3 ms·

It's funny how these things turn our expectations upside-down. I'm from the UK originally and they semi-recently (~10 years ago) upgraded the severity with whic

by smcl 7y ago

It's funny how these things turn our expectations upside-down. I'm from the UK originally and they semi-recently (~10 years ago) upgraded the severity with which they treat cannabis so that it's now "Class B". This means that mere possession can result in "Up to 5 years in prison, an unlimited fine or both" (more @ https://www.gov.uk/penalties-drug-possession-dealing https://www.gov.uk/penalties-drug-possession-dealing). So yeah, your country might not be so backwards after all, and in this respect at least is pretty enlightened in the grand scheme of things :-)

detritus 7y ago
And at around the same time made magic mushrooms completely illegal, whereas prior there had been a workaround leading to a healthy market. The tragedy of this late Labour-era push against loosening /smarting-up of drug legislation is that it fairly directly led to the boom in synthetic cannabinoids, starting with the fairly benign Spice (as a brand) and resulting in a swathe of much-stronger, less-tested and more dangerous brands flying under the radar which (all Hoover/Google-like) were collectively known as 'Spice', but have caused problems for many in the underclass and prisons and such. I'm not much in to party politics, but this is one thing I directly attribute to Gordon Brown and his very unhelpful moralising.
- mrzool 7y ago
  Workaround == loophole?
  - detritus 7y ago
    That's another way to put it, of course :) The law specified dried mushrooms specifically as the stance skirted complexities regarding the picking or possession of native wildlife samples (psilocybe semilanceata predominently). With kits offering the ability to grow easier-to-grow strains from elsewhere in the world (Central and South America principally) we sought clarification from the Home Office on whether it was actually illegal to possess and sell fresh magic mushrooms. Turns out, there wasn't anything illegal in that. Made for an interesting few years. We assumed a change or clarification in the law at some point, so prepared for a time when sale of fresh mushrooms per se would be outlawed. We never expected them to come down as hard as they did though, so the survival/back up plan of forming a small laboratory to grow mycelium and take spore prints and cater to an enthusiast market was all for naught. Strange to think at the time that we thought we were on the verge of the UK being at the front of the line for a change in stance on cannabis and drugs generally, but Mr. Brown took us down a different path.
    - mrzool 7y ago
      > Made for an interesting few years. Wow, didn’t know that. Which years are we talking about, roughly?
      - detritus 7y ago
        2003-2005-ish - so more couple than few!
teknopaul 7y ago
Or the UK is backwards.
- smcl 7y ago
  In this respect (and in a few others) that's absolutely true
jazzyjackson 7y ago
At least USA has racism as an excuse for banning jazz cigarettes, but why does UK want to put people in jail for smoking weed?
- giobox 7y ago
  While it’s true it was upgraded to class B somewhat absurdly and has theoretical significant penalties for use, the reality is police simply don’t really pay attention to individual use and the law is not really enforced to that extent against individual users. You’d have to be staggeringly unlucky to see jail time for simply smoking a joint in the UK, something reflected in the large drop in convictions etc even after the status change. > https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/police-going-soft-on-cannabis-users-pzb3m5q7h https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/police-going-soft-on-cann...
- Theodores 7y ago
  High-grade 'skunk' weed and a few concerned parents. Under New Labour (not to be confused with the Labour Party) the generic catch-all term 'cannabis' was down-graded to Class C. So still illegal. Then, after a few complaints from parents with kids ending up in lunatic asylums due to smoking too much high-grade weed, something had to be done. The market for weed has changed a lot over the years, in the last century the product came from who-knows-where and was generally that resin stuff with who-knows-what in it. Then the market changed to the regular 'skunk' weed - dried leaves of weed. This then became a bit of a racket, if you believe the Daily Mail it became the business of Vietnamese gangs with the money being laundered through cash only nail bars. For a while the product was quite dangerously adulterated with wallpaper paste sprayed on to make it look extra good. The slight problem with this is that the wallpaper paste would not do wonders for circulatory systems, giving rise to blood clots etc. There was also a side-problem of legal highs, e.g. 'spice', these really tipping people over the edge into psychosis. The adulterated weed was soon rejected by the customers and even stronger 'high grade' weed began to be what was available. By now the older sticky resin type of weed that your grandfather smoked whilst listening to The Beatles and wearing tie-dye clothing was no longer available. We had gone from 'shandy' to 'absinthe', a different beast. Also to note is that the government is nowadays Conservative so there is nobody in power wanting to enable people to enjoy the finer grades of weed - just ban it is the attitude. People who do smoke the stuff do end up with ideas above their station and you can't have that. Often the word 'psychosis' was used to describe the kids that worried their parents by smoking too much of the stuff. 'Paranoid' was also an oft-used word. Sure the more modern weeds are a lot more intoxicating than the cannabis resin that went around in the olden days but it is always easier to blame the coping strategy rather than the root problem, e.g. the difficulty of being a teenager in modern Britain.

by smcl 7y ago

detritus 7y ago

And at around the same time made magic mushrooms completely illegal, whereas prior there had been a workaround leading to a healthy market. The tragedy of this late Labour-era push against loosening /smarting-up of drug legislation is that it fairly directly led to the boom in synthetic cannabinoids, starting with the fairly benign Spice (as a brand) and resulting in a swathe of much-stronger, less-tested and more dangerous brands flying under the radar which (all Hoover/Google-like) were collectively known as 'Spice', but have caused problems for many in the underclass and prisons and such. I'm not much in to party politics, but this is one thing I directly attribute to Gordon Brown and his very unhelpful moralising.

mrzool 7y ago
Workaround == loophole?
- detritus 7y ago
  That's another way to put it, of course :) The law specified dried mushrooms specifically as the stance skirted complexities regarding the picking or possession of native wildlife samples (psilocybe semilanceata predominently). With kits offering the ability to grow easier-to-grow strains from elsewhere in the world (Central and South America principally) we sought clarification from the Home Office on whether it was actually illegal to possess and sell fresh magic mushrooms. Turns out, there wasn't anything illegal in that. Made for an interesting few years. We assumed a change or clarification in the law at some point, so prepared for a time when sale of fresh mushrooms per se would be outlawed. We never expected them to come down as hard as they did though, so the survival/back up plan of forming a small laboratory to grow mycelium and take spore prints and cater to an enthusiast market was all for naught. Strange to think at the time that we thought we were on the verge of the UK being at the front of the line for a change in stance on cannabis and drugs generally, but Mr. Brown took us down a different path.
  - mrzool 7y ago
    > Made for an interesting few years. Wow, didn’t know that. Which years are we talking about, roughly?
    - detritus 7y ago
      2003-2005-ish - so more couple than few!

teknopaul 7y ago

Or the UK is backwards.

smcl 7y ago
In this respect (and in a few others) that's absolutely true

jazzyjackson 7y ago

At least USA has racism as an excuse for banning jazz cigarettes, but why does UK want to put people in jail for smoking weed?

giobox 7y ago
While it’s true it was upgraded to class B somewhat absurdly and has theoretical significant penalties for use, the reality is police simply don’t really pay attention to individual use and the law is not really enforced to that extent against individual users. You’d have to be staggeringly unlucky to see jail time for simply smoking a joint in the UK, something reflected in the large drop in convictions etc even after the status change. > https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/police-going-soft-on-cannabis-users-pzb3m5q7h https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/police-going-soft-on-cann...
Theodores 7y ago
High-grade 'skunk' weed and a few concerned parents. Under New Labour (not to be confused with the Labour Party) the generic catch-all term 'cannabis' was down-graded to Class C. So still illegal. Then, after a few complaints from parents with kids ending up in lunatic asylums due to smoking too much high-grade weed, something had to be done. The market for weed has changed a lot over the years, in the last century the product came from who-knows-where and was generally that resin stuff with who-knows-what in it. Then the market changed to the regular 'skunk' weed - dried leaves of weed. This then became a bit of a racket, if you believe the Daily Mail it became the business of Vietnamese gangs with the money being laundered through cash only nail bars. For a while the product was quite dangerously adulterated with wallpaper paste sprayed on to make it look extra good. The slight problem with this is that the wallpaper paste would not do wonders for circulatory systems, giving rise to blood clots etc. There was also a side-problem of legal highs, e.g. 'spice', these really tipping people over the edge into psychosis. The adulterated weed was soon rejected by the customers and even stronger 'high grade' weed began to be what was available. By now the older sticky resin type of weed that your grandfather smoked whilst listening to The Beatles and wearing tie-dye clothing was no longer available. We had gone from 'shandy' to 'absinthe', a different beast. Also to note is that the government is nowadays Conservative so there is nobody in power wanting to enable people to enjoy the finer grades of weed - just ban it is the attitude. People who do smoke the stuff do end up with ideas above their station and you can't have that. Often the word 'psychosis' was used to describe the kids that worried their parents by smoking too much of the stuff. 'Paranoid' was also an oft-used word. Sure the more modern weeds are a lot more intoxicating than the cannabis resin that went around in the olden days but it is always easier to blame the coping strategy rather than the root problem, e.g. the difficulty of being a teenager in modern Britain.