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The Case Against Weed Decriminalization
posted (July 24, 2012)
On Friday's newscast you heard from Doug Singh - the former police minister who's now the chairman of the committee to examine the decriminalization of marijuana.

He said the committee is only considering the options - but also added that most of the members of the 8 persons committee are pro-decriminalization - including two members who are regular users of marijuana.

And that's why he's invited PUP Senator Karen Bodden to lend her considerable experience and knowledge to the committee.

She meets with the group for the first time on Thursday - but spoke to us today. She said that the public, national conversation about marijuana use is one that she's been waiting to hear for a long time She's happy that it's finally started but, So far, not so happy with the direction it's going. She told us more:..

Senator Karen Bodden
"Today I am happy because I believe that we are at that point where that conversation that takes place in an honest, open manner. For me I am excited because what I have been trying to do for decades as you put it - I can finally see it happening. I can finally see parents throughout that period - have suffered from all the ills of marijuana use. In particular parents who have come to me seeking assistance for their child are now able to better understand the conversation and basically decriminalization should have been at the end of a continuum, so to speak. Had we been responding as we ought to have been responding to the data presented throughout the years - it would have been a time now when people would have had access to the right education, where students coming out of school would be armed with skills that they could make decisions, where the society would not feel that the lesser burden is just to decriminalize it and get them off your back because that seems to be how people start to feel - that we are so caught up in this marijuana issue that we have no way out and all that would not have been happening at the pace that it is happening today where in my mind its being manage in a haste that doesn't make much sense."

"So yes, over the years we could have form the foundation and the foundation would have been prevention education. This is where I believe that if the committee is serious it cannot just focus on decriminalization, cannot, because that would be adding another injustice to the same people that they are targeting to help. It's not right. Most of the young people who will jump on the decriminalization bandwagon have very little education or very little information about what it is that they are jumping on the bandwagon for. All they see is that "the Babylon (police) can't harass me no more because this is so and so and Doug Singh is a big man because he does so and so." buts it's not fair, they are manipulating the ignorance and the lack of information and that it not right."

Jules Vasquez
"You think that smoking marijuana is a bad thing?"

Senator Karen Bodden
"Bad is an operative word and so I want to look at the dynamics actually. From my experience working in the schools and still doing so because I do drug counseling as well with families and when I see where a student at 16 years old goes on the street and he purchases marijuana, but he has never smoke "hydro" he just smoke the regular cannabis and when that child finish smoking that child gets so paranoid that he walks the floor for 3 nights without sleeping; he can't sleep and he is look for edge weapons to take care of his family because they are a threat to him in his state of mind. At 16, then I see the mother coming into my office with her son in that condition. There is no way that I can sit in front of you and say smoking marijuana is no big deal and when I have to take that child to the psych unit and then drive the child up to Belmopan where the child is then kept for 8 days in the psych unit before being release so that they can detox and I take that child home and to date that child has still not return to the form of normalcy, so he is still not in school."

"Last year when I had to physically hold one of the students right here because a few of the girls got together and decided that they were going to make marijuana fudge, this child had never had marijuana before and so when she ate the fudge she just got so paranoid that she was attempting to fit herself through a window. Jules when I see those things, those are the reasons why I am as passionate as I am. I have very interest in hearing what Switzerland is doing or what Australia is doing, very little. I read the statics for information but I am more interested in what is right for Belize, what is right for us. What is the national vision for us? What is it that we want? Our country to accomplish and is this the right way for us to go about doing it. So when I summarize all that in looking at the effects that I have had to deal with over the years and our children, when I am called to a primary school where a six year old is addicted to marijuana because the family has this ritual that they go through - religious ritual and the child was a part of all that. At 6 years old, the teacher was frustrated, she couldn't get the child to concentrate, couldn't get the child to sit still and eventually the principal decided that if they talk to this child, what are some of the issues that this child has and one of the first thing that came out of the child's mouth was 'Ms. if you want me to sit down you just have to give me some weed, because only when I smoke weed I am able to sit down.' At 6 years old, he didn't understand what was happening to him. When they call me in to deal with that - I have 2 cases like that at that same age. when they call me in to deal with the situation and we sent for the parents and we sat down with the parents and for me to know that they love their child but because of ignorance of the whole marijuana issue - it's based on hearsay, it's based on people saying that it's no big deal, people tell you that God make it and so forth. God also made Poison Ivy, but would you hug up a plant of Poison Ivy because God made it?"

Jules Vasquez
"What effect do you think it will have on young people when they hear that 10 grammes is decriminalize?"

Senator Karen Bodden
"Jules that is scary to even perceive at this point because being in school and not just at Sadie Vernon but schools all over the country, we know that our young people are experimenting. We also know that over the years they have develop an attitude of 'if we see the police, we will run from them etc.' but now for us to go to the point where they are able to have this quantity and feel good about it because even if they are caught by the police they don't face jail time. I am also concern that some schools operate on policies. One such policy being the alcohol and drug policy for high schools and so many of the high school students are adults by chronological age and so when you say to them "well you are not allowed to have marijuana on the school compound, don't you see the drug policy, these are the consequences." How will that school carry out those consequences within this context."

"When you talk about trends - we could have identified the trend from 1998 to 2003. Within that 5 year period, you had almost a 19.1% increase in marijuana use. You went from 1.2% use among students in 1998 to 20.3% in 2003. I think we saw an increase from 1.2% to 20.3% over a 5 year period and so I believe that if we were to conduct a similar survey today in our secondary schools you would be somewhere in the vicinity of almost 1/3 of our student population who are at risk for marijuana use and that is a huge number and when you speak to many of them they will tell you I started using in primary school."

Senator Bodden is a career educator and trained drug counselor. She has been invited to be a member of the committee, but so far, she has only indicated that she is attending a meeting to make her views known.

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