Expert: Carl Fuglein - 7/30/2009

Question
QUESTION: Hello. I am a christian and have a few questions.
First of all is it a sin to masturbate? People say it leads to bad thoughts but im not so sure. I feel it puts an end to those thoughts your already having. Also i know drugs are bad but i don't feel marijauna harms people as long as they are responsible like myself, it is all natural,and besides it being illegal is it a sin to smoke it? Lets not go into what the goverment says about the plant because all their demonization has been debunked. I just want to know if it is a sin to smoke marijauna,besides it being illegal i mean. tanks

ANSWER: Jim-

Whether or not masturbation is a sin is an unanswered question.  You are right in saying that it puts an end to lustful thoughts, but which came first?  Did you have those lustful thoughts because you wanted to masturbate?  Masturbation can become addictive, and just about every addiction is harmful to your body.  If you want to know more about masturbation, let me know.

Now for marijuana.  Sounds like you have your mind made up.  There's a reason why it's illegal - many, many, studies have shown that long term marijuana use is harmful to your brain.  There are other problems as well, such as reducing your ability to have children.  Is it a sin?  Well simoly because it's illegal, it's a sin, as we are to abide by the laws of man (render unto caesar and all that rot.)  Smoking and driving puts other people as well as yourself in danger.  The people who debunk the government and all the medical studies are merely trying to justify their smoking it.  I'd look closer to the studies.

hope this helps,

blessings.


carl

please take the time to rate my answer.




---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: I don't have my mind made up and i didnt intentd to be rude if i was.
Of course smoking while driving is bad equally as bad as drinking which i thing is much more harmful to ones body. Is the smoking of marijauna an sin if i live where it was legal (amsterdam lets say)??

This is nothing combative but this is what i was talking about when i said debunked(Good thing for copy and paste) :)
Marijuana causes brain damage
The most celebrated study that claims to show brain damage is the rhesus monkey study of Dr. Robert Heath, done in the late 1970s. This study was reviewed by a distinguished panel of scientists sponsored by the Institute of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences. Their results were published under the title, Marijuana and Health in 1982. Heath's work was sharply criticized for its insufficient sample size (only four monkeys), its failure to control experimental bias, and the misidentification of normal monkey brain structure as "damaged". Actual studies of human populations of marijuana users have shown no evidence of brain damage. For example, two studies from 1977, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) showed no evidence of brain damage in heavy users of marijuana. That same year, the American Medical Association (AMA) officially came out in favor of decriminalizing marijuana. That's not the sort of thing you'd expect if the AMA thought marijuana damaged the brain.

2. Marijuana damages the reproductive system
This claim is based chiefly on the work of Dr. Gabriel Nahas, who experimented with tissue (cells) isolated in petri dishes, and the work of researchers who dosed animals with near-lethal amounts of cannabinoids (i.e., the intoxicating part of marijuana). Nahas' generalizations from his petri dishes to human beings have been rejected by the scientific community as being invalid. In the case of the animal experiments, the animals that survived their ordeal returned to normal within 30 days of the end of the experiment. Studies of actual human populations have failed to demonstrate that marijuana adversely affects the reproductive system.

3. Marijuana is a "gateway" drug-it leads to hard drugs
This is one of the more persistent myths. A real world example of what happens when marijuana is readily available can be found in Holland. The Dutch partially legalized marijuana in the 1970s. Since then, hard drug use-heroin and cocaine-have DECLINED substantially. If marijuana really were a gateway drug, one would have expected use of hard drugs to have gone up, not down. This apparent "negative gateway" effect has also been observed in the United States. Studies done in the early 1970s showed a negative correlation between use of marijuana and use of alcohol. A 1993 Rand Corporation study that compared drug use in states that had decriminalized marijuana versus those that had not, found that where marijuana was more available-the states that had decriminalized-hard drug abuse as measured by emergency room episodes decreased. In short, what science and actual experience tell us is that marijuana tends to substitute for the much more dangerous hard drugs like alcohol, cocaine, and heroin.

4. Marijuana suppresses the immune system
Like the studies claiming to show damage to the reproductive system, this myth is based on studies where animals were given extremely high-in many cases, near-lethal-doses of cannabinoids. These results have never been duplicated in human beings. Interestingly, two studies done in 1978 and one done in 1988 showed that hashish and marijuana may have actually stimulated the immune system in the people studied.

5. Marijuana is much more dangerous than tobacco
Smoked marijuana contains about the same amount of carcinogens as does an equivalent amount of tobacco. It should be remembered, however, that a heavy tobacco smoker consumes much more tobacco than a heavy marijuana smoker consumes marijuana. This is because smoked tobacco, with a 90% addiction rate, is the most addictive of all drugs while marijuana is less addictive than caffeine. Two other factors are important. The first is that paraphernalia laws directed against marijuana users make it difficult to smoke safely. These laws make water pipes and bongs, which filter some of the carcinogens out of the smoke, illegal and, hence, unavailable. The second is that, if marijuana were legal, it would be more economical to have cannabis drinks like bhang (a traditional drink in the Middle East) or tea which are totally non-carcinogenic. This is in stark contrast with "smokeless" tobacco products like snuff which can cause cancer of the mouth and throat. When all of these facts are taken together, it can be clearly seen that the reverse is true: marijuana is much SAFER than tobacco.

6. Legal marijuana would cause carnage on the highways
Although marijuana, when used to intoxication, does impair performance in a manner similar to alcohol, actual studies of the effect of marijuana on the automobile accident rate suggest that it poses LESS of a hazard than alcohol. When a random sample of fatal accident victims was studied, it was initially found that marijuana was associated with RELATIVELY as many accidents as alcohol. In other words, the number of accident victims intoxicated on marijuana relative to the number of marijuana users in society gave a ratio similar to that for accident victims intoxicated on alcohol relative to the total number of alcohol users. However, a closer examination of the victims revealed that around 85% of the people intoxicated on marijuana WERE ALSO INTOXICATED ON ALCOHOL. For people only intoxicated on marijuana, the rate was much lower than for alcohol alone. This finding has been supported by other research using completely different methods. For example, an economic analysis of the effects of decriminalization on marijuana usage found that states that had reduced penalties for marijuana possession experienced a rise in marijuana use and a decline in alcohol use with the result that fatal highway accidents decreased. This would suggest that, far from causing "carnage", legal marijuana might actually save lives.

7. Marijuana "flattens" human brainwaves
This is an out-and-out lie perpetrated by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America. A few years ago, they ran a TV ad that purported to show, first, a normal human brainwave, and second, a flat brainwave from a 14-year-old "on marijuana". When researchers called up the TV networks to complain about this commercial, the Partnership had to pull it from the air. It seems that the Partnership faked the flat "marijuana brainwave". In reality, marijuana has the effect of slightly INCREASING alpha wave activity. Alpha waves are associated with meditative and relaxed states which are, in turn, often associated with human creativity.

8. Marijuana is more potent today than in the past
This myth is the result of bad data. The researchers who made the claim of increased potency used as their baseline the THC content of marijuana seized by police in the early 1970s. Poor storage of this marijuana in un-air conditioned evidence rooms caused it to deteriorate and decline in potency before any chemical assay was performed. Contemporaneous, independent assays of unseized "street" marijuana from the early 1970s showed a potency equivalent to that of modern "street" marijuana. Actually, the most potent form of this drug that was generally available was sold legally in the 1920s and 1930s by the pharmaceutical company Smith-Klein under the name, "American Cannabis".

9. Marijuana impairs short-term memory
This is true but misleading. Any impairment of short-term memory disappears when one is no longer under the influence of marijuana. Often, the short-term memory effect is paired with a reference to Dr. Heath's poor rhesus monkeys to imply that the condition is permanent.

10. Marijuana lingers in the body like DDT
This is also true but misleading. Cannabinoids are fat soluble as are innumerable nutrients and, yes, some poisons like DDT. For example, the essential nutrient, Vitamin A, is fat soluble but one never hears people who favor marijuana prohibition making this comparison.

11. There are over a thousand chemicals in marijuana smoke
Again, true but misleading. The 31 August 1990 issue of the magazine Science notes that of the over 800 volatile chemicals present in roasted COFFEE, only 21 have actually been tested on animals and 16 of these cause cancer in rodents. Yet, coffee remains legal and is generally considered fairly safe.

12. No one has ever died of a marijuana overdose
This is true. It was put in to see if you are paying attention. Animal tests have revealed that extremely high doses of cannabinoids are needed to have lethal effect. This has led scientists to conclude that the ratio of the amount of cannabinoids necessary to get a person intoxicated (i.e., stoned) relative to the amount necessary to kill them is 1 to 40,000. In other words, to overdose, you would have to consume 40,000 times as much marijuana as you needed to get stoned. In contrast, the ratio for alcohol varies between 1 to 4 and 1 to 10. It is easy to see how upwards of 5000 people die from alcohol overdoses every year and no one EVER dies of marijuana overdoses.

WHAT IS THE ICLU DRUG TASK FORCE?
The Indiana Civil Liberties Union (ICLU) Drug Task Force is involved in education and lobbying efforts directed toward reforming drug policy. Specifically, we support ACLU Policy Statement number 210 which calls for the legalization of marijuana. We also support an end to the drug war. In its place, we favor "harm reduction" strategies which treat drug abuse as what it is- a medical problem-rather than a criminal justice problem.

The Drug Task Force also works to end urine and hair testing of workers by private industry. These kinds of tests violate worker privacy to no good purpose because they detect past use of certain drugs (mostly marijuana) while ignoring others (e.g., LSD) and cannot detect current impairment. In situations where public and worker safety is a legitimate concern, we advocate impairment testing devices which reliably detect degradation of performance without infringing upon worker privacy.  

Answer
Jim-

I didn't think you were rude, it just sounded like you were looking for a loophole, sin wise.  Lots of my questioners do, look for a loophole that is.

You've obviously done your research.  I read everthing, and you quote some reliable sources.  I haven't done any research lately, and my opinion is perhaps based on old info.

To give you some background, I HAVE smoked pot, but only twice.  I didn't really see that I was any differently high than being drunk.  I abused alcohol when I was in my 20's and 30's.  I was on the road to being an alcoholic, but finally quit.  I drink occasionally, maybe 1 margarita every other month.  And when I do have one, I almost never have 2, and my wife will drive home.  I also smoked cigarettes - up to 5 packs a day when I quit, cold turkey, in October 1980.  I was 33 - I had been smoking since I was 16.

So, I've had some experience.  Here's what I think, sin-wise - anything that will impair your body either short term or long term, is probably a sin.  God gave us a body to live in while we are here on earth, and we should take care of it.  So, since there is damage, albeit small in some cases, damage from marijuana, tobacco, and alcohol (even my occasional margarita) are probably sins in God's eyes.  I know I did it countless times, but getting drunk or high is just stupid - why not get high on life?  Know the joy of Jesus and get high on that?  That's what I think - you need to make up your own mind.

Would smoking pot be a sin in Amerstdam?  In my opinion, yes.

As far as the law goes, I think driving drunk should be 2 strikes and you're out - go to jail for a year and permanently lose your license. Same thing for marijuana.  And I say this becuase I know I was just lucky - I never got stopped. I have a cousin who permanently lost his license for drinking.  It's no fun.  He's clean now, but spent years just drunk.  Almost ruined his life entirely.  Driving while impaired is bad for you and the general public - that's why my wife drives (she rarely drinks).

Thanks for the 10's btw.  There's a story behind that scripture.  There's a camp song title "Aintnorock" based on that scripture - "aontnor rock gonna cry in my place, as long as I'm alive I'll glorify the name of God."  I like the song, so adopted that scripture.  then when I turned 50, my fellow youth leader changed the words to :"Aintnorock older than Carl is, as long as I'm alive, and he don't die, he's older than me, yea, yea, yea."  It stuck - I often use aintnorock as a screen name or user name on forums and such.

Jim, back to your issue.  I think you just need to make up your mind about the pot and whether or not it's a sin - I can't decide for you.  You'll have to make a lot of decisions in your life about your own body  - choose wisely.

Blessings,
Carl