So why is cannabis illegal? This is a really simple question which should be easy to answer, but it’s not really.
We’re told that cannabis is illegal now because it’s changed and isn’t the “nice” drug it used to be when it was originally made illegal. No, that doesn’t make sense but it is the reason given. Take the claim made by Debra Bell, one of the leading prohibition campaigners in the country, on her website “Talking about cannabis” for example:
It is not the same stuff as you may have smoked at college in the 60s, 70s, and 80s and can have devastating effects on the young.
So, according to people like Debra Bell, since cannabis was criminalised 40 or so years ago it’s changed from being a mild, pretty safe and enjoyable recreational drug into something utterly different – something dangerous and destructive. We’ll come back to this shortly, but the first question to ask is clearly why a pretty safe, mild, relaxing, recreational substance which people like Debra Bell tell us was used without too much of a problem was prohibited in the first place? Getting a sensible answer to that is hard, because in truth the original criminalisation of cannabis was done for no good reason, based on ouright lies and – lets be perfectly honest – racism and there isn’t a sensible answer.
The problem with cannabis is that it’s not just an enjoyable recreational drug, it also has a range of medical and industrial uses which could seriously challenge the vested interests of petro chemical, pharmaceutical and agricultural concerns, worse it was a drug most often used by people from cultures which were other than white western and later it became entwined with the alternative culture and anti war movements.
Also contrary to the claims made by people like Bell, cannabis was a pretty strong substance back in the 60’s and 70’s. Actually, lets be honest cannabis has never been simply a mild relaxing recreational drug, it has a long and well established cultural role and has been involved in – if not responsible for – a great deal of creativity in the past. If you doubt this take a look at a major article UKCIA hosts called Pot Culture, written some time back by Russell Cronin it takes you through the cultural role cannabis has played between 1914 to the end of the 1990’s.
UKCIA also has a chronology of cannabis prohibition which makes for an interesting read, we have the Cannabis timeline showing the significant events which lead us to where we are now and much more besides in our “history” section here.
Quite simply cannabis was not prohibited for any real or honest reasons to do with protecting the public from a dangerous, damaging, addictive killer drug, although that was the claim made at the time.
Before cannabis prohibition in fact there was not a cannabis problem in any way shape or form and it was not a drug used by children and young teenagers. Cannabis should not have been prohibited in the first place, but it was and because of this governments set about choking off the traditional trade routes which had been supplying the “mild relaxing” version people used to enjoy.
Now of course suggesting that some drugs should be prohibited assumes prohibition is a reasonable way to actually control dangerous drugs, which frankly is a difficult proposition to support given the demonstrable failure, death and destruction the policy is creating around the world. It is indeed a very strong argument that drugs should be legalised in order to properly control, regulate and limit the trade. What happens under prohibition is the trade and the culture it supports simply goes underground and gifts eye watering profits to organised crime and even terrorists.
So not only was cannabis not the sort of dangerous drug that should have been prohibited in the first place, the actual act of creating prohibition has itself introduced a whole new set of problems. The sad fact is, they are problems we could – and should – have seen coming because we saw it all when the USA tried to prohibit alcohol 90-odd years ago. What happened then is well documented; the mob took over and used violence to provide the consumer demand with a product which was a far more dangerous version of the real thing the policy originally tried to protect people from. Moonshine, bath tube gin and the rest were high strength versions of alcoholic drinks often contaminated by methanol. The heavy drinking of high octane spirits which took place in the “speakeasies” – the illegal drinking dens – was unrestricted by any workable law and roped in children en mass. Sounds familiar?
If we are to believe prohibition campaigners like Debra Bell what happened with alcohol has happened with cannabis today with the development of so-called “skunk”. Debra Bell claims the mob has produced a far more dangerous version of cannabis and children are using it en mass, which is leading to all sorts of problems. According to Talking About Cannabis (on the page linked above), signs to watch out for include
Sensitive eyes, runny nose, sores and burns on flesh, clothes, sheets.
Blood on sheets.
Burns around the mouth, rash around the mouth.
Keeping arms covered.
All of the above is wrong incidentally, as is so much that site. But the main case usually centres around the change in “potency” in recent years.
This is where things get sticky though because with cannabis strength as such is possibly less important than the ratio of THC to CBD – the two most common active active chemicals (drugs if you prefer) the plant produces. This is something we’ve discussed at length here before, but essentially THC produces psychotic like symptoms in users and is therefore claimed to cause psychotic illness in a small proportion of the population, whereas CBD has a moderating, even anti psychotic effect; the two drugs are thought to balance each other out.
According to Talking about cannabis, again on the same page linked to above, Debra Bell tells us that
Interestingly, CBD appears to have been virtually bred out of skunk, which may account for the devastating effects we are seeing, especially among the young.
So if you believe prohibition campaigners the modern “mob” has produced an extreme hybrid of cannabis akin to moonshine of old. The way to deal with this according to the drug warriors is more of the regime that caused the problem in the first place. Things have only gone wrong like this, they tell us, because we haven’t been energetic enough in enforcing prohibition.
The case being made by the prohibition camp is simply stupid and illogical, it’s straight from the “when in a hole dig faster” school of problem solving, you do not stop a sore thumb by hitting it harder with the hammer. But it gets a good press and Debra Bell is in high demand from a media only too eager to support her message. Those of us on this side of the argument need to ask ourselves another very simple question: How did this happen?
The cannabis law reform campaign has made a huge tactical error, born perhaps from a knowledge that the original prohibition of cannabis was groundless. That error was to assume that because the exaggerated claims of prohibition were originally groundless cannabis was harmless and thus by extension will always be harmless. Thus the cry went out to “free the weed”, the “harmless herb” and so on. In truth cannabis was never “harmless” – nothing on this earth is and even the good old style hash would have been a bad thing for school kids to be using. It was a pretty safe substance for adults to use, but even that doesn’t in itself guarantee that it couldn’t ever become something different. Had cannabis not been prohibited it wouldn’t have been exposed to the distorted economics of prohibition which it’s being argued created the modern strains selected not for the quality of the product but for the quantity and ease of growing under intensive conditions using huge amounts of chemicals.
All it took to undermine that simplistic mantra of the old legalisation movement was to point out this change in the supply side and to highlight the claims of a link to mental illness, because everyone is scared of madness. The claim was simple; these new, changed, even genetically modified varieties were causing an epidemic of schizophrenia in young people. It didn’t matter that the claims made were at best overblown, often groundless and – as in the case of “genetically modified” just plain wrong, the damage was done and reefer madness V2 was born.
Now of course, whereas there was hype and stupidly overblown claims, there was also a grain of truth in the psychosis claims. People with severe mental illness do seem to take to cannabis like ducks to water. People who use cannabis heavily when kids do sometimes seem to develop psychotic problems and so there is a linkage between cannabis use and the development of the illness. Yet when the rates of psychotic illness are looked at, there’s no evidence of any increase despite the huge increase in cannabis use which would seem to all but dispel the reefer madness V2 claims.
Beyond the hype there are serious issues which, although often deployed as reasons to keep cannabis illegal are actually strong reasons to support law reform. If there is any truth that low CBD cannabis carries an elevated risk of psychosis then we need a proper regulation of what is a massive multibillion pound industry. If there is a problem with kids using cannabis we need laws which focus on reducing their access to the trade, as we know illegal dealers seldom ask for proof of age. If some people are vulnerable, they should have the protection of the law, not be treated as criminals.
Of course the prohibition supporters counter these arguments by pointing out that vastly more people use legal alcohol than consume illegal cannabis and claim that law reform would lead to an increase in cannabis use. Well, yes it would increase use to an extent, but not all use is abuse and if the fears of prohibition created high potency hybrids are in any way true the risk would be far lower due to proper market regulation. At the very least a legalised regime would allow users to know what they’re getting, it could even prevent the sale of potentially dangerous varieties if that was felt necessary. We would also be able to study the whole issue in a way we simply can’t at present and health promotion campaigns would be evidenced based, not hype based as now. Laws which act in the interest of consumers have the support of consumers and are thus enforceable laws.
Regarding levels of use though it’s worth bearing in mind that if there were 5 million cannabis users – not an impossible figure – that would represent approaching a tenth of the number of alcohol users. Put that way cannabis use is already properly regarded as common place, like it or not.
What prohibition campaigners often neglect to mention is that alcohol is a product subjected to a lot of commercial promotion, what in the world of illegal drugs is called “pushing”. There is a lot wrong with the way we deal with alcohol as well, to be honest our whole approach to drug use needs a good shaking.
But the big problem is that what cannabis users see is blatant hypocrisy with the policy towards their drug of choice and those toward the problems caused by alcohol . This week the office of national statistics released some frightning statistics about our love affair with the bottle
The number of alcohol-related deaths in the United Kingdom has consistently increased since the early 1990s, rising from the lowest figure of 4,023 (6.7 per 100,000) in 1992 to the highest of 9,031 (13.6 per 100,000) in 2008.
Whatever the dangers of cannabis frankly it’s hard to imagine that it could ever come close to the damage caused by alcohol, yet the very people who regard cannabis as a dangerous drug don’t even consider booze to be a drug, they even leave the marketing and health promotion in the hands of the dealers, The Portman Group. Cannabis prohibition is well understood to be based on lies, hype and hypocrisy because of this.
If you lie to me once I ignore everything you tell me, the result is genuine concerns about cannabis are drowned in a sea of and disinformation and simply dismissed by the people who perhaps need to listen. This will not change unless this prohibition madness ends.
Again as in my last post – Has anyone said what the motivation was for producing/breeding/inventing this ‘new substance – skunk’. They just seem to assume that the criminals want to be nasty for the sake of it since that is what they do.
Maybe they should de-criminalise the older harmless stuff to send out a ‘clear message’ about ‘skunk’
Or maybe ‘skunk’ is just a word and has no real meaning that can be defined under the law. Can these people tell us why there is no equivalent substance in America (called ‘skunk’ or any other name). Possibly Americans are a little behind in cannabis technology !! 😎
I am off to keep my arms covered and look sores on my sheets
I agree with you about the “race” component: it’s illegal to allow anybody in your house to smoke cannabis because of fears of jazz musicians coming from the West Indies and bringing the stuff; likewise the prohibition of allowing anybody to smoke opium in your house reflected a fear of Chinese sailors bringing the stuff here in the late 19th century.
What concerns me is that legalizing the “old” low-THC/high-CBD weed wouldn’t touch the skunk trade, as much of this is directed towards young folk who want a psychotomimetic experience. Some of these will go on to develop psychotic symptoms that recur whether or not cannabis is taken, and a small number of these may have a genetic trigger predisposing to development of schoziphrenia that is waiting for envoronmental situations to pull it, eg inhalation of strong cannabis smoke.
I object to legalisation of cannabis because it could be the vanguard for legalisation of a whole load of drugs which are presently banned because of the harm they can do to both users and society. For example, stimulants like cocine can not only predispose to blood-borne viruses through sharing straws, but can also lead to unsafe sex and crime.
If any drugs are legalised then it needs to happen on a pragmatic, case-by-case basis, on which premise there’s a better cse for decriminalising heroin under certain conditions than there is for legalising cannabis, because the problem of heroin cannot be dealt with at root within the shores of Great Britain.
You assume legalising cannabis wouldn’t solve the claimed problem of so-called skunk, but don’t have any evidence to base that assumption on, do you? I would argue that if you removed the forces that created the demand in the first place it would indeed kill off the trade.
Why doesn’t the existance of a legal alcohol market cause a demand for cocaine I wonder? Just what connection to cocaine does cannabis have that booze doesn’t, other than its illegality?
Your comments about legalising heroin are interesting. You are aware, I suppose, that all legal heroin (diamorphine) is actually grown in this country?
I did a random search ‘how many people die from ecstasy?’ and the typical return was ‘
There is a 7 in a million chance of dying of ecstasy – more people die from choking on peanuts then dying from ecstasy.
No one has actually ever overdosed on MDMA. They have however died from other natural side effects of MDMA. Such as overworking themselves.’
(http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_people_die_each_year_from_an_over_dose_of_ecstasy)
I did a similar search replacing the word ‘ecstasy’ with the word ‘alcohol’ and typical of that return was ‘
Alcohol
Estimates of annual alcohol-related deaths in England and Wales vary from 5,000 to 40,000. This includes deaths from cirrhosis of the liver and other health problems from long-term drinking, deliberate and accidental overdose, traffic deaths, fatal accidents while drunk etc.
(http://www.drugscope.org.uk/resources/faqs/faqpages/how-many-people-die-from-drugs.htm)
NB I performed a similar search on cannabis but the returns were largely subjective and propagandist.
With regard to the Cannabis debate, The government engineered the ‘Skunkweed’ scare. Skunk has been around for years, certainly since I first started smoking cannabis, c1978, and at the time was known as ‘Sensimilla’ and was easily obtained – Google it and you’ll get loads of info.
“Sensimilla, or sensi, is the term for flowers produced from a female plant that has not been fertilized and does not contain seeds (literally ‘sin semilla’ translated from Spanish as ‘without seed’). Usually very potent marijuana as none of the buds have turned into seeds and lost their THC.”
Taking any drug presents risks, (more so in young people; that’s why regulation is required), prescription drugs have side effects, anti-depressants (SSRI’s), bizarrely have the risk of inducing suicidal thoughts – in some patients.
Alcohol and tobacco are the biggest killers and are legal!
If the governments policy on cannabis is to be taken seriously, the only possible option they have to control the harm caused by alcohol is to prohibit it. Obviously they won’t. Obviously they know prohibition won’t be successful. Obviously double standards.
Another dichotomy is the availability of cannabis seeds in the uk and the arguments in parliament against making them illegal. Staggering duplicity and another nail in the coffin of an unjustifiable drugs policy.
Still not any the wiser about ‘skunk’ –
How can one tell if a given sample of plant matter is skunk or not?
Is it possible to tell whether a seed can produce skunk?
Is there a scientific definition of what is and what is not skunk ?
Also why do criminals want stronger weed for children? – surely the weaker stuff means they have to buy more to get the same effect. As in the cocaine trade – it used to be fairly pure in the 1970s nowadays most of what is purchased is less than 30 % purity (that means 70% of it – nearly 3 quarters – is not cocaine at all) – but it is sold in ever greater quantities. It’s not like they have to buy it from Asia and smuggle it into the country any more so why is selling less of it more desirable?
Legalisation would allow all products to be tested before sale (just like alcohol – you can tell Vodka from Beer by the labeling ) and consumers could make a choice. Remember we are only talking about legalising not making it compulsory – it could be done with the message ‘We have to control this stuff because it is so dangerous’ and just like cigarettes advertising could be banned, sale to minors made a criminal offense, only a limited number of outlets would sell it and there could be restrictions about using it in a public place. I doubt this would cause an epidemic in use and the overall harm would be reduced.
If Frugal Dougal (and the majority of the British public) are worried that the same thing may happen with other drugs they forget that the alcohol, ‘Legal Highs’, glue sniffing etc are all more dangerous than legal heroin or cocaine.
LEGALISING DOES NOT MEAN PROMOTING (just as legal penalties do not stop people using a substance) – it simply means getting the criminals out of the business and reducing the harms caused by poor quality products and hit and miss levels of potency associated with the current illegal market. The government can still send out the strong messages about harm if they wish to whilst saving money, reducing crime and ensuring those who do use drugs do so in the least harmful way to themselves and society as a whole.
How can one tell if a given sample of plant matter is skunk or not?
Usually, by smoking it. Otherwise it normally gives off a more pungent smell, but this is no indicator of strength, some weak strains stink to high heaven.
Is it possible to tell whether a seed can produce skunk?
If you knew where it came from, yes, from looking at it, no.
Is there a scientific definition of what is and what is not skunk ?
Skunk used to be a particular strain of cannabis, “Skunk #1”, grown in Amsterdam and was known for being particularly strong and getting people very stoned. Nowadays it is used as a blanket term for any strong weed, and by politicians and scaremongers (as if there is a difference) as a completely separate drug to cannabis. It is not.
Also why do criminals want stronger weed for children?
It’s not specifically for children, life isn’t quite that cartoony with the big bad dealer just wanting to harm children for the sake of it. A lot of cannabis in the UK is homegrown indoors, with obvious restrictions on space. This means that they will try to grow as strong a product as possible with these restrictions. Also, it’s a competitive market, people are more likely to buy from someone who sells good weed, as due to it being illegal they don’t know what the next batch will be like.
Criminals want money, not to harm your children.
Skunk used to be one of the blanket terms for herbal cannabis during the 90’s, originating from the name of one particular strain but it was one of many and that name stuck. Missapplying cannabis strain names has been common for decades. Herbal cannabis has been so prevalent over the last 10 years or so, any of the common weed names are used. The governments ‘skunk’ delusion is simply embarrassing.
Thanks for attempting to answer my questions
But still they need clarification.
How strong does something need to be to be called skunk – can you really quantify this from smoking alone ? Especially if (as most people seem to do) it is mixed with tobacco. Does it have to be homegrown and strong or can it be imported like it always used to be ? Still no DEFINITION of what skunk is but there seem to be several notions of what it might be – all of which are tied up with some idea of relative potency. Like beauty it seems to be in the perception of the beholder.
I disagree that the market is competitive. For most people they are happy to be able to buy anything at all rather than comparing deals and then taking the strongest for the money. Children and Students always get the worst quality since they very rarely have the confidence to complain and are often inexperienced anyway. I would have thought the lowest price was most important for the majority of young people. I watched some students roll a joint at a party a few years ago. They put a few specks of what they called skunk into a cigarette and passed it round about 10 people. There was so little cannabis in this ‘joint’ that most of the effect must have been from the tobacco they used so they would not even be able to tell how potent their stash was. I have a theory that most people smoke cannabis mixed with tobacco since the stuff they buy/grow is so awful that it cannot be smoked pure. Very few people in the UK seem to know how to dry, cure or store what they have bought/grown to keep or improve it’s potency and flavor. I always recommend that people do not smoke cannabis (Vaporising or cooking is better) but if they do smoke it I plead with them not use tobacco but no one ever listens. That is why I stopped associating with these people – it was just too awful to watch !
Why would someone with cramped conditions grow cannabis as strong as possible ? Surely they would want to grow as much as possible if it was for sale – quality is probably only a factor if it is for personal use.
By the way Skunk is a strain bred in California in the 1980s – The dutch adopted it at a later date. I am sure a whole range of genetics has been labeled as skunk over the years though
Great article as ever UKCIA!
Just wanted to comment on something phrtao said:
“I have a theory that most people smoke cannabis mixed with tobacco since the stuff they buy/grow is so awful that it cannot be smoked pure. {snip}if they do smoke it I plead with them not use tobacco but no one ever listens.”
I’d have to disagree with this entirely. I smoke my cannabis with tobacco and it’s certainly not for the reason you suggested there. I certainly don’t smoke mine with tobacco due to the quality of the weed itself, if that were the case the good quality stuff I regularly get (I’m a bit of a connoisseur!) would not be used the same way. I personally believe that the reason many people start smoking cannabis with tobacco is that (as youngsters) they’ve already begun experimenting with tobacco. Cannabis use usually (at least in my experience) comes later. Also there seems to be something in the whole ceremony of rolling a joint. Connecting the rizla, adding the mix, the roll, the lick, the twist. For me there’s something almost ceremonial in all that. Something that just isn’t there for me using other methods.
All that said I would agree that for anyone whose new to cannabis, smoking it is not the way to go. There are much safer methods that do not include prescribing to the governments most dangerous legal poison.
Hi Dragon83uk
Have to say I’m very much with Phrtao on this one, tobacco is to be avoided at all costs.
I do agree about the enjoyment of smoking a tobacco joint and all the stuff that goes with it, but tobacco is a known addictive killer sadly.
The enjoyment it gives is actually its drug effect, it makes you feel good about having smoked it.
Promoting the pure use of cannabis – as opposed to mixing with tobacco is one of the main aims of UKCIA and has been for a while now, check out Tokepure in the Activism section of the main site.
From my experience using cannabis lead me to a 20 year tobacco addiction which was very hard to break, I think that happens to a lot of people.
I do agree that cannabis alone is a different experience to smoking with tobacco, but it’s a change you get used to and don’t really miss eventually. The “ceremony” of preparing the joint is probably a part of the psychological addiction to tobacco.
Sorry!
> Dragon83UK,
I Agree with UKCIA – I used to use tobacco and cannabis for many years and I was addicted to the mixture. The mixture is like a craving for smoking (tobacco) but you get a bit stoned as well so you end up feeling either washed out all day or jittery because you have not had your tobacco fix. This mixture deserves much of the reputation that is usually attributed to cannabis in the UK (Addictive, lung damage, can make you sick/white outs, panic attacks, paranoia etc). I think another, historical, reason for using it with tobacco was that years ago we used to always get hashish instead of grass and it was much easier to smoke this in a tobacco mixture rather than needing a pipe or bong or some other device. Tobacco is a dangerous and chemically addictive substance which is very bad for you, especially without a filter! In fact if you use cigarette tobacco (as most of my acquaintances used to) without the filter it is designed to be passed through then it is actually much more poisonous than rolling tobacco or cigars! If you see some one light a roll up and then put it to their mouth after it burns then chances are they got their tobacco habit from tobacco mixture joints (Think about it you see that all the time – I know I do).
If you are indeed a true connoisseur then try your best stuff pure – if it is dried, cured and stored correctly then it will roll better than in a mixture. The taste is so much better, it is less harsh and you will enjoy it. All the ritual is still there as well. A tip for those trying to give up tobacco is to smoke a roll-up cigarette first to get rid of the craving before smoking a pure joint (otherwise a pure joint – no matter how good will just not do it for you) then eventually ditch the tobacco. After some weeks or months or considerable pain you will end up using less of your ‘stash’, ingest considerably less smoke and be free to choose when to smoke without being a slave to tobacco addiction. A vaporiser is better still in terms of economy , quality of effect, and very low health risks – It is the true connoisseur’s choice !
I am aware that UKCIA does not condone or promote the use of cannabis by anyone but they do advocate that people know the things that make it harmful.
BEST TO NOT SMOKE AT ALL – but if you must do it – do it as safe as possible.
PS Do you really think the likes of Bob Marley, Jerry Garcia, Louis Armstrong, David Crosby etc (All genuine connoisseurs – add your own names to this list) sat there breaking up cigarettes to roll a ‘skuny spliff’ ?
Hiya both, sorry for the late reply.
I don’t disagree with either of you and admire the work that’s been done with tokepure, my point was that the reasons given by phrtao for why people use tobacco in their joints was not actually true. I’d just like to point out a few things, firstly, I was a tobacco addict for a good year or two before I smoked cannabis in a joint. That said I can recognise that my cannabis use has become tied in with that addiction, I’ve definitely used it for an excuse not to quit. And to put phrtao’s mind at rest, I do use rolling tobacco, I’ve never liked cigarette tobacco, it’s a nightmare to roll with! Secondly when I said I’m a connoisseur I merely meant that I can recognise the varying qualities of the weed I smoke. Sorry for giving the wrong impression. I only get about a ten bag (at about 1g!, beggars can’t be choosers!) every week and I like to make that last me as long as possible. Using it the way I do means that I can make that small amount last me a good 2-3 nights. If I were to use it in a pipe or cooking there’s just no way that could last me that long, thus I’d have to buy more. I would like to get my hands on a vaporiser but I’m reluctant to deal with my tobacco addiction at the moment, I’m aware it’s not a healthy life choice nor one that I’d advise be copied by others but it is my choice.
I still stand by my point however, people don’t just smoke joints with tobacco because of the quality of the weed.
Finally with regards to:
UKCIA
“The “ceremony” of preparing the joint is probably a part of the psychological addiction to tobacco.
Sorry!”
That may very well be the case, although there are beneficial things to be taken from having meditative acts like this, ok it’s not exactly the best form of meditation, but, hey, if it works for me.
And I’ve got to ask, Sorry? Why?
Just “sorry” for saying something you enjoy is an addiction!
What I would say though is I bet you’d use less cannabis if you smoked pure, seriously most people seem to.
No worries, I’m under no illusions about the risks involved with my choice nor the problem with its addictiveness. As for smoking less without tobacco, I don’t share your enthusiasm. There’s just no way I’d put less in a bowl than I would in a joint, I’ve been smoking for over a decade so I know what it takes to get me to where I’d like to be. I like the quick delivery that’s offered with smoking, which is why I’d consider a vaporiser. In fact I recently found out that making a home vaporiser is quite a simple task so I may be giving that a try in the near future, which in turn may help me quit nicotine. As for cooking with it there’s just no point in the amounts I can afford to get it(about 1g per week). Plus the high takes a good half an hour to arrive, also I’d say it’s a different high to smoking it. Like I said before, I do agree with the message your trying to get across to others, it’s just not for me. At least not right now.