legalization of cannabis and hemp

I will begin with my opponents claim that "the idea that cannabis can be considered both a depressant and a stimulant as well as a hallucinogen is absurd." In a nutshell, no, it is not. My opponents seems to struggle with the concept of "psychoactive". Psychoactive is not a classification of drug in the sense that we are talking about. Caffeine, for example, is a psychoactive stimulant. Alcohol is considered a psychoactive depressant. "Saying that, I could say that alcohol does the same, more or less, depending on the individual and how certain chemicals react to the individual." This is one of the great problems when discussing pharmacological effects of any drug. Like I stated , the effects of most drugs can be subjective, leaving room open for interpretation. General classifications exists for the sake of simplicity and relative accuracy. Alcohol is primarily considered a depressant, but in small doses, for certain people, it does act a stimulant. This is different from cannabis in that the effects of administration can generally be classified in all three fields at once, due to the exhibition of different types of psychoactive properties at one time. My opponent is quick to dismiss the concept of cannabis being a cocktail of drugs. The fact remains that there are a plethora of active psychoactive compounds in cannabis that have unique effects depending on concentration. I am unsure of why my opponent was so defensive of this remark, as it does not imply anything about the inherent harms that Cannabis can cause. Rather, it simply examines a key difference between cannabis and alcohol. http://www.a1b2c3.com... I never claimed that cannabis caused depression, I simply stated that there is a link. I am unsure of what my opponent means by conducting similar tests with tobacco and alcohol. As I stated before, I am not looking to compare the drugs, rather I am simply showing that there are health risks. Admittedly, I believe I may have misspoken about risk of stroke being widely accepted. I had grouped it together with heart attacks, which are in a well known risk of cannabis use. There is compelling evidence that usage can cause strokes, but it is not conclusive. http://www.dailymail.co.uk... http://news.bbc.co.uk... My opponent makes the assertion that cars should be banned using my logic. I disagree. Cars are a utilitarian mode of transpiration that represent a beneficial asset to humanity. Cars unarguably provide a net benefit to society. Thankfully, my opponent finally made the fast food analogy. My opponent makes the assertion that using my logic, fast food should be banned. I completely agree. Fast food is the perfect example of what happens to society when individuals are allowed to make choices that are very unhealthy and self destructive. Fast food is arguably more addictive than most illegal drugs, and in many cases more damaging. While it's nice to think that people are able to make sane, rational choices and self indulge in unhealthy foods responsible, this is simply not connected to reality. As a result of fast food and junk food being legal, we have approximately 127 million adults in the U.S. being overweight, 60 million obese, and 9 million severely obese. The libertarian utopia in which all human beings are rational and capable of self regulation does not exist. A very, very small minority of people are able to self regulate, just as a very small minority of people are able to use Crack Cocaine without becoming addicted. http://www.thatsfit.com... "But it was voted back in by the people in a democratic society who only want the liberty to chose to become intoxicated." The fact that the majority want a liberty to do something does not make it the best course of action. The fact that the majority of people want or do not want something to be legal is not logical grounds for making it so. Otherwise, my opponent would have instantly defeated himself, seeing as the majority of Americans do not want cannabis legalized. "I am saying that because it is able to intoxicate you and, once again, like many things has a potential for abuse, it should not be prohibited, but regulated" This statement does not make logical sense. Regulation will allow for more damage to be done to society and individuals than prohibition. My opponent further elaborates on his stance with this statement: "...and because of this it should be the right and the responsibility of the individual to make the correct decisions regarding what they want to put in their body and when, not the governments." Finally, my opponent explains his true feelings logic behind wanting legalization. Despite acknowledging that there would be potential for abuse and harm to society, my opponent claims that legalization is still the best course of action. The only way to reconcile this fact is to believe that "liberty" and "freedom" outweigh the tangible negative effects of legalization. This is clearly a false premise. The entire concept of civil liberties is a false premise. It is essentially one that would state, people should be allowed to participate in actions that inevitability harm themselves and others because there is some type of "god given" or natural authority that gives them the ability to do so. Thus, it is on the same level of validity as say, appealing to the Bible. While obviously this premise cannot be proved to be untrue, assuming that it is true is simply faulty logic. There is no reason to believe that people have the unalienable right to harm themselves, especially when such harms cause damage to society as well. Any attempt to justify this position will essentially boil down to an appeal to authority or other type of logical fallacy. That is not to say that all freedom is bad. Rather, it is to say that freedom cannot be used to justification for freedom. Freedom, when contributing to the well being and health of society, is a good thing. A general example of this would be free enterprise. Liberties need to be considered on a case by case basis in order to be considered logically beneficial and good, rather than using the false premise that liberty is some type of natural right. Like I said before, humans are not rational creatures, thus it does not make sense to entrust with them the legal right to participate in activities that can cause harm to themselves and others, when such a right will inevitably result in pain and suffering. To put the argument of drug usage and civil liberties in context, I will use a simple theoretical situation. Say theoretically, cannabis is legalized next year. The following year, fatalities caused by cannabis usage increase by 50% (for arguments sake). My opponent argument would argue that, despite these negative consequences, that society is somehow better off than an alternative scenario in which cannabis was kept illegal and the negative consequences did not occur. Here it becomes clear that one would be unable to logically reason that scenario one is better than scenario two by any set of logical criteria. Rather, the reasoning that scenario one is better than scenario two requires one to accept that freedom itself somehow makes up for the pain and suffering that freedom brings.