Pot is a Gateway Drug (to less alcohol consumption and hard drug use)
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Study today shows 1 in 20 babies born is negatively affected in the womb by booze.
Think about that - 5% - or, taken over our whole population - 16 Million or so.
There are a LOT of the %'s - and, remember, you have to add them all up. Something might seem small if you don't.
For example, 4-5% of people are Sociopaths
A few % of other babies are affected by other drugs, including many legal ones (opiates and many more).
1-2% are psychopaths
So we've probably hit 15% (50+ Million Americans!) before we even get started with more "natural" defects, although many of these are environmentals also (many cancers, allergies, etc.).......
This is what amazes me sometimes about the Right and their preaching for people to "lift themselves up by their bootstraps". I've read too much history to believe that BS. Sure, during WWII or certain booms almost anyone could get a job with good pay and benefits, but those times are few.
Anyway, add up those numbers (autism, aspergers, lupus, cancers and more) and you'll soon find it's best to assume that quite a large % of the population needs help....medicines or behavior. Many cannot be helped.
I know a really nice and loving couple that adopted a "booze" baby. No matter what they did, they could not get him under control...whether he was 2, 5, 8 or 11 years old. Finally they had to think of their own safety and that of others and assign him to a "state school"...which really means you will be drugged for the rest of your life.
As if to prove the point, the couple (thought infertile) had a bio child many years later and you could not find a more mature husband and man (he's 22 or so now)....
Anyway, the points are many. First, one needs to make the assumption that a vast percentage of people have serious conditions. Sure, they are on a scale....but easily 1/3 of people are burdened by something quite heavy which is not their own fault. To those we can add another 1/3 who screw themselves up...and maybe the last 1/3 that is semi-normal. Again, there are lots of factors at work. Many who screw themselves up may have been born unlucky with a poor IQ and in poverty. Or, maybe they are smart and have a good family but are heavily (genetically) prone to addition.
What is the point of all this? Be nice to people - be accepting, assume they are going through many hard passages. When it comes to medicine, just about anything in moderation which can help should be available. At the same time, in the USA we probably over-medicate both our children, patients and ourselves...
No one said life is easy.
Having been a member of the "counterculture", I got my fill of soft drugs way back when. Turns out that pot doesn't agree with me. I sorta wish it did...booze doesn't agree with me either. I've been "experienced" but those types of drugs are of no use once you have been to the mountaintop and seen the promised land.
As the song goes "I want a new drug" (you have to be older to remember that song).
I am sympathetic to your point ... however, should point out that many of the people afflicted with any of the conditions and disorders you cite, are afflicted with several others simultaneously. It's known as co-morbidity. What this means is that your assignment of serious disorders to such a majority of the population is incorrect. Yes, there are LOTS of people with serious disorders. But not nearly of the magnitude you suggest.
Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Carl Sagan, Oliver Sachs, Francis Crick (discoverer of DNA / awarded Nobel Prize), George Washington, Wm Shakespeare, Joan of Arc .... my handy list ... so many more I can trot out but y'all get the idea ...
Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Carl Sagan, Oliver Sachs, Francis Crick (discoverer of DNA / awarded Nobel Prize), George Washington, Wm Shakespeare, Joan of Arc .... my handy list ... so many more I can trot out but y'all get the idea ...
And Willie Nelson, Michael Phelps, George Bush, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, John Kennedy, Andrew Jackson, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, etc.
We can list all day and everyday thereafter all year and not get through much of history's list ...
Nor will you get the message through to the prohibitionists and Reefer Madness Addicts of the world...
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