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  • Locked thread
KingEup
Nov 18, 2004
I am a REAL ADDICT
(to threadshitting)


Please ask me for my google inspired wisdom on shit I know nothing about. Actually, you don't even have to ask.

Install Gentoo posted:

Would you mind showing where he's doing that? Because from where I'm standing none of his posts have anything like that going on, only other people blowing his opinions way out of proportion.

Well maybe catasphrophising isn't the right word:

echinopsis posted:

Who is going to pay for the psychiatric visits for psychosis or for COPD treatments?

echinopsis posted:

who pays for the ambulance when johnny 16 eats too many cannabis cookies and gets scared? We live in a social society and this drug use is going to have a cost. It might be small. It's likely smaller than the cost of prohibition and/or the cost of alcohol to society. Doesn't mean it's "all good"

I don't understand why he seems so preoccupied with the costs of cannabis use and 'who is going to pay for it' (following cannabis legalisation) when we have been been paying for the costs of cannabis use in loving addition to the costs of cannabis prohibition for more than 50 years.

Excuse me if I think little Johnny phoning an ambulance is a totally nonsensical concern when prohibition related violence, growth of organised crime, corruption and human rights abuses are tearing societies apart. The structural violence at play here is on a scale comparable to slavery and here we have some poo poo-heel banging on about the cost a loving ambulance call.

It would be no different to hand wringing about the cost of extra ballot papers needed if women won the right to vote. Suck it the gently caress up.

KingEup fucked around with this message at 04:25 on May 31, 2013

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Muck and Mire
Dec 9, 2011

Install Gentoo posted:

Would you mind showing where he's doing that? Because from where I'm standing none of his posts have anything like that going on, only other people blowing his opinions way out of proportion.

It appears that you don't understand, clearly. There's about 50 pages of fairly solid discussion of weed here, much of which is about the specific regulatory bodies and procedures that have emerged since weed became legal in CO and WA. He appears to have missed all of that and instead wants to focus on the terrible social consequences of legal weed which are, of course, laughable in the face of the very real harm that prohibition causes today.

Of course we want to "do it right" but tut-tutting over the cost of all the ambulances we're going to need in a legal weed world is just concern trolling. It's worth addressing him, concern trolling and all, because there are people who will say these same dumb things as weed legalization spreads.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

KingEup posted:

Well maybe catasphrophising isn't the right word:



I don't understand why he seems so preoccupied with the costs of cannabis use and 'who is going to pay for it' (following cannabis legalisation) when we have been been paying for the costs of cannabis use in loving addition to the costs of cannabis prohibition for more than 50 years.

Excuse me if I think little Johnny phoning an ambulance is a totally nonsensical concern when prohibition related violence, growth of organised crime, corruption and human rights abuses are tearing societies apart. The structural violence at play here is on a scale comparable to slavery and here we have some poo poo-heel banging on about the cost a loving ambulance call.

It would be no different to hand wringing about the cost of extra ballot papers needed if women won the right to vote. Suck it the gently caress up.

But none of that has anything to do with what he's actually saying. What he's saying is "since we're going to be taxing legal weed, some of it should go to cover the costs to society".

At absolutely no point does he say that prohibition is a great idea or weed shouldn't be legal.

Muck and Mire posted:

It appears that you don't understand, clearly. There's about 50 pages of fairly solid discussion of weed here, much of which is about the specific regulatory bodies and procedures that have emerged since weed became legal in CO and WA. He appears to have missed all of that and instead wants to focus on the terrible social consequences of legal weed which are, of course, laughable in the face of the very real harm that prohibition causes today.

Of course we want to "do it right" but tut-tutting over the cost of all the ambulances we're going to need in a legal weed world is just concern trolling. It's worth addressing him, concern trolling and all, because there are people who will say these same dumb things as weed legalization spreads.

Again, you're completely blowing what he says out of proportion. He says "hey weed isn't social cost free, let's pay for that as part of the taxes" and you're painting it as if he's saying "weed will destroy society and we shouldn't do it".

Muck and Mire
Dec 9, 2011

Well, given that a ton of people already smoke weed and that traditionally legalization does not increase usage... who pays for the social costs of weed now?

Of course taxes on weed should go for good things, up to and including offsetting any harm caused by legalization (lol), nobody will contest that. His attitude is lovely and his examples are laughable.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

Muck and Mire posted:

Well, given that a ton of people already smoke weed and that traditionally legalization does not increase usage... who pays for the social costs of weed now?

Of course taxes on weed should go for good things, up to and including offsetting any harm caused by legalization (lol), nobody will contest that. His attitude is lovely and his examples are laughable.

Everyone does.

His attitude isn't lovely at all, it's in line with how other direct taxes like this tend to work.

Red_Mage
Jul 23, 2007
I SHOULD BE FUCKING PERMABANNED BUT IN THE MEANTIME ASK ME ABOUT MY FAILED KICKSTARTER AND RUNNING OFF WITH THE MONEY

Muck and Mire posted:

It is pretty funny to watch people take their inherent dislike of "stoner culture" and let it color their arguments about marijuana legalization.

Ugh, the leaf of the marijuana plant is being displayed on the regulatory material that deals with said plant? How gauche.

Its funny because I really detest stoner culture(even just general drug culture really), but that label is unmistakable and easily recognized and basically just done well. Also it's a giant loving middle finger to the rest of the country and I like watching states get pissy with each other.

Preem Palver
Jul 5, 2007

Install Gentoo posted:

Everyone does.

His attitude isn't lovely at all, it's in line with how other direct taxes like this tend to work.

I think everyone's jumping on him because he's acting as if literally no one else ever thought of these issues before weed was legalized in Washington and Colorado, instead of spending all of two minutes skimming through this thread or googling to find out what regulations are being put in place to address the societal cost of legalization. We're all aware that some people will have adverse affects from certain drugs, including marijuana, so him continuing to act as if everyone in this thread are a bunch of stoners obsessed with weed no matter the consequences is kind of insulting on his part. Hell, my own issues with social anxiety and chronic depression were likely exacerbated by heavy weed smoking when I was 19-22 (there were other factors that were probably bigger contributors), but I'm still in favor of legalization. I don't think anyone in here has said that legal weed should not be taxed or that those taxes should not go to offsetting the societal cost. If anyone did it's simple enough to put them on ignore.

And, y'know, his holier-than-thou attitude that no one should ever want to be intoxicated or do something that may be harmful because of the ~cost to society~. Guess it's time to give up the caffeine and acetaminophen, lest someone have a heart attack or suffer liver damage.

echinopsis
Apr 13, 2004

by Fluffdaddy
Holy loving poo poo you guys get your panties in a bunch quickly don't you?

echinopsis
Apr 13, 2004

by Fluffdaddy

Delta-Wye posted:

If you think kids who eat too many pot brownies are expensive to treat, you should see how expensive your average old (or fat, or god help you, fat AND old) person is.

Fuckin' tell me about it. I work in the health industry, you think I don't see waste and the money spent keeping people afloat under UHC?

I'm all for UHC and I generally don't think people should be forced to pay for everything of their own. And of course some people are going to cost the system more than their "fair share" but when it's because of an active choice of their life (alcohol, risky sports etc) I think it's fair to pass some of the burden back to them to try to fairen it up a bit.


Muck and Mire posted:

Why should I pay for roads I don't use, or recreation areas I don't visit, or any other single thing from which I don't receive direct and acute benefits? Because that's what living in a society is like.

I appreciate your points but it's not black and white is it? Do trucks pay more road tax because they harm the road more?

litany of gulps posted:

Frankly, no. What you're talking about is ridiculous, and looks to me like a thinly veiled excuse to trash talk people that smoke marijuana because you have some personal dislike toward it.

Nice words in my mouth. I don't get where you think I'm trash talking weed consumers.



KingEup posted:

Yes, there are costs associated with marijuana use but there are also costs involved with credit card use, spending too much time in the sun and listening to loud iPods.

So how do we address those? How do we not burden the entire nation excessively for the moronic acts of the few?

quote:

We don't really disagree on this point, we just don't get the hand wringing.

Welp

Muck and Mire posted:

Well, given that a ton of people already smoke weed and that traditionally legalization does not increase usage... who pays for the social costs of weed now?

Doesn't matter, because it certainly doesn't come from taxes on cannabis. Hopefully a move can change this

quote:

His attitude is lovely and his examples are laughable.

it's you. you're the laughable example

Preem Palver posted:

And, y'know, his holier-than-thou attitude that no one should ever want to be intoxicated or do something that may be harmful because of the ~cost to society~.

Jesus. All I was saying was that it would be "ideal" for people to not "do" cannabis. That would be the overall best scenario. Just like it would be overall best if no-one overate or had car accidents. Of course these things happen so lets deal with them when they do

mugrim posted:

Progressive income taxes and universal health care. Pot related issues medically speaking are negligible and in an Obese nation eating itself to death there are many easier ways to lower healthcare costs on a much larger scale.

Interesting. Working in the medical field makes me cynical towards UHC simply because of the lack of ways to deny treatment to those to which it's not cost effective (or I should say, extremely non cost effective and/or seriously crossing the line of pure wasting money). That's a different beef I have with medical ethics which I want to chat about but here isn't the place

Muck and Mire
Dec 9, 2011

echinopsis posted:


Jesus. All I was saying was that it would be "ideal" for people to not "do" cannabis.

Counterpoint: You don't listen to rap music

MixMasterMalaria
Jul 26, 2007

echinopsis posted:

Oh you're not talking about dangers when used as directed? Cool
If they labeled cannabis with sufficient instructions for use without harm then you'd be fine with it, regardless of how people actually used it? Even if acetaminophen/paracetamol is safe at the suggested doses its does generate a significant burden for health systems because of its real-world use profile.

quote:

Paracetamol overdose results in more calls to poison control centers in the US than overdose of any other pharmacological substance, accounting for more than 100,000 calls, as well as 56,000 emergency room visits, 2,600 hospitalizations, and 458 deaths due to acute liver failure per year.[78] A study of cases of acute liver failure between November 2000 and October 2004 by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the USA found that paracetamol was the cause of 41% of all cases in adults, and 25% of cases in children.[79]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracetamol_toxicity

echinopsis posted:

All I was saying was that it would be "ideal" for people to not "do" cannabis. That would be the overall best scenario. Just like it would be overall best if no-one overate or had car accidents. Of course these things happen so lets deal with them when they do

People do all kinds of things to improve their quality of life and not every marginally elevated statistical risk that people accept in exchange for subjective benefits is some kind of tragedy. Where do you draw the line?

MixMasterMalaria fucked around with this message at 10:24 on May 31, 2013

echinopsis
Apr 13, 2004

by Fluffdaddy
I honestly don't know how well regulated paracetamol is in the US. You can only buy boxes of 20 tablets from a supermarket here in NZ, any more and you have to go to a pharmacy. You do raise interesting information though and perhaps some of us in the drug dealing industry are a little lax with our paracetamol.

MixMasterMalaria
Jul 26, 2007

echinopsis posted:

I honestly don't know how well regulated paracetamol is in the US. You can only buy boxes of 20 tablets from a supermarket here in NZ, any more and you have to go to a pharmacy. You do raise interesting information though and perhaps some of us in the drug dealing industry are a little lax with our paracetamol.

It's available in large quantities over the counter in the US.

http://www.amazon.com/Tylenol-Extra-Strength-Acetaminophen-Caplets/dp/B003BDUBRA/ref=zg_bs_3764011_1

echinopsis
Apr 13, 2004

by Fluffdaddy
Interesting. I don't know what to make of it exactly

wilfredmerriweathr
Jul 11, 2005
I understand that you come from a different place but you really shouldn't be passing judgement on legalization efforts in the US without understanding our society.

The interesting fact is that the exact same argument you use against weed being legalized (it will stress the UHC system) is the argument that people use here against UHC.

"I don't want to pay for [health problem someone could theoretically have brought on themselves]" is the only real argument I've heard from opponents of UHC in the US, and yet here you are, WITH UHC, arguing about why weed shouldn't be legalized because then your UHC system will have to pay for all those problems that weed brings on (even though there don't actually appear to be any problems - studies that tried to find health problems with it ended up finding that cannabis use by and large makes people live a bit healthier - and yes we've been doing studies on this stuff in california for almost 20 years now.)


Also I think maybe you are unaware of the ridiculous sway that pharmaceutical companies command in the US. We have a huge problem with prescription painkiller abuse, for example, due in part to the fact that doctors hand them out like hotcakes. How to they justify this? They just put a shitload (500+ mg) of paracetamol in each pill to "dissuade abuse" so that people end up slowly killing their liver.

wilfredmerriweathr fucked around with this message at 13:13 on May 31, 2013

echinopsis
Apr 13, 2004

by Fluffdaddy

wilfredmerriweathr posted:

the exact same argument you use against weed being legalized

:ughh:

RichieWolk
Jun 4, 2004

FUCK UNIONS

UNIONS R4 DRUNKS

FUCK YOU

echinopsis posted:

Not as a rebuttal, but can you elaborate on the dangers of acetaminophen? I sell/dispense it to people every day and I want to know what I should be warning them about

echinopsis posted:

Fuckin' tell me about it. I work in the health industry, you think I don't see waste and the money spent keeping people afloat under UHC?


You can't even be bothered to learn about drugs you legally dispense to others every day, why should anyone pay attention to your arguments about a drug you clearly have zero knowledge of?

edit: nevermind, you're from new zealand. HAHAHhahahahahahaha

veedubfreak
Apr 2, 2005

by Smythe
Just a quick note, but google the amount of deaths from ALREADY LEGAL SUBSTANCES vs weed. You will see that no one has ever died from weed. Now crawl back under your rock.

Also, COPD from weed, that's just funny.

Murmur Twin
Feb 11, 2003

An ever-honest pacifist with no mind for tricks.

echinopsis posted:

Jesus. All I was saying was that it would be "ideal" for people to not "do" cannabis. That would be the overall best scenario.

Woah woah woah. I disagree.

quote:

You know what situation would be best? If people didn't smoke weed at all. But people are going to, so we make it so when they do there are support groups if they want to stop but feel they can't (yes this happens with cannabis) and ways to recover some of the cost to the health system.

Some quick questions for you:

1. Have you ever smoked weed?

2. Why do you think people smoke weed? I mean this in the literal "are you aware of the effects of weed" sense, not in the "why do people turn to intoxicants" sense.

I've been a pot smoker for the last decade or so and if anything it's improved my life. Listening to your favorite song or eating your favorite food or just smoking up and relaxing after a hard days' work is wonderful. I've made plenty of interesting friends by offering to share a bowl with them. I'm generally a really happy person because I stress out about insignificant bullshit far less than most people I know. And yes, I do this all with a full-time job that I'm good at and a clean criminal record, and no, I don't wear pot leaves on my shirts or think saying "420 BRO!!!!" is funny.

Obviously that last paragraph is more antecdotal than scientific, but I don't think I'm a unique case. There's a reason that people are starting to vote to legalize weed, and that's because thousands of people are trying it and realizing that (for them) the pros outweigh the cons. I get the fears that people will crash their cars or overdose on brownies or become lazy, but those are individual things that can be addressed with proper education and an understanding of positive/negative behaviors.

Murmur Twin
Feb 11, 2003

An ever-honest pacifist with no mind for tricks.
double post, aaaugh

Rigged Death Trap
Feb 13, 2012

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

echinopsis posted:

Fuckin' tell me about it. I work in the health industry, you think I don't see waste and the money spent keeping people afloat under UHC?

I'm all for UHC and I generally don't think people should be forced to pay for everything of their own. And of course some people are going to cost the system more than their "fair share" but when it's because of an active choice of their life (alcohol, risky sports etc) I think it's fair to pass some of the burden back to them to try to fairen it up a bit.

Interesting. Working in the medical field makes me cynical towards UHC simply because of the lack of ways to deny treatment to those to which it's not cost effective (or I should say, extremely non cost effective and/or seriously crossing the line of pure wasting money). That's a different beef I have with medical ethics which I want to chat about but here isn't the place

The way UHC works is that the healthy portion of the public effectively subsidizes the currently sick. There shouldn't be any denied treatments because the program exists for the good of all people in society. Cost effectiveness in UHC should only be approached in ways that deliver the same or better treatment for lower cost, never as tightening the pool of treatable patients.

As for Marijuana's medical cost: Most of the stigma surrounding marijuana is based around it's illegality, removing that stigma will also help to remove the myths surrounding it, leading to more responsible use and a reduction in possible harm. Having it become a regulated and labelled substance will make it easier for people to understand the side effects, either by increasing the amount of readily available information or through awareness programs, failing that it can be printed straight on the bag.

This way more people with a predisposition to mental illnesses, arguably the group most likely to suffer detrimental side effects, will inevitably learn about what marijuana may do to their mental health.

This possible increase in medical costs is still, however, dwarfed by both current economic and societal costs of prohibition.


Also some of the pro-weed guys are coming off as pricks.
Echinopsis has some very legitimate, grounded concerns about legalization.

Doorknob Slobber
Sep 10, 2006

by Fluffdaddy

Muck and Mire posted:

It is pretty funny to watch people take their inherent dislike of "stoner culture" and let it color their arguments about marijuana legalization.

I am 100% for marijuana legalization and smoke myself and hope to grow/sell it at some point. But I hate "stoner culture". I went to Hemp Fest in Seattle a couple years ago and it was the most terrible experience of my life. I blame all the attempts to keep pot illegal on the culture surrounding marijuana and I hope that now that it is legal we will see that stuff go away.

FreshlyShaven
Sep 2, 2004
Je ne veux pas d'un monde où la certitude de mourir de faim s'échange contre le risque de mourir d'ennui
I don't wanna join the echinopsis dogpile, but I have an issue with his argument: he begs the assumption that marijuana use is a net cost to society. Sure, pot has some downsides, but is that a safe assumption? Legalization in CO and WA will undoubtedly bring in tourists, who spend money at hotels, restaurants, shops, resorts, rental places, etc. and some of that money will end up in state coffers even though it doesn't come directly from pot revenues. In addition, while pot may have some very mild downsides, it's still up in the air as to whether or not it is, on a whole, healthy or unhealthy. It doesn't cause respiratory cancers, COPD or significant lung damage but studies suggest that pot users are less likely to develop bladder cancer or type II diabetes. There are also preliminary studies suggesting that cannabinoids may interfere with arterial plaque formation, the main cause of heart attack and stroke. Plus, marijuana treats many common ailments like mild to moderate pain, nausea, PMS or insomnia more safely than drugs like Midol or Ibuprofen. It also seems to reduce stress and increase restfulness(it's a common treatment for insomnia), both of which are known to improve health and lengthen lifespans. And most importantly, if, as intended, marijuana is used as a healthier and safer alternative to alcohol, the reduced cost in alcohol-related illnesses, disturbances and crimes should more than cancel out any possible harms caused by cannabis use.

rscott
Dec 10, 2009
When your arguments start with talking about weed caused COPD cases and psychosis from eating too many pot brownies it's pretty hard to take anything further you say after that seriously, especially when you continue to use rhetoric like, "burden the nation excessively" w/r/t marijuana use.

KernelSlanders
May 27, 2013

Rogue operating systems on occasion spread lies and rumors about me.

veedubfreak posted:

Just a quick note, but google the amount of deaths from ALREADY LEGAL SUBSTANCES vs weed. You will see that no one has ever died from weed. Now crawl back under your rock.

Also, COPD from weed, that's just funny.

Please substantiate that ridiculously over broad and general statement.

Also: counter point. Note that I'm not saying this is an argument for or against legalization, but the debate isn't helped by clearly false hyperbole.

litany of gulps
Jun 11, 2001

Fun Shoe

KernelSlanders posted:

Please substantiate that ridiculously over broad and general statement.

Also: counter point. Note that I'm not saying this is an argument for or against legalization, but the debate isn't helped by clearly false hyperbole.

It appears that he's talking about death from simply taking the substance. Which is true.

If you're bringing in related issues like driving while impaired, I think at the very least we can all agree that driving while under the influence of marijuana is significantly less damaging than driving while under the influence of alcohol or any number of more legal and socially acceptable drugs. You can be right at the cusp of legality to drive while intoxicated with alcohol and be 11 times more likely to have a car accident. How does that compare with the 2 times from marijuana? Or the 23 times from texting?

Not that anyone here seems to be particularly supportive of legalizing operating heavy machinery while on drugs in general.

Edit: God forbid we even start looking at how many people in America use painkillers and drive around on that poo poo.

litany of gulps fucked around with this message at 18:48 on May 31, 2013

I Dont Like You
Jul 6, 2003

KernelSlanders posted:

Please substantiate that ridiculously over broad and general statement.

Also: counter point. Note that I'm not saying this is an argument for or against legalization, but the debate isn't helped by clearly false hyperbole.

Well, I don't see one source in that USA Today "article" anyway, but I was under the assumption that veedubfreak meant no one died from the act of smoking weed itself.

Red_Mage
Jul 23, 2007
I SHOULD BE FUCKING PERMABANNED BUT IN THE MEANTIME ASK ME ABOUT MY FAILED KICKSTARTER AND RUNNING OFF WITH THE MONEY

litany of gulps posted:

Not that anyone here seems to be particularly supportive of legalizing operating heavy machinery while on drugs in general.

I assure you the biggest hurdle to marijuana legalization in the mind of the average voter at this point are the people who support legal operation of heavy machinery while under the influence of all manner of drugs. There are several of them in this thread periodically.

Also for the record there are 4 recorded deaths from marinol overdoses. While (AFAWK) you cannot take a lethal dose of marijuana, you can take a lethal dose of THC, its still kind of hard to do though since it takes a lot.

MaxxBot
Oct 6, 2003

you could have clapped

you should have clapped!!
I would happily pay a "sin tax" on pot as long as the tax covered the quantifiable costs to society from pot and nothing else, I would expect this figure to be low single digits if that. Does anyone honestly think there is any chance at all that the sin tax in real life would be what I just described and not some arbitrarily high amount?

EDIT: Also, while I do not support using heavy machinery while significantly impaired on anything, I just want all sources of impairment to be treated equally based off of how impaired your are, not based off of bullshit moralizing. As someone noted before texting while driving is insanely risky as proved by multiple studies but no one seems to have the same reaction to that as they do pot :confused:.

MaxxBot fucked around with this message at 19:01 on May 31, 2013

veedubfreak
Apr 2, 2005

by Smythe

I Dont Like You posted:

Well, I don't see one source in that USA Today "article" anyway, but I was under the assumption that veedubfreak meant no one died from the act of smoking weed itself.

This is exactly what I meant. It is not physically possible to smoke yourself to death. Meanwhile people OD on prescription drugs, acetomenaphin, alcohol, etc daily.

I'm betting those people who are twice as likely to get in an accident are usually getting rear ended by drunks because they are driving too slow after smoking.

Delta-Wye
Sep 29, 2005

MaxxBot posted:

I would happily pay a "sin tax" on pot as long as the tax covered the quantifiable costs to society from pot and nothing else, I would expect this figure to be low single digits if that. Does anyone honestly think there is any chance at all that the sin tax in real life would be what I just described and not some arbitrarily high amount?

Literally zero chance. What the hell is it with people and taxes? You pay it for the well-being of the community, not because you want to. Sin taxes are also used for more things than purely raising revenue anyways.

MaxxBot
Oct 6, 2003

you could have clapped

you should have clapped!!

Delta-Wye posted:

Literally zero chance. What the hell is it with people and taxes? You pay it for the well-being of the community, not because you want to. Sin taxes are also used for more things than purely raising revenue anyways.

Sin taxes are among the worst ways to raise government revenue, it's one of the most regressive forms of taxation you can have. I'm not completely against them as stated before but I am against making them arbitrarily high as means to to try stop people from using something.

KernelSlanders
May 27, 2013

Rogue operating systems on occasion spread lies and rumors about me.

litany of gulps posted:

It appears that he's talking about death from simply taking the substance. Which is true.

If you're bringing in related issues like driving while impaired, I think at the very least we can all agree that driving while under the influence of marijuana is significantly less damaging than driving while under the influence of alcohol or any number of more legal and socially acceptable drugs. You can be right at the cusp of legality to drive while intoxicated with alcohol and be 11 times more likely to have a car accident. How does that compare with the 2 times from marijuana? Or the 23 times from texting?

Not that anyone here seems to be particularly supportive of legalizing operating heavy machinery while on drugs in general.

Edit: God forbid we even start looking at how many people in America use painkillers and drive around on that poo poo.

Someone's probably burnt their house down while smoking it too. That's beside the point. While I agree that THC, by itself has probably never killed someone acutely in a recreational dose, all this is saying is that it's never killed anyone except in the ways it's killed someone. "No one has ever died from weed," is as silly a statement as, "no one has ever died from a bucket," which is also demonstrably false.

Nintendo Kid
Aug 4, 2011

by Smythe

MaxxBot posted:

I would happily pay a "sin tax" on pot as long as the tax covered the quantifiable costs to society from pot and nothing else, I would expect this figure to be low single digits if that. Does anyone honestly think there is any chance at all that the sin tax in real life would be what I just described and not some arbitrarily high amount?


The government would have to be stupid as all hell not to slap high taxes on pot, because it's a guaranteed revenue stream and it's also very unlikely that even weed with very high taxes would cost more than illegal weed tends to now.

800peepee51doodoo
Mar 1, 2001

Volute the swarth, trawl betwixt phonotic
Scoff the festune

Delta-Wye posted:

Literally zero chance. What the hell is it with people and taxes? You pay it for the well-being of the community, not because you want to. Sin taxes are also used for more things than purely raising revenue anyways.

With sin taxes in particular, one problem is that they are heavily regressive and disproportionately effect the poor. I'm not opposed to taxes and if that's what it takes to get weed legalized and begin to tear down the horror show that is the drug war, then fine. I'd really rather just charge income taxes and tax the profits of the legal businesses, though.

wilfredmerriweathr
Jul 11, 2005
Yeah legal weed could be taxed 100% and it'd probably still be cheaper than now.

Delta-Wye
Sep 29, 2005

MaxxBot posted:

Sin taxes are among the worst ways to raise government revenue, it's one of the most regressive forms of taxation you can have. I'm not completely against them as stated before but I am against making them arbitrarily high as means to to try stop people from using something.

800peepee51doodoo posted:

With sin taxes in particular, one problem is that they are heavily regressive and disproportionately effect the poor. I'm not opposed to taxes and if that's what it takes to get weed legalized and begin to tear down the horror show that is the drug war, then fine. I'd really rather just charge income taxes and tax the profits of the legal businesses, though.

Delta-Wye posted:

Literally zero chance. What the hell is it with people and taxes? You pay it for the well-being of the community, not because you want to. Sin taxes are also used for more things than purely raising revenue anyways.

I feel that their other purposes outweigh the regressive nature, if it's not done to ridiculous excess. Wikipedia calls them "sumptuary taxes" taxes, which makes it sound less puritan and more policy based, which does a better job of explaining what I mean. :science:

Servetus
Apr 1, 2010

Delta-Wye posted:

I feel that their other purposes outweigh the regressive nature, if it's not done to ridiculous excess. Wikipedia calls them "sumptuary taxes" taxes, which makes it sound less puritan and more policy based, which does a better job of explaining what I mean. :science:

Sumptuary laws are puritanical most of the time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumptuary_law

Delta-Wye
Sep 29, 2005

Servetus posted:

Sumptuary laws are puritanical most of the time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumptuary_law

Hence "makes it sound". Sumptuary laws/taxes artificially raise the price of items to reduce their use. It's unfortunate they are as regressive as they are (and it's worth trying to reduce that harm), but I don't think using taxes to keep the price of cannabis at a level the market will support (current prices) as opposed to the 'real' cost (maybe as far as an order of a magnitude lower) is necessary a bad idea. This is especially true if we are wading into uncharted territory to begin with; a lot of people are uncomfortable with a drug free-for-all and if there is still a large support for government control over use, and sin taxes are preferable to prohibition to me.

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TACD
Oct 27, 2000

KernelSlanders posted:

Please substantiate that ridiculously over broad and general statement.
I've posted this earlier in the thread but it bears a repeat: An index of fatal toxicity for drugs of misuse. Note Table 2, where death certificates on which cannabis is the only drug mentioned average 1.4 per year. (And 'mentioned' ≠ 'cause of death', but this study doesn't get into that level of detail.) In any case, whether or not the number of people killed just from the act of using cannabis is literally zero - I'm inclined to believe it is, but you can't prove a negative - you can see that it's ludicrously safe to use compared to everything else.

Edit: I've also previously referenced this study into relative drug harms which concludes cannabis is a bit more dangerous... than things like LSD, ecstasy and ketamine. (Which is to say, those drugs are even less harmful than an already almost harmless substance.) Any argument that is based on the 'harms' of cannabis is knocked completely sideways as soon as you look at how our society tolerates the massive harms caused by alcohol and tobacco. It's a non-starter.

TACD fucked around with this message at 20:21 on May 31, 2013

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