1/5/10 Mother Jones reviews a new book:
Tell Your Children is nonfiction that takes a sledgehammer to the promised benefits of marijuana legalization, and cannabis enthusiasts are not going to like it one bit....
We look back and laugh at Reefer Madness, which was pretty over-the-top, after all, but Berenson found himself immersed in some pretty sobering evidence: Cannabis has been associated with legitimate reports of psychotic behavior and violence dating at least to the 19th century, when a Punjabi lawyer in India noted that 20 to 30 percent of patients in mental hospitals were committed for cannabis-related insanity. The lawyer, like Berenson’s wife, described horrific crimes—including at least one beheading—and attributed far more cases of mental illness to cannabis than to alcohol or opium. The Mexican government reached similar conclusions, banning cannabis sales in 1920—nearly 20 years before the United States did—after years of reports of cannabis-induced madness and violent crime.
Regular readers of this blog will not be surprised, but regular readers of
Mother Jones are probably making little Bereson voodoo dolls now. I suspect George Soros' funding of pot legalization is at least partly driven by his hatred of America, which does not
yet look like Jamaica.
You published a link a while back that showed a 1 in 11 chance of becoming schizophrenic after marijuana use, with that occurrence being completely unpredictable. When California went reefer mad I said that we will soon know if there is really any scientifically provable benefit to marijuana. And whether tobacco smoking was uniquely bad, or if inhaling the smoke of any burning leaves would result in similar effects.
ReplyDeleteCorrelation is not causation.
ReplyDeleteIt's at least as likely that schizophrenics tend to self-medicate with cannabis as it is that cannabis causes schizophrenia.
Jeff: No, some of the studies, such as the Christchurch, N.Z. longitudinal study, looked for prodomal indications of mental illness and established that heavy use preceded schizophrenia. Not every pot smoker or even most will end up schizophrenic, but often enough that it is a significant public (and private) health concern.
ReplyDeleteWould bi-polar be included in this? I've seen a number of people who smoked pot, that turned out to be bi-polar, or were related to them.
ReplyDeleteDon't forget that Silicon Valley seemed to run on pot, at least in the early days. (as you probably knew, since you lived here) The workers that didn't use it seemed to be a smaller number than the users. I don't work in high-tech anymore (since '00), so I don't have a current view.