Canada’s legal pot is going well
reuters.com
reuters.com
Those who are 'for' are upset about the supply issues that have occurred with the legal supply being limited (long delays), more expensive and often poor quality (moldy).
Those who are indifferent are annoyed they have not offered any incentive to municipalities to allow stores (no share of taxes, no increase to enforcement budgets, no ability to control, limit or place restrictions on store locations) and made prices high making thus causing no reduction of the black market.
Those who are 'against' think private businesses selling weed will increase sale to minors and just generally make a bunch of moral panic arguments.
I smoked exceedingly rarely before legalization (3 times in my entire life) and now I smoke often. I'm happy to pay the paltry prices for the amount of enjoyment I get from it, and I know that the weed I get is safe for me to consume. It also arrives in a day or two after ordering. Most times I'm surprised it came so quick!
I'm in Ontario.
You are the boogeyman to the people who oppose legalisation. One of the rare people who didn't smoke simply to obey the law and are now getting stoned because it's legal. :P
I think the people who rarely smoked are the most happy, because they are not worried about a minor price increase but also appreciate the convenience and legal acceptance.
I am personally happy with legalisation and, as someone who no longer smokes but realises the relative lack of harm from consuming cannabis (especially as compared to alcohol), think it is the morally right thing to do.
Despite my own beliefs, public opposition to the rollout is still significant and definitely worth mentioning especially in a Reuters article that will be propagated everywhere.
As a pre- and post-legalization smoker, I always thought this was a naive view. Having to deal with a sketchy flaky street dealer (not to mention finding one to begin with) is absolutely going to turn a lot of people off of smoking. And speaking from experience, waiting on an empty street corner for 20-30 minutes for your dealer to show up (because he's always late) gives you a lot of time to introspect and question your choices...
It is really nothing like walking into a clean retail store with regular business hours, display cases, and pretty young cashiers. The street dealer situation makes you feel like a lowlife piece of shit who has a lot of growing up to do; the legal retail situation makes you feel like a yuppie walking into an Apple Store. I wouldn't be at all surprised if this new option led to 2 or 3 times as many people smoking. And to me, that's completely fine (really, good for me since it makes it more socially acceptable).
I think the smokers who believed that legalization didn't offer a more appealing purchasing option for a ton of people must be the 24/7 stoners who only have other 24/7 stoners as friends and can't imagine not having immediate access to weed.
We have no idea of the prevalance of this kind of person. There's no research.
(I am in favour of legalisation.)
So yes, that's all anecdotal, but at least in my circles I have seen over the past 30 years that (semi)legalizing indeed helps a lot; because there is a 40-50 year trackrecord in countries like NL, there must be someone who researched it and has data about the actual effects of legalization and 'gedoog' (semi-legalization) strategies?
Portugal is the most common example of how harm reduction policies help to decrease mortality and usage, a better informed population where drugs aren't taboo makes their usage be lower and more responsible.
I have some Dutch friends, most don't really smoke weed as often, usually on a special occasion. Harder drugs usage is also more responsible, most of them test their drugs before consuming, don't overdo it. Openness and information invites responsibility.
That said I applaud them. That's a very respectable level of restraint and community-mindedness (I swear that's a word).
That was me. Although not because I was afraid of getting caught, but simply because the effort and logistics of attempting to get ahold of a consistent supply of quality weed without getting ripped off was not worth it.
(I am in favour of legalisation.)
You're totally right that those people exist and there are 'many' of them. I'm going off conversations that have occurred and caused certain cities, especially in the Peel and Halton regions, to ban stores.
Honestly the real number of people who feel a type of way about legalisation doesn't even matter that much, especially when decisions like this are up to already elected representatives and not handled by referendum. The squeaky wheel gets the grease, and this is a fundamental issue with the implementation of democracy in the west. For issues that most people don't consider a hill to die on (or, at least, both sides) elected representatives don't end up voting in line with actual public opinion. A prime example of this fact is that legalization only happened in 2018 and not 20 years earlier.
(I am against legalisation; I don't live in Canada.)
For me it is completely easy to believe. Cannabis is not addictive enough for me to go to the trouble of getting it illegally.
Yep, I agree.
But we need to talk not just about what happens today, but what happens in the future. If cannabis is normalised and legally available will that increase the use of cannabis?
I think use of cannabis will increase in Canada after legalisation and I doubt anybody will disagree or project a decrease. I think a bigger question is whether public opinion will continue to trend favourably in light of current medical knowledge which seems to think that cannabis causes less harm than alcohol thus making it a better way to waste time and/or ease general existential angst on the weekends.
While I don't think more people getting stoned is necessarily 'win' for Canadian society, I think if it diverts them from other more harmful forms of impairment (alcohol or 'hard' drugs) it probably is.
Up until now it was mostly conjectures, and very biased observations only (not only because of preconceptions, but also because the smoking population was so fringe). Even if it ends up there’s tons of unpredicted critically bad side effects, at least we’ll be out of the boogyeman phase and will have solid evidence of what’s good and wvat’s bad.
Take really care about that dude. Just like few drinks here and there, few cigarettes once in a while or even pain medication when you really need are not dangerous, continuous use just because "It's easy to get and it feels good" have major long term impact on you health.
Moreover, most retail stores in Ontario were given very short notice (~2-4 months) to build the stores and open up on April 1st couple weeks ago. I would say in a year or two, we would have likely forgotten about all this and will be having normal and regular deliveries via Canada Post like any other product.
https://www.thestar.com/news/cannabis/2019/03/18/will-ontari...
Granted, I don’t smoke that often - but I’ve been to one of the stores and ordered from OCS online and have nothing negative to say. Maybe I just had low expectations?
Where those who oppose or are on the fence form a majority (or at least a vocal one) municipalities have banned stores for now. I expect once the province smartens up and gives municipalities the ability to control proximity to schools, parks, churches and other places the law expects children to congregate (or gives up some of that sweet tax money) the people who are on the fence will lighten up.
The Chinese community in the GTA is a great advocate, and cause, of municipalities banning stores. They form a large and vocal bloc and for whatever reason seem to view cannabis as a hard drug and oppose any form of decriminalisation or legalisation.
I disagree. Sure, a free market is better than a government monopoly, but marijuana isn't anywhere close to a free market. It's highly regulated and highly constrained. Only 25 stores were allowed to open province wide in one of the biggest giveaways to the private sector ever. Those licenses are probably worth hundreds of millions of dollars each and Ford just gave them away to lucky lottery winners. And of course he's going to protect them -- no city is going to allow the Mac's milk shop on every corner to start selling pot so those lottery winners are just going to print money for themselves, and lobby for their own interests, not ours.
Better a government monopoly with profits going to the taxpayer than a private sector oligopoly.
Hasn't been perfect of course, but its far from the disaster certain groups are trying to paint it as.
Most of the actual failures fall on the provincial governments in my view. I think cannabis legalisation will probably be one of the few positive achievements history sees from the Trudeau administration although I hope I'm wrong.
I have heard that the roll-out went very well in Alberta, although they also have a very lax approach to alcohol sales unlike Ontario.
https://potfacts.ca/the-liberal-party-elite-is-heavily-inves...
https://ottawasun.com/2015/10/28/liberal-cfo-could-rake-in-m...
I haven't heard any moral outrage arguments in the press or otherwise. Remember that this isn't only a youth issue or it wouldn't be used in a federal campaign promise. It is, by definition, widely supported. Recall that people well into their 60s and 70s came of age smoking pot.
IMHO there's much more moral outrage associated with the Conservative plan to reduce drinking restrictions. Ontario remains a pretty uptight place.
I want to say it took about 18 months.
The Canadian federal government does not sell cannabis. Some of the provincial governments do but not all. Many (I love that word) provinces, including Ontario, allow the private sector to sell cannabis with the correct license.
>When alcohol and coffee are so normalized that people can consume these drugs even in workplaces, it's simply ridiculous how we treat weed, quite possibly a safer drug
There are very few workplaces in Canada where drinking on the job would be accepted. Between cannabis and alcohol, cannabis is probably more acceptable. Caffeine definitely causes a lesser level of impairment than either cannabis or alcohol and is not really comparable. A workplace doesn't really care about the level of medical harms caused by a drug, just the level of impairment, which is why 'nobody' (disclaimer: I'm sure a statistically insignificant number of people do) gets fired for taking a smoke break (off company time of course).
Keep in mind that cannabis is technically illegal across the US, the US federal government just chooses not to enforce the law in renegade states for the most part. The Canadian and American situations are not comparable.
But I'd still trust Joe to drive the forklift after a cup of coffee and cigarette than a drink and a doob.
for the most part, those are rural communities - i suspect there would be shops there if they were allowed.
One should also mention that weed is by no means 100% safe. I myself was once hospitalized due to a panic attack caused by too much weed. But compared to other "normal" drugs like nicotine, alcohol, caffeine etc weed is among safest.
Brick and mortar just recently launched in this province, it was rushed and isnt in good shape. Other provinces are faring better in this regard.
The product selection is large, but in stock inventory of lower-priced products especially tends to be lacking. Some clearly over-priced products are trying to be the "Apple of weed" and failing, the market should sort that out.
An unexpected challenge of legalization is that new users can get overwhelmed by choice. Our government has unfortunately repeated the old indica=sleepy, sativa=energetic nonsense in the official literature despite advances in the science showing that while these distinctions are great to seperate plant types they distinguish between effects poorly.
I have been working on a project [1] that attempts to index the scientific literature and provide a better, evidence-based path towards cultivar selections. Every endocannabinoid system is different so this will never be totally correct, but it can at least trim down the options for new users.
I hear you can often get next day delivery when ordering from the darknet, and it's been that way for years.
Weedmaps is the defacto "local" black market source in my area, I can have product in hand within 2 hours from a selection of dealers.
Sellers post their "menus" on the app and leave a phone number or email. Responses are quick. Delivery is $10-15 usually.
Most will verify you are 19+ when they drop it off, as selling drugs to minors has historically had stiffer penalties then selling to adults. The laws have all changed now and the first person was just charged with possession under the new laws last week.
I mentally compare it to alcohol. A "couple beer" buzz costs me about $1.50, and I feel wonderful the next day. And at the rate I use it, the $50 bag (1/8oz) has lasted since about November and isn't empty yet.
Ah yes, Netherlands: a land of barbarians, murder and rampant disentery. Not a single industry in sight.
Netherlands were the first in the industrialized world to tolerate it, and that demonstrated a lot of courage given the general attitudes at the time. Their example paved the way forward to today, when Canada is the first country in the industrialized world to give cannabis legal status.
Legalization of cannabis is the drug policy equivalent of marriage equality in social policy (which in Canada is also the law of the land).
But more stores will open. And gradually, the black market should shrink. We'll see. I'm just glad we aren't wasting tax dollars trying to enforce prohibition anymore.
The federal government gets a quarter of the cannabis tax revenues (the remaining three quarters go to the province) capped at one hundred million with any overage going solely to the province so it really is a drop in the bucket at far as the fed is concerned.
The primary health risk of cigarette smoking comes from the products of incomplete hydrocarbon combustion. These cause inflammation (leading to chronic lung disease) and many are carcinogenic.
An intelligent realist understands that most people are ignorant and prone to addictive behaviors, and will intervene where possible to substitute a lower-risk behaviour for a higher-risk one.
Instead, stupid doctors have refocussed their (otherwise appropriate) campaign against smoking on vaporization, and the government has moronically banned it in all the same places as smoking.
This stupidity has spilled over into marijuana legalization, causing vaporization liquids to remain illegal and denying users access to a relatively safe, measured, convenient dosage format with a long shelf life.
Patients taking marijuana for medical reasons are thereby screwed.
I despise stupid people making decisions in large groups. What a clusterfuck.
What changed is the government is now acting as a cartel for a very small number of companies who are allowed to sell legally. The legal companies are not meeting demand in any way comparable to pre-legalization. Prior to legalization we had a thriving free market the government wasn't getting a cut so there was no incentive for the laws on the books to be enforced. Now there is. The government makes money from weed sales so they have incentive to use force against those who are meeting the needs of the market.
Nothing got safer for the public. Its just now very risky to sell weed. Screw everything about how the government legalized weed in Canada. Its exactly as it was before except now the big companies have the RCMP as their enforcers to use against their competition.
What's unfortunate in theory, and funny in practice, is that "cannabis clinics" are essentially public on-boarding centres for this entrapment. The people working there aren't any more knowledgeable than a google search and take advantage of people naively thinking this "Medical Marijuana License" is anything other than a permit to get scammed by licensed producers (or cartel members, in this case). A part of the consultation is being taught how to buy from these LPs online as if one has never used amazon.com -- pretty funny to experience while playing dumb.
The entire province of BC had just one single cannabis storefront on day of legalization - despite hundreds of storefronts applying for permits. So customers went from buying weed in storefronts to having to do alleyway deals because of legalization.
https://vancouversun.com/cannabis/cannabis-news/partaking-so...
Nothing changed on the “legal” date.
But I did hear from one store that they were planning to close down, so they could legally apply for a licence and re-open. So the transition wasn’t as smooth as it could have been.
But no one started doing alley way deals “because legalisation”. There was already a large population who simply saw the stores as middle men, who marked up prices. Why buy from a store when you know who the store buys from? And why shouldn’t that continue?
I can buy from the brewery or the liquor store, why should marijuana be any different?