In the original sense of the word, pot, coffee and tobacco aren't "narcotics," and I suspect cocaine and speed aren't either. The root word means "sleepy," doesn't it? So that would mean opiates and downers.
That, IIRC, is true about the root word of "narcotic". I don't really know which effect pot has though, and I've heard which ever way you are, pot will make you the opposite. But whoever it was I heard that from may have been wrong. I agree about "narcotics" being opiates and downers though because if somebody smokes opium they generally get sleepy. Anybody here ever read "The Quiet American"?
I don't use drugs and illegal herbs recreationally, and hardly drink intoxicating beverages. Fought my way off cigarettes five years ago and refuse to give up coffee and tea.
Me neither and I'm not inclined to want to be around people who do for a variety of reasons. A friend of mine quit smoking after he had a heart attack a couple of years ago... he said it's different when the doctor asks you whether you'd rather have a cigarette or your life.
Tea and coffee... don't give 'em any ideas. I drink both and sometimes I like to spike my coffee with 7 year old Jim Beam. The politicos better not start messin' with my favorite drinks to have with my Mexican food and cheeseburgers and whatever else I choose to eat. What's next? They start telling us what we can and can't eat? Thinking of that, I'd like to have seen 'em tell my Grandpa and his brother and some of their friends about what they can and can't cook because they were liable to be BBQing anything and my great uncle even made his own white corn hominy complete with soaking/washing in Red Devil brand lye. Don't give 'em any ideas or they'll legislate us out of everything while they're at it.
While drugs and guns are a very bad mix, at least one of the times I have had a gun pointed at me, the bad guy was either on a drug, or a riding an adrenaline high so strong it had the same effect. Bad guys, it turns out, are not especially concerned about gun safety! (Who'd've thought?)
That's what I was getting at in an earlier post. An amatuer criminal can be generally very un-gun-savvy and still kill you with one. I made a comment about a "talented amatuer", but in reality, they don't really have to be all that talented either.
Bad guys who do home invasions may or may not be high. It makes very little difference to their victims. It might help the bad guys -- "hashish" and "assassin" come from the same root word -- or not.
Yeah, it again, does come from the same root word, IIRC. I'm reminded of the Moro Juramentados in the Phillipine Insurrection... they were really doped up and they kept coming despite being shot to dollrags with US .30-40 Krag rifles (after the .38LC revolvers failed to stop/neutralize). Those original doped up assassins got in close and went berzerk with a knife too, IIRC reading, much like I recall reading about the Moros and their Kris knives- they'd take a man's arm off as clean as if a surgeon had amputated it, but a lot faster.
A problem with drugs is that it is not at all clear why some are thought "bad" and others "good" (it turns out many of Carrie Nation's Temperance crusaders were fond of laudnum -- an opiate -- and cocaine-based patent medicines, both legal at the time).
This shows the hypocrisy of the Temperance movement. This also probably explains why Carrie Nation herself was so berzerk while busting up saloons. She probably got away with it because nobody knew how to handle her.
We find that okay for alcohol, have even fewer laws and customs restricting tobacco use, and nearly none for coffee and tea; it's not clear why those are "better" than marijuana, amphtimines or barbituates. They're not illegal because they're bad, they are bad because they are illegal.
Again, don't give 'em any ideas about messing with my coffee and my sweet tea. I live in the South. You don't mess with a Southerner's sweet tea.
The story of Hercules and the Hydra comes to mind: for ever head he would cut off, two more would spring up in its place.
The law of unintended consequences rears its ugly head again.
The wave of alcohol-related crime was only ended by ending Prohibition. Oddly, there was not a huge increase in the number of alcoholics once the bars were open. Nor was drunk driving any less a crime after alcohol was legally available than when it was not.
The alcohol-related crime wave that existed during Prohibition shifted to the WoD because BATF had to have a reason to exist. In order to exist, they needed a new "public enemy #1". But the real reason pot is illegal is the cotton farmers decided to knock out the competition from the hemp farmers.
) than actual addicts. Most people have no trouble functioning even if they like to alter their minds or moods on occasion.
