Firearms and Marijuana question

There is no lawful use under Federal law. Marijuana is a Schedule 1 drug - no recognized medical use. This status was recently reaffirmed.
 
RobertJ. said:
Have there been any studies to back this?

I'd sure like to see one!
Click to expand...
I don't care about studies. I care about real world results. Studies have biases, mistakes, etc. People burn out from marijuana.
 
GL9CK said:
I don't care about studies. I care about real world results. Studies have biases, mistakes, etc. People burn out from marijuana.
Click to expand...

That's pretty much what I expected. Your opinion. That's fine, everyone is entitled to one. So here's mine:

Lazy people are lazy even without it. Yes, weed may make them even more lazy. But it doesn't make them violent. Would alcohol? What would be the "real world results" of lazy people drinking alcohol compared to lazy people smoking weed?

I know a sizable group of people personally, all who make in excess of 100k a year, who don't see it any differently than enjoying a fine wine.

And how many deaths have there been from overdosing on smoking weed? That would be none. Alcohol? Get a calculator.

Suggesting that smoking weed is as destructive as alcohol is absolutely ridiculous.

Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.
 
Deaths from smoking weed? Direct or the ones you underwrite when your suppliers have territorial disputes? An interesting moral dilemma, a little harmless relaxation brought to you by ruthless cartels and 30,000 dead Mexicans. You will say the government is at fault by making dope illegal while ignoring it is filling your demand that makes crime and corruption profitable.
 
I have to laugh when the argument about whether dope makes you stupider than beer, and therefore one is okay to be in active handling of a firearm comes up. Stop it, guys. Intoxication is intoxication. Is there an adult in the room?

The original question was about legality of state legal/ weapon in possesion. That has been answered. A resounding....."I'm not sure, cause the feds and states are arguing about it, pays your money and takes yo chances."
 
Last edited:
Trying to be objective instead of taking any sides, I'll have to say that marijuana's negative effects are more insidious than certain intoxicants that are currently legal. Because of alcohol's fast half life in the system, we can scientifically determine how much one has consumed within a certain amount of time, and thus judge how it has effected the individual, and thus we can easily pinpoint both acute intoxication as well as determine how much it is affecting the person in question at the time of any situation. i.e. If someone who has been drinking crashes a car because he is drunk, we can take blood samples to prove acute intoxication, thus proving it as a factor in the crash, as well as prove it legally for many various legal charges, and offhanded say "ye, this man has taken of drink, and drunk he drove", whilst the marijuana user who crashes a car due to being under the influence of his drug is quite the opposite, objective scientific tests cannot determine absolutely how much the user has used, nor can it prove acute intoxication, nor can we see acute levels and prove the use of the drug was a definite factor, quite like alcohol. If Johnny Drunkard gets pulled over and blows a 0.2, we know he's driving when he should not be because he just drank; if we get a urine analysis of Pauly Puffer, there is no way to tell if the THC in his system is recent or residual.

tl;dr Alcohol comes and goes, and a man who had a few too many drinks two days ago is completely sober today, whilst the marijuana user has the drug build up in his system, creating long term effects, and making judgements of the effects of the drug on the person to be more difficult. If a person drinks a six pack of beer at 5-7 PM, he will be sober enough to shoot come 9 AM the following morning, and we know for certain his condition. If marijuana becomes more legal, how can employers or peace officer determine when someone is acutely intoxicated, or if their long term status has been harmed enough to make legal determinations, or to terminate employees? We know when someone who sometimes consumes alcohol should and should not be shooting, but with other intoxicants, when and how do we draw lines?

Do we set standards that if one recently consumed the drug, they should not be carrying a gun or participating in shooting sports? How do we determine what is sufficient intoxication, acute or otherwise? Is a complete ban on all users true justice, or are we stripping people of their rights in a very unjust manner?

I say, use what I'll invent as a standard for personal use, The Cough Medicine Rule. If the effects of an over the top medication, that anyone can buy, and are not subject to such hot debates, makes you groggy, sleepy, dopey enough that you should not operate a car or heavy equipment, than any equivalent intoxication by any other substance should prevent you from shooting, driving, ect., and that constitutes a rule of thumb, not so much legal. Don't take it from the point of "I had X amount of substance y", go "if the individual is under the influence, this person should not be doing any of these activities".

I'll step in the mess this thread has become long enough to say this, I'm a "Oakie from Miskogee" kinda guy, I've had my problems with the bottle, and am against all drugs, including marijuana. I'll say that observing those around me who have used marijuana that yes, indeed, it is acutely intoxicating to those who use it, people tend to not notice because it is not as extreme as alcohol, and that there is long term intoxication, which we mistake for personality changes, it is a bad drug with bad effects. Its psychological addiction is worse than alcohol, because users believe the drug is benign, nay, beneficial, and because they think the drug is harmless, they see its abuse as harmless, and refuse to recognize problems and deal with them.

All that being said, marijuana is simply to prevalent in the United States to be eliminated, and we reach a dangerous tipping point when stripping such a large population of rights and enforcing such actions could be logistically impossible, unenforceable, and hit a point of unjustly stripping men of God given rights in a war we have lost for decades, and are reaching a point we cannot win. The ATF and FBI don't prosecute most of the cases of barred individuals who attempt to buy firearms legally in the first place, and when we consider all of the dangerous violent criminals and felons on the streets with guns, it would seem enforcing strong gun restrictions on legal marijuana users is a pipe dream, will probably be as useful as the war on marijuana itself, and will actually drive otherwise legal and healthy individuals who use the drugs back onto black markets to avoid legal recognition for their use with all of the negative legal consequences, thus chasing away potentially law abiding users away from taxed and regulated marijuana, which would defeat any advantages of its legalization.

if I went on too long, as I always do, let me know.
 
mak1965 said:
You are so right! I smoked Mucho Maryjane back in the day, and could not see one good reason for anyone under the influence of ANYTHING being able to be armed at all. It is not very good.
Click to expand...

Cowboy action ranges have a rule - when the alcohol comes out after the match the guns MUST be put away. That rule should be good for anyone who smokes marijuana or even takes any other "chemical" for recreational purposes. First, it's unsafe. Second, it's illegal.

Guns and mind bending substances DO NOT MIX.

If the Colorado rules actually permit them to be together that doesn't make it smart - and if you're selling it legally in that state and if you are permitted to be armed while doing so, well, DON'T USE IT!
 
Last edited:
patrickd said:
Until the Feds legalize it they are oil and water.. When you fill out that federal form when buying a gun it asks whether you use the weed or not... Answer yes and see what happens.. While it might cause a civil war, technically, under the current US statutes and the mindset of the Supreme Court, the feds could in theory strip users of pot or any illegal drug of their right to own a firearm. Even though the US Constitution has the 10th Amendment, the federal government doesn't really recognize it.
Click to expand...

I live in the state of WA. Here is is illegal to buy a gun or get a cwp if you use even though it is legal here, and in our own special kind of stupid, it is not if you are on the federal watch list. geez
 
RobertJ. said:
That's pretty much what I expected. Your opinion. That's fine, everyone is entitled to one. So here's mine:

Lazy people are lazy even without it. Yes, weed may make them even more lazy. But it doesn't make them violent. Would alcohol? What would be the "real world results" of lazy people drinking alcohol compared to lazy people smoking weed?

I know a sizable group of people personally, all who make in excess of 100k a year, who don't see it any differently than enjoying a fine wine.

And how many deaths have there been from overdosing on smoking weed? That would be none. Alcohol? Get a calculator.

Suggesting that smoking weed is as destructive as alcohol is absolutely ridiculous.

Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.
Click to expand...
Denying that smoking weed can be as destructive as alcohol is ridiculous. Do some research if you don't believe my opinion.

I don't care how much money your friends make. Addicts exist at all income levels.
 
Guns and weed?

1f746eb2318970be797acecdf1d7ef8b_zpsrklzprem.jpg

8c2a1408d814537e2980cf20b3bbc22f_zpsaebd64da.jpg
 
RobertJ. said:
That's pretty much what I expected. Your opinion. That's fine, everyone is entitled to one. So here's mine:

Lazy people are lazy even without it. Yes, weed may make them even more lazy. But it doesn't make them violent. Would alcohol? What would be the "real world results" of lazy people drinking alcohol compared to lazy people smoking weed?

I know a sizable group of people personally, all who make in excess of 100k a year, who don't see it any differently than enjoying a fine wine.

And how many deaths have there been from overdosing on smoking weed? That would be none. Alcohol? Get a calculator.

Suggesting that smoking weed is as destructive as alcohol is absolutely ridiculous.

Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.
Click to expand...
Speaking as a recovering alcoholic with over 31 years sobriety who also used to smoke a fair amount of weed, this is right on the money. And I have some experience to back it up as well.
Never heard of somebody stoned getting into a car accident that kills a whole family or carload of other people.
Drunks do it every day.
Never seen somebody stoned get belligerent and aggressive and start a fight.
I used to do that almost every time I drank.
Sure stoners get "burned out" and develop a serious lack of ambition.
But then in my experience that describes most Gen Y and Millennials anyway - even without pot or any other drugs.
From my personal experience, saying pot is as destructive as alcohol is absolutely false.
Heck, last time I looked MJ wasn't even considered to be physically addictive - only psychologically addictive.
Alcohol on the other hand is both psychologically and EXTREMELY physically addictive.
Of all the intoxicants out there - and I've tried just about all of 'em - pot is about the closest there is to being harmless IMO.
I view pot as being less of an issue than tobacco - and keeping it illegal makes about as much sense as prohibition did - a mistake that gave rise to most of the crime organizations that still plague us today. Including most of the Kennedys ;)
Just one man's opinion of course.
I do agree that MJ and guns don't mix, but I don't think those who toke should have their gun rights revoked either - any more than someone who drinks alcohol should loose their gun rights.
 
Last edited:
Watch a 30 minute program with Ozzie Osborne in it and then tell me.
 
joebiker said:
Watch a 30 minute program with Ozzie Osborne in it and then tell me.
Click to expand...
LOL, you think all Ozzie did to get as addled as he is was to smoke pot?
Have I got a bridge to sell you! Cheap too!

Seriously, that guy has done copious quantities of every drug known to man - legal drugs, illegal drugs, prescription drugs, street drugs... AND he's just about drowned himself in booze too. Not for just a little while either - for decades!

Not a good example for proving any view point in this discussion - other than proving that ANY mind altering substance is destructive if not taken in moderation.
 
Last edited:
To respond to Mr. BC38, I think some of marijuana's statistical coverage as a factor in violence and crime, as well as its inclusion in most mindsets, can be explained in my previous post. Whenever someone is drunk when he causes a car wreck, its a drunk driving wreck, when a someone is drinking and they get into a fight, its alcohol related violence, but the same is almost never true with marijuana. Without the ability to prove acute intoxication, even if it was the direct cause, it's almost never listed as so. Also keep in mind that many marijuana users who get into trouble abuse over drugs and alcohol, so stoned Steve's violent outburst is attributed to other drugs and/or alcohol, and marijuana is always left "innocent". THC benefits from soft attitudes, its a self fufulfilling prophecy; marijuana is not thought to be at fault for anything, so therefore we never consider it a contributing factor, and we often leave it out when it is a factor, or even when it is at direct fault. No stoned driver will admit, nor can we prove, that he was stoned at the time of the wreck, will he? And of course, someone who has smoked marijuana for years, and whose behaviours have become so heavily modified for so long that we assume his marijuana affected state is the individual's "normal' state, we just assume that the actions were the individual's normal, certainly nothing to do with a drug he has consumed heavily for years.

I'll speak from my own drinking experience, if you drink hard enough long enough, you start to assume your drinking antics are your normal, and its not till you are dried out and healed that you realize that it wasn't you, but the bottle. Others around us assume the same thing, if our drinking affects us enough long enough, our stupidity from drinking is "normal", and our uncharachteristic actions are "who we are", even if they are not. In fact, a big barrier to recovery, and the crux of psychological addiction, is the belief that we are what the addiction makes us, that we follow the bottle out of free will, we are not slaves to addiction, and we control it, all lies. Its a world of heavy defense mechanisms, where if we walk around at a party without pants on, and a lampshade upon our head, we would insist the lights were to bright and the room to hot, therefore out attire, when in truth its just because we are drunk. With the marijuana user, how can we tell his violent actions and negative actions from his normal self and determine if the man did the violence, and what part did his drug of use play?

I myself never got into any fights ever during my drinking, in fact I was exceptionally well behaved and my problem was with the drinking itself, and I saw people who were passed out who also could have never made any trouble if they wanted to. Does that mean alcohol can't be linked to negative actions? As for your examples of people being stoned not causing trouble, tell me, is marijuana not the most common drug besides alcohol in the bad blocks of America's worst cities, with some of the highest violent crime and murder in the entire world? Marijuana is traded there constantly, abused openly, and can be associated with some of the worst violence in the world. Give me a large pool of inner city violent criminals, then tell me, how many abuse marijuana? To say there is no correlation between THC and violence is nonsense, the statistics would state it is indeed involved in the systems of most violent criminals. Is it simply benign in their system, or a contributing factor is the hard part to prove, but to say stoners don't do any violence would be a stretch.

I think the stereotypes of Cheech and Chong, Shaggy of Scooby Doo, ect., or the dead head hippie, do not universally represent the worst of marijuana abuse, and we forget about the 13 year old kid skipping school to sling dope, high on his drug, and the kinds of violence he has seen and has committed. Perhaps we have given the drug too much of the benefit of the doubt, or perhaps not.

I would simply submit that the argument that marijuana is harmless is without merit, and there are serious charges it has to answer to in terms of accidents and crime. Again, I'll state that it should not be used to disqualify men from God given rights, but its close correlation to many of society's ills cannot be simply scoffed off, or the drug be declared benign.
 
Duckford said:
To respond to Mr. BC38, I think some of marijuana's statistical coverage as a factor in violence and crime, as well as its inclusion in most mindsets, can be explained in my previous post. Whenever someone is drunk when he causes a car wreck, its a drunk driving wreck, when a someone is drinking and they get into a fight, its alcohol related violence, but the same is almost never true with marijuana. Without the ability to prove acute intoxication, even if it was the direct cause, it's almost never listed as so. Also keep in mind that many marijuana users who get into trouble abuse over drugs and alcohol, so stoned Steve's violent outburst is attributed to other drugs and/or alcohol, and marijuana is always left "innocent". THC benefits from soft attitudes, its a self fufulfilling prophecy; marijuana is not thought to be at fault for anything, so therefore we never consider it a contributing factor, and we often leave it out when it is a factor, or even when it is at direct fault. No stoned driver will admit, nor can we prove, that he was stoned at the time of the wreck, will he? And of course, someone who has smoked marijuana for years, and whose behaviours have become so heavily modified for so long that we assume his marijuana affected state is the individual's "normal' state, we just assume that the actions were the individual's normal, certainly nothing to do with a drug he has consumed heavily for years.

I'll speak from my own drinking experience, if you drink hard enough long enough, you start to assume your drinking antics are your normal, and its not till you are dried out and healed that you realize that it wasn't you, but the bottle. Others around us assume the same thing, if our drinking affects us enough long enough, our stupidity from drinking is "normal", and our uncharachteristic actions are "who we are", even if they are not. In fact, a big barrier to recovery, and the crux of psychological addiction, is the belief that we are what the addiction makes us, that we follow the bottle out of free will, we are not slaves to addiction, and we control it, all lies. Its a world of heavy defense mechanisms, where if we walk around at a party without pants on, and a lampshade upon our head, we would insist the lights were to bright and the room to hot, therefore out attire, when in truth its just because we are drunk. With the marijuana user, how can we tell his violent actions and negative actions from his normal self and determine if the man did the violence, and what part did his drug of use play?

I myself never got into any fights ever during my drinking, in fact I was exceptionally well behaved and my problem was with the drinking itself, and I saw people who were passed out who also could have never made any trouble if they wanted to. Does that mean alcohol can't be linked to negative actions? As for your examples of people being stoned not causing trouble, tell me, is marijuana not the most common drug besides alcohol in the bad blocks of America's worst cities, with some of the highest violent crime and murder in the entire world? Marijuana is traded there constantly, abused openly, and can be associated with some of the worst violence in the world. Give me a large pool of inner city violent criminals, then tell me, how many abuse marijuana? To say there is no correlation between THC and violence is nonsense, the statistics would state it is indeed involved in the systems of most violent criminals. Is it simply benign in their system, or a contributing factor is the hard part to prove, but to say stoners don't do any violence would be a stretch.

I think the stereotypes of Cheech and Chong, Shaggy of Scooby Doo, ect., or the dead head hippie, do not universally represent the worst of marijuana abuse, and we forget about the 13 year old kid skipping school to sling dope, high on his drug, and the kinds of violence he has seen and has committed. Perhaps we have given the drug too much of the benefit of the doubt, or perhaps not.

I would simply submit that the argument that marijuana is harmless is without merit, and there are serious charges it has to answer to in terms of accidents and crime. Again, I'll state that it should not be used to disqualify men from God given rights, but its close correlation to many of society's ills cannot be simply scoffed off, or the drug be declared benign.
Click to expand...

May I ask a couple of questions?
1) How many times have you smoked pot?
2) How many people do you know who smoke pot?
3) How many people have you been around who are stoned?

Those are really semi-rhetorical questions, because so many of your statements lead me to strongly believe I already know the answers. Just for purposes of transparency I will answer all 3 of those myself.

1) Hundreds
2) When I was younger, before I got sober, just about every one of my friends and acquaintances - for many years.
3) Hundreds

Now for some even more pertinent questions.

a) How many times has smoking pot (without any alcohol) caused you or anyone you know to get into an auto accident - or any other serious accident?
b) How many people have you personally known (including yourself) who has had a MV or other serious accident due to being drunk?
c) How many stoned people (again, without alcohol) have you seen get into a fight or other violent altercation?
d) How many drunks have you seen get into fights?
e) How many hours have you spent talking to and listening to the stories of alcoholics and drug abusers?

Again I'll answer those questions from my personal experience - a lot of years of hard partying followed by a lot of years in AA & Alanon.

a) Zero
b) Dozens - many of them met in AA
c) Zero again
d) Dozens again. Some of the dives I used to frequent would have multiple fights every night.
e) THOUSANDS. Literally.

No need to lecture me about the nature of addiction, denial, and how they affect the life and thinking of the addict/alcoholic. I've lived it brother. I am sorry if I overstated the case and gave the impression that I think pot is 100% benign. It isn't. Nothing that alters your mental state is.

HOWEVER, in my many years of experience with both, I can say that the negative effects of alcohol abuse are at least 10x those of pot. Not just in my life, but in the life of the dozens of friends I partied with and the hundreds I have known through AA.

And as for the inner city cesspools, you are seriously mistaken if you think pot is the big problem drug, and even more naive if you think it is the cause of the violence in those places. Ever heard of Meth? How about Crack? What about Cocaine? All of them are much bigger problems - both in terms of their effects on users, and the violent behavior associated with their use.

Unless you are talking about the violence associated with DEALING pot as a black market drug, then the violence associated strictly with pot USE is negligible. If you want to talk about violence associated with illegal drugs, let's look at the prohibition era.

People stoned on pot simply are NOT violent. Unlike most other illegal drugs and alcohol. I can buy the argument that someone who is stoned may become violent if they are also drinking, or doing crack, or coke, or whatever. But I have known (and been) enough stoned people to tell you pot does NOT make people violent.

So please, share with us your personal experiences. Not just conjecture and theories about what contribution pot MAY make to behavior when combined with other drugs. Tell us about the stoners you've known and how violent they were.

You also seem to be hanging your hat on the fact that you can't prove whether someone is under the influence of pot by a simple test as you can with alcohol. That is true, but here is a good one for you. There is good statistical evidence to support the claim that a very large percentage of people who are stoned can still PASS the exact same field sobriety test that 90% of the people who are legally drunk fail. So then the question is, how impaired is the stoned person - compared to the person who's had just two or three beers?

Look, I'm not advocating pot use. What I am saying is that going back to the 20's - starting with the "reefer madness" type of propaganda - it has been demonized and portrayed as this HUGE horrific evil. A lot of people, and I think you are probably one of them, have bought into it. You've already shared that you've been known to have a drink or two yourself, but I'll bet you've never smoked pot. Am I right?

Me, I've known a lot of stoners - heck I've been one. I can tell you right now that those who toke a little weed may not be as "on the level" as teetotalers - but in my experience they are far FAR less imbalanced than people who drink alcohol. And that is equally true for those in both camps who imbibe a little AND for those who overdo it and abuse either substance.

BTW, much like those chicken-littles who predicted there would be blood in the streets when open carry and easier concealed carry permits were proposed, folks got all up in arms and predicted a huge rise in crime and auto accidents and such when the push was on to legalize pot here in Washington. Guess what? It didn't happen. Anymore than legalizing open carry or changing to a shall-issue permit status resulted in a shootout at the OK Corral every other day, the incidence of crime and auto accidents and all the horrific results they predicted would come with legalized pot haven't materialized either.

Again, that is my experience. Please share yours. Not theories, or statistics - which we all know can be manipulated to support any position the statistician wants. Tell us about the violent pot heads you know or have known and your personal experience with getting high.
 
Last edited:
The ATF is completely firm and unambiguous on this point. They recognize NO lawful use of marijuana, including medical use. The ATF even issued an open letter to FFLs stating that position in very plain language. I'd look it up, but I'll leave that to those who may be interested (I'm not lazy and stoned, it's just been a long day, and I need to get to bed).

My feeling is that even if all 50 states and DC legalized weed, the feds would keep it illegal. Why? If you were a dictator, despot, or tyrant, what population would you prefer to "govern": a population that is angry, disenfranchised, and able to organize and overthrow your government, or a population that is complacent and "mellow" and is federally prohibited from buying or possessing firearms and/or ammunition? This is the real reason gun owners have no business smoking or ingesting weed.
 
Last edited:
Yes,*Users* of weed are prohibited persons. Not just while using, but straight prohibited, similar to felony conviction. Having a Medical Card is prima facae proof. Additionally states can have their own definitions, for example " two or more drug releated offenses, if the most recent.is within 5 years" .

But the interesting angle from the first post is that this is all regarding USE, not possesion, or being in proximity. So the interesting question would be about Non-Using security personnel protecting a legal CO growing or distribution facility.
 
Applies to medical weed, too.

9th Circuit (notoriously liberal thus surprising decision) just held the ban of gun sales to medical marijuana cardholders does not violate the 2ndAmendment. And they went a bit further in deciding it is reasonable to assume a med mj cardholder is likely to USE weed.

Be safe.
 
Yeah, the opportunity to restrict more people's 2A rights trumps the 9th Circus's other liberal agendas.

Like I've said before pot being illegal while alcohol and tobacco are legal makes no sense.
To put it in 2A terms that is about as logical as banning your 9mm AR15, but not banning my semi-auto Marlin Camp 9...
 
Last edited:
The correct answer was written over 200 years ago-- Shall not be infringed.

Federal government has no business meddling with this.

Quibbling over double standards, booze vs pot, might be good fodder for general discussion but is no rationale for government intrusion where Constitutionally forbidden.






Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

SWF Staff
  • Locked
Win a Smith & Wesson Model 686 Revolver – .357 Magnum Giveaway
5 6 7
Replies
193
Views
13K
SWF Staff
SWF Staff
6string
OGCA show accident - OGCA Roberts Center Shows Canceled
2 3
Replies
60
Views
7K
bph9
B
C
  • Locked
REMAINING WITHDRAWN, Magazines; S&W M52, Browning HP
Replies
3
Views
844
CHARLIE699
C
D
  • Locked
WTS New in Box Firearms! Dan Wesson, Kimber, Charter Arms
Replies
0
Views
889
dandyrandy
D
chief38
EDC comfort is often overlooked, made fun of and poo - poo'd. Sometimes people try in intimidate EDC-er's.
2 3
Replies
80
Views
4K
doubleclaw
doubleclaw

Latest posts

Back
Top