FCBlitz said:
I don't care if you inhale gasoline. But there are very solid study's that have been showing that smoking MJ has negative impacts on health and behavior.
Good and fair point. Anyone suggesting MJ is innocuous is kidding themselves. At the same time, saying it's a psychotic drug that causes people to commit violence and stab people 108 times and all these other things is silly too.
The reality is, it's a little less mind altering than alcohol, and way less toxic to the body.
I do think one area of concern is with children and young adults. Obviously with children it should always be illegal except extreme cases (certain seizures that are treated with THC, for example), and even with young adults, studies show that it has a huge impact on brain development.
Another area of concern is just the public nuisance. In major cities where it's legal, you can smell it everywhere. It's kinda disgusting.
In California, when they legalized weed, the sale of illegal weed went up 300%. That's because once it was regulated, the taxes made it so expensive that people went the illegal route.
I guess I'm for legalizing it, or at least having the state leave it up to the individual cities or counties to decide. I don't like everything being a federal issue, and I also don't like everything being a state issue. We're a large, diverse state, and allowing Austin to do one thing while Abilene or Fort Worth or whoever does something else is fine with me on issues like this.