Pubdate: Sat, 07 Jun 2014
Source: Register Citizen (CT)
Copyright: 2014 Register Citizen
Contact:  http://www.registercitizen.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/598
Author: Alyssa Rosenberg, The Washington Post
Page: A8

WE NEED TO LEARN A FEW THINGS ABOUT USING MARIJUANA

If there is one thing you can say about New York Times columnist
Maureen Dowd, it is that she knows her brand. Even when she has a bad
high in Colorado and uses it as the peg for a column on the messy
process of marijuana legalization, she does not lose sight of her
Dowdisms. Dowd may have lost her mind via mis-dosage, but in writing
about it, she stays on message by describing "my more mundane drugs of
choice, chardonnay and mediocre-movies-on-demand," blaming a girlish
affinity for chocolate for her misfortune and confessing her stoned
fascination with the green corduroy jeans she was wearing at the time.

But while it is easy to make fun of Dowd's bad experience with
edibles, when it comes to marijuana, there is a good point tangled up
in her column. A majority of Americans may favor legalizing marijuana.
But that does not mean that everyone knows how to consume it in ways
that are pleasurable and safe for them, or that avoid unpleasant side
effects.

Most Americans learn to drink by a process of trial and error,
conducted through wellestablished rituals and with social support. If
marijuana is to be consumed in similar ways, a lot of new consumers
will have to learn how to toke.

Take Dowd's experience. She got much higher than she wanted to because
she made the not-unreasonable assumption that a candy bar was a single
serving, eating the whole thing in one go. "A medical consultant at an
edibles plant where I was conducting an interview mentioned that candy
bars like that are supposed to be cut into 16 pieces for novices,"
Dowd explains that she finds out later. "That recommendation hadn't
been on the label."

It is one thing for experienced consumers to scoff at Dowd's lack of
knowledge. But she is not going to be alone, and asking for labeling
or instructions is not unreasonable. Similarly, new marijuana
consumers may look to analogous delivery mechanisms and social rituals
when they are smoking joints for the first time, and expect that they
ought to treat joints exactly like cigarettes.

When new marijuana consumers venture beyond products that look similar
to ones they already know, they will have to figure out the answers to
a number of questions.

New drinkers may know intellectually that beer, wine and liquor have
different amounts of alcohol by volume. But they still have to figure
out what they are comfortable drinking, and then determine the amounts
they can drink and the rates at which they can drink it. The
difference between passing out from keg stands and enjoying High West
bourbon neat is a matter of education and socialization.

Smokers and eaters of edibles will have to learn the same things with
different strains of and delivery systems for pot. How many hits can
they take or brownies can they eat, depending on the bud or the
clarified butter in question? How full should they pack the bowl of a
pipe or the oven of a vaporizer? If their tolerance is higher than a
single square of Dowd's chocolate bar, how many is optimal? What is
the difference in dosage between a nice vibe at a party and hiding in
a corner to avoid displaying your incoherence and anxiety?

Americans long ago decided that tee-totaling isn't the only
alternative to being a sot. If the country is to determine that
marijuana ought to be legal for recreational as well as medical use,
we will need to find a model for marijuana consumption that differs
from the motivation-sapped stoner or the deadly violence sometimes
committed under the influence.

We figured out a way to regulate alcohol rather than banning it. And
we developed a vision for classy, controlled alcohol consumption, even
if we occasionally tweak that model in response to dismaying social
developments like binge drinking. For Maureen Dowd's dignity, and the
rest of our sakes, we should do the same for marijuana.
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MAP posted-by: Matt