Hemp / Cannabis / Marijuana FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions about marijuana and industrial hemp legalization.
This FAQ about marijuana and industrial hemp legalization was compiled and written by Brian S. Julin verdant@twain.ucs.umass.edu with numerous contributions by others.
Copyright (c) 1 9 9 4 by Brian S. Julin
The following persons have contributed to this document at some point in it's evolution: Laura Kriho cohip@darkstar.cygnus.com (original list of questions), Marc Anderson (fact finding), Paul L. Allen (LaTeX formatting) ,plus some others who haven't said they want their name put in.
This material is maintained and written by Brian S. Julin, with help from several other individuals. It is copyrighted material. The copyright is only there to prevent anyone from editing or selling this material. Feel free to redistribute the material in any form as long as it is unaltered in content, and no credit or money is taken for the contents themselves. Comments, questions, contributions or ideas should be mailed to verdant@twain.ucs.umass.edu or c/o Brian S. Julin at UMACRC, S.A.O. Mailbox #2, Student Union Building, UMASS, 01003
01 What is hemp?- For our purposes, hemp is the plant called `...
- 02 What is cannabis?
- Cannabis is the most durable of the hemp plants, and ...
- 03 Where did the word `marijuana' come from?
- The word `marijuana' is a Mexican slang term which ...
- 04 How can hemp be used as a food?
- Hemp seed is a highly nutritious source of protein ...
- 05 What are the benefits of hemp compared to other food crops?
- Hemp requires little fertilizer, and grows well ...
- 06 How about soy? Is hemp competitive as a world source of protein?
- Hemp does not produce quite as much protein as soy, ...
- 07 How can hemp be used for cloth?
- The stalk of the hemp plant has two parts, called ...
- 08 Why is it better than cotton? (Hemp)
- The cloth that hemp makes may be a little less soft ...
- 09 How can hemp be used to make paper?
- Both the fiber (bast) and pulp (hurd) of the hemp ...
- 10 Why can't we just keep using trees? (Hemp)
- The chemicals used to make wood chemical pulp paper ...
- 11 How can hemp be used as a fuel?
- The pulp (hurd) of the hemp plant can be burned as is ...
- 12 Why is it better than petroleum? (Hemp)
- Biomass fuels are clean and virtually free from ...
- 13 How can hemp be used as a medicine?
- Marijuana has thousands of possible uses in medicine....
- 14 What's wrong with all the prescription drugs we have? (Hemp)
- They cost money and are hard to make. In many cases,...
- 15 What other uses for hemp are there?
- One of the newest uses of hemp is in ...
- 16 How and why was hemp made illegal?
- Tough question! In order to explain why hemp, the ...
- 17 OK, so what the heck does all this other stuff have to do with hemp?
- To make a long story short, during the first decades of this ...
- 18 Now wait, just hold on. You expect me to believe that they wouldn't have thought to pass a better law, one that banned marijuana and allowed commercial hemp, instead of throwing the baby out with the bath water?
- There's more. `Chemical pulping' paper was invented ...
- 19 Is there a lesson to be learned from all this? (Well why aren't we using hemp, then?)
- Several. The first is that hate does not pay. It ...
- 20 Doesn't marijuana stay in your fat cells and keep you high for months?
- No. The part of marijuana that gets you high is ...
- 21 But ... isn't today's marijuana much more potent than it was in the Sixties?
- (Or, more often ... Marijuana is 10 times more powerful than ...
- 22 Doesn't Marijuana cause brain damage?
- The short answer: No....
- 23 If it doesn't kill brain cells, how does it get you `high'? (Marijuana)
- Killing brain cells is not a pre-requisite for ...
- 24 Don't people die from smoking pot?
- Nobody has ever overdosed. For any given substance,...
- 25 I forgot, does marijuana cause short-term memory impairment?
- The effect of marijuana on memory is its most ...
- 26 Is marijuana going to make my boyfriend go psycho?
- Marijuana does not `cause' psychosis. Psychotic ...
- 27 Don't users of marijuana withdraw from society?
- To some extent, yes. That's probably just because ...
- 28 Is it true that marijuana makes you lazy and unmotivated?
- Not if you are a responsible adult, it doesn't. Ask ...
- 29 Isn't marijuana a gateway drug? Doesn't it lead to use of harder drugs?
- This is totally untrue. In fact, researchers are ...
- 30 I don't want children (minors) to be able to smoke marijuana. How can I stop this?
- Legalize it. They can smoke it now; it is about as ...
- 31 Won't children be able to steal marijuana plants that people are growing?
- Well, if you are worried about them stealing the ...
- 32 Hey, don't you know that marijuana drops testosterone levels in teenage boys causing [various physical and developmental problems]?
- Marijuana does not turn young healthy boys into lanky,...
- 33 Doesn't heavy marijuana use lower the sperm count in males?
- Not by much, (if at all) and this can be a good thing....
- 34 I heard marijuana use by teenage girls may impair hormone production, menstrual cycles, and fertility. Is this true?
- Also unproven and unfounded, but there is no ...
- 35 Isn't smoking marijuana worse for you than smoking cigarettes?
- There are many reasons why it is not. You may have ...
- 36 Don't children born to pot-smoking mothers suffer from ``Fetal Marijuana Syndrome?''
- If a fetal cannabis syndrome exists, cases are so ...
- 37 Doesn't marijuana cause a lot of automobile accidents?
- Not really. The marijuana using public has the same ...
- 38 Aren't you afraid everyone will get hooked? (Marijuana)
- Marijuana produces no withdrawal symptoms no matter ...
- 39 Is urine testing for marijuana use as a terms of employment a good idea? I want to make sure my business is run safely.
- No! Some of your most brilliant, hard working, ...
- 40 Isn't all this worth the trouble, though, in order to reduce accident risks and health care costs? (Marijuana testing)
- Everyone knows that marijuana users are bad employees,...
- 41 Wouldn't it be best to just lock the users all up? (Marijuana)
- How do you plan to pay for that? Already, well over ...
- 42 I heard that there are over 400 chemicals in marijuana... Wellllll...?
- True, but so what? There are also over 400 chemicals ...
- 43 Doesn't that stuff mess up your immune system and make it easier for you catch colds? (Marijuana)
- Marijuana (Delta-nine-THC) does have an `immunosuppressive ...
- 44 Why is it STILL illegal?: (Marijuana)
- The official answer: Because you shouldn't use it....
- 45 What can I do to bring some sense into our marijuana laws?
- There are many things you can do. Activists ...
- 46 Where can I get more information? (Marijuana laws)
- Many places. One of the best is by using ...
- 47 Umm, I'm computer illiterate, so that just went way over my head. Are there any good books I could go get instead? (Marijuana)
- Here is a list of some of the must-read books ...
- 48 Do you have any advice for people who want to organize their own group? (Marijuana)
- There are some very good books that will help ...
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