anti- marijuana legalization
...nt perspectives. As I learned in D.A.R.E. some people decide to experiment with new drugs because they become bored or tried of the same high time after time. Another reason is just that users become desensitized to the illegality of drugs by using marijuana and are just more willing to compromise their morals to get high. Few people realize just how detrimental smoking marijuana can be to their health. Tests have shown that “a person who smoke five joints a week may be taking in the same amount of cancer causing agents a person who smokes a full pack of cigarettes every day” (Marijuana Special). This is a scary fact, and when paired with the fact that the average age people begin to experiment with marijuana is fourteen (Mathias) the health of many is severely compromised. Of the people who experiment with pot, many will make it a habit and even more will try new drugs while still smoking marijuana on a regular basis. This does not even include the increased health risks incurred by people who consume cigarettes and alcohol as well as marijuana. Health problems, more specifically “cancers of the aero digestive tract, have been directly linked to people who habitually smoke marijuana” (Marijuana Special). This alone should be enough of a reason to keep marijuana illegal. But some people that are pro legalization would say, that cigarettes too have been linked to specific types of cancers, and I cannot argue with that fact. However marijuana has also been shown to “produce defects in cognitive functioning” (Marijuana Special). Cigarettes do not do this, they may have cancer-causing agents but they do not interrupt with our functioning, as does marijuana. In a test preformed at the NIDA (National Institute on Dug Abuse) center in Baltimore, it was concluded that marijuana usage severely impairs people simply motor skills and reduces reaction time. In the study subjects were given a cigarette to smoke containing 0, 1.8, or 3.6 percent THC the subjects were then left alone for twenty minutes. After that time the subjects were give a simple sobriety test. The results showed that those persons receiving higher amounts of THC displayed more swaying and...