Thoughts on the film's message (SPOILERS INCLUDED)
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elevatorbabies — 17 years ago(September 16, 2008 10:31 PM)
Tobacco and Alcohol are both drugs. Both of which are highly addictive and kill millions of people.
Here are some statistics from the druglibrary.org
This is how many deaths each drug kills every year in the U.S alone.- Tobacco kills about 390,000.
- Alcohol kills about 80,000.
- Sidestream smoke from tobacco kills about 50,000.
- Cocaine kills about 2,200.
- Heroin kills about 2,000.
- Aspirin kills about 2,000.
- Marijuana kills 0.
There has never been a recorded death due to marijuana at any time in US history. - All illegal drugs combined kill about 4,500 people per year, or about one percent of the number killed by alcohol and tobacco. Tobacco kills more people each year than all of the people killed by all of the illegal drugs in the last century.
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pgrass13 — 17 years ago(October 26, 2008 12:04 AM)
People always claim marijuana nevere killed anyone, but doesn't the smoke have damaging effects? Also, I am sure I have hearfd of people dying as a result of being high and doing something stupid like driving.
Same thing we do every night try to take over the world -
tetragrammatoncleric — 17 years ago(November 09, 2008 05:58 PM)
Smoking anything has carcinogenic and other damaging implications regardless of what it is. Smoking is just 1 way to consume cannabis. The most effective method for recreational use is through use of a vaporizer that heats the plant, but not to the point of combustion.
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bryanross1985 — 16 years ago(November 18, 2009 06:54 AM)
A buddy of mine who was a heavy pothead, and I mean heavy, was severely paranoid and ended up taking a power drill to his head. So don't tell me that it doesn't kill anyone.
HELP ME!!! I need to know if I am alone. -
Caribbean_Smurf — 17 years ago(November 23, 2008 08:17 AM)
I don't know what others think, but it seemed to me to make a pretty convincing arguement against marijuana use
No it doesn't. Anybody with half a brain know nothing that happens in this movie could ever be a result of smoking marijuana. In fact, it makes people who are against marijuana look like a bunch of malinformed tools.
It's like saying drinking coffee turns you into a sex maniac. -
osbo45 — 17 years ago(December 05, 2008 11:56 PM)
Your coffie analogy is not really acurate, marijuana lessens your inhabitions and can lead to things that would never have happened otherwise. I used to be a pothead when I was younger and while the effects are not anywhere near what they are protrayed as being in Reefer Madness there are still negitive aspects. Pot is not nearly as bad a alchocol but it makes your mind fuzzy and makes you sit around watching tv and eating junk food. That is in no way good for you.
"people who speak in metaphors can shampoo my crotch" -
alexandre-georgiev — 16 years ago(April 20, 2009 04:50 PM)
My best thrill is to drive while high drive a BYCICLE. Not a freaking car. And btw, try driving slightly high vs driving slightly drunk. Come back and tell me on which you drove past 30 in a zone of 30. Tell me on which you actually gave a sh!t about stop signs. Sitting and watching movies while eating chips does it for the first 6 months. After that you get bored and want to get out. I do not say that weed is a blessing, I m saying it s not a curse in any kind. If you are thinking of legalizing something, legalizing that would not hurt. YES Mary Jane interfers with your brain development if you smoke some before 18 ( about that age, you are done with your brain growth ), but NEWSFLASH! so does alcohol, and a bit stronger. Wanna look at the side effects of alcohol abuse vs weed abuse? Sure, it may make you slow, or give you cancer if you really go hard on it, but can you loose a limb at 50 years old? Alcohol can, just ask my gf's uncle whose gangrenous leg is on the knife edge, litterally, due to his alcoholism. Nope, smoking weed ain't drinking from the Holy Grail, but frankly, there's not so much negative about it, besides being mainstream in teenagers due to it being an illicit substance ( and thus attractive ). Oh, and yes there's positive. At least for me. Believe it or not, my grade average went by a bit more than half a letter up, and I m in university in chemistry ( nope, still haven't found a way to synthesise weed, working on it though
). And there's more much more. Nope, I'm not advising/advertizing it. I m just saying, legalizing it would make sense, if it stays like tabacco: out of kids hands. -
cobhc_for_life — 16 years ago(August 31, 2009 11:44 AM)
I started smoking pot at 16 years old. I got straight F's my freshman and sophomore years. I told me parents i was sick of education and didn't even want to bother with it anymore. They flipped the beep out and demanded I make it to UCLA or some crap. Then I started making friends with the potheads, and they ALWAYS had pot. junior and senior years I got all A's and B's, made up every single credit i beep up on, and managed to hit the minimum credit requirement by the very end of the year. i made it to college and im actually starting my second year today. and i wouldn't have gotten anywhere close to this point if it wasn't for pot. and now my parents know about it and they're threatening to test my urine at random. why? because pot is DANGEROUS!!! and ILLEGAL!!!
i can't wait to move out, im never gonna call my parents ever again, it'll be the best years of my life. -
sheens43 — 15 years ago(May 06, 2010 06:23 PM)
It doesn't "make" you sit around watching TV and eating junk food; it just happens that those are enjoyable to do while high. Just like alcohol doesn't force you to have sex, but it does make sex feel better. It still comes down to the person's individual choice. I've been high where I was productive, and didn't sit around doing nothing.
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rwsmith29456 — 17 years ago(December 28, 2008 08:35 PM)
If the movie was about drugs in general, I'd say that yes, it could happen and it does, but pinning all that on weed is beyond ridiculous. I've known a lot of people from 53 years that smoked dope and 99% of them never even committed a crime, except for possesion of marijuana.
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Comradedent-1 — 17 years ago(March 22, 2009 11:55 AM)
From my understanding over 1 million non-violent offenders are in prison because of this movie and that is nothing to laugh about. This movie was released in 1936 and the tax law was passed in 1937, as the op says it was very convincing to middle america at this time and the moral crusaders who lost the battle against alcohol 4 years earlier got their revenge with this monroe doctrine of the drug war.
Legalization needs to come and it needs to come quickly, the government needs to suck up it's controlling ways and stop being our parents.
P.s. This is not coming from a pothead, I like alcohol better -
Scotty7617 — 17 years ago(March 27, 2009 01:25 PM)
"I don't know what others think, but it seemed to me to make a pretty convincing arguement against marijuana use."
Exaggerating the dangers of drugs does far more damage than they would do otherwise. You can lie to kids and tell them that smoking pot will cause them to act the way the kids in the movie do. You can tell them that pot is in the same category as drugs like crack, PCP, or meth.
But what's going to happen when they eventually smoke pot, either through peer pressure or curiosity, and they don't act like in the movie, or it doesn't have the same effects as the hard drugs?
They're going to think "Well, if they were lying about that, they must have been lying about the dangers of the other stuff too."
"We'll settle this the old Navy way. First guy to die loses."