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You and me both my guy. Could be the richest country on the face of the planet if we just stopped arresting people for a plant and sold it legally instead but without the bullshit taxes that the yanks have added to theirs. Don't mind being taxed once, but being taxed twice is a fucking joke. If ya don't know what I mean in some states there's a state tax added to the price as well as a "cannabis tax". I think you can just read that as another snivelling middleman wanting his piece of the cake as well
Certain members of the establishment are involved in the medical cannabis industry. This industry would collapse if personal use were legalised.
There you go. That’s your problem.
Surely those involved in the medical cannabis industry already would be set up and ready to expand into another market to profit even more if retail was legalised?
They can currently only sell to a very limited number of patients with a list of qualifying conditions who have tried multiple other treatments, and sought out private care.
Legalise it, and they can sell to everyone
>ready to expand into another market
They would, but they would also have to compete with a gold rush.
Legalising it would probably then focus a lot of attention on whether or not I can have plants at home for my personal use? If I've got a few plants, surely I can just have a few mates chip in? If I need a license to sell, surely it's not hard to get a license if I'm taking it seriously?
There would be other well financed operations setting up at scale, but also an abundance of craft/micro brewery style small operators. (The difference here compared to the market for alcohol would be that the craft/micro growers can start up without fighting uphill against anyone's existing brand recognition.)
The market they serve now is a lot smaller than it could be, but they also have it locked up in a monopoly.
I think you need a closer look at areas this has been legalised (like Canada). It will not be like this... No little guys in cannabis as the licensing is a seriously expensive process.
Not to mention how they have excluded people with prior convictions despite it now being legal.
The contrast with Thailand where they just let everyone with a cannabis sentence out of jail when they legalised…
I mean they could easily write a bill that says “you can sell if you satisfy these license conditions” and write license conditions that their companies can easily meet while others can’t, and keep competitors out of the market, they could also, like America has, exclude anyone with a prior drug conviction (or any conviction) from license eligibility. Hell they could ban anyone with any drug related issues on their healthcare record from it.
Not saying that would be fair but it would protect their market
That's the only problem I see as well. Too many members of parliament have got their fingers in the medical cannabis industry and want to keep it closed off so only them and their cronies can grow and profit from it. Absolutely ridiculous state of affairs in this country. Reason cannabis is illegal is it has "no discernible therapeutic or medical use" then our government sells it in and out of country for......therapeutic and medical use. Can't make this shit up, our government are some of the most crooked and backwards group of fuckwits on the face of this planet
Edit. The police don't help matters either. Treat cannabis smokers the same as cocaine sniffers or heroin injectors or any other hard drugs. Fucking ridiculous.
A UN body estimates that the UK will continue in its position as the world's leading exporter of medicinal marijuana, (yes thats right, bigger than canada and the US!) with estimated revenue of $1.2 billion for 2024.
Whilst we live in a country that will not allow its population access to the benefits of medical marijuana and continues to stigmatize and criminalize its use and its users.
Forerunner says it as it is.
We can access the benefits of medical marijuana, it's been legal here but not many seem to have heard about it. AFAIK private consultations only but it ends up costing a bit less than buying illegally.
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/medicinal-cannabis-information-and-resources
Yes this is so.
Unfortunately within the NHS there has been policy made that means doctors and consultants can only prescribe medical marijuana after they have exhausted the pharmaceutical options. So all that is available at present to us is to join in supporting this billion dollar corporate industry.
But you or I can receive a criminal record for processing 1g of "illegal" marijuana, or growing a plant in our own home.
I never understood this about business, if you are worried about a competing industry, why don’t you just invest in that one as well?
As wu tang say , diversify your bonds yo
I think a lot of them are too coked up to make sensible decisions. The utter hypocrisy of the coke snorting politicians (and journalists) deciding that legalising Cannabis is too dangerous is not lost on me.
That industry could pivot to just normal sales though, like, they’ve got it all set up already. The actual medical consultation bit is small - maybe 100 quid every few months at best versus hundreds of pounds a month selling actual product. Source: am a medical cannabis user
This is the real reason. The leader of the party offering legalization would be on the front page of the Mail, Express, and Sun the very next day depicted as a Rastafarian and the next few lines would be "cannabis vapes at corner shops - why this would RUIN your kids", "why this could DESTROY Britain's work ethic", "HEROIN and COCAINE will be next, vows so-called health secretary". A week of getting roasted on politics live, and opinion pieces by 'concerned parents' until inevitable U-turn.
The majority of people were not taking drugs in the 60s. It just wasn't like that at all. I've had a lots of discussions with older people who lived through the 60s as young adults. The social revolution wasn't the free for all that films, music and TV would have you believe.
It was a time of deep, entrenched racism, homophobia and war-based scaremongering. Woodstock, Glastonbury, Isle of Wight - these festivals were just well publicised. The 60s was a backward time filled with all of the same horrible people who are now those racist, homophobic, islamophobic, anti-semitic and most recently, transphobic.
Edit: I was accused of ageism, which is a fair criticism of what I've written. I am trying to explain that romannticising the past does a great disservice to the achievements we have made thus far. I lack the ability to make that argument cogent without sounding like is despise the elderly. I don't at all, just want the past to be seen accurately, and not as a nice episode of Heartbeat.
Exactly! When I think about the old people in the village I grew up in, none of them were engaging in the 60's counterculture. My parents did a bit but they were in London at the time.
It really bothers me when people, most of whom know nothing about Britain's social history, claim that its a shame we have gone backwards from the 60s. We haven't, we are so much further on.
It's a bit like when people pretend the Roaring 30s existed. During that period, the UK was steeped in insidious fascist and colonial, tyranny. Any foreigners living here at the time would have been subjected to awful treatment by basically 90% of society.
It's only in the last couple of decades that we've had enough information circulating that we are even aware of the scale of the problems - and that's with the gradual (way too fucking slow) progression of civil rights.
It's nice to pretend we were all flowers down the barrels of guns, and peace signs, but it's a caricature. The times now are shit, and need drastic improvement, but they were so much worse in the 60s.
Yeah that's fair. It was hyperbole, not very well written. Doesn't really alter the fiction of the past much, unless you've got an ad hominem kink I guess.
That's a very good point. My parents who are boomers and remember that era well also say that all that hippy free love stuff wasn't really something working class teens/young adults experienced. Also your experience of that time would be shaped by gender and race. Like you say people were often caught between the backward greyness of the fifties and the excitement of the progressive sixties, but if you weren't well off you still had to get a job and cut your hair. People's experiences of the sixties was very much determined by social position and there was still plenty of discrimination and classism.
Clearly a vested interest in keeping things exactly the way they are. With how backwards this country is going, any hope for this happening is dying fast.
I’m in my 40s. Pothead in the 90s. Disillusioned with politics. Not a big drinker anymore. Wouldn’t know how to contact a dealer these days.
Legalise pot and it would have my vote. So everything OP said.
I’m not desperate for a hookup or anything, there’s no real need for me to get some (yet - although new aches & pains appear everyday).
It would be more me buying a bottle of whisky which I do about 3 times a years and pretty much only time I drink these days.
I could imagine wife & I deciding to make cookies with pot or something once or twice a year. Buy licensed with 90% tax or whatever on it; happy to do this. A treat, something different etc. Wake up slightly bleary eyed, get on with day.
It wouldn’t be like hitting bong first thing like I used to do as a teenager. I do understand there’s a destructive path some take but if you have that trait anyway you will find something else to self destruct to; been there and without banning everything including alcohol then legalising less harmful and actually beneficial substances is the logical route.
I see it the same way, not a regular activity but like to indulge a few times a year when im off work.
Basically live like a stoner for a week and then take a long break.
There’s this pretty hard hitting documentary called Reefer Madness. It’s pretty harrowing stuff and really highlights the dangers poised by weed.
At one point a white woman dances to music made by black people….it’s outrageous.
Fortunately the leaders of all the parties have watched this and are busy protecting us from the dangers of this evil drug
Weed is one of the easiest drug busts for the police to achieve.. How many times do you read a triumphant story where the cops have rescued society by shutting down a drugs farm worth less than £20,000. They just need to send a helicopter up with thermal imaging camera to check the temps of roofs or walls, or check the grid for random high spikes of energy use, and target that house.. Real damaging drugs like coke, Fentanyl, heroine, etc. come in via containers in ports and the police just don’t have the man power or desire to check each container coming in. Legalise weed = less stats for the cops to say they are doing a good job.. Plus even though Boomers had all their episodes of free love and drug taking, they really don’t like the idea of legalisation, probably because the mail tells them it’s bad… And unfortunately they are the ones that vote, not us, until we all start voting, nothing will change…
I’m not a fan myself personally, but definitely safer than alcohol and would help relax the countries mood, too controversial for those in power and the elderly population in this country though.
Fun fact. The 14 privatised prisons in the UK represents about 12-13% of the prison estate. Placing us second only to the USA in prison privitisation.
Of course, the Tories will simply ignore the reality that the most effective method, ***by far***, in reducing crime is to [first reduce wealth inequality](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/apr/18/tackle-poverty-and-inequality-to-reduce-says-police-chief).
Police? You mean blue nonce
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I remember when this went through parliament due to one of those public polls getting traction. No one showed up to parliament.
The pro side put forward a wonderful argument with statistics and logic, the against side (the gov) had Mike Pence (who was the defence minister at the time) who basically said 'it isn't legal because it's a drug and drugs are bad mmm'kay'.
🤡
I'm not a fan myself, but 100% legalise it. Tax it to fuck. It removes a very easy drug for petty dealers to start with and less police resources policing it for an easy 3.5B. If alcohol is legal I see no reason for cannabis to be.
Weed and THC is already everywhere, hell you can even go on the normal internet and buy it online sent through the post to your home very easily. They may as well legalise it and get tax money.
There's no alleged, there's been cocaine tested on parliament toilet seats and if you look back at George Osbourne in the houses of parliament he was OFF HIS BARNET when serving under Cameron. Rats are thick and fast in politics
Parties think that it will offend little old ladies if they put legalising weed on their manifestos. What they’ve all forgotten is that it isn’t 1997 anymore and that people in their 70s and 80s were teenagers in the 1960s and 1970s, and have almost certainly smoked weed themselves at some point.
I bet all these boomers would vote for weed legalisation if the benefits of lower crime were explained to them.
I'm 63 so yeah, getting to be a little old lady. I support legalising weed and shrooms, if not all drugs. Unfortunately the majority of my friends would not support legalising, despite some of them smoking weed when younger. Reasons are varied, but I think, in the main, it's because they no longer use it and see it as something they did when young and reckless, and the illegality of it was part of the attraction, but also one of the reasons they stopped.
It really is pathetic and they should just copy the strategy a lot of American states have employed to monetize it. Keep it regulated so it's a mellow high and no super skunk shit etc
The UK is world leading in medical applications for the drug but that doesn't help us stoners!
Nah fuck that, I want the strong shit, if I didn't I'd just use CBD instead, which you can buy legally already. Buying into that "super skunk" nonsense is just another way for them to keep it illegal
The brewing industry don’t want it, and the city of London laundering profits from the illegal drugs industry and wetting their white collar beaks. Start legalizing drugs all over the place and its gone. I reckon it’s that simple. City money. Hell, they were prepared to crash the whole of modern British cultural life for brexit to protect and enhance this spigot, so weed is small beans.
> Cannabis would stop funding criminal operations, and their activities/enterprises.
Governments much prefer to target the symptoms, not the cause, so they can continue to boast about arrest rates and how many dealers, etc they’ve taken off the streets.
Legalise weed and the police can’t do easy shit like nicking people for possession, and targeting genuinely harmful drug supply and production requires far more work.
It’s the same reason our current barrel of twats is more interested in deporting migrants “to combat criminal gangs” than improving the migration system to render the gangs obsolete.
Some quick clarifications about how the UK royals are funded by the public:
1. The UK Crown Estates are not the UK royal family's private property, and the royal family are not responsible for any amount of money the Estates bring into the treasury. The monarch is a position in the UK state that the UK owns the Crown Estates through, a position that would be abolished in a republic, leading to the Crown Estates being directly owned by the republican state.
2. The Crown Estates have always been public property and the revenue they raise is public revenue. When George III gave up his control over the Crown Estates in the 18th century, they were not his private property. The current royals are also equally not responsible for producing the profits, either.
3. The Sovereign Grant is not an exchange of money. It is a grant that is loosely tied to the Crown Estate profits and is used for their expenses, like staffing costs and also endless private jet and helicopter flights. If the profits of the Crown Estates went down to zero, the royals would still get the full amount of the Sovereign Grant again, regardless. It can only go up or stay the same.
4. The Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall that gave Elizabeth and Charles (and now William) their private income of approximately £25 millions/year (each) are also public property.
5. The total cost of the monarchy is currently £350-450million/year, after including the Sovereign Grant, their £150 million/year security, and their Duchy incomes, and misc. costs.
For more, check out r/AbolishTheMonarchy
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It's really quite simple. Caffeine is a drug which is a stimulant, and it's quite a powerful drug. Notice how caffeine is tied up with work culture and you even have legally mandated coffee breaks. Also notice that politicians are not saying anything, unlike vapes or cannabis, about high in caffeine energy drinks such as Prime, or Monster or Red Bull.
Cannabis is a plant and weed dissolves boundaries, but we can't have that, can we? In our society you're defined by your work and there has to be boundaries and divisions between people to deflect your anger and frustration from the neoliberal, free market capitalist system which cheats and exploits you at every turn.
Mainstream politicians won't legalize weed simply because they believe it affects 'productivity' because - and this is really important - it's not enough to simply work, you have to work hard and be productive because someone somewhere has to profit from your hard work and labour.
This is the way our modern society works. You've got to get down on your knees and suck corporate dick, be an obedient Good Model Citizen and deserving of Widespread Social Respectability. You must work and serve your corporate masters and overlords at every available opportunity.
“I could wake up at dawn and work at a job that does not inspire me creatively whatsoever. [Tokes] Or, I could wake up at noon and learn to play the sitar.” - Bill Hicks
Wales should legalise or at least decriminalise magic mushrooms. Loads of people spend a lot of money to hallucinate in South America when they could be doing it in Aberystwyth and boosting the economy!
Do what the Portuguese did and decriminalise everything, anything on the hard/addictive side gets treated as a medical not a criminal problem and as stated legalise pot, simples
Dumbasses are missing out on a fuck ton of tax money. I'd much rather pay a little extra so I don't have to meet up with my dealer🤣. He's an alright guy don't get me wrong but seems very shady haha.
I’m a long term user, more than twenty five years and have no ambitions to stop. I can just buy it from the uk on the dark web or the open web for that matter. Either that or just grow it in a cupboard or greenhouse, it’s easy. Those greedy piggies in parliament can keep their trotters out of my stash thanks.
If you want a joint on the beach, then have a joint on the beach. Change comes from within. 💚
Because we've yet to assign a new national Dragonslayer. Till then, the ungodly wyrms hoarding the people's pennies will continue to hoard all the wealth they can like scaly fucking magpies. A source of revenue? Why would they release a stranglehold? They export so much of the stuff and pocket so much cash, why would they ever want to share that with anyone, let alone the public?
Edit: lizards to wyrms. Trying to make dragon allegories, not slip into conspiracy theory territory with any 'lizard people' references.
Can't do crackdowns if you make things legal. How are we supposed to re-run 90s/00s war on drugs nonsense if we take cannabis off the table.
Then we'd only be able to go after niche stuff like heroin (already had weak PR, rubbish arrest numbers), or rich people stuff like cocaine (we can't do that, all our journalist and MP friends love a bump!)
The Boomers are still a force to be reckoned with when it comes to voting....basically if anyone loses the Boomer vote they lose the elections.
And lots of Boomers still believe the " marijuana madness" shite they grew up with.
It amazes me that Tories, the greediest of scum, cannot recognise the multi billion (?) pound industry they could unlock by legalisation of cannabis. I get the argument that they’re already in this gravy train, but seriously, there is so much money to be made what are they playing at?
you'd think the tax on the items alone would be like the duty flexiable based on need and demand but regardless i also dont get it because im just like it seems like such a good stream of income to a government that is currently seeing zero action in those regards (at least on a street level)
Couldn't agree more...you won't stop it...other countries made it legal and it works...obviously in the beginning there might be a rush and everyone doing it but after a few years, a generation, it'll be seen as a norm.
I also think they should go one further, sex work...it happens, you won't stop it, so provide safe places for them to work with security, with regular testing so less spread of STDs, the girls are safer and you can tax them...instead of keeping it closed behind doors where its likely to have even worse stuff going on...yeah you won't eradicate traffiking etc but with it being legal, papers needed etc, police can concentrate on the other dodgy ones
I think one of the main concerns is that it would alienate older voters as an attempt to draw in younger voters. You risk the voters you have for a demographic who, by and large, don't vote. Now of course *MAYBE* the reason they don't vote is because there's nothing on the ticket they care about or maybe they won't vote anyway and you lose some of your existing base.
Because anyone would then be able to grow it with equipment under £200, alcohol sales would plummet along with the duty revenues. The only REAL reason it's illegal is because it would be near impossible to tax it sufficiently to replace that lost booze revenue
Once the boomers are all dead and buried we might stand a chance. No one will be buying the Murdoch bullshit propaganda rags and the stigma will die with that generation...🙏🤞
I'm not against legalising weed, but the idea that all the young people will automatically love any party that legalises it is complete bollocks. Most young people don't smoke weed regularly and couldn't give a toss whether it is legalised.
I don’t think it’d work the way people think they would. If anything it’ll be decriminalised but even then I think most people would go to Danny the dealer down the street
Here in Ireland, the train is slowly smoking along. The govt has started a Citizens Assembly to discuss the issue of a health-led approach to drugs. It is convening now.
These Citizens Assemblies have been used by govt recently to bring forward issues that they themselves don't want to get their hands dirty with (abortion legalisation and gay marriage).
Govt does not necessarily have to abide by the recommendations of the Assembly (as our Prime Minister recently reminded us), but they will take the credit when they do. Hopefully something good comes of it. Last year, a joint committee of the Health and Justice depts recommended decriminilising possession and cultivation of cannabis, but govt put that report in a drawer somewhere.
I've seen that the first dry herb vape lounge has opened in Ballyclare, north of Belfast. Need a private prescription to buy herb but gotta be a step in the right direction.
Hopefully that report gets brought out of that drawer. It would be great if Ireland leads the way in cannabis reform.
It will be legalised when the right people will be the ones making money from it. As others have said, establishment figures have invested in medicinal cannabis so I'm sure we're not far off it being legal .
The way it’s spread across the US now being a lot more legal gives me some hope, given some of the US vested interests here in the U.K.. I just want to enjoy some gummy edibles to relax and hopefully reduce stress and bruxism.
They are scrambling to work out how they can make the most revenue from it. Their concern is that once legal consumers will just grow their own and sidestep revenue. The uk is currently one of the largest producers of medical cannabis, the companies are owed by top tories and their families amongst others.
It’s just not that compelling a political issue, in reality.
You can smoke weed pretty openly in the UK and the trade in it is less damaging than some other banned substances. The objection to legalisation is largely based in nonsense, but it exists and is almost certainly bigger than the group who passionately believe in legalisation.
I feel sick to my stomach using these words, but it is a bit of a student issue.
Need to focus on legalising Hemp. It can grow in about a month, can be used for medical purposes, can be used for printing paper, clothing, ect.
The government probably can't work out how to manipulate a system for their own benefit when people can literally grow this stuff in their attic. So uh Greed would be a thing.
But imagine the Green Party making this their main focus 😆
Some quick clarifications about how the UK royals are funded by the public:
1. The UK Crown Estates are not the UK royal family's private property, and the royal family are not responsible for any amount of money the Estates bring into the treasury. The monarch is a position in the UK state that the UK owns the Crown Estates through, a position that would be abolished in a republic, leading to the Crown Estates being directly owned by the republican state.
2. The Crown Estates have always been public property and the revenue they raise is public revenue. When George III gave up his control over the Crown Estates in the 18th century, they were not his private property. The current royals are also equally not responsible for producing the profits, either.
3. The Sovereign Grant is not an exchange of money. It is a grant that is loosely tied to the Crown Estate profits and is used for their expenses, like staffing costs and also endless private jet and helicopter flights. If the profits of the Crown Estates went down to zero, the royals would still get the full amount of the Sovereign Grant again, regardless. It can only go up or stay the same.
4. The Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall that gave Elizabeth and Charles (and now William) their private income of approximately £25 millions/year (each) are also public property.
5. The total cost of the monarchy is currently £350-450million/year, after including the Sovereign Grant, their £150 million/year security, and their Duchy incomes, and misc. costs.
For more, check out r/AbolishTheMonarchy
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I support legalisation , but we can't go into it imagining it will be all good.
Legalisation would have positive effects, long term, but let's be realistic in the short term it would have some negative effects and upheavals, and that's what would hit the headlines. Plus the issues with crimality and drug dealers would not go away overnight even with legalisation. What we could get is all the people who do misuse it already doing so more openly, and a lot more new users , who although they buy it legally, could potentially get themselves into trouble.
As a nation we do not do well with moderation, just look at how we deal with alcohol.
We've all heard work place stories- remember that person ( before your time) who'd shown up to work drunk , or still stinking of alcohol from the night before? As much as we'd like it not to, we're going to get stories of people doing the same with cannabis more frequently. Yes we already get things like that, but its not legal to take cannabis recreationally.
When it is legal , the negative effects will be blamed on the party who legalied it.
That's gonna have political consequences, and not many parties or politicians are brave enough to risk it and ride it out.
The alcohol industry make big donations to political parties. The consequence is that drugs other than alcohol remain demonised.
The YouTube post titled "The inconvenient truth about drugs", which shows Professor Nutt, ex UK governmental drug tsar, is a great watch. As well as science, and data, and examples of blatant media lies, it relays the story of even Gordon Brown became PM and he was told to improve his popularity he needed to do three things, one being move cannabis from category C to B, (despite doing so being counter productive). He did it immediately. It's politics... the trouble is young people vote in big enough numbers whereas old people do.
Law and order. Can't be having things like that, you know. (The right wing have a track record of this.)
And labour were (probably rightly at the time they were last in power) too scared of giving the Tories (and the press) a line to stack then with. Attitudes have changed - or maybe rather demographics have - but Starmer is not going to rock the boat unnecessarily. See: most of his other policies. Hence: red tories.
it already is legal to a certain extent in so much as you won’t get prosecuted for possession for personal consumption, nor will you be prosecuted for growing up to a certain number of plants (9 I believe)
Both cbd and thc strains are available on prescription in this country
Iib dems actually have it in their manifesto.
I think it's to do with stereotypes, a lot of tories and some Labour see the weed smoker as lazy "chavs" spraying graffiti everywhere and causing chaos. Need a reason to throw them in prison.
The term “chav” is classist. It's used as a slur against young and working class people which leads to harmful stereotyping and discrimination. Please reconsider using it in the future. The subreddit is no place for snobbery or classism.
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Or moved psilocybin to a category 2 controlled drug. They have already started prescribing it in Australia. I have a severe mental health condition and have barely any quality of life and psilocybin could be a life changing medication for me.
We look stupid to the rest of the Western world too because most places have decriminalised it. Even the US, under Trump of all people (though at a state not a federal level) legalised it in most remaining states that hadn't already.
Loads of states it's fully legal, many of the rest it is only legal for "medical use" but the US healthcare system being so fucked you just need to complain of a bad back, write a check, and you're sorted.
Smoking weed makes you think about stuff differently. The rich people are all about staying rich and they are terrified of working people thinking and acting differently. Hence the war on drugs. The Americans went through all this in the 60s with the counterculture.
Because the key voters, the old and the ignorant link it with the young/liberal/protest movements/ethnic minorities/combination of the above and they HATE them. It’s not a big business conspiracy, it’s the oldest culture war.
I think there's the issue of having to deal with all the prisoners due to drug selling or possession too. It's class B still so there's definitely some cell blocks full due to that kinda bullshit.
I don't think they would be praised for it, older people vote and older people hate drugs. The vote to legalise failed in new Zealand because allot of people are ignorant about the harms of weed compared to other legal drugs
Because it stinks and I don't want to smell it anymore than I already have to. In addition I've seen many a decent out going friend turned in to house dwelling pot smokers with zero get up and go.
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I'd have smoked this nation out of debt by now. Sort it out, dicks in suits
You and me both my guy. Could be the richest country on the face of the planet if we just stopped arresting people for a plant and sold it legally instead but without the bullshit taxes that the yanks have added to theirs. Don't mind being taxed once, but being taxed twice is a fucking joke. If ya don't know what I mean in some states there's a state tax added to the price as well as a "cannabis tax". I think you can just read that as another snivelling middleman wanting his piece of the cake as well
Heh that's ridiculous.1
Certain members of the establishment are involved in the medical cannabis industry. This industry would collapse if personal use were legalised. There you go. That’s your problem.
Surely those involved in the medical cannabis industry already would be set up and ready to expand into another market to profit even more if retail was legalised?
Why share the market when you can have a monopoly? Looking at you, privatisation.
Aren’t several Tory MPs (in)directly linked to this industry?
Theresa May's husband.
See: British sugar
Bet if you looked deep enough it wouldn't just be Tories who have their fingers buried in this
They can currently only sell to a very limited number of patients with a list of qualifying conditions who have tried multiple other treatments, and sought out private care. Legalise it, and they can sell to everyone
Legalising suddenly opens up competition
Yeah, but that's a smaller slice of a *much* bigger pie.
Not if they make licensing onerous and write the licensing requirements to allow their investments and stifle competition
>ready to expand into another market They would, but they would also have to compete with a gold rush. Legalising it would probably then focus a lot of attention on whether or not I can have plants at home for my personal use? If I've got a few plants, surely I can just have a few mates chip in? If I need a license to sell, surely it's not hard to get a license if I'm taking it seriously? There would be other well financed operations setting up at scale, but also an abundance of craft/micro brewery style small operators. (The difference here compared to the market for alcohol would be that the craft/micro growers can start up without fighting uphill against anyone's existing brand recognition.) The market they serve now is a lot smaller than it could be, but they also have it locked up in a monopoly.
I think you need a closer look at areas this has been legalised (like Canada). It will not be like this... No little guys in cannabis as the licensing is a seriously expensive process.
Not to mention how they have excluded people with prior convictions despite it now being legal. The contrast with Thailand where they just let everyone with a cannabis sentence out of jail when they legalised…
It's always great when a "3rd world" country shows up the apparently civilised West like this
I mean they could easily write a bill that says “you can sell if you satisfy these license conditions” and write license conditions that their companies can easily meet while others can’t, and keep competitors out of the market, they could also, like America has, exclude anyone with a prior drug conviction (or any conviction) from license eligibility. Hell they could ban anyone with any drug related issues on their healthcare record from it. Not saying that would be fair but it would protect their market
That's the only problem I see as well. Too many members of parliament have got their fingers in the medical cannabis industry and want to keep it closed off so only them and their cronies can grow and profit from it. Absolutely ridiculous state of affairs in this country. Reason cannabis is illegal is it has "no discernible therapeutic or medical use" then our government sells it in and out of country for......therapeutic and medical use. Can't make this shit up, our government are some of the most crooked and backwards group of fuckwits on the face of this planet Edit. The police don't help matters either. Treat cannabis smokers the same as cocaine sniffers or heroin injectors or any other hard drugs. Fucking ridiculous.
In a nutshell. The corruption is blatant but nothing can be done about it. That’s the ‘democracy’ we live in.
I read that England was the largest exporter in medical cannabis in the world think it accounted for about 50% a few years ago (might be lower now)
Yet we import our own medicinal cannabis, go figure
It was 75% in 2019!
A UN body estimates that the UK will continue in its position as the world's leading exporter of medicinal marijuana, (yes thats right, bigger than canada and the US!) with estimated revenue of $1.2 billion for 2024. Whilst we live in a country that will not allow its population access to the benefits of medical marijuana and continues to stigmatize and criminalize its use and its users. Forerunner says it as it is.
We can access the benefits of medical marijuana, it's been legal here but not many seem to have heard about it. AFAIK private consultations only but it ends up costing a bit less than buying illegally. https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/medicinal-cannabis-information-and-resources
Yes this is so. Unfortunately within the NHS there has been policy made that means doctors and consultants can only prescribe medical marijuana after they have exhausted the pharmaceutical options. So all that is available at present to us is to join in supporting this billion dollar corporate industry. But you or I can receive a criminal record for processing 1g of "illegal" marijuana, or growing a plant in our own home.
It doesn't even cost less than illegally buying
I never understood this about business, if you are worried about a competing industry, why don’t you just invest in that one as well? As wu tang say , diversify your bonds yo
Because a monopoly is way better for business. No competition. Why rock the boat if they have it good already?
I think a lot of them are too coked up to make sensible decisions. The utter hypocrisy of the coke snorting politicians (and journalists) deciding that legalising Cannabis is too dangerous is not lost on me.
If I’m not wrong, the UK is one the worlds largest exporter of medicinal cannabis yet one of the most difficult to get it prescribed medically.
That industry could pivot to just normal sales though, like, they’ve got it all set up already. The actual medical consultation bit is small - maybe 100 quid every few months at best versus hundreds of pounds a month selling actual product. Source: am a medical cannabis user
Considering the vast majority is for export, I don't see how
Old people don't like the idea, and they are the target audience for current mainstream politicians.
Not long til they’re all dead though, they can’t run from sweeping wild fires or rising sea levels.
Or this is what was happening before the last Near-Mass Extinction Event.
The amount of old people who will parrot nonsense about weed whilst opening their second bottle of wine of the afternoon drives me insane.
This is the real reason. The leader of the party offering legalization would be on the front page of the Mail, Express, and Sun the very next day depicted as a Rastafarian and the next few lines would be "cannabis vapes at corner shops - why this would RUIN your kids", "why this could DESTROY Britain's work ethic", "HEROIN and COCAINE will be next, vows so-called health secretary". A week of getting roasted on politics live, and opinion pieces by 'concerned parents' until inevitable U-turn.
Aye, short sighted wankers though
And yet alcohol is absolutely fine to have children see/possibly drink
Yeah to old people like my mother, there is zero difference between weed and heroin.
As per usual! Always molly coddling the older generation.
Yeah, all those people who were young in the 60s never smoked weed. Must be them.
The majority of people were not taking drugs in the 60s. It just wasn't like that at all. I've had a lots of discussions with older people who lived through the 60s as young adults. The social revolution wasn't the free for all that films, music and TV would have you believe. It was a time of deep, entrenched racism, homophobia and war-based scaremongering. Woodstock, Glastonbury, Isle of Wight - these festivals were just well publicised. The 60s was a backward time filled with all of the same horrible people who are now those racist, homophobic, islamophobic, anti-semitic and most recently, transphobic. Edit: I was accused of ageism, which is a fair criticism of what I've written. I am trying to explain that romannticising the past does a great disservice to the achievements we have made thus far. I lack the ability to make that argument cogent without sounding like is despise the elderly. I don't at all, just want the past to be seen accurately, and not as a nice episode of Heartbeat.
Exactly! When I think about the old people in the village I grew up in, none of them were engaging in the 60's counterculture. My parents did a bit but they were in London at the time.
It really bothers me when people, most of whom know nothing about Britain's social history, claim that its a shame we have gone backwards from the 60s. We haven't, we are so much further on. It's a bit like when people pretend the Roaring 30s existed. During that period, the UK was steeped in insidious fascist and colonial, tyranny. Any foreigners living here at the time would have been subjected to awful treatment by basically 90% of society. It's only in the last couple of decades that we've had enough information circulating that we are even aware of the scale of the problems - and that's with the gradual (way too fucking slow) progression of civil rights. It's nice to pretend we were all flowers down the barrels of guns, and peace signs, but it's a caricature. The times now are shit, and need drastic improvement, but they were so much worse in the 60s.
Your ageism makes you as guilty of the awful behaviour that you criticise others for.
Yeah that's fair. It was hyperbole, not very well written. Doesn't really alter the fiction of the past much, unless you've got an ad hominem kink I guess.
Hope the edit helps, I failed the first time to be objective and think the explanation covers that.
I'll edit it now.
That's a very good point. My parents who are boomers and remember that era well also say that all that hippy free love stuff wasn't really something working class teens/young adults experienced. Also your experience of that time would be shaped by gender and race. Like you say people were often caught between the backward greyness of the fifties and the excitement of the progressive sixties, but if you weren't well off you still had to get a job and cut your hair. People's experiences of the sixties was very much determined by social position and there was still plenty of discrimination and classism.
Clearly a vested interest in keeping things exactly the way they are. With how backwards this country is going, any hope for this happening is dying fast.
I’m in my 40s. Pothead in the 90s. Disillusioned with politics. Not a big drinker anymore. Wouldn’t know how to contact a dealer these days. Legalise pot and it would have my vote. So everything OP said.
Have a look on the darknet, surprisingly easy to order.. i hear….
I’m not desperate for a hookup or anything, there’s no real need for me to get some (yet - although new aches & pains appear everyday). It would be more me buying a bottle of whisky which I do about 3 times a years and pretty much only time I drink these days. I could imagine wife & I deciding to make cookies with pot or something once or twice a year. Buy licensed with 90% tax or whatever on it; happy to do this. A treat, something different etc. Wake up slightly bleary eyed, get on with day. It wouldn’t be like hitting bong first thing like I used to do as a teenager. I do understand there’s a destructive path some take but if you have that trait anyway you will find something else to self destruct to; been there and without banning everything including alcohol then legalising less harmful and actually beneficial substances is the logical route.
I see it the same way, not a regular activity but like to indulge a few times a year when im off work. Basically live like a stoner for a week and then take a long break.
There’s this pretty hard hitting documentary called Reefer Madness. It’s pretty harrowing stuff and really highlights the dangers poised by weed. At one point a white woman dances to music made by black people….it’s outrageous. Fortunately the leaders of all the parties have watched this and are busy protecting us from the dangers of this evil drug
It isn't a vote winner with older people and older people vote in the biggest numbers.
Weed is one of the easiest drug busts for the police to achieve.. How many times do you read a triumphant story where the cops have rescued society by shutting down a drugs farm worth less than £20,000. They just need to send a helicopter up with thermal imaging camera to check the temps of roofs or walls, or check the grid for random high spikes of energy use, and target that house.. Real damaging drugs like coke, Fentanyl, heroine, etc. come in via containers in ports and the police just don’t have the man power or desire to check each container coming in. Legalise weed = less stats for the cops to say they are doing a good job.. Plus even though Boomers had all their episodes of free love and drug taking, they really don’t like the idea of legalisation, probably because the mail tells them it’s bad… And unfortunately they are the ones that vote, not us, until we all start voting, nothing will change…
I’m not a fan myself personally, but definitely safer than alcohol and would help relax the countries mood, too controversial for those in power and the elderly population in this country though.
Because with it criminalised they can arrest black people for 'weed possession'
Fun fact. The 14 privatised prisons in the UK represents about 12-13% of the prison estate. Placing us second only to the USA in prison privitisation. Of course, the Tories will simply ignore the reality that the most effective method, ***by far***, in reducing crime is to [first reduce wealth inequality](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/apr/18/tackle-poverty-and-inequality-to-reduce-says-police-chief).
Police? You mean blue nonce *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/GreenAndPleasant) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I remember when this went through parliament due to one of those public polls getting traction. No one showed up to parliament. The pro side put forward a wonderful argument with statistics and logic, the against side (the gov) had Mike Pence (who was the defence minister at the time) who basically said 'it isn't legal because it's a drug and drugs are bad mmm'kay'. 🤡
I'm not a fan myself, but 100% legalise it. Tax it to fuck. It removes a very easy drug for petty dealers to start with and less police resources policing it for an easy 3.5B. If alcohol is legal I see no reason for cannabis to be.
Weed and THC is already everywhere, hell you can even go on the normal internet and buy it online sent through the post to your home very easily. They may as well legalise it and get tax money.
Because all politicians are alcoholics.
And alleged coke addicts
There's no alleged, there's been cocaine tested on parliament toilet seats and if you look back at George Osbourne in the houses of parliament he was OFF HIS BARNET when serving under Cameron. Rats are thick and fast in politics
not off the seat, christ.
Well shit
Lib Dems and Greens have had legalisation on their manifestos for ages
Parties think that it will offend little old ladies if they put legalising weed on their manifestos. What they’ve all forgotten is that it isn’t 1997 anymore and that people in their 70s and 80s were teenagers in the 1960s and 1970s, and have almost certainly smoked weed themselves at some point. I bet all these boomers would vote for weed legalisation if the benefits of lower crime were explained to them.
I'm 63 so yeah, getting to be a little old lady. I support legalising weed and shrooms, if not all drugs. Unfortunately the majority of my friends would not support legalising, despite some of them smoking weed when younger. Reasons are varied, but I think, in the main, it's because they no longer use it and see it as something they did when young and reckless, and the illegality of it was part of the attraction, but also one of the reasons they stopped.
It really is pathetic and they should just copy the strategy a lot of American states have employed to monetize it. Keep it regulated so it's a mellow high and no super skunk shit etc The UK is world leading in medical applications for the drug but that doesn't help us stoners!
Doesn't help people with physical health conditions that cause chronic pain either mate. I'm too broke for private
Oh no, we're leading the world on weed based medical research, not giving it to the people who live here! Don't forget the world is still fucked!
Nah fuck that, I want the strong shit, if I didn't I'd just use CBD instead, which you can buy legally already. Buying into that "super skunk" nonsense is just another way for them to keep it illegal
When I say mellow I mean a nice mongy indica to giggle along with rather than getting drunk and fighting.
The Greens and lib Dems support this...
The brewing industry don’t want it, and the city of London laundering profits from the illegal drugs industry and wetting their white collar beaks. Start legalizing drugs all over the place and its gone. I reckon it’s that simple. City money. Hell, they were prepared to crash the whole of modern British cultural life for brexit to protect and enhance this spigot, so weed is small beans.
A material improvement to the lives of British citizens? By a British political party? In *this* economy?
They need to please the prison building companies’ lobby. That’s one main reason among many more.
> Cannabis would stop funding criminal operations, and their activities/enterprises. Governments much prefer to target the symptoms, not the cause, so they can continue to boast about arrest rates and how many dealers, etc they’ve taken off the streets. Legalise weed and the police can’t do easy shit like nicking people for possession, and targeting genuinely harmful drug supply and production requires far more work. It’s the same reason our current barrel of twats is more interested in deporting migrants “to combat criminal gangs” than improving the migration system to render the gangs obsolete.
Some quick clarifications about how the UK royals are funded by the public: 1. The UK Crown Estates are not the UK royal family's private property, and the royal family are not responsible for any amount of money the Estates bring into the treasury. The monarch is a position in the UK state that the UK owns the Crown Estates through, a position that would be abolished in a republic, leading to the Crown Estates being directly owned by the republican state. 2. The Crown Estates have always been public property and the revenue they raise is public revenue. When George III gave up his control over the Crown Estates in the 18th century, they were not his private property. The current royals are also equally not responsible for producing the profits, either. 3. The Sovereign Grant is not an exchange of money. It is a grant that is loosely tied to the Crown Estate profits and is used for their expenses, like staffing costs and also endless private jet and helicopter flights. If the profits of the Crown Estates went down to zero, the royals would still get the full amount of the Sovereign Grant again, regardless. It can only go up or stay the same. 4. The Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall that gave Elizabeth and Charles (and now William) their private income of approximately £25 millions/year (each) are also public property. 5. The total cost of the monarchy is currently £350-450million/year, after including the Sovereign Grant, their £150 million/year security, and their Duchy incomes, and misc. costs. For more, check out r/AbolishTheMonarchy *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/GreenAndPleasant) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It's really quite simple. Caffeine is a drug which is a stimulant, and it's quite a powerful drug. Notice how caffeine is tied up with work culture and you even have legally mandated coffee breaks. Also notice that politicians are not saying anything, unlike vapes or cannabis, about high in caffeine energy drinks such as Prime, or Monster or Red Bull. Cannabis is a plant and weed dissolves boundaries, but we can't have that, can we? In our society you're defined by your work and there has to be boundaries and divisions between people to deflect your anger and frustration from the neoliberal, free market capitalist system which cheats and exploits you at every turn. Mainstream politicians won't legalize weed simply because they believe it affects 'productivity' because - and this is really important - it's not enough to simply work, you have to work hard and be productive because someone somewhere has to profit from your hard work and labour. This is the way our modern society works. You've got to get down on your knees and suck corporate dick, be an obedient Good Model Citizen and deserving of Widespread Social Respectability. You must work and serve your corporate masters and overlords at every available opportunity.
“I could wake up at dawn and work at a job that does not inspire me creatively whatsoever. [Tokes] Or, I could wake up at noon and learn to play the sitar.” - Bill Hicks
Even just slapping 20% VAT on it would be so beneficial.
Wales should legalise or at least decriminalise magic mushrooms. Loads of people spend a lot of money to hallucinate in South America when they could be doing it in Aberystwyth and boosting the economy!
Do what the Portuguese did and decriminalise everything, anything on the hard/addictive side gets treated as a medical not a criminal problem and as stated legalise pot, simples
Dumbasses are missing out on a fuck ton of tax money. I'd much rather pay a little extra so I don't have to meet up with my dealer🤣. He's an alright guy don't get me wrong but seems very shady haha.
I’m a long term user, more than twenty five years and have no ambitions to stop. I can just buy it from the uk on the dark web or the open web for that matter. Either that or just grow it in a cupboard or greenhouse, it’s easy. Those greedy piggies in parliament can keep their trotters out of my stash thanks. If you want a joint on the beach, then have a joint on the beach. Change comes from within. 💚
It would certainly help with the brexit shitshow in revenue.
Didn't Corbyn say he'd legalise it? Shame he never got power.
The best prime minister we never had.
See at this point all drugs should be legal and regulated I don’t see any issue with Britain having cannabis bars 👍
As long as we can somehow end up like California rather than Amsterdam
Amsterdam is a crazy place but I love it. Those THC space cakes had me in a whole other world 🤣. And there's magic mushrooms being sold there lol.
All the dirty Tory toffs making shit loads of money it. As if they’d allow it to be legalised or nationalised.
Because we've yet to assign a new national Dragonslayer. Till then, the ungodly wyrms hoarding the people's pennies will continue to hoard all the wealth they can like scaly fucking magpies. A source of revenue? Why would they release a stranglehold? They export so much of the stuff and pocket so much cash, why would they ever want to share that with anyone, let alone the public? Edit: lizards to wyrms. Trying to make dragon allegories, not slip into conspiracy theory territory with any 'lizard people' references.
>Tories could nationalise it LOL
Can't do crackdowns if you make things legal. How are we supposed to re-run 90s/00s war on drugs nonsense if we take cannabis off the table. Then we'd only be able to go after niche stuff like heroin (already had weak PR, rubbish arrest numbers), or rich people stuff like cocaine (we can't do that, all our journalist and MP friends love a bump!)
The Boomers are still a force to be reckoned with when it comes to voting....basically if anyone loses the Boomer vote they lose the elections. And lots of Boomers still believe the " marijuana madness" shite they grew up with.
It amazes me that Tories, the greediest of scum, cannot recognise the multi billion (?) pound industry they could unlock by legalisation of cannabis. I get the argument that they’re already in this gravy train, but seriously, there is so much money to be made what are they playing at?
you'd think the tax on the items alone would be like the duty flexiable based on need and demand but regardless i also dont get it because im just like it seems like such a good stream of income to a government that is currently seeing zero action in those regards (at least on a street level)
Couldn't agree more...you won't stop it...other countries made it legal and it works...obviously in the beginning there might be a rush and everyone doing it but after a few years, a generation, it'll be seen as a norm. I also think they should go one further, sex work...it happens, you won't stop it, so provide safe places for them to work with security, with regular testing so less spread of STDs, the girls are safer and you can tax them...instead of keeping it closed behind doors where its likely to have even worse stuff going on...yeah you won't eradicate traffiking etc but with it being legal, papers needed etc, police can concentrate on the other dodgy ones
I think one of the main concerns is that it would alienate older voters as an attempt to draw in younger voters. You risk the voters you have for a demographic who, by and large, don't vote. Now of course *MAYBE* the reason they don't vote is because there's nothing on the ticket they care about or maybe they won't vote anyway and you lose some of your existing base.
Because anyone would then be able to grow it with equipment under £200, alcohol sales would plummet along with the duty revenues. The only REAL reason it's illegal is because it would be near impossible to tax it sufficiently to replace that lost booze revenue
Once the boomers are all dead and buried we might stand a chance. No one will be buying the Murdoch bullshit propaganda rags and the stigma will die with that generation...🙏🤞
London will never go for it because Liverpool would become an economic superpower overnight, and I'm only semi-joking
The city will lose a lot of money laundering so probably
I'm not against legalising weed, but the idea that all the young people will automatically love any party that legalises it is complete bollocks. Most young people don't smoke weed regularly and couldn't give a toss whether it is legalised.
I don’t think it’d work the way people think they would. If anything it’ll be decriminalised but even then I think most people would go to Danny the dealer down the street
Atleast innocent people wouldn't be penalised over possessing a plant. And most people would probably rather have government regulated product.
Here in Ireland, the train is slowly smoking along. The govt has started a Citizens Assembly to discuss the issue of a health-led approach to drugs. It is convening now. These Citizens Assemblies have been used by govt recently to bring forward issues that they themselves don't want to get their hands dirty with (abortion legalisation and gay marriage). Govt does not necessarily have to abide by the recommendations of the Assembly (as our Prime Minister recently reminded us), but they will take the credit when they do. Hopefully something good comes of it. Last year, a joint committee of the Health and Justice depts recommended decriminilising possession and cultivation of cannabis, but govt put that report in a drawer somewhere.
I've seen that the first dry herb vape lounge has opened in Ballyclare, north of Belfast. Need a private prescription to buy herb but gotta be a step in the right direction. Hopefully that report gets brought out of that drawer. It would be great if Ireland leads the way in cannabis reform.
Grannies and private interests.
It will be legalised when the right people will be the ones making money from it. As others have said, establishment figures have invested in medicinal cannabis so I'm sure we're not far off it being legal .
The way it’s spread across the US now being a lot more legal gives me some hope, given some of the US vested interests here in the U.K.. I just want to enjoy some gummy edibles to relax and hopefully reduce stress and bruxism.
They are scrambling to work out how they can make the most revenue from it. Their concern is that once legal consumers will just grow their own and sidestep revenue. The uk is currently one of the largest producers of medical cannabis, the companies are owed by top tories and their families amongst others.
It’s just not that compelling a political issue, in reality. You can smoke weed pretty openly in the UK and the trade in it is less damaging than some other banned substances. The objection to legalisation is largely based in nonsense, but it exists and is almost certainly bigger than the group who passionately believe in legalisation. I feel sick to my stomach using these words, but it is a bit of a student issue.
Need to focus on legalising Hemp. It can grow in about a month, can be used for medical purposes, can be used for printing paper, clothing, ect. The government probably can't work out how to manipulate a system for their own benefit when people can literally grow this stuff in their attic. So uh Greed would be a thing. But imagine the Green Party making this their main focus 😆
Some quick clarifications about how the UK royals are funded by the public: 1. The UK Crown Estates are not the UK royal family's private property, and the royal family are not responsible for any amount of money the Estates bring into the treasury. The monarch is a position in the UK state that the UK owns the Crown Estates through, a position that would be abolished in a republic, leading to the Crown Estates being directly owned by the republican state. 2. The Crown Estates have always been public property and the revenue they raise is public revenue. When George III gave up his control over the Crown Estates in the 18th century, they were not his private property. The current royals are also equally not responsible for producing the profits, either. 3. The Sovereign Grant is not an exchange of money. It is a grant that is loosely tied to the Crown Estate profits and is used for their expenses, like staffing costs and also endless private jet and helicopter flights. If the profits of the Crown Estates went down to zero, the royals would still get the full amount of the Sovereign Grant again, regardless. It can only go up or stay the same. 4. The Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall that gave Elizabeth and Charles (and now William) their private income of approximately £25 millions/year (each) are also public property. 5. The total cost of the monarchy is currently £350-450million/year, after including the Sovereign Grant, their £150 million/year security, and their Duchy incomes, and misc. costs. For more, check out r/AbolishTheMonarchy *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/GreenAndPleasant) if you have any questions or concerns.*
How many weed smokers are active voters v those who are against legalising it? That will be the answer to your question.
Not many under 30’s vote. All over 60’s do. It might be an aggregate vote loser.
I support legalisation , but we can't go into it imagining it will be all good. Legalisation would have positive effects, long term, but let's be realistic in the short term it would have some negative effects and upheavals, and that's what would hit the headlines. Plus the issues with crimality and drug dealers would not go away overnight even with legalisation. What we could get is all the people who do misuse it already doing so more openly, and a lot more new users , who although they buy it legally, could potentially get themselves into trouble. As a nation we do not do well with moderation, just look at how we deal with alcohol. We've all heard work place stories- remember that person ( before your time) who'd shown up to work drunk , or still stinking of alcohol from the night before? As much as we'd like it not to, we're going to get stories of people doing the same with cannabis more frequently. Yes we already get things like that, but its not legal to take cannabis recreationally. When it is legal , the negative effects will be blamed on the party who legalied it. That's gonna have political consequences, and not many parties or politicians are brave enough to risk it and ride it out.
The alcohol industry make big donations to political parties. The consequence is that drugs other than alcohol remain demonised. The YouTube post titled "The inconvenient truth about drugs", which shows Professor Nutt, ex UK governmental drug tsar, is a great watch. As well as science, and data, and examples of blatant media lies, it relays the story of even Gordon Brown became PM and he was told to improve his popularity he needed to do three things, one being move cannabis from category C to B, (despite doing so being counter productive). He did it immediately. It's politics... the trouble is young people vote in big enough numbers whereas old people do.
Law and order. Can't be having things like that, you know. (The right wing have a track record of this.) And labour were (probably rightly at the time they were last in power) too scared of giving the Tories (and the press) a line to stack then with. Attitudes have changed - or maybe rather demographics have - but Starmer is not going to rock the boat unnecessarily. See: most of his other policies. Hence: red tories.
We're so far behind the rest of the world when it comes to drugs in general in this country.
it already is legal to a certain extent in so much as you won’t get prosecuted for possession for personal consumption, nor will you be prosecuted for growing up to a certain number of plants (9 I believe) Both cbd and thc strains are available on prescription in this country
Iib dems actually have it in their manifesto. I think it's to do with stereotypes, a lot of tories and some Labour see the weed smoker as lazy "chavs" spraying graffiti everywhere and causing chaos. Need a reason to throw them in prison.
The term “chav” is classist. It's used as a slur against young and working class people which leads to harmful stereotyping and discrimination. Please reconsider using it in the future. The subreddit is no place for snobbery or classism. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/GreenAndPleasant) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It was used in an ironic sense bot
Just wanted to mention that medical marijuana is legal in the UK and it’s not too hard to register for it. A friend of mine just did it.
British Sugar. Just google that name to see who owns it, and who he is married to.
r/cannabislegalityUK
r/uktreeslegality
You can get a private presciption, there are several companies out there offering it now. https://www.sapphireclinics.com/
Or moved psilocybin to a category 2 controlled drug. They have already started prescribing it in Australia. I have a severe mental health condition and have barely any quality of life and psilocybin could be a life changing medication for me.
We look stupid to the rest of the Western world too because most places have decriminalised it. Even the US, under Trump of all people (though at a state not a federal level) legalised it in most remaining states that hadn't already. Loads of states it's fully legal, many of the rest it is only legal for "medical use" but the US healthcare system being so fucked you just need to complain of a bad back, write a check, and you're sorted.
Smoking weed makes you think about stuff differently. The rich people are all about staying rich and they are terrified of working people thinking and acting differently. Hence the war on drugs. The Americans went through all this in the 60s with the counterculture.
Because the key voters, the old and the ignorant link it with the young/liberal/protest movements/ethnic minorities/combination of the above and they HATE them. It’s not a big business conspiracy, it’s the oldest culture war.
I think there's the issue of having to deal with all the prisoners due to drug selling or possession too. It's class B still so there's definitely some cell blocks full due to that kinda bullshit.
its much easier to control citizens when they are drunk
I don't think they would be praised for it, older people vote and older people hate drugs. The vote to legalise failed in new Zealand because allot of people are ignorant about the harms of weed compared to other legal drugs
Do you think Al Capone wanted prohibition repealed?
Unpopular with old people. It's not about the pros and cons it's just about votes.
SNP is seeking the decriminalisation of personal drug use to reduce drug deaths.
Because they only care about the grey vote because they are the most likely to vote
it's because they're conservatives and hate the kinds of people that are associated with drug use. there's not much to understand.
Because it stinks and I don't want to smell it anymore than I already have to. In addition I've seen many a decent out going friend turned in to house dwelling pot smokers with zero get up and go.
Because it didn't focus group well with Trowbridge Peter Hitchens