A former dope smoker writes something fairly sensible

I cannot link to it, because it is behind a pay-wall, but several people have drawn my attention to an article in the London 'Sunday Times' of 29th January by India Knight, which has a bearing on our drug controversy.

Ms Knight confesses to a great deal of adolescent cannabis consumption. And she seems to want to keep her credentials as an all-round cool person and relaxed parent. Also, she appears to me to have swallowed the doubtful view that modern cannabis is hugely stronger than it was when she was young. This argument has proved useful to quite a lot of people who have grown up a bit since they used cannabis in their youth and want to explain that it was different then. But I believe that some experts dispute it.

Anyway, the article describes how she found a group of male teenagers in her house smoking dope. And how she remonstrated with them to stop. And how even so it happened again, until she went ballistic and also when one of those involved  (not related to her) was given psychiatric treatment (well, neuropsychopharmacological treatment, more likely, given that this trendy new discipline has more or less ousted psychiatry nowadays, and has pushed neurology to one side a bit, too) .

But it is clear from what she writes that she now grasps that cannabis-smoking is definitely correlated with mental illness. What she used to think of as harmless is (I paraphrase) likely to land you in the locked ward.

I should state, in all honesty, that I disagree with quite a lot of what she says, and – as 'depression' is mentioned in the article – I must say here that I regard the medical treatment of 'depression' with 'antidepressants' as being just as alarming in its own way (and just as much of a danger to our society) as the unofficial decriminalisation of cannabis. 

But it is something when a person of this kind, generally associated with the 'let it all hang out' faction in the media, at least begins to perceive the danger of this filthy, unpredictable poison. The unthinking defenders of dope should take note. Maybe when they, too, have responsibility for anyone else, they may come to learn that this is a serious matter.