Living here in Mendocino County, I am much more familiar with the marijuana industry than I would care to be. Not only do we live with the consequences of our state's effort to allow the medicinal use of pot, but our own county government has long taken a "don't ask, don't tell" approach since it represents a significant portion of our rural county's economy.

Many in my town favor legalization and argue that recreational use of marijuana is safer than alcohol.

It was nice to see this Pajama's Media column providing another view on the impact of marijuana use.

There’s no question that making drugs illegal creates serious problems for our criminal justice system. It clogs the courts, it corrupts police officers and government officials, and it funds some really sleazy people. All of this is true — but it turns out that there are some substantial social costs on the other side that simply don’t get any attention. While it may sound like I have been watching Reefer Madness (1936) – a tragically overwrought portrayal of the dangers of marijuana — it turns out that mental illness is one of those social costs.

A surprising number of scholarly studies in the last 25 years have demonstrated that marijuana use seems to cause an increase in psychoses such as schizophrenia, and somewhat less dramatic mental illnesses such as bipolar disorder.

Let me emphasize: This isn’t just correlation analysis — finding that people with a current mental illness are disproportionately potheads. I am well aware that people with significant mental illness problems tend to “self-medicate” using various psychoactive drugs (including alcohol). No, these are longitudinal studies that show the marijuana use comes first, with the mental illness later in life.

The first of these, involving Swedish conscripts, was published in the Lancet in 1987. Those who had used marijuana heavily by age 18 were six times more likely to develop schizophrenia. A British medical journal paper published in 2002 performed a longitudinal study in New Zealand and found that:

Firstly, cannabis use is associated with an increased risk of experiencing schizophrenia symptoms, even after psychotic symptoms preceding the onset of cannabis use are controlled for. … Secondly, early cannabis use (by age 15) confers greater risk for schizophrenia outcomes than later cannabis use (by age 18). The youngest cannabis users may be most at risk because their cannabis use becomes longstanding.

This paper, from the British Journal of Psychiatry in 2004, should also make you a bit concerned. From the abstract:

On an individual level, cannabis use confers an overall twofold increase in the relative risk for later schizophrenia. At the population level, elimination of cannabis use would reduce the incidence of schizophrenia by approximately 8%, assuming a causal relationship. Cannabis use appears to be neither a sufficient nor a necessary cause for psychosis. It is a component cause, part of a complex constellation of factors leading to psychosis.

The Friends of Dave name has served me well on my blog since March 31, 2004. The idea for the name "Friends of Dave" came in a conversation with my sister. We were talking about possible names for my blog and we came up with that name.

The other day at work, the idea of using a domain name involving torches and pitchforks came up as we were discussing a future project. That got me thinking. I've posted a number of times about the lack of outrage over the slow pace of education reform in our state. Many times I've used the pitchforks and torches phrase. As I was thinking about variations on the pitchforks and torches idea, the notion of the angry villagers came up and my blog's new name was born.

While the name has changed and the visual theme I'm using has changed as well, there probably won't be a lot of other changes. My interest in technology, politics and education reform remain. My narcissism which leads me to post personal tidbits here will also pop up from time to time, although most of that now exists on my Facebook page.

I hope to add some graphics to the heading of the site soon. An artist of my acquaintance is going to create some imagery that goes with the new name of the site. Hopefully that will be online soon.

Thanks for reading my ramblings! Read the rest of this post!

My sister Michelle is today's most awesome person. It is a lifetime achievement award rather than for any particular event.

To all my friends and family! I hope you all have a great Christmas and a wonderful New Year!

Tired of the Black Friday rush? Amazon has their Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals all on a single page. Check it out: