Blair Anderson, on the hustings 'canvassing for opinion'

Blair Anderson, on the hustings 'canvassing for opinion'
affiliation: Blair4Mayor.com

Saturday, September 26, 2009

MEDIA, LIES and SOFT DRUGS

Support for clinical trials of cannabis

Image by publik16 via Flickr

5 THINGS THE CORPORATE MEDIA DON'T WANT YOU TO KNOW ABOUT CANNABIS

Writing in the journal Science nearly four decades ago, New York State University sociologist Erich Goode documented the media's complicity in maintaining cannabis prohibition.

He observed: "[T]ests and experiments purporting to demonstrate the ravages of marijuana consumption receive enormous attention from the media, and their findings become accepted as fact by the public. But when careful refutations of such research are published, or when later findings contradict the original pathological findings, they tend to be ignored or dismissed."

A glimpse of today's mainstream media landscape indicates that little has changed -- with news outlets continuing to, at best, underreport the publication of scientific studies that undermine the federal government's longstanding pot propaganda and, at worst, ignore them all together.

Here are five recent stories the mainstream media doesn't want you to know about pot:

1. Marijuana Use Is Not Associated With a Rise in Incidences of Schizophrenia

Over the past few years, the worldwide media, as well as federal officials in the United Kingdom, Canada and the U.S. have earnestly promoted the notion that smoking pot induces mental illness.

Perhaps most notably, in 2007 the MSM reported that cannabis "could boost the risk of developing a psychotic illness later in life by about 40 percent" -- a talking point that was also actively promoted by U.S. anti-drug officials.

So, is there any truth to the claim that pot smoking is sparking a dramatic rise in mental illness? Not at all, according to the findings of a study published in July in the journal Schizophrenia Research.

Investigators at the Keele University Medical School in Britain compared trends in marijuana use and incidences of schizophrenia in the United Kingdom from 1996 to 2005. Researchers reported that the "incidence and prevalence of schizophrenia and psychoses were either stable or declining" during this period, even the use of cannabis among the general population was rising.

"[T]he expected rise in diagnoses of schizophrenia and psychoses did not occur over a 10-year period," the authors concluded. "This study does not therefore support the specific causal link between cannabis use and incidence of psychotic disorders. ... This concurs with other reports indicating that increases in population cannabis use have not been followed by increases in psychotic incidence."

As of this writing, a handful of news wire reports in Australia, Canada, and the U.K. have reported on the Keele University study. Notably, no American media outlets covered the story.

2. Marijuana Smoke Doesn't Damage the Lungs Like Tobacco

Everyone knows that smoking pot is as damaging, if not more damaging, to the lungs than puffing cigarettes, right?

Wrong, according to a team of New Zealand investigators writing in the European Respiratory Journal in August.

Researchers at the University of Otago in New Zealand compared the effects of cannabis and tobacco smoke on lung function in over 1,000 adults.

They reported: "Cumulative cannabis use was associated with higher forced vital capacity [the volume of air that can forcibly be blown out after full inspiration], total lung capacity, functional residual capacity [the volume of air present in the lungs at the end of passive expiration] and residual volume.

"Cannabis was also associated with higher airways resistance but not with forced expiratory volume in one second [the maximum volume of air that can be forcibly blown out in the first second during the FVC test], forced expiratory ratio, or transfer factor. These findings were similar amongst those who did not smoke tobacco. ... By contrast, tobacco use was associated with lower forced expiratory volume in one second, lower forced expiratory ratio, lower transfer factor and higher static lung volumes, but not with airways resistance."

They concluded, "Cannabis appears to have different effects on lung function to those of tobacco."

Predictably, the scientists' "inconvenient truth" was not reported in a single media outlet.

3. Cannabis Use Potentially Protects, Rather Than Harms, the Brain

Does smoking pot kill brain cells? Drinking alcohol most certainly does, and many opponents of marijuana-law reform claim that marijuana's adverse effects on the brain are even worse. Are they correct?

Not according to recent findings published this summer in the journal Neurotoxicology and Teratology.

Investigators at the University of California at San Diego examined white matter integrity in adolescents with histories of binge drinking and marijuana use. They reported that binge drinkers (defined as boys who consumed five or more drinks in one sitting, or girls who consumed four or more drinks at one time) showed signs of white matter damage in eight regions of the brain.

By contrast, the binge drinkers who also used marijuana experienced less damage in 7 out of the 8 brain regions.

"Binge drinkers who also use marijuana did not show as consistent a divergence from non-users as did the binge drink-only group," authors concluded. "[It is] possible that marijuana may have some neuroprotective properties in mitigating alcohol-related oxidative stress or excitotoxic cell death."

To date, only a handful of U.S. media outlets -- almost exclusively college newspapers -- have reported the story.

4. Marijuana Is a Terminus, Not a 'Gateway,' to Hard Drug Use

Alarmist claims that experimenting with cannabis will inevitably lead to the use of other illicit drugs persist in the media despite statistical data indicating that the overwhelming majority of those who try pot never go on to use cocaine or heroin.

Moreover, recent research is emerging that indicates that pot may also suppress one's desire to use so-called hard drugs.

In June, Paris researchers writing in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology concluded that the administration of oral THC in animals suppressed sensitivity to opiate dependence.

Also this summer, investigators at the New York State Psychiatric Institute reported in the American Journal on Addictions that drug-treatment subjects who use cannabis intermittently were more likely to adhere to treatment for opioid dependence.

Although a press release for the former study appeared on the Web site physorg.com on July 7, neither study ever gained any traction in the mainstream media.

5. Government's Anti-Pot Ads Encourage, Rather Than Discourage, Marijuana Use

Sure, many of us already knew that the federal government's $2 billion ad campaign targeting pot was failing to dissuade viewers from toking up, but who knew it was this bad?

According to a new study posted online in the journal Health Communication, survey data published by investigators at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania found that many of the government's public-service announcements actually encouraged pot use.

Researchers assessed the attitudes of over 600 adolescents, age 12 to 18, after viewing 60 government-funded anti-marijuana television spots.

Specifically, researchers evaluated whether the presence of marijuana-related imagery in the ads (e.g., the handling of marijuana cigarettes or the depiction of marijuana-smoking behavior) were more likely or less likely to discourage viewers' use of cannabis.

Messages that depict teens associating with cannabis are "significantly less effective than others," the researchers found.

"This negative impact of marijuana scenes is not reversed in the presence of strong anti-marijuana arguments in the ads and is mainly present for the group of adolescents who are often targets of such anti-marijuana ads (i.e., high-risk adolescents)," the authors determined. "For this segment of adolescents, including marijuana scenes in anti-marijuana (public-service announcements) may not be a good strategy."

Needless to say, no outlets in the mainstream media -- many of which donated air time to several of the beleaguered ads in question -- have yet to report on the story.

-- MAP Posted-by: Richard Lake

URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v09.n885.a01.html

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Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Alcohol, Cannabis... Sandals, Jandals.

sleepwalking with the damned

Image by Kalense Kid via Flickr

"Evidence for the effectiveness and cost–effectiveness of interventions to reduce alcohol-related harm"

 
WHO "European" keyword list..   (see http://www.euro.who.int/document/E92823.pdf )
 
  • ALCOHOL DRINKING – prevention and control
  • HARM REDUCTION
  • COST–BENEFIT ANALYSIS
  • EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE
  • PUBLIC POLICY
  • HEALTH PROMOTION
  • INTERVENTION STUDIES
Why CANNABIS cannot have the same best practice applied to it as ALCOHOL (a hypnotic sedative) beggers me. The underlined keywords 'for addressing and understanding alcohol' seem not to apply to the cannabis policy formulation. Yet the 'drug use' particularly amongst youth remains a 'spectrum' issue.
 
Doh!  When something is made illegal do we all turn stupid?

Saturday, September 19, 2009

On state controlled and regulated cannabis and alcohol.

President George W. Bush meets with California...

"Texass Blonde Geowrge, jew bwing any?"

Image via Wikipedia

State Controlled and Regulated Class D,
 
Cannabis under Class D would be 'state' controlled but community trusts could administer and local bodies enforce. (No more difficult than licensing trusts for alcohol, indeed easier if community has buy in to solutions under ambit of Class D regulation.) 
 
Empowering Communities to fix what is broken....   revenue stream should be fiscally neutral.
If cannabis isn't the problem its shouldn't be bearing the (cost) burden.
 
Cannabis SHOULD compete with Alcohol, and displace the serious 'demon drink'  harms economically.
 
To raise the cost and decrease availability of  of alcohol without lowering sanction on cannabis will lead to more sanction related harm  > ipso facto more police resources required to fix emerging problem. [Changing Alcohol laws/regulations may make the problem worse to more people ]
 
for example in Sellman's  5+ solution, blanket age of 20yrs for alcohol is proposed. Whereas Class D is 18yrs. (IE: practice with safe drugs and less will abuse alcohol at 20yrs)
 
Remove anomalous double standards that are an identified impediment to 'all drug' health promotion
 
 
Yadda yadda  /Blair

 
 

Copenhagen Considers Legalizing Cannabis - By User
A debate over legal marijuana has been raging in Denmark this summer because of an unpleasant gang war. Denmark has had a liberal attitude towards cannabis since the 1970s. The open sale of hashish. ... The report refers to the Beckley Foundation Cannabis Commission report in several places. In short, the report concludes (like Arnold Schwarzenegger) that there are no examples of state controlled and regulated cannabis, but that it could nevertheless be an alternative to ...
420 Magazine - http://www.420magazine.com/forums/
 
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Friday, September 18, 2009

School Bus, Full Life

Post my presentation to Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey Palmer (President, Law Commission) on "Alcohol in our Lives" the cosmos provided the following photo opportunity on my drive home down Woodham Rd outside Avonside Girls High School.







(NB: One of the past Principals of AGHS became Labour MP, Hon Marian Hobbs, now retired).




Monday, September 14, 2009

Dunedin Mayor sees SAFER alternatives required for Undies.

see comment #122
/ Blair Anderson  ‹(•¿•)›
ph (643) 389 4065   cell 027 265 7219

Friday, September 11, 2009

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Age of Consent.

Age of Consent (film)

Image via Wikipedia

As seen on Trademe Opinion.

This judge must be a mate of Phill Goffs.... he wanted the age of consent lowered to 12!

And not without good reason.

Such a move would demonstrate a far more enlightened justice/health approach than is evident now.

While Goff was shot down by one-sided media storm better described as a moral panic, no one seemed to notice that our age of consent laws are 'Victorian' by world standards. They smack of intolerance (that is the USA model after all) and protect youth poorly. Further evidence [such] laws do a very poor job of defining 'morality'. Most of Europe and 'educated' countries like Canada understand this issue. We collectively do not. And because of that, we endanger our children in the mistaken belief 'if it just saves one kid'.

I look forward to a more informed debate surrounding age of consent but doubtless we will lurch on jaw gnashing 'morality in hope' the law if only applied with more retributive 'get tough' teeth - will work eventually.

It will not.

(Canada, AOC is 14 with 2yr difference rule same as proposed by Goff. )



--
Blair Anderson ‹(•¿•)›

Social Ecologist 'at large'
http://mildgreens.blogspot.com
http://blairformayor.blogspot.com
http://blair4mayor.com
http://efsdp.org

ph (643) 389 4065 cell 027 265 7219

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