Should Marijuana be legal?

Legal Marijuana

An often arising social question that has come up throughout the 20th century and continues to crop up today is the issue of legalizing marijuana . While the general approach to dealing with this issue is to consider the harmful effects of the drug , including harmful social effects , there are many reasons that approach is inappropriate . What follows will briefly discuss the know effects of marijuana and consider why that knowledge has absolutely no bearing on the issue . Although this question really has no bearing at all on the issue of

legalizing marijuana , it is generally the focus of those who oppose marijuana use and thus , will be the focus of this essay . The question is "How dangerous is marijuana to users " In general , this essay will address four issues : 1 ) Why is marijuana use a legal issue while tobacco and alcohol use are not 2 ) Is marijuana a harmful drug 3 ) If now , why the concern over marijuana use and 4 ) What are the drug effects of marijuana ? This analysis will demonstrate that a research-based argument against marijuana use is groundless and has no bearing on the issue . Although marijuana is the most widely used illegal drug in the US , this is probably best addressed to legislators . Clearly , that effort is fruitless since it is already well known that marijuana is less harmful (in fact , not harmful ) than tobacco and alcohol , both of which are legal . We shall conclude by pointing out that the matter of legal marijuana is merely a social issue that cannot be resolved rationally

Even though marijuana has been associated with some health hazards it is not a harmful drug ! Arguments to the contrary have been filled with contradictions , not so much because the drug doesn 't have some undesirable health consequences , but because those consequences are often exaggerated . The active ingredient in marijuana is THC tetrahydrocannabinol . THC acts at receptors in the brain involved with coordination , memory , thought and perception . The drug is thought to affect neural centers connected with motivation and stress and might also affect ovulation and decrease sperm production . It can affect blood pressure and therefore might pose a problem to individuals with blood pressure concerns , and it might trigger anxiety and depression and irony since the drug is often used to avoid depressed states and often causes elation . Other undesirable effects have been noted throughout this report , but a rational review of the generaly effects of marijuana clearly demonstrate that alcohol and tobacco cause far more family , social and health problems than marijuana , and yet alcohol and tobacco are legal and there is no effort to alter the situation . Why then , is so much effort addressed to keeping marijuana illegal

In the 1980s , the federal government briefly resorted to spraying marijuana plants with paraquat in an effort to stop people from smoking it . This government action should have been viewed as a crime and the government officials who suggested it and put it in place should have been...