Street drugs are higher than you think
... psychological effects are difficult to predict. If you’re planning on taking MDMA don’t expect just the love, also expect increased heart rate, blood pressure, and body temperature; jaw and teeth clenching (hence why a lot of raves have binky’s) hypertension, dehydration, chills and or sweating, nausea, blurred vision, faintness, dizziness, confusion, insomnia, and even paranoia. That doesn’t sound all that bad; I mean it goes away, right? It does but it causes liver damage, brain damage, paralysis, and after long term the effects aren’t reversible. As many as 4.31 per cent of eighth graders, 66 per cent of 10th graders and 10.59 per cent of 12th graders have tried ecstasy. Domestically, the DEA seized 196 MDMA tablets in 2000. The amount of seizures made by Customs has increased from 400,000 in February 1997, to 7.2 million in February 2001. An increase of 140 per cent has been reported of the use of MDMA amongst young people from 1995-2001. Marijuana, the #1 drug used throughout the world, has two parts: one legal, the other severely frowned upon by federal law. Let’s take a look at the brighter side. Hemp, mainly used in the production of jewellery, is merely the remaining parts of the marijuana plant. Under a DEA ruling that took affect in February 2002, food products containing even trace amounts of Tetrahydrocannabine (THC) are banned under the Controlled Substance Act. The rules are clearly indicating that if a substance contains THC and is intended to enter the body then it is an illegal product. “Many people don’t understand, says Asa Hutchinson, “many Americans do not know that hemp and marijuana are both parts of the same plant and that hemp cannot be produced without producing marijuana.” The psychoactive parts of marijuana used to get “high” consist of the flowering tops (buds), the leaves and the resin. Most ordinary marijuana has an average of three per cent THC. Sinsemilla, which is made from just the buds and flowering tops of female plants, (the male plants is used for catnip) has an average THC concentration of 7.5 per cent, although it can go as high as 24 per cent. Hash oil, a tar like liquid distilled from hashish, generally consists of between 15 and 50 per cent of THC, but can have as much as 70 per cent THC, enough to get you right messed up. Where does it all come from though? Cannabis sativa, the hemp plant, grows wild throughout most of the tropic and temperate regions around the world. Prior to the advent of synthetic fibres, the cannabis plant was cultivated for the tough fibre of its stem. Cannabis contains chemicals that are unique to the cannabis plant, “cannabinoids.” Among the cannibinoids synthesized by the plant are cannabinal, cannibidiol, cannabinalidic acids, cannabigesol, cannabichronene, and several growers of tetrahydrocannabinol. One of these, delta-9-THC, is responsible for the psychoactive effects of cannabis. These effects tend to be called “tripping out,” where you see things move in ways they don’t normally move and almost everything around you is hilarious. Not to mention the need to eat when you get “pasties.” Marijuana is currently in the process of being decriminalized. Don’t think this means you can toke up in front of the local 7-Eleven. This merely implies you’ll get a fine much lik...