• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Colorado survey shows what marijuana legalization will do to your kids

T

TheDemSocialist

Gradualist
DP Veteran
Joined
Apr 13, 2011
Messages
34,951
Reaction score
16,311
Gender
Undisclosed
Political Leaning
Socialist
Rates of marijuana use among Colorado's teenagers are essentially unchanged in the years since the state's voters legalized marijuana in 2012, new survey data from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment shows.
In 2015, 21 percent of Colorado youths had used marijuana in the past 30 days. That rate is slightly lower than the national average and down slightly from the 25 percent who used marijuana in 2009, before legalization. The survey was based on a random sample of 17,000 middle and high school students in Colorado.
"The survey shows marijuana use has not increased since legalization, with four of five high school students continuing to say they don’t use marijuana, even occasionally," the Colorado health department said in a news release.

The latest data from Colorado includes 2015, reflecting two full years of the legal marijuana market's effect. These numbers give the strongest indication yet that fears of skyrocketing adolescent use have not materialized.
Click to expand...


Read more @: Colorado survey shows what marijuana legalization will do to your kids

But if we legalize weed all our kids are gonna become lazy pot head hippies! Wait a sec, that prediction isnt materializing? Say it ain't so!
 
So libertarians were right decades before liberals ever decided that legalizing pot was the right political move to take. Good to know.
 
Henrin said:
So libertarians were right decades before liberals ever decided that legalizing pot was the right political move to take. Good to know.
Click to expand...

Yes its just as black and white as that. Libertarian V Liberals on the "pot issue"
 
TheDemSocialist said:
Yes its just as black and white as that. Libertarian V Liberals on the "pot issue"
Click to expand...

Hey, you guys stole from us to gain political points, so yeah. Are libertarians just supposed to forget about being called crazy for saying this stuff decades ago?
 
Henrin said:
Hey, you guys stole from us to gain political points, so yeah. Are libertarians just supposed to forget about being called crazy for saying this stuff decades ago?
Click to expand...

Gentlemen, Gentlemen!

It doesn't really matter, because conservatives and (especially) social conservatives are eating crow and having their hair-on-fire claims thrown back in their faces.
 
I kind of expected that would be the case and have never opposed legalization, but it doesn't change the reality that weed isn't harmless to kids. 1 in 6 who start smoking as teens will develop a dependency as opposed to 1 in 10 who start smoking as adults and there are certainly cognitive impairments to frequent users, particularly to those already predisposed to mental illness. And of course, controlling for alcohol, the risk of vehicular accidents are double for teens who smoke weed as opposed to those who do not. That being said, I hope the taxes from marijuana are going toward paying the associated public health costs and toward prevention efforts. I am all for the liberty of people choosing to do it of their own accord but I should not have to pay for it and they should be held accountable if they do it irresponsibly in a way that hurts others.
 
Henrin said:
Hey, you guys stole from us to gain political points, so yeah. Are libertarians just supposed to forget about being called crazy for saying this stuff decades ago?
Click to expand...

You must live in a very black and white world. I dont doubt that many libertarians were for marijuana legalization before it became "mainstream" be them left-libertarians or right-libertarians, but there were still many many many many people from all political leanings and political thought who were for marijuana legalization as well before it became "mainstream". To boil it down as a black and white Libertarian v Liberal standpoint is idiotic.
 
TheDemSocialist said:
You must live in a very black and white world. I dont doubt that many libertarians were for marijuana legalization before it became "mainstream" be them left-libertarians or right-libertarians, but there were still many many many many people from all political leanings and political thought who were for marijuana legalization as well before it became "mainstream". To boil it down as a black and white Libertarian v Liberal standpoint is idiotic.
Click to expand...

Democrats didn't support the position until it was politically expedient. Democrats do that kind of **** on everything though, so it's not surprising. We didn't really start hearing liberals talk about legalizing pot until after the party decided to make it a goal of theirs in certain areas of the country. Oh and yes, libertarians were talking about it on the political stage well before liberals ever were. Of course when Libertarians were doing it we were called crazy and potheads by everyone.

It should also be noted that democrats have a long history now of stealing platforms and positions from third parties like the green and libertarian party.
 
Last edited:
Tanngrisnir said:
Gentlemen, Gentlemen!

It doesn't really matter, because conservatives and (especially) social conservatives are eating crow and having their hair-on-fire claims thrown back in their faces.
Click to expand...

Particularly not since the authoritarians will never, but never ever, admit that they were wrong about marijuana legalization. (or anything else, for that matter.) They can't say that it will make the "darkies think they're as good as white people" any more, but they will continue to spread fear that legalization will result in huge increases in usage.
 
TheDemSocialist said:
Read more @: Colorado survey shows what marijuana legalization will do to your kids

But if we legalize weed all our kids are gonna become lazy pot head hippies! Wait a sec, that prediction isnt materializing? Say it ain't so! [/FONT][/COLOR]
Click to expand...

My argument was about something that's actually important - people dying:
Study finds fatal crashes in Colorado have risen since legalized marijuana | Colorado Springs Gazette, News

DENVER - In the first year marijuana was available at retail stores in Colorado, 94 people died in crashes where a driver involved tested positive for some amount of marijuana, according to the third-annual marijuana legalization impact study released by the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area.

That's up from 71 in 2013, 78 in 2012 and 66 in 2011, the federal agency tasked with monitoring drug activity in Colorado, Montana, Utah and Wyoming found.

Tom Gorman, director of Rocky Mountain HIDTA, said those numbers were collected from coroners, police and sheriffs across the state.

"In 2009 when medical marijuana took effect, about 10 percent of all our traffic fatalities were marijuana related," Gorman said. "Now it's 19 percent. You'd have to be in total denial to say this is not related to legalizing marijuana. More people are going to use marijuana, and because of that you're going to have an upward trend in all these areas."

In Colorado, driving under the influence of marijuana is the same crime as driving drunk, and a driver whose blood contains 5 nanograms of the psychoactive drug THC is considered impaired. The data Gorman used was testing for anything above 1 nanogram of THC in 2014 and anything above 2 nanograms of THC in 2013 and 2012. The report notes the change captured overall screenings (not just fatalities), an increase of about 18 percent of cases that otherwise would not have registered.

Mason Tvert with the Marijuana Policy Project, the group that helped legalize marijuana in Colorado, said the report was "disingenuous and poorly researched."

"If this were a government report on any other issue it would probably spark and investigation into the competency and the political motivation of the agency that produced it," Tvert said.

He noted with regard to the fatalities that other state agencies have said one year of data is too little to draw conclusions on, and other drugs and alcohol are often involved in these fatalities.

About 33 percent of the fatalities in the HIDTA report involved only marijuana.

The report also found:

- an increase in marijuana related hospitalizations and emergency room visits

- an increase in marijuana related calls to poison control

- an increase in marijuana that is leaving Colorado for other states
Click to expand...
 
It's funny that even when democrats steal a position they fail to understand the reason for that position. Libertarians believe in legalizing pot because we own ourselves, while democrats believe in it because it's not bad for you. I enjoy people that can't even steal right.
 
Last edited:
Henrin said:
Democrats didn't support the position until it was politically expedient. Democrats do that kind of **** on everything though, so it's not surprising. We didn't really start hearing liberals talk about legalizing pot until after the party decided to make it a goal of theirs in certain areas of the country. Oh and yes, libertarians were talking about it on the political stage well before liberals ever were. Of course when Libertarians were doing it we were called crazy and potheads by everyone.
Click to expand...

Now you are trying to make it a Libertarian v Democrat issue?
1.)Legalization of Marijuana isnt even on the Democratic Party platform
2.)Many Democrats are still against legalization of Marijuana
3.)Marijuana legalization throughout history has been supported by individuals of all political stripes be them socialists, anarchists, left and right wing libertarians, pacifists, liberals, progressives, communists, etc.
4.)Do you not know the history of marijuana use and the legalization movement in the USA? Much of it was endorsed by individuals involved in the anti-war movement who were mostly made up of "left wing" individuals.....
5.)Individual liberty to use narcotics or put what you want in your body is not as simple as a issues that can be entirely cast as "libertarian" v "liberal" or "Democrat" or however your trying to frame this argument now.
6.)The world isnt as black and white as you want it to be
7.)In reality marijuana legalization has been supported from all stripes of people holding many stripes of political beliefs. Be them liberal, progressive, right wing libertarian, left wing libertarian, communist, socialist, anarchists, moderates, centrists, independents, etc.
 
faithful_servant said:
My argument was about something that's actually important - people dying:
Study finds fatal crashes in Colorado have risen since legalized marijuana | Colorado Springs Gazette, News
Click to expand...

Should we make alcohol illegal again because people are driving drunk?

Also simply having THC in your system at a time of a crash does not mean marijuana is responsible for the crash. Marijuana is not like alcohol.

"The problem with these criticisms is that we can test only for the presence of marijuana metabolites, not for inebriation. Metabolites can linger in the body for days after the drug’s effects wear off — sometimes even for weeks. Because we all metabolize drugs differently (and at different times and under different conditions), all that a positive test tells us is that the driver has smoked pot at some point in the past few days or weeks... It makes sense that loosening restrictions on pot would result in a higher percentage of drivers involved in fatal traffic accidents having smoked the drug at some point over the past few days or weeks. You’d also expect to find that a higher percentage of churchgoers, good Samaritans and soup kitchen volunteers would have pot in their system. You’d expect a similar result among any large sampling of people. This doesn’t necessarily mean that marijuana caused or was even a contributing factor to accidents, traffic violations or fatalities. This isn’t an argument that pot wasn’t a factor in at least some of those accidents, either. But that’s precisely the point. A post-accident test for marijuana metabolites doesn’t tell us much at all about whether pot contributed to the accident." https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...lities-in-colorado-are-at-near-historic-lows/
 
faithful_servant said:
My argument was about something that's actually important - people dying:
Study finds fatal crashes in Colorado have risen since legalized marijuana | Colorado Springs Gazette, News
Click to expand...
faithful_servant said:
Except for the part about more people getting killed....
Click to expand...

As was already pointed out, correlation does not imply causation. Alcohol, tobacco, and junk food kill over a million Americans a year. Why don't we lock people who eat at McDonalds, smoke a cigarette or enjoy a beer after work in cages just to keep the rest of us safe?

Henrin said:
It's funny that even when democrats steal a position they fail to understand the reason for that position. Libertarians believe in legalizing pot because we own ourselves, while democrats believe in it because it's not bad for you. I enjoy people that can't even steal right.
Click to expand...
Oh look, an anarchist pretending to be a libertarian pretending he invented the idea of being against the drug war.
 
Henrin said:
So libertarians were right decades before liberals ever decided that legalizing pot was the right political move to take. Good to know.
Click to expand...

People should listen to libertarians more.
 
Henrin said:
Democrats didn't support the position until it was politically expedient.
Click to expand...

This is true, but that's actually true for most candidates of both parties. Not just liberals.
 
TheDemSocialist said:
Should we make alcohol illegal again because people are driving drunk?

Also simply having THC in your system at a time of a crash does not mean marijuana is responsible for the crash. Marijuana is not like alcohol.

"The problem with these criticisms is that we can test only for the presence of marijuana metabolites, not for inebriation. Metabolites can linger in the body for days after the drug’s effects wear off — sometimes even for weeks. Because we all metabolize drugs differently (and at different times and under different conditions), all that a positive test tells us is that the driver has smoked pot at some point in the past few days or weeks... It makes sense that loosening restrictions on pot would result in a higher percentage of drivers involved in fatal traffic accidents having smoked the drug at some point over the past few days or weeks. You’d also expect to find that a higher percentage of churchgoers, good Samaritans and soup kitchen volunteers would have pot in their system. You’d expect a similar result among any large sampling of people. This doesn’t necessarily mean that marijuana caused or was even a contributing factor to accidents, traffic violations or fatalities. This isn’t an argument that pot wasn’t a factor in at least some of those accidents, either. But that’s precisely the point. A post-accident test for marijuana metabolites doesn’t tell us much at all about whether pot contributed to the accident." https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...lities-in-colorado-are-at-near-historic-lows/
Click to expand...

At the end of the day, more people have died so that other people could get high. Is that a good thing or a bad thing???
 
RabidAlpaca said:
As was already pointed out, correlation does not imply causation. Alcohol, tobacco, and junk food kill over a million Americans a year. Why don't we lock people who eat at McDonalds, smoke a cigarette or enjoy a beer after work in cages just to keep the rest of us safe?


Oh look, an anarchist pretending to be a libertarian pretending he invented the idea of being against the drug war.
Click to expand...

One bad thing does not justify another.

I agree that this study is largely based on correlation, but it also shows multiple trends, not just two.
The report also found:
- an increase in marijuana related hospitalizations and emergency room visits
- an increase in marijuana related calls to poison control
Click to expand...
 
faithful_servant said:
At the end of the day, more people have died so that other people could get high. Is that a good thing or a bad thing???
Click to expand...

More people have died to get high on alcohol. Does that mean we should make alcohol illegal again because people are driving drunk?

And you also ignored the points from the source how your study is deeply flawed: "The problem with these criticisms is that we can test only for the presence of marijuana metabolites, not for inebriation. Metabolites can linger in the body for days after the drug’s effects wear off — sometimes even for weeks. Because we all metabolize drugs differently (and at different times and under different conditions), all that a positive test tells us is that the driver has smoked pot at some point in the past few days or weeks... It makes sense that loosening restrictions on pot would result in a higher percentage of drivers involved in fatal traffic accidents having smoked the drug at some point over the past few days or weeks. You’d also expect to find that a higher percentage of churchgoers, good Samaritans and soup kitchen volunteers would have pot in their system. You’d expect a similar result among any large sampling of people. This doesn’t necessarily mean that marijuana caused or was even a contributing factor to accidents, traffic violations or fatalities. This isn’t an argument that pot wasn’t a factor in at least some of those accidents, either. But that’s precisely the point. A post-accident test for marijuana metabolites doesn’t tell us much at all about whether pot contributed to the accident."
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom