Marijuana Is Not Really Harmless

The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article today about the long-term impact of consistently smoking marijuana.

The article reports:

International research has revealed that the more cannabis you smoke, the more likely you are to be lower paid and have relationship difficulties.

The study followed children from birth up to the age of 38 and found people who smoked cannabis four or more days a week over many years ended up in a lower social class than their parents.

It also found that regular and persistent users ended up with lower-paying, less skilled and less prestigious jobs than those who were not regular cannabis smokers.

Financial, work-related and relationship difficulties were further experienced by those taking the drug, which worsened as the number of years of regular cannabis use progressed.

The study, conducted by a team of researchers led by Magdalena Cerda at the University of California and Avshalom Caspi and Terrie Moffitt at Duke University, appeared in the journal Clinical Psychological Science.

‘Our research does not support arguments for or against cannabis legalization,’ said Cerda. ‘But it does show that cannabis was not safe for the long-term users tracked in our study.

One of the things that amazes me is the move to legalize marijuana in America while stigmatizing smoking tobacco. Both are damaging to the lungs, both ingest various toxins into the body, but smoking tobacco does not generally impact your social or financial success. Marijuana is not a harmless drug, and it is not a good idea to legalize the use of recreational marijuana until there is more study of its long-term effects. It is also very naive to believe that saying that recreational marijuana, legal in some states for people over twenty-one, will not be used by those under twenty-one. Teenagers using marijuana on a regular basis will not be of benefit to our society.