A very controversial and contention issue to be sure; if America were to decriminalize marijuana usage, would people smoke more, would we see greater rates of addiction, and other harms, or would we just benefit from a great reduction in law enforcement costs, criminal profiteering and other punitive sanctions?

These were the questions that researchers from the RAND Drug Policy Research Center wanted to answer, and to do so they looked primarily at the Dutch experiment with the decriminalization and the defacto legalization of marijuana, and have extrapolated these effects to speculate on the American situation.

The study authors have characterized the Amsterdam marijuana policy experiment into primarily two phases. The first phase was simply a decriminalization of the sale and possessions of marijuana, and the second phase essentially legalized the sale, and allowed for coffee shops to sell the drug openly and without sanction within the city of Amsterdam.

Looking at marijuana usage rates, they state that a decriminalization of the plant, and allowing people to grow their own and smoke as they wish without providing legal venues for the sale of marijuana seems to have no effect whatsoever on increasing the rates of drug use.

Legalization and sale in coffee shops has resulted in a dramatic increase in marijuana usage, and the study authors speculate that if such a policy were adopted in America, with its history of commercialization, promotion and free speech, this increasant effect could well be amplified.

But what about the gateway theory?

One of the real obstacles to marijuana decriminalization is the fear that marijuana tends to increase the chances of experimentation with other harder drugs, and thus if we increases the rates of marijuana use, we may increase our societal problems with harder and more destructive drugs.

Again, looking at the Dutch model of decriminalization and even legalization, it doesn’t appear that this is so, and in fact, although legalization has increased the rates of marijuana use, it seems to have dampened somewhat the association between marijuana use and use of harder drugs.

Virtually all users of harder drugs have smoked marijuana, but most marijuana users do not go on to use harder drugs, so is there a gateway risk?

Well in the Dutch experiment, what seems to have happened is that by legalizing the sale of marijuana, officials have greatly reduced the impact of the street level dealers. The overwhelming majority of Amsterdam marijuana users buy their drug from coffee shops in a legal manner, and these coffee shops almost universally do not sell harder drugs. The average marijuana smoker just doesn’t seem to have the same access to different and harder drugs. American marijuana smokers in contrast do buy their drugs from street dealers, and these dealers are in many cases also offering harder drugs of abuse.

So legalization of sale, although it has increased marijuana usage, seems to have decreased problematic usage of harder drugs.

So what should America do?

It seems pretty clear that decriminalization offers almost all benefits with essentially only very minimal risks. And when these minimal risks are compared in severity to the harms enacted through the punitive enforcement of marijuana drug laws, the benefits of decriminalization become more persuasive.

So, let's decriminalize it. The Dutch experiment shows that making it completely legal does cause some problematic increases in usage, and America may not want to follow down this policy road; but allowing people to grow a small amount for personal consumption seems to offer the best overall solution to everyone involved.

So, researchers seem to back decriminalization, public option concurs…government, what's the hold up?

Marijuana is not good for you. It does cause addiction, it does lessen cognitive abilities, and it would be great if people would just stop using it and all other drugs of abuse; but since that's not likely to happen, and we obviously have no real control over its illegal distribution and sale, we should take steps to reduce the harms of a punitive anti marijuana policy.

Marijuana is no big deal…if you only smoke it in real moderation and if you wait until you are 21 to do so.

Unfortunately, a lot of teens are smoking it in great quantities…a lot of teens are addicted to the drug. Also, since by definition teens are not 21 years of age, they are doing great harms to their still developing minds.

If parents can keep kids from using the drug until after the age of 18 the risks that they will ever have a real problem with it decline dramatically. Additionally, since the risks of mental illness related to marijuana usage rise greatly with earlier ages of experimentation, the younger teens start smoking, the greater the damage done.

Prevention is the key, and preempting a problem before it emerges is always the best course of action, but even after experimentation ensues, the earlier you intervene and you earlier you stop that drug use, the better the eventual outcome, and if needed, the easier the treatment.

What are the Teen Specific Risks of Marijuana Usage?

Addiction

Teens seem especially vulnerable to the addictive properties of marijuana, and with the strength of today's marijuana, too many teens get caught up in what begins as casual experimentation and ends us in dependency and pain.

Academic Performance

Teens who smoke marijuana don’t do as well in school. Marijuana smoking teens are less likely to finish high school, less likely to get good grades and less likely to go to college. Smoking marijuana can seriously derail academic performance, and during a time in life when school success has such a great influence on later life success.

The teen years are a time of exploration, a time to have a lot of fun, but also a time when your job is to go to school, get good grades and move on into successful adulthood. Marijuana lowers the chances.

Marijuana decreases cognitive performance for about 24 hours after it is smoked; decreases the ability to consolidate memories and concentrate, and on tests of mathematical and verbal reasoning, marijuana smokers perform significantly worse. If you smoke daily, you are never as smart as you would otherwise be and even if you are still a motivated student (something that seems less likely with greater marijuana usage) you are not as able to perform well, not as able to learn what you need to know.

The damage done is not permanent and your mind can recover, but at the same time you can't get those years back, and if you do poorly in high school there can be long lasting and serious life consequences.

The Risks of Mental Illness

The earlier you start using marijuana, the greater your risks of suffering from psychosis later in life. Teens who smoke before the age of 18 have 2-3 times the chances of experiencing a schizophrenic like condition in their 20's. Marijuana use also seems linked with later in life depression and anxiety disorders, although the link has been less casually proven.

Marijuana usage is also linked with increased rates of teen depression, especially depression in teen girls. Teen girls who do develop marijuana prompted depression are very likely to self medicate their condition with ever more drug and alcohol abuse, further compounding the problem.

Psychosocial Development

Marijuana decreases your ability to learn, and what you do learn tends to be state dependant learning. Essentially, you can learn while high on marijuana, but you need to be high once again to retrieve that information and to make full use of stored marijuana consolidated memory.

Marijuana also blunts emotional experiences. While high on marijuana you do not accurately experience social and emotional challenges that are essential for full emotional and social development. If you are high on marijuana enough of the time, you never learn how to deal with the challenges and social situations of life, and you never mature into a real developmentally appropriate adult. The earlier you start smoking the greater the delay, and the more you smoke the less social learning that is accomplished. If a teen starts smoking at 13 and becomes a daily user throughout their teens, even where they to ultimately stop in their 20's, they would present in many ways with the emotional and psychosocial maturity of a 13 year old.