To not understand why drinking alcohol while your kids are asleep is ok but smoking weed is not?

[QuackPorridgeBacon]

I know this may sound like a twattish thread and I understand I may get a lot of shit for it.

The thing is though, I don't understand how wine and gin (two favourites on here) are seemingly ok to consume while kids are in bed sleeping, yet having a smoke is terrible.

Now, putting legalities aside (I don't think they matter seeing how some places are now legalising it can't be that bad) what is the issue with smoking but there seems to be no issue with drinking?

I see friends on fb and the like talking about having a few bottles almost every night some with really small babies (I'm terribly anxious so the younger the child the more I worry, even though I probably shouldn't lol) yet if you have a smoke you are deemed irresponisble and a druggie right up there with crack fs.

One person I know, would drink almost every night and would complain that her partner (now ex) would smoke weed. Yet I see them both as the same really, maybe I see the drinking as worse though because once you are drunk that's it there is no way to really stop that in an emergency. Smoking, you tend to snap out of it need be and are always alert and just snacking will make you feel how you did before anyway.

Basically, wondering what others views are?

Mandy- great post. I'm a teacher and I can tell when kids are in a home where weed is smoked because you can smell it on their hair, their books, their bags. I can well believe the parents don't realise this, in the same way all smokers aren't aware that they smell.

I agree insofar as if someone grows their own weed (so the ethical issues about being part of a chain which involves child exploitation, trafficking, ruined lives etc aren't relevant) , then ingests it in a way which doesn't involve to tobacco (which is very harmful) also ensuring that if they smoke it they do it in a closed room with excellent ventilation to avoid it getting in the rest of the house, then showering and washing their hair and clothes to avoid the lingering stink .... yeap I agree, if you do all those things it's certainly no more harmful than a glass of wine. The legal side is irrelevant to me in that scenario.

HOWEVER I doubt many weed users fit the criteria above. Most I know buy their weed and smoke it mixed with tobacco

A 10 from your local dealer doesn't have any medicinal purposes. Promise.
Smoking weed won't cure your pain or help your cancer (as many many people believe)

Most (sensible) people who aren't obsessed with weed to a point (which you get with alcohol, by the way - which is a much worse substance IMO and I would rather be around 100 high as fuck people than 100 drunk as fuck people) understand that it won't cure anything, but it offers RELIEF. Which is a big thing.

As I said earlier, CBD gives me relief from my pain and anxiety. It doesn't fix it, but for a couple of hours while I'm vaping it I actually get to experience the rare phenomenom known as "calm". The only time I've ever felt calm before that in recent years is after my colonoscopy while on twilight sedation meds!

Cocklodger you make these statements as though they are concrete, verifiable facts but where is your evidence? I'm inclined to believe these are your opinions based on information fed to you that you swallowed without examination.

Because I can tell you for fact that a couple of puffs off a joint takes away my period pain in minutes. I can tell you that a small dose from a pipe a few times a week keeps my anxiety in check. That when I consumed pot during chemotherapy I felt calmer and less nauseous. Yes, this is anecdotal but it's first hand experience. What's yours?

The cannabis plant is made up of a staggering number of active ingredients of which THC and CBD are only the two we (barely) understand. They are both present in the plant and the ratio of them influences the effect that consumption will have on you but it's not that one component when extracted is magic and another is evil.

I know a lot of things get put up bums for smuggling purposes but wow you'd have to have a pretty big bum to make butt smuggling of cannabis worthwhile!

I'd also add that anyone going to the lengths I outlined above to ensure their weed consumption isn't harmful... probably ought to get out more!!
It's akin to going to the effort of making your own wine which you then consume alone in a sealed room, followed by a quick shower

I can't honestly see much difference - not a weed smoker myself because I don't like the taste, but I don't have any problem with those who enjoy it. A disproportionate number of people on Mumsnet are very hung up on rules. Lots of goody-twoshoes Brown Owl types on here who don't get out much and have rationalised their lack of life as good parenting.

PS mandate you are being very naive if you think the only parents who are using weed are the ones whose kids' bags smell of it.

You are also being naive if you think that everyone who consumes weed gets it from some dark back alley thug, gets mindbendingly high right there and then drives to school to collect their kids. This is war-on-drugs propaganda. Just as most drinkers know how to consume responsibly, so do most users of cannabis. To think otherwise is to wilfully choose to be uninformed.

nikiforov

Where did you get 10 people from? It says 13 studies with a 10 to 20 years span.

Sir Robin Murray quoted is Professor Sir Robin Murray - Professor of Psychiatric Research at Kings College
kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/en/persons/robin-murray(0875bc32-9bb1-47b3-90c2-5783969e5ce5).html

So I am prepared to accept his analysis of the robustness of studies is probably better than mine.

It does bother me just how "think of the children!!!" people are on here. I get that second hand smoke is bad - but if you're smoking outside and bedroom windows are closed, kids are in bed, they're not getting second hand smoke. Smoke at the very end of the damn garden if you have one.

I don't think anybody should smoke inside at all ever because no matter what, it smells fucking awful!

But the amount of MNetters commenting on this who are gonna have a bottle of wine over the course of tonight and tomorrow are being mahoosive hypocrites

You can drink in moderation, you can't smoke drugs in moderation.

If you expand his list of research then you'll find a significant number of studies you might want to look at
kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/en/persons/robin-murray(0875bc32-9bb1-47b3-90c2-5783969e5ce5)/publications.html

Why can't you smoke in moderation?!

"Evidence has consistently demonstrated that cannabis use is a risk factor for psychosis,
both for those with existing psychotic disorders and for young people vulnerable
to psychosis. Clinicians must be aware of the psychotic potential of cannabis and
synthetic cannabinoids, monitor for psychotic emergence among users, and take care
not to neglect cannabis use disorders when planning treatment."

Among VULNERABLE adults is a very different thing from your typical "normal" adult.

www.procon.org/files/current_psychiatry_psychosis.pdf

All quite recent studies were looked at, 2011. The evidence just is not conclusive as of yet and you posted a quote from the Telegraph, taken out of context - I'd like to see the man's actual paper detailing exactly what his conclusion was without the bias against or for weed.

Lasagna that is just plain false. You absolutely can smoke drugs in moderation. In fact, when you smoke or vape weed (as opposed to eating it) you know almost immediately how strong the effect is and can therefore stop before you get wasted. Drink, otoh, takes a while to really hit and you can consume too much before you realise you need to slow down.

Smoking in moderation- not inhaling? im fairly sure having one drag of a spliff is moderate smoking.

'You can drink in moderation, you can't smoke drugs in moderation.' Genuine lol

From what I can read after finding the meta-analysis (but not the entire paper, which I'd again need access to because the abstract still doesn't account for how many people had psychosis or a risk of genetic psychosis prior to intake of cannabis, which is also a big big part of his other papers - most of them are based on whether it increases the risk of psychosis in the future in patients with schizophrenia and similar disorders) that yes, there is a tenuous link, but it hasn't been fully proven yet. A link can be made, but there are a million other factors to consider - such as factors like are people with mental disorders/a risk of psychosis more likely to turn to drugs that will worsen that, blah blah so on and so forth.

It's also talking about daily high potency use, not occasional use.

niki
I quoted what he told the Telegraph who appear to have interviewed him. A leading academic has drawn a conclusion based on studies and expressed that view in a newspaper.

The article also says that Murray does not have a position on legalising cannabis other than seeing what happens in the US where it has been legalised.

Why encourage more people to take shit though. Great if canabis relieves pain, alcohol kills bacteria, fags keep mosquitos away ( just made that up) but we talking about using drugs recreationally.
Why make even more mild altering substances a part of life. If you are ill then it's medicine but if it's just to calm down after work that's a bit sad.

For those using the cannabis -> psychosis argument who are genuinely concerned and interested in being roundly informed, this site seems to have investigated the issue in depth. cannabisandpsychosis.ca/home/

‘Eleven suggest a significant increase in onset of psychosis in cannabis users, and the other two trend [towards it],’ Sir Robin Murray says, adding, ‘we’re as sure as we can be’ that cannabis triggers psychosis. Results don’t yet factor in high-strength skunk, as it ‘hasn’t been around long enough’.

That's the quote you linked. Are you seriously telling me the telegraph wouldn't pick and choose which quotes they wanted to use from the interview to make it seem slightly less positive?

It literally says in one of the papers: "Current evidence shows that high levels of cannabis use increase the risk of psychotic outcomes and confirms a dose-response relationship between the level of use and the risk for psychosis. Although a causal link cannot be unequivocally established, there is sufficient evidence to justify harm reduction prevention programs."

A casual link cannot be unequovically established, but HIGH LEVELS of use increase the risk.

His papers only state that it's absolutely certain it increases the risk in people with a risk of psychosis or who already have psychosis present in their medical history. I'm pulling this from the links you gave me.

All the negative opinions people have about cannabis users. The kids stink, the people do poorly on tests etc. I get the impression they are talking about people with a cannabis addiction. I don't think any addiction is healthy. But the views a lot are taking are really only comparable to alcoholism. There is no way teachers call tell ALL the children who have parents that smoke the occasional joint apart from kids that parents don't. And if you do think that then YOU are being naive. I actually find it funny that all the anti cannabis posters probably don't realise they interact with people that do smoke it. And you probably don't know it because your views are so clouded, they are afraid to tell you.

www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2215036614001175

The Lancet Psychiatry
Volume 2, Issue 3, March 2015, Pages 233-238

Journal home page for The Lancet Psychiatry

Articles

Proportion of patients in south London with first-episode psychosis attributable to use of high potency cannabis: a case-control study

"Introduction

Cannabis is the most popular illicit drug in the world. Uruguay was the first country to legalise its use and several US states have done so or are in the process of doing similar.1 Therefore, any harm caused by cannabis use should be quantified. Prospective epidemiological studies have consistently reported that use of cannabis increases the risk of schizophrenia-like psychosis.2,3 In the UK, the investigators of the 2012 Schizophrenia Commission4 concluded that cannabis use is the most preventable risk factor for psychosis, and research that aims to improve estimation of the drug's contribution to illness development should be pursued."

Why is no one linking articles for all the negative impacts alcohol has on people? For all the mental disorders it causes, all the hospital admissions, all the suicides etc?

I think some people are making huge assumptions here. Perhaps their judgement is clouded

No one has said that as a teacher then can tell ALL the children whose parents smoke cannabis. I'm sure I don't know ALL the kids at my school who smoke it. However I know enough to see that quite a number who do use it, are certainly not growing their own (probably wouldn't have a clue where to start) they buy it and don't know exactly what they are buying, how strong it is and how much they're being ripped off.

Although there are kids of all abilities who smoke it there is s particular problem
Among the less able, lower achieving pupils, and they tend to be the ones who develop a dependency often around anxiety... I guess it's a vicious circle of lacking confidence academically and socially, therefore finding that a smoke reduces their anxiety temporarily, therefore.....

I (and I imagine many MNers) don't give a shiny shite whether some adults eat, smoke or shove weed up their bum in their own home because they're in pain, anxious or just fancy some. But that's not most teenagers who use it are doing it and you're naive if you think it is, and that's a far bigger global issue with far reaching repercussions than the odd middle aged MNer having their weekly dose

That's about "skunk-like" cannabis, not regular cannabis. Read the full thing.

"The ready availability of high potency cannabis in south London might have resulted in a greater proportion of first onset psychosis cases being attributed to cannabis use than in previous studies."

High potency.

Oh, yeah. I don't think anybody under the age of 18 should be taking any drug - not that that stopped me from being stupid and having jager bombs at 15 and kids will probably be having drinking parties for a long time, but hopefully they very quickly learn that going above their limits is stupid and tone down.

I don't drink or smoke at all. Vaping CBD (a completely legal substance - for now) is the only non-pharmaceutical vice I have.