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Comment by xk_id | Hacker News Reader

There is nothing particularly “soft” about cannabis. As mounting modern evidence shows, it suppresses REM sleep (and by extension the consolidation of procedural learning undertaken during the day) and it lowers executive function, concentration and motivation. These effects also persist for some time after use is stopped, even if they are eventually reversed.

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Minus the concentration and motivation parts, so does does coffee, tea and other caffeine based products but you don’t see anyone clamouring to ban those.

Throughout history there were many coffee bans, so it's not like nobody thought about it.

I worked as a barista for years so I know a fair amount about coffee but the historical legality and prohibition of it is actually something I know very little about. Think I am going to do some Wikipedia browsing this afternoon!

I'm not particularly up to date on the literature, but it seems soft compared to other popular recreational drugs like illicit cocaine, methamphetamine, benzodiazepines and opiates. On the legal side it's clearly softer than alcohol, and probably less harmful than smoking tobacco.

For cannabis specifically it's worth also mentioning in many places you can consume it without interacting with criminals or being at risk of negative law enforcement interactions. This makes it socially softer than the illegal drugs.

It's "soft" relative to stuff like cocaine, heroin, crack, meth etc which muck you up more. It's probably kind of a par with alcohol in terms of problems caused.

On par? I mean, alcohol will literally kill you if you drink too much or have prolonged exposure. Alcohol makes you sick and fat.

If anything, alcohol is far worse than cannibas. Time will tell what effects it has on the wider population, but keep in mind cannibas use has been pretty wide spread for centuries and has been legal in many places in the US for over a decade.

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