Salient. Victoria University Student Newspaper. Volume. 33, Number 10. 8 July, 1970
Marijuana Seminar at Vic
Marijuana Seminar at Vic
"What will the effect of 20 years of bad legislation be?"
This was the question posed by Dr Erich Geiringer at a Marijuana Seminar held at Victoria last month.
Dr Geiringer was a member of a panel which included Ray Henwood, of the DSIR, Dr Blake-Palmer, Chairman of the Board of Health Committee on Drug Abuse and Drug Dependency in New Zealand, Graeme Nesbitt, Cultural Affairs Officer at Victoria, Professor Fastia of the Pharmaceutical College of the Dunedin Medical School and Gerard Curry, a junior lecturer of law at Victoria and Ex-President of the Association. The panel was chaired by Jack Shallcrass, a senior lecturer in Education at Victoria.
.jpg)
Dr Geiringer: "....definitely aphrodisiac."
Dr Geiringer said that only a miniority of people would use marijuana were it to be legalised. He said that repression may actually serve to promote the use of marijuana and that the present law in any event involved a restriction of people's rights as it prevented them from doing something they were able to do before.
He said that the present legislation set up barriers between the generations and forced ordinary people to mix with criminals. "Suddenly we have a society where a large number of ordinary people are seen as criminals," he said.
Dr Geiringer said that many of the problems of contemporary American society date back to the prohibition era—with which the present attitude to marijuana in New Zealand could be likened. 'That's when organised crime started," he said. "It was a rough society before. Now it is a violent and criminal society."
Dr Blake-Palmer said that it was interesting that "the countries with the longest experience of marijuana—such as India and the Lebanon—should have determined to eliminate marijuana and concentrate on the cultivation of cash crops."
Dr Blake-Palmer said that "marijuana acts directly upon perception and indirectly upon reason. If you are high on marijuana you have exactly the same distortion in your thinking and reasoning as that experienced in a psychosis. We can't possibly make any assertions that marijuana is not worse or little worse than alcohol."
.jpg)
Graeme Nesbitt: "The quality, I am told..."
He concluded that "at the present state of our knowledge it would be impossible to legalise the use of marijuana. We have had one lesson with thalidomide—why should we expose ourselves to further risks?"
Graeme Nesbitt said that it was his view that marijuana should be freely available to all people who are entitled to consume alcohol in a public place (that is, people who are twenty years of age or more). He said that he thought that it should be illegal to buy or sell marijuana. Instead, people should be entitled to grow their own. He said that "the quality, I am told, is not less than that of overseas varieties."
Mr Nesbitt also spoke of the need for a provision to restrain people from interfering with others while under the influence of the drug. He said that he agreed that medical evidence suggested that marijuana created psychological dependency but suggested that analogies could be drawn with nicotine and caffeine.
Mr Henwood spoke of the difficulty of policing any relaxed laws on marijuana. He said "I don't honestly think we're ready yet as a society to authorise the use of a further hallucinatory drug."
"To group cannabis with other narcotics is wrong," he said. He said he wished that the medical profession would spend as much time in researching marijuana as it does in those who wish to use it. He spoke of a balance between use and abuse of the drug and gave alcohol and its use as an analogy.
Mr Curry said that the evidence on the effects of marijuana is equivocal. He mentioned a number of investigations which had failed to demonstrate that marijuana was harmful and he denied that there was any evidence of physiological dependencies arising from use of the drug.
He said that, as a result of society's attitude to marijuana, a number of young people—admittedly a minority—would come to lose respect for the laws and values of society. "The damage of this," he said, "is that the lack of respect for the law will become widespread.
Professor Fastia said that "we are not in a position to make confident assertions" about the nature of the effects of marijuana. He said that a person who takes small amounts of marijuana is unlikely to get into trouble. However, it was not possible to standardise the substance.
He said that the effects of the drug on the majority of users was not at issue. It was the effects on a minority that was a matter for concern. He said that marijuana should be judged by the same criteria as other drugs.
A period of questions from the floor and from individual panel members followed the initial remarks by the six speakers. The first question was put to Professor Fastia by Dr Geiringer, who asked whether, in view of the fact that consumption of oxalic acid, which can produce harmful effects, can be distilled from strawberries and rhubarb, people who ate strawberries and rhubarb should be imprisoned. Professor Fastia said that the difference was that, in the case of marijuana, the risks inherent in the use of the drug are almost unknown at the present.
.jpg)
Gerard Curry: "....losing respect for the law"
In reply to a question from the floor, Dr Blake-Palmer said that countries that had legalised the use of marijuana had suffered "a flood of visitors who wanted to share in the new freedom".
Dr Geiringer, in response to another question, spoke of a drug which was similar to marijuana and was freely available in New Zealand; which produced hallucinations; which was 'defitely aphrodisiac"; which could kill if taken in an overdose; and which would lead to cancer if "chronically abused". (The drug referred to is understood to be nutmeg.)
Dr Blake-Palmer replied to another question by saying "I make no comments on any matters of which I have no cognisance". Several members of the audience responded by shouting "Shut up!"
A representative of the Police had been invited to attend the seminar but no representative was sent.
.jpg)
Dr Blake-Palmer: "Shut up!"