marijuana

Grass, an adult card game that has been on the shelves for decades, is currently being sold at Toyworld.  It was only time before some nit picking busybody managed to get a newsie interested in the story.

Sarah Dunn to the rescue!

An adult card game which lets players pretend to be cannabis-dealing kingpins is being sold at Toyworld Nelson.

In Grass, players use cards to mimic dealing cannabis, stealing from one another and protecting their “stash” to amass drug money. Individual cards include “Steal your neighbour’s pot”, “Catch a buzz” and “Lust conquers all”.

“Like the real thing, it’s easy to learn,” say the tongue-in-cheek instructions. “We suggest that you begin gradually with Grass, till you get used to it.”

At Toyworld, it hangs in the puzzles section next to decks of playing cards and games like Uno.

Grass is out of the reach of most little hands, but would stand out to any older children who could identify the distinctive cannabis leaf emblazoned on the packaging.

Read more »

New evidence suggests that marijuana maybe popular because it helps people cope with the pain of loneliness.

Why smoke marijuana? Users would probably reply that numbed-out bliss is its own reward. But if smoothing out the harsh edges of reality is your goal, what bruises are you attempting to avoid?

Newly published research suggests that, at least for some, the answer is: The intense discomfort of social exclusion.

“Marijuana has been used to treat physical pain,” reports a research team led by University of Kentucky psychologist Timothy Deckman, “and the current findings suggest it may also reduce emotional pain.”

Interesting. Got me fascinated.

[D]ata on 5,631 Americans, who reported their level of loneliness, described their marijuana usage (if any), and assessed their mental health and feelings of self-worth. Not surprisingly, the researchers found a relationship between loneliness and feelings of self-worth, but it was significantly weaker for regular pot smokers.

“Marijuana use buffered the lonely from both negative self-worth and poor mental health,” the researchers write.

Another experiment, featuring 537 people, found those who were experiencing social pain were less likely to have suffered a major depression in the past year if they smoked pot relatively frequently.

Still another experiment, featuring 225 people, used the computer game Cyberball to create an immediate experience of social exclusion. Half the participants in the three-person game received the ball twice early on, and then never again during the course of the game. They then reacted to a series of statements designed to assess whether their need for self-esteem and belonging felt threatened—statements such as, “I had the feeling that the other players did not like me.”

The results: Those who smoked marijuana relatively frequently felt less threatened than those who smoked it less frequently, or not at all.

I’m very interested on the effect mitigating loneliness caused by severe depression.

While the government moves to ban K2 and other synthetic cannabinoids there is some evidence too that dope growing is bad for the environment. Which is going to put a dampener on Metiria Turei’s assumptions that the far north maori weed growers are entreprenuerial heroes, when the reality is, it appears, that they are environmental. vandals

This news is sure to send the Greens into a weed induced tail spin.

Talk about sitting back and watching the grass grow. Greens and government officials in Washington State are normally fierce towards carbon emitters, pioneering tough standards on power stations, for example. But their principles go to pot when it comes to cannabis growing.

The practice, legalised there by a vote in last year’s presidential election, is immensely polluting. Growing just one kilo of marijuana, a study concluded last year, releases as much carbon dioxide as driving across the United States seven times. This is because it is mainly cultivated indoors – with bright lights, air-conditioning, fans, dehumidifiers and even machines specially generating the gas to produce more potent puffs.

Normally keen green groups, such as the Sierra Club and Conservation Northwest, have dopily told The Seattle Times that they have other priorities. Governor Jay Inslee – who hails Washingtonians as “the people who are destined to defeat carbon pollution” – declined to comment. And the City of Seattle, despite aiming to be carbon-neutral by 2050, is producing new zoning regulations to permit plenty of indoor reefer ranching.

Let’s see how the Greens deal with this shocking news.

Hunting through the archive, I see Metiria Turei actually looks like she’ll have some support from Labour Leader David Shearer in the call to create ‘Green’ jobs by harnessing the ‘real entrepreneurial skills’ of dope growers and dealers.

Read more »

The other day I blogged about Meteria Turei and her marijuana ideas, NZ First then issued a press release and I blogged again about it this morning.

TVNZ is now running a story about it. Which is good, it needs more coverage.

Metiria Turei’s claim that Maori growing marijuana are developing entrepreneurial and horticultural skills has been slammed as “mind-blowingly ridiculous” by Associate Health Minister Peter Dunne.

The Green Party co-leader made the comment on Maori TV’s Native Affairs programme this week, but she has been cut down by Dunne, who branded the claim as “ridiculous” and “irresponsible in the extreme”.

In the show, Turei said growing the illegal drug helps develop “real skills” among Maori, particularly in disadvantaged areas.

“There’s some real skills there actually, some real entrepreneurial skills, some real horticulture skills, as much as people might think that’s a bit funny,” she said.

However the way they have gone about this story it is somewhat disturbing.

First of all TVNZ doesn’t credit where the story came from. Now you might say they could have found the story themselves and they could have. Except they have lifted the Youtube edit of the story that I did, exactly, from my Youtube channel. In the screenshot below you can see they credit the source as Youtube. The only place this can be found on Youtube is my channel.  Read more »

Looks Like NZ First are reading Whaleoil. I posted this video a few days ago about Metiria Turei’s whacky ideas about Maori and marijuana.

Now Barbara Stewart has launched into Metiria Turei.

New Zealand First says Green Party co-leader Metiria Turei is off the planet by claiming in a TV interview that Maori growing marijuana are developing entrepreneurial and horticultural skills.  Read more »

The Green taliban have released some new policy.

Metiria Turei was on Maori TV last night saying that cannabis dealing/growing/possession should be legalised for Maori.

Apparently, it’s all for the children.

WTF?

She and Bruce Ferguson must be hanging out together.

From the No Shit Sherlock files. Just ask any secondary school teacher who the dope users are in the class, they know. Now some research shows that there is lasting IQ degradation from regular use of cannabis under the age of 18.

The persistent use of cannabis before age 18 has been linked to lasting harm to intelligence, according to a large study.

Analysis of more than 1000 New Zealanders found those who took up cannabis in adolescence and used it for years afterwards experienced an average decline in IQ of eight points when measured at age 13 and 38.

People who did not begin using cannabis until they were adults, with fully formed brains, did not show the same declines.

Experts here and abroad say the findings are significant and could offer some explanation for the “teenage stoner” stereotype.

Lead researcher Madeline Meier of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, said quitting cannabis later in life did not appear to reverse the loss of intelligence.

Higher IQ correlated with higher education and income and better health, she said.

“Somebody who loses eight IQ points as an adolescent may be disadvantaged compared to their same-age peers for years to come.”

That said, I think cannabis usage for over 18 should be decriminalised.

Helen Kelly has popped up again having a dig at some employers who she doesn’t want drug testing people using dangerous equipment to fell bloody big trees.

Ms Kelly said the industry’s “one trick pony” of drug testing was insufficient to end the workplace toll.
While drug testing was important, the industry needed to take into account other factors to reduce forest fatalities, such as training issues, trained health and safety representatives and reasonable work hours.

How about this Helen? Take the drugs out the of forestry industry and see if that works first. Whats the bet stoned workers are more likely to be injured and die, and your denial of this simple fact is killing workers. Chainsaws and marijuana do not mix.