The Marijuana Debate
Tue, Jun 10th 2008, 10:24
It's only a matter of time before lies surrounding the marijuana debate come crumbling down. The problem with the current 'debate' is that there are basically two sides, one grounded in reality and one grounded in the usual politics.
Take
this article for example. It has an eye catching headline of "Marijuana May Up Heart Attack, Stroke Risk". The first paragraph of the article reads:
"Heavy marijuana use can boost blood levels of a particular protein, perhaps raising a person's risk of a heart attack or stroke, U.S. government researchers said on Tuesday."
Such strong words! "
can boost blood levels"? "
perhaps raising a person's risk"?
Perhaps its time to stop smoking! Perhaps.
Now lets look at some actual facts. The study was done on "18 long-term, heavy marijuana users and 24 other people who did not use the drug" "based on self-reported drug history". The participants were smoking an average of "78 to 350 marijuana cigarettes per week". Now reread that last sentence, 350 "marijuana cigarettes" a week! So here we have a "respected" news organization, Reuters, reporting that "Marijuana May Up Heart Attack, Stroke Risk" based on a study from an extremely biased source that uses self-reported data by people claiming, literally, to smoke 50 joints a day. Good thinking!
Often times this is how the marijuana debate gets framed, and what's sad is that any legitimate concerns about marijuana use gets thrown aside for crack pot studies like this. Couple that with extremely shoddy and flat out irresponsible journalism on the part of "respected" news organizations, and the entire debate becomes useless.
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