It was Warren Edward Buffet , US multi-millionaire Investor and Philanthtropist who said, “The smarter the journalists are, the better off society is. [For] to a degree, people read the press to inform themselves-and the better the teacher, the better the student body.”

Of course the opposite also stands. Bad press serves a number of purposes, not least of which as a way to propagate information which is at best, untrue and at worst, downright dangerous. We know this as "yellow journalism", which was a building block of the initial program used to outlaw cannabis, a negative PR program which was implemented by US Secretary to the Treasury Andrew W Mellon, and his anti-cannabis rotweiller (and soon to be son-in-law) Harry J Anslinger.

Home-grown cannabis is simply the healthiest option. Although the alcohol industry, the Pharmaceutical industry, and the Petroleum industry would disagree.

Which links nicely to a news report published Sunday 25th May by The Northumberland Gazette in the North of England.

The story goes on to explain how a local man (Ian Skivington) was caught growing 132 cannabis plants at his Amble home, as well as at an industrial estate near-by. Police valued the cannabis at £18,600.

"Described as a professionally-organised cannabis farm by prosecutor James Long, Skivington's Hadston location contained 132 cannabis plants along with drug-making paraphernalia including extractor fans and watering systems."

But magistrates heard Skivington was growing the crops for his own use to aid cruciate ligament damage in both his knees.

Described as a "responsible individual" by John Lawson, defending, Skivington was said to be injecting cannabis oil to help ease the pain which had plagued him for more than 20 years.

Did you say Responsible individual?

Hang on a minute! Injecting cannabis oil? Who ever heard of such a notion? Smoke it yes. But IV use of cannabis oil is simply not going to get you anything except a nasty abcess or two and some gunk flowing round your veins, (until it finds a blockage and stops!).

Of course there was that nutty-bint Nicky Taylor, a British 'journalist', who was filmed smoking cannabis in cafes in Amsterdam before injecting the main ingredient of the stronger "skunk" variety of the drug in a laboratory in London.

Apparently in a ground-breaking experiment conducted in cahoots with the BBC, Nicky Taylor was attempting to understand what her own children would have to deal with if they were exposed to cannabis later in life, although what Ms Taylors stunt hoped to actually achieve in the eyes of the greater cannabis debate (apart from that is, getting her face on TV and her name in the newspapers) is anyones guess?

According to DRCNet (stopthedrugwar.org) a full-time pro cannabis reform organisation from Washington DC in the United States, this was nothing but a poorly orchestrated publicity stunt designed to add weight to the anti-cannabis argument, by attempting to put cannabis use into the same pigeon-hole as other, more dangerous drugs which are administered Intra-Veinously.

Scott Morgan wrote in the "Drug War Chronicle " blog;

And so, we're reminded yet again that there is simply no level of absurdity to which the purveyors of anti-marijuana hysteria will not stoop. It shouldn't be at all necessary to explain that no one shoots THC straight into their veins. So when we find this intrepid "journalist" rolling around on the floor soiling herself or whatever, let's just keep in mind that it won't happen again unless this ridiculous stunt somehow catches on.

And if that happens, it will be BBC's fault, not marijuana's.

Of course, while this preposterous exercise will teach us nothing about the effects of recreational marijuana use, it does illustrate two important points worth considering:

1. Marijuana is sufficiently mild in its effect that anyone attempting to vividly depict its horrors must resort to the most extreme and unrealistic experiments imaginable. Showing footage of normal marijuana users using marijuana normally would be utterly boring and insignificant. Thus, the choice to approach the subject under such bizarre conditions tells you everything you actually need to know about the integrity of marijuana's critics.

2. Marijuana is so amazingly safe that this journalist can confidently inject its main ingredient straight into her veins. Do you think the BBC or the doctors involved in this mindless charade would have allowed this to proceed if there were any real danger? This whole trainwreck is really just a giant concession that marijuana is medically safe even in atypically massive
doses.

Once again, we can count on marijuana reporting in the British press to be injected with everything but the truth.

Strong words indeed.

Out on the Internet message boards dedicated to cannabis and its use, the opinions I found there were much the same. People are simply not injecting cannabis, nor have they ever.

Furthermore since the BBC ran this irresponsible diatribe, a lot of people have been searching the message boards for information on how to create a mixture of THC which could then be taken by IV.  So as and when the first person dies and is found with lumps of green plant matter washing around his or her system, blocking important veins and arteries I hope the BBC are taken to task.

Ignorance
Getting back to the news report published by the Northumberland Gazette, it would appear that the man in question, Mr Ian Skivington, has manufactured something of a result by taking advantage of the ignorance the judicial system suffers when it comes to cannabis.

Simply put he has concocted a story which his defence solicitor has taken hook, line and sinker, and presented this as "fact" to the court, in a bid to escape a jail sentence, which he succeeded in doing.

The Northumberland Gazette, which recently carried other ground breaking stories such as "Wheelie bin shortage hits green scheme ", and "Church opens bell tower " must have thought all their christmas's had come at once, as a real live news story broke in their region.

But rather than making the most of a story, they cocked it up with information which has absolutely no credible worth, by choosing not to research the article before hitting the "publish" button.

So our first "Comic of the week" award for cannabis journalism goes to the Northumberland Gazette . Congratulations to them.

You can let the editor (Paul Larkin) know exactly what you think by clicking here .

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