Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/09/18/canadian-soldiers-have-been-gi.html
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I smoked weed all through my military career, nothing that bad ever happened, that I can remember.
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Attorney General Sessions will keep us safe… from REEFER MADNESS!
(But we might need a weed-proof wall.)
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Except for stopping use 28 days before deployment, this sounds pretty much like the rules for alcohol.
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This is actually very reasonable and should be easy to follow. Particularly they take into account that tests weeks down the road can show trace evidence long after the effects have worn off. Making such tests unreliable
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Wow. As an American, I’m shocked. What kind of government organisation, especially a military, establishes and enacts policy on the basis of evidence, science, and reason?! These rules should be arbitrary, draconian, and capriciously applied at the whim and prejudice of unaccountable senior staff!
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Logical rules? What are they smoking?!
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So how long before Jefferson Beauregard bans Canadian service members from visiting the US?
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Potential life-time bans for our pot-smoking Canadian brothers and sisters.
As well as investors…
I wonder how this all affects our own politically connected ‘investors’?
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How about a wall o’ weed?
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I would treat it just like alcohol. If it’s beer thirty, its four twenty.
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“What was that bump?”
“Probably just a pot hole. Or maybe a remnant of those giant spider people we took out yesterday. Remember that?”
“OH man, during the laser light show? That was far out.”
“Have you ever looked at your rifle, I mean, really looked at your rifle?”
I figure the rules would be similar to alcohol consumption. Drunk while operating heavy machinery or weapons would be just as bad.
If going to school near Ft Riley is any indication, lots of people in the Army did drugs and drank.
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Man, that blows my mind. By the time I was in (‘96-‘00), they were ruthless about any drug use. We probably peed in a cup once a month. When guys did get busted, it was pretty brutal, iirc. 2 months half pay and a couple weeks barracks restriction for first offense. Something like that.
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The tricky part is that you can fail a cannabis test weeks after all effects are gone. Alcohol tests are more accurate in determining if you are actually impaired at the time of testing.
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That’s where the bong was hidden, Dude!
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I think that highlights the difficulty of legal impairment. Because alcohol is out of your system fairly quick, a blood test can show how much you had in your system at the time you goofed up.
As I understand it with weed, it can be hard to gauge how impaired ones is, a even though the tests can show use, it show when and how much. So it seem the guidelines are such because of this.
Yes, it seems poor at showing how much and how long ago it was used. And even if they improve the test on those measurements impairment in individuals can vary widely.
These restrictions only seem reasonable if you believe the reefer madness hysteria of the last 80 years. Cannabis is not at all like alcohol. It is not toxic and is in fact beneficial to treat or ameliorate a wide variety of conditions potentially affecting Canadian soldiers, including PTSD, anxiety, depression, chronic pain and many other ailments. Humans have a built-in endocannabinoid system that responds favorably to the components of the plant.
Some people can use a lot of cannabis and not be impaired, others may be effectively impaired on a small dose. The same is true of antihistamines and cough syrup. Cannabis is widely used throughout the Silicon Valley tech community and many people feel they work more effectively under the influence. Anyone should be allowed to use whatever helps them function at the highest level, as long as they are not impaired.
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Agreed. I smoked regularly during college, but was very athletic from the age of 21 to 41. I’d never smoke at work, but I’d assume my levels were so low from all the exercise and burning of fats, I never tested positive when asked to pee in a cup.
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Over the years my own tolerance has varied wildly from being nearly catatonic from my first legal edible that wasn’t really very strong to years later when I would take large amounts of edibles and dabs and not really feel much of an effect. I think have now found a happy and healthy (and more affordable) middle ground.
But the point being its more complicated than m beers = impaired or n cocktails = impaired and can change with food, sleep, stress, exercise, cbd, etc…
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