Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Modern pot

Back to the stoned age - Features, Health & Wellbeing - The Independent

So, a 38 year old who had quite a lot of cannabis in his youth tries it again and now finds it causes paranoia. His explanation:
....cannabis itself has evolved into something unrecognisable – skunk, which is now the market leader, accounting for 81 per cent of the marijuana sold on British streets, compared with just 20 per cent in 2002. It's around three times stronger than normal cannabis thanks to higher levels of the compound THC, which causes the psychotic symptoms, and lower levels of another compound called cannabidiol, which experts think protects users from the effects of THC.

The cannabis that fuelled the hippie generation's quest for world peace has been contorted by market forces and cross-pollination into a nervous, twitching grotesque. The latest government stance on marijuana is to suggest that it be reclassified from a class C drug to a class B drug, based largely on the fact that skunk is now so prevalent.

Bizarrely, given my past, I am now inclined to agree with them. What I took bore no similarity to the dope I used to enjoy
This will annoy the drug de-criminalisation crowd.

2 comments:

RebeccaH said...

I have a younger brother who used marijuana back in the 70s quite extensively. It did something to his young brain, and he has been unemployable and a wasted human being ever since. And that was the supposedly "mild" stuff of the 70s. So screw the de-criminalization crowd.

Anonymous said...

Maybe your younger brother was a deadbeat BEFORE the marijuana. You ever think of that? Maybe YOU'RE the wasted human being, hmm? Talking about your brother that way... shame.