piercethevale said:
...nice summation...and I personally take exception to cannabis being reffered to as a 'Drug'...its' not by medical or legal definition a 'Drug'...and to continuously support this notion by common usage is unsupportive of this fact...don't feed the negative...besides, as my own M.D, told me over 20 years ago..."...it's less harmful than anything I can prescribe for stress and of far less harm than alcohol" [which is by definition a 'Drug']
Actually the definition of drug does not include the term "harm" or "harmful".
In fact a drug is descibed as being any chemical substance which, when absorbed by a living organism, alters normal bodily functions.
So indeed marijuana is a drug, as is caffiene, tobacco and alcohol
My best friend is a recovering addict, her drug of choice was marijuana. My daughter and her boyfriend are both marijuana addicts. Seriously, they are addicted. I have seen what happens when they come off it and it isnt pretty.
There are those who can drink heavily and regularly without developing addictive behavior and there are those who become addicted to one glass of wine every friday night. There are two components to addiction. The chemical/biological addiction and the chemical/psychological addiction. So for some the regular use of marijuana may present no issue with addiction but this is certainly not the case for everyone.
Marijuana definitely has the ability to cause biological and psychological damage. Marijuana taken regularly before the brain reaches maturity (approx 20years =/-2years) restricts the ability of the brain to mature. Once marijuana is stopped that under matured part of the brain starts its maturing process again and if the individual is in his forties he finds himself in the precarious position of having a teenage brain in an adult body. The nerve cells aiding intelligence, consciousness, and self-awareness keep growing even into a persons 20s. Frontal lobes that aid self-control, judgment, emotional maturity, and organizing and planning ability grow again, starting at about age 10 for girls, 12 for boys. Puberty stimulates brain focusing * abilities which expand if stimulated or shrink if neglected. The parietal lobes controlling sight, sound, and speech, the interconnecting circuits, the temporal lobes that control language and emotions, the hippocampus that creates memories, and the amygdala controlling fear and anger mature with androgen, a male hormone, all continue their process of maturation into the late teens or early 20's.
Any drug, including caffiene, marijuana and alcohol will restrict this process of developement.
Rogue red
