuana. “In America we spend nearly $8 billion trying to enforce the laws prohibiting the use and possession of marijuana” (Cartwright 86). This money could be spent on highways, schools and other government properties but instead it is spent on enforcing laws that are being broken every single day. Another huge part of the DEA is the so-called war on drugs. Mexican drug cartels are a huge supplier of marijuana to the U.S. “In 2009, the U.S. National Drug Intelligence Center estimated...
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... If a substance can make someone who is ill feel better, why keep it from him or her? On the surface this sounds right. People who advocate making marijuana legal for medical purposes take this approach. What could it hurt? A closer look reveals that marijuana should not be legalized for medical use, because young people are given mixed signals about drugs, other drugs can be used that are easier to regulate, and there are more harmful side effects. Marijuana is one of the most abused drugs in America today. It is estimated that close to four million Americans regularly use marijuana. It is often one of the first illegal drugs that young people experiment with (Gassett2). Legalization for medical purposes would send a mixed signal to our youth. Young people are taught at a very early age about the harmful effects and the abusive potential of marijuana. If at the same time, they are told that marijuana is medically benevolent, the result could be confusion. Andrea Barthwell, former deputy Director of the office of National Drug Policy said this in 2004, “Children entering drug abuse treatment routinely report that they heard ‘pot is medicine’ and, therefore, believed to be good for them.” (19). At a time when recreational drug use is at an all time high, it would not be wise to legalize marijuana for medical purposes. The war on drugs begins with young people. If they are confused about whether or not a drug like marijuana is harmful, the battle is over before it begins...
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...America is at war. We have been fighting drug abuse for almost a century. Four Presidents have personally waged war on drugs. Unfortunately, it is a war that we are losing. Drug abusers continue to fill our courts, hospitals, and prisons. The drug trade causes violent crime that ravages our neighborhoods. Children of drug abusers are neglected, abused, and even abandoned. The only beneficiaries of this war are organized crime members and drug dealers. The United States has been engaged in a “war” for nearly 25 years. A war in which there is a great deal of confusion as to why we are engaged in it, and if we are in the war for the right reasons. The resolution of the war is curtailed by varying opinions and subjective statistical proof. The war which has been a continuing struggle, is the “war on drugs” At the heart of this war is a fundamental question: Is this a battle the United States can win? It is likely everyone will agree drugs are harmful, they have serious medical side-effects. Drugs are addictive; can ruin a family, a job, a life. I agree that drugs have very negative side effects, but is the solution to fight a very costly and ineffective battle to eradicate drugs entirely? Is this even a possibility? I am not so sure, and this paper will show that the war on drugs has likely caused much more harm than good. Further, it will explain why not all drugs are the same, explore some options, and look at the future of the United States, and of the world ...
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...Drugs in AMerica | From Sea to Shining Sea | Patricia Diaz | 000348122 | GLT 1 111.6.2 | 2/5/2014 | | “Drugs in America from sea to shining sea” Drug use in the United States has been on a steady rise. This is largely due to the increasing popularity of Marijuana. Marijuana was on the decline from the 1990s to mid to late 2000s but has been on a steady increase since then. This is due to the changing perception and attitudes towards marijuana. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, in 2013, 7.0 percent of 8th graders, and 22.7 percent of 12th graders used marijuana in the last month. Why this sharp increase? This is related to state’s passing of legislation for the legalization of marijuana. This cannot help in the war on drugs. The use of marijuana has been shown to be the gateway to other more illicit drugs. Medical Marijuana has been in use for many years in the United States. It has been touted as the new miracle drug. While there are benefits to this drug the long term effects are still being analyzed. It has been said to help prevent blindness from Glaucoma; an appetite stimulant in Aids patients; and helps controls muscle spasms in Multiple Sclerosis patients. It can also have negative side effects such as paranoia, feeling of panic, hallucinations, and anxiety. People also have complained to short term memory loss, mood swings, perceptions and information processing. Why are there two different spectrum of the “miracle...
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...Legalizing Marijuana: The ethical issue and problem Dorcas Rivera SOC 120 Introduction to Ethics & Social Responsibility Instructor: Robert Gala September 23, 2013 Legalizing Marijuana: The ethical issue and problem Marijuana is the most commonly abused drug. Therefore, legalizing marijuana, not only now, but for many years, has been the topic on rather or not it should be legalized. Even though marijuana has been legalized for medical use in 18 U.S. states, this has caused big controversy in our country and the ethical issue and problems it presents. In this article I will explain; what is marijuana, the risk of marijuana use, the effects of marijuana (in the brain and body), and the pros and cons of legalizing it. I will also explain how one of the classical theories, utilitarianism, would resolve the problem. On the other hand, I will contrast the response with the perspective brought to the issue by, ethical egoism. Lastly, will ended off choosing which of the two are closer to my view. Marijuana is a green, brown, or gray mixture of dried, shredded leaves, stems, seeds, and flowers of the hemp plant. You may hear marijuana called by street names such as pot, herb, weed, grass, boom, Mary Jane, gangster, or chronic. All forms of marijuana are mind-altering. In other words, they change how the brain works. They all contain THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), the main active chemical in marijuana. They also contain more than 400 other chemicals. Marijuana's...
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...The Blunt Truth Many people including myself have been told that drugs are bad and to never use them, and as a child we listen to our authority figures even though we may not understand the reason behind it. To this day, I still remember the D.A.R.E program in the fifth grade, but now that I am older, I realize that people are going to do drugs despite what laws are in place. The drug in question is marijuana. Marijuana is all around us; it is in the music we listen to, the television shows and movies we watch, and is constantly on the news. The debate to legalize marijuana in the United States has been argued since the existence of the drug and is even more prevalent today. Marijuana today has more uses than just to get “high,” it has medical and financial benefits that are commonly overlooked. Most Americans today believe that someone who smokes marijuana is a lazy, 20-year-old stoner who does not contribute to society other than buying large amounts of Doritos and Taco Bell. This statement is completely false. Marijuana can be used by anyone and has many more uses than just to get high. Marijuana’s main psychoactive ingredient is tetrahydro-cannabinol or THC (Griffiths). Marijuana has been used as a medicine in European colonies in North America since the 18th century (Griffiths). According to Heather M. Griffiths, “people seek out marijuana with medical problems including nausea, vomiting, weight loss, multiple sclerosis, asthma, inflammation, glaucoma, poor appetite...
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