Legalization of marijuana and secondhand smoke (Has this been debated here before?)

Great Debates
1

After a quick search I can see no threads that debate this issue in specific, and it doesn’t seem to be part of the larger legalization debate, so let’s do it:

Regardless of whether it’s legal, secondhand marijuana smoke is harmful.

To begin with, it’s smoke, which necessarily irritates the lungs and eyes and causes damage after nontrivial exposure.

Secondly, and more dangerously, it’s intoxicating smoke, which means you can’t easily evade it, and it alters your cognition without your consent. I think the experience with non-smoking sections in restaurants and, earlier, airline flights amply demonstrates the standard fluid dynamics idea that any gas will expand to fill any volume it is placed in, and just as secondhand tobacco smoke has a nontrivial nicotine content, secondhand marijuana smoke must have a nontrivial THC content.

I honestly do not think the facts laid out in either of those above paragraphs are in dispute, and it worries me that they’re simply being ignored, instead.

So what is my solution? Greatly restrict the areas where people can smoke marijuana: No marijuana smoking outside, in businesses that don’t explicitly cater to the marijuana smoking trade, or in moving vehicles. That last would entail a ‘lit joint’ or ‘lit bong’ law stricter than modern ‘open container’ laws, and, given the area effect of the THC haze, such a law would have a much greater justification.

My idea of ‘businesses that explicitly cater to the marijuana smoking trade’ is essentially the notion of tea houses and marijuana clinics: Places where the only reason someone would go in would be to smoke marijuana, so inhaling secondhand smoke in addition to their own smoke would not be an important aspect of the experience.

As for enforcement, recklessly making non-smokers smoke, especially something mind-altering, is either assault or, at the very least, reckless endangerment. This includes scenarios where apartment dwellers force their THC haze on people who live in the same building or home dwellers force their haze on people who live on the same block (although it is difficult for me to imagine anyone who gets so fried you can detect it from the next house).

Is anyone seriously opposed to these ideas?

2

It’s already against the law to operate a vehicle while intoxicated, and that includes being high on pot. Any laws against second-hand tobacco smoke would apply to any smoke of any kind.

So what new laws do we need?

3

Laws that ensure nobody’s mind is affected without their consent. That’s what this all comes down to, and it is a vital issue when dealing with a known intoxicant that has an area effect.

4

I don’t know how much experience you have with marijuana, but the “area effect” you suggest is tiny at best (worst in this case I suppose). The truth is secondhand marijuana smoke isn’t as intoxicating as teen movies would suggest. Even sitting in a “hotboxed” car with multiple blunts blazing is unlikely to get you high if you’re not actively smoking, if you’re in an average room or outside you won’t feel a thing. Think about it: have you ever caught a nicotine buzz from cigarette smoke? As smoke expands it is diluted immensely.

5

This is interesting to know, but even if the effect is small that doesn’t reduce the risk of intoxication to zero. It also doesn’t negate any of the other harmful effects smoke has on human beings.

6

the only issue i see is the mention of apartment dwellers. They have the same right to smoke medical marijuana as everybody else. Just because you have to live in a flat does not mean you are not medically perfect … I am quite gimptastic and will be moving to Arizona in Jan of 2012, and I can’t magically make a house pop out of my ass, I will have to live in an apartment until I can find a house to purchase. Thanks to the wonders of major multiple joint damage, migraines and other health issues, I am a candidate for medical marijuana and will be using. [Although I do plan on vaporizing and not smoking]

7

It’s pretty hard to get stoned from secondhand smoke. Outdoors, I’d say it’s not an issue. Even indoors, you would need a HELL of a lot of smoke and zero tolerance before any risk of intoxication.

No. It really isn’t.

I’d say it’s more in the ballpark of an inappropriate fart.

Fine ideas. But the problem with the smoke is the smell, and the carcinogenic factor, not that people are going to be getting intoxicated from secondhand smoke.

8

OK, there’s a solution, isn’t there? Does vaporizing have any secondhand effects?

carm: ‘Inappropriate farts’ aren’t full of toxic and intoxicating chemicals, and ‘pretty hard’ to get intoxicated is a long way from ‘impossible’, which is where alcohol sits.

9

You haven’t smelt my farts! :slight_smile:
Seriously, you would need to knowingly stay in a room filled with smoke for several hours. Even then you would probably only get a slight buzz. I can’t think off the top of my head of any situation where someone would get stoned from second hand smoke involuntarily.

Obviously staff in coffeeshops, etc; but these people would presumably be smokers themselves.

10

You still haven’t shown that second hand pot smoke frequently results in intoxication. I reject that premise.

11

Like while eating in a restaurant, or living in an apartment?

This is too much if it’s more than I consented to. If you disagree, this discussion is likely over. (This also applies to Fear Itself’s post.)

One would imagine. This is why I want it banned from business that do not explicitly cater to that trade.

12

You appear to have very little experience with pot, and as a result you exhibit an unrealistic fear of the potential effects of exceedingly small amounts of THC in second hand smoke.

It is not possible to get any kind intoxication from second hand smoke in a restaurant. Unless it is Alice’s Restaurant.

13

Restaurants already have non-smoking sections. Some are entirely non-smoking. This wouldn’t be any different after marijuana was legalised. Also, as Fear Itself points out, most restaurants are far too big for this to be a problem.

As for apartment living - you are not going to get stoned from your flatmate sparking a joint. If your flatmate invited ten friends over, shut the windows, blocked under the door, and they all started smoking heavily - you still probably wouldn’t get high. This is the only time there is even a small possibility of involuntary intoxication. And naturally, if your flatmate keeps on doing this while he knows you don’t smoke, it’s probably time for one of you to move out.
Btw, this is no different to the situation now, unless you would call the police on your own flatmate for smoking pot, in which case that option would no longer be open to you.

You implied consent by not leaving the hotbox.

I don’t know where you’re based, but don’t most workplaces ban smoking nowadays? Where I live it’s illegal to smoke in any workplace - bar, office, taxi, nightclub.

I’m not arguing with banning weed from the workplace. I’m saying that it is a lot harder to get stoned from secondhand smoke than you believe, and that to the average Joe Public, he’s really not at any risk of stoners getting him high. Even if he lives with them.

14

When I served in the U.S. Navy we were subject to random uranalysis, and people sometimes tested positive. A very common ploy among those who tested positive was “I haven’t been toking…I was at a party/in a room/in a car/etc. where others were smoking and must have picked it up by contact”. It never worked. The naval powers-that-be cited repeated studies that showed it was impossible to get a measurable dose of THC from casual contact. I have no reason to disbelieve them.

Having said that, I have no doubt that any legalization of marijuana will be immediately followed by the same laws that apply to tobacco smoking…and to alcohol consumption when minors are present, and probably some new ones as well.
SS

15

Fear Itself, carm: Do either of you think it’s moral to expose anyone to mind-altering substances without either their consent or an overriding public interest they be so exposed?

SeldomSeen: I hope marijuana usage is subject to at least all of the laws that apply to both tobacco and alcohol usage. I hope that will be enough.

16

Since it is not possible for second-hand pot smoke in a restaurant to alter your mind, I would say the question of consent is moot.

17

*Like while eating in a restaurant, or living in an apartment?
*

No. More like if you crammed three people in a telephone booth, sealed all the openings with duct tape, and inhaled deeply for hours as the other two puffed away on enormous marijuana cigarettes, you MIGHT be able to feel something. It MIGHT be enough to get you high. It’s that difficult to become intoxicated from secondhand marijuana smoke. Basically, if anyone has ever gotten high from secondhand weed smoke, it’s because they tried VERY HARD to. It wouldn’t be an accident, it would be an accomplishment!

Literally sucking the smoke straight out of the smoker’s mouth as they exhale, which is actually a fairly common practice amongst weed smokers, is unlikely to make one stoned, in my experience.

18

Yeah, but you can get anything you want at Alice’s restaurant. That would imply that if you want to not get stoned, you can. :slight_smile:

19

Whoa…

20

No - not if it’s an amount that could intoxicate them. But what we’re trying to say is, it isn’t.
Have you ever heard of anyone getting drunk from non-alcoholic beer? Non-alcoholic beer actually has alcohol in it - just a really tiny, tiny amount. Secondhand smoke from weed is pretty similar.