Author Topic: Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering  (Read 1629 times)

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Offline Antigen

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Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering
« on: April 11, 2004, 02:14:00 PM »
April 10, 2004, 12:56AM
 
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mp ... ok/2497565


Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering

By SHERYL McCARTHY

In December 1994, Joycelyn Elders, the U.S. surgeon general, was unceremoniously booted out of her job by President Clinton. The pediatrician and former director of the Arkansas health department had taken controversial stands on a number of issues.

She urged anti-abortion groups to "get over their love affair with the fetus and start supporting the children."

She said it was impossible to teach teenagers how to protect themselves from AIDS "without telling them about sex."

She said girls who were lesbians should be allowed to join the Girl Scouts because "none of us is good enough, or knows enough, to make decisions about other people's sexual preferences."

She suggested that the government study the feasibility of legalizing drugs.

But the last straw came when she suggested that sex-education courses should probably include a discussion of masturbation.

In a heartbeat, Elders was out the door and back in Arkansas -- too much of a perceived political embarrassment for the Clinton administration.

I admired her commitment to saying what she believed to be the truth, even if it was politically unpopular. If you can't get a straight answer from the nation's top doctor, then whom can you trust? But Elders paid the price for it.

I'm pleased to report that she's still at it, though. Now 70, Elders, who spends a lot of her time giving speeches, is working with the Marijuana Policy Project, an advocacy group, to get states to adopt medical marijuana laws. These laws, which are in effect in eight states and are being considered in five others, including New York, would legalize marijuana to treat the symptoms of diseases such as cancer, multiple sclerosis and AIDS.

Writing last month in The Providence Journal, Elders called on the Rhode Island legislature to approve such a bill, saying it was "simply wrong for the sick and suffering to be casualties in the war on drugs."

Nearly 700,000 arrests in 2002 were on marijuana charges, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, 88 percent of them for simple possession. Elders views the drug laws as "a war on our young people" and says that, while we let police lecture students about drugs, we haven't taught young people the real disadvantages of drug use.

"We've been very silent on that issue, except to pick them up and put them in jail," she told me. "We just commit them forever to a terrible handicap."

The hypocrisy in this is that while tobacco kills 435,000 Americans a year, we continue to sell it knowing that, even though it's forbidden to minors, any young person who wants to can buy it.

Elders wants to see marijuana treated the same way as alcohol and tobacco, and to have harder drugs dispensed legally on a controlled basis, which would lower their cost and eliminate the crimes that are committed to get the money to buy them. But people do get upset when you talk about relaxing the drug laws.

"I'm aware of that," Elders said. "I just have to express what I believe. I can't worry about what other people think. And if you can give me enough facts to show me I'm wrong, I would change."

Elders says she doesn't regret any of the stands she has taken. "I feel very good about taking those positions. Many of them were very unpopular then, but more and more people are moving towards my position."

McCarthy is a columnist for Newsday in New York.

[note: Newsday is the #1 daily among NYPD]

Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul alike.
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Offline thepatriot

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Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering
« Reply #1 on: April 12, 2004, 12:32:00 PM »
Wasn't Elders also he one that advocated having training for  teens to masturbate??
« Last Edit: December 31, 1969, 07:00:00 PM by Guest »
arasota Straight Escapee

Offline Antigen

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Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering
« Reply #2 on: April 12, 2004, 01:42:00 PM »
You must have been watching Faux News that day. What she actually said was that masturbation, being a fairly common human behavior, ought not be excluded from courses on human sexuality. Not that teachers should start giving live demonstrations. Just that the printed curriculum should cover that sub-topic.


Our youth can not understand why society chooses to criminalize a behavior with so little visible ill effect or adverse social impact... These young people have jumped the fence and found no cliff.

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/nc/ncmenu.htm' target='_new'>Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse

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Offline Cayo Hueso

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Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering
« Reply #3 on: April 12, 2004, 01:46:00 PM »
Quote
On 2004-04-12 10:42:00, Antigen wrote:

What she actually said was that masturbation, being a fairly common human behavior, ought not be excluded from courses on human sexuality. Not that teachers should start giving live demonstrations.  


Awww C'mon....why not? :lol:  :lol:

It is criminal to steal a purse. It is daring to steal a fortune. It is a mark of greatness to steal a crown. The blame diminishes as the guilt increases

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Offline thepatriot

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Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering
« Reply #4 on: April 12, 2004, 03:09:00 PM »
I think kids can figure it out on their own.... :lol:
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arasota Straight Escapee

Offline Antigen

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Elders backs marijuana for sick, suffering
« Reply #5 on: April 12, 2004, 10:25:00 PM »
Right, I have my reservations about whether a topic as private and sensitive as sex ought to be formally addressed in a public school setting to begin with. But it's sort of accepted that it is and ever shall be. So the big tadoo was over whether or not to teach it comprehensively and accurately.

But then, I take mild offence to all those preachy PSAs preaching about everything from smoking habits to insurance fraud. I just don't think government has any place moralizing and preaching at us.

What is this new loyalty? It is, above all, conformity. It is the uncritical and unquestioning acceptance of America as it is. It rejects inquiry into the race question or socialized medicine or public housing, regards as heinous any challenge to what is called the system of private enterprise, identifying that system with Americanism. It abandons evolution, repudiates the once popular concept of progress, and regards America as a finished product, perfect and complete. The concept of loyalty as conformity is a false one. It is narrow and restrictive, denies freedom of thought and conscience... What do men know of loyalty who make a mockery of the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights?
http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/unitarians/commager.html' target='_new'>Henry Steele Commager, 1947

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