Legalized Recreational Marijuana - Weird Seeing It Out In The Open?

[Kevin Bresnahan]

On another thread, a side discussion broke out about the open use of recreational marijuana, so rather than continue it there, I thought I'd start a discussion here...

I live in Maine, which legalized recreational marijuana in 2016 (but took almost 5 years to allow the first store/dispensary to open). I also live near the beach where there are a ton of rental properties and these days, it's become almost "normal" to walk by a rental house and get a heavy whiff of weed. But what I find weird is seeing someone walking down the street smoking a spliff, which doesn't seem right since anyone walking around sipping an open beer is likely to get some grief from the boys in blue.

Don't get me wrong, I think it should've been legalized years ago. But at the same time, I don't know that I'm comfortable with how quickly it's become so ubiquitous out there. Just yesterday, I was walking by a house under renovation and the crew was standing around outside on some sort of break & two of the guys were clearly smoking a joint. I don't think I'd want those guys working on my house after that break.

In general, I think it's weird but I'm sure with time, I'll get used to it.

[Dmitry]

3 minutes ago, bresna said:

 

In general, I think it's weird but I'm sure with time, I'll get used to it.

Will you get used to it when heroin is legalized in the state if Maine? That day may come eventually. 
 

[Jack Pine]

I feel you Bresna. I've been a dedicated user myself for many years, yet voted against recreational use in my state(it passed anyway). It's a vice, to me anyway, and I still hide it as if it were illegal. I certainly can't complain about how prices have tumbled in recent years, or about the advent of cheap vapes and cartridges which are much more discrete than burning plant material. I somehow miss the old days though, when it was a bit of a secret club.

[Teasing the Korean]

Medical is legal where I live, and you don't have to jump through any hoops to get a card.  People are smoking weed on the street all the time.  At least we don't get freaked out by the smell of skunk anymore.  We all just assume it's weed now.

While I am not a fan of smoke, I think that edibles are a reasonable and realistic alternative to drinking.  I know drinkers who alternate alcohol with edibles on different days, to save themselves the calories.

Edited June 11, 2023 by Teasing the Korean

[Ken Dryden]

I don't care as long as a stoner doesn't run into me after a few too many tokes. I still remember the drunk driver who just missed hitting me head on in 1978, after he sideswiped me and crashed into a telephone pole, he breathed Jack Daniels in my face when he came to. I had a strong desire to pull him out of the truck and beat the living daylights out of him.

[sonnymax]

 

On 6/11/2023 at 9:50 AM, bresna said:

...But what I find weird is seeing someone walking down the street smoking a spliff, which doesn't seem right since anyone walking around sipping an open beer is likely to get some grief from the boys in blue...

The idea that legalization permits public use is incorrect. In Massachusetts, consuming even legally purchased cannabis in a public place is illegal. This includes smoking, vaping, and cannabis-infused foods. A quick search shows other "legalized" states have similar restrictions.

On 6/11/2023 at 10:01 AM, Dmitry said:

Will you get used to it when heroin is legalized in the state if Maine? That day may come eventually. 
 

[Kevin Bresnahan]

26 minutes ago, sonnymax said:

The idea that legalization permits public use is incorrect. In Massachusetts, consuming even legally purchased cannabis in a public place is illegal. This includes smoking, vaping, and cannabis-infused foods. A quick search shows other "legalized" states have similar restrictions.

I do understand that but for now at least, it seems like the police are letting things go a bit as they figure out how to handle it. I feel like it's almost being treated like cigarette smoking. Just yesterday I was walking along Long Sands Beach near my house when I got a strong whiff of weed. Clearly the large group of young people on the beach below me were smoking a joint. On these beaches, cigarettes are banned, so clearly smoking a joint is also banned. But just like the ban on cigarette smoking is never really enforced, this looks to be a "look the other way" offense as well.

I have to wonder if no police department wants to be the first to get dragged to court for trying to prosecute someone for smoking weed in public.

[Dub Modal]

When you see or smell something that might be weed, there’s a good chance it’s not. There are cbd products that contain delta 8 or 9 which come in edibles or vape/smoke products and these are legal at the federal level via the 2018 farm bill (if that year is wrong, it’s one close to it). Unless you see the label, you wouldn’t be able to tell by looking if it’s weed or a cbd product. They come in joints and buds that look exactly the same. It’s weaker than typical weed as well but gives a similar buzz if dosed at higher levels. 
 

Just want to add that I think schedule 1 is ridiculous no matter the substance. That classification bars it from research which is ignorant and draconian. When debates flare up in legislatures there’s always someone opposed to legalization that brings up that there’s no research as to what these substances do to people. Well, thanks to them advocating schedule 1 classification you’ll never see domestic research funded or performed. It’s a ridiculous and absurd position but unironically advocated by people in a position to know better. What a shame. 

[Gheorghe]

I´m a quite old fashioned guy in that context. The stuff was around everywhere when I was a teenager, and users would get busted by police and it was a natural thing. But I never had the urge to try it. I think in context with "drugs" I was a more mundane person, smoking normal cigarettes and drinking beer was all I was intrested in. I have or had the impression that reefer-smokers had a more "spiritual thing" in it. Some where into meditation or stuff, and I think that though I have education I was more the workman-type of consuming "goodies" , I mean just cigarettes and beer or wine or „țuică” or „palinca” (prune schnapps or marille schnapps). 
After the stupid "drinkin contests" in the teenage and early twen years, gettin  married I reduced that stupid alcool thing and eventually cut it out completly , I drink my alcool-free beer each evening.  

But I don´t really understand why they legalizize reefer smokin if they try to forbid cigarette smokin. Well I don´t have no idea what effect reefer has, but I couldn´t imagine having a coffee withouth enjoying a cigarrete with it. This has been so for the last 50 years. 

So, if everybody is smokin reefer now .....let em do what they want, but I don´t like that "half morale" where militant non smokers tell me how dangerous is my goddamn cigarette combined with coffee drinkin, or after dinner or after sex😄, while the same politic parties want to legalize reefer . 

Edited June 20, 2023 by Gheorghe

[Stompin at the Savoy]

I've always liked cannabis but 10 or 15 years back I switched to the type of vaporizing devices which use flowers or hash (ie not those awful black box vape pens with glycerine cartridges, ew!).  These heat the material typically with a stream of heated air so that the lighter, more volatile compounds - various cannabinoids and terpenes - vaporize but the temperature is below the level required for combustion.  Very little smell emitted and the smell is different from burning cannabis - faint and more like the raw flower smell.  I find that I don't like being around when people combust cannabis any more.  It's a loud smell and it's smoke and contains nasty stuff like benzine.

Edited June 20, 2023 by Stompin at the Savoy