# Kayaking while drunk



## capta (Jun 27, 2011)

Well, here's a good idea. Let's take the unquestionably most ignorant (of boating regulations, at least) group of boaters out there and let them blunder about on the water, putting themselves and others in mortal danger, *DRUNK*! Yeah, Canada!

"In Canada, you may soon be able to paddle a canoe while cracking open a cold one.

Kayaking while drunk is currently subject to tough punishments which means offenders can lose their driving licences or get driving bans.

Now, parliamentarians are weighing legislation that would exclude any vessel "propelled exclusively by means of muscular power".

Drinking while flying a hovercraft would remain an offence.

A cruel bonus penalty for drink-drivers?

Under the current criminal code, operating a vessel while impaired by drugs or alcohol is illegal, but the law does not define the term "vessel".

The proposed changes add a definition to include hovercrafts but not vessels "propelled exclusively by means of muscular power" - human-powered boats like canoes, kayaks, paddleboats and rowing boats.

Boating is a popular summer activity and about 12.4m Canadians go recreational boating each year.

Police do give fines for impaired boating and often bolster their presence on the water on busy summer weekends.

People caught face potential fines, losing their driver's licence and even imprisonment.

In 2011, a 57-year-old man made news after being arrested in Ontario for paddling a boat while impaired.

The National Post, which first reported on the legal changes, raised the case of an Ontario man who tipped a canoe, sending an eight-year old passenger into the water.

He was swept over a nearby waterfall and died. The man was allegedly drunk and goes on trial this year.

An estimated 40% of the boating-related accidents in Canada involve alcohol consumption as a factor.

The Canadian Safe Boating Council opposes the legislative changes and told MPs studying the bill that, between 1991 and 2010, alcohol was either the cause or suspected cause in 375 deaths in human-powered boats in Canada.

Canada's Liberal government tabled the new impaired driving legislation mainly to deal with the use of drugs while driving.

The country is expected to legalise recreational marijuana next summer."
---http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-41437084


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

Something not quite right here. Alcohol consumption, liquor laws etc. are a Provincial matter in Canada, not Federal.
Methinks it's just political BS and poor reporting that is typical of the media.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

I was reading up on this yesterday. Captas article I think is accurate.

What I read is they are changing Federal Impaired driving laws to address driving while stoned as part of the package to legalise marijuana. Part of the package is dropping human powered water craft from impaired riving, but in Ontario at least, it will still be illegal, but under the lesser charge of drinking in public.

Or something like that. I don't know all the details.


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## rbrasi (Mar 21, 2011)

What's the point? That because one Darwin Award proved out the worst possible outcome of kayaking while impaired, therefore Canadian lawmakers are making a huge mistake? Or, hooray we can now openly drink that beer while fishing from the kayak on a peaceful lake at dusk? I like my nothingburger with cheese, please.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

What could be more Canadian that cracking open a cold one while paddling a cedar strip canoe down the waters of some remote northern river. Sounds idyllic to me . 

Take off ya hosehead. :laugh

Seriously … I think it makes sense to me. It’s hard to do much damage to others while paddling drunk. Nice to see a little sense coming from lawmakers. 

As for the legal weed, bring it on! About time we did away with this ridiculous prohibition. Decriminalize it all, I say!


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

1st. Darwin was clearly wrong or all the idiots would have self destructed by now.

2nd. A constitutional amendment would be required to take this regulatory power away from the Provinces.


Ain't gonna happen ..... a nothing burger. Just more media hype and BS.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

I agree with you BP. I don't fully understand how it's working. From what I read it's somehow linked to the negotiations with the provinces with the legalisation with weed. I don't fully understand it. Or maybe it's just Ontario that's changing. Pretty sure in Quebec you could already have a beer in a canoe.


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

First, section 38 of the Constitution of Canada sets out the general amending formula for changes to the Constitution. This formula requires the approval of the Senate and House of Commons and of the legislative assemblies of at least two thirds of the provinces with at least 50% of the population of all provinces.

Quebec never agrees to anything. The Liberals are scared ****less of Quebec


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

I like this quote: "Any damn fool can navigate the world sober. It takes a really good sailor to do it drunk."
-Sir Francis Chichester while loading his boat with gin.


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

Slayer said:


> I like this quote: "Any damn fool can navigate the world sober. It takes a really good sailor to do it drunk."
> -Sir Francis Chichester while loading his boat with gin.


Just more proof that Darwin had it wrong.
Having been raised with an alcoholic in the family, I don't find Chichester funny.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

I think I have it figured out. Although Provinces regulate liquor and roads, the actual charge of impaired driving is a criminal code offence. Its not a provincial offence. Maybe because of its severity. Not sure why its different. And it has been a criminal code offence for a long time. Since 1920. So, yes, I guess the Federal government can change it.

Check it out.

Criminal Code

Still though, I think Capta should have titled this thread- Kayaking while high, since that's the catalyst for the changes |)


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## hellosailor (Apr 11, 2006)

Methinks the rationale behind this comes from one too many complaints filed by paddlers who HAVE gotten citations, pointing out that drunk motoring laws are there to protect society from a drunk at the helm [sic] of a 4000# missile, or a considerably larger vessel.

As opposed to paddlers, who really can't create a whole lot of damage when they bump into something in the night. Sure, they may drown themselves, but that's their right. The point is that they are pretty much unable to cause harm to anything else, so why even open the door to questioning their sobriety? Or lack thereof.

Watercops could make better use of their time looking into bigger problems.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

I thought this thread was just to have a bit of fun. Some of you are taking this way too seriously. Have another beer and chill out — preferably in a canoe 

Arcb has it right about this being a criminal offence, therefore part of the Criminal Code, which is federal. Seems a bit odd, but does not require a Constitutional amendment to change the Code. 

Yes, paddlers can cause problems, but on the scale of things it’s nothing like getting behind a 3 ton pile of metal and driving it at 100 km/hr. Applying the same laws to canoeist is the perfect example of taking a good idea and extending it to its illogical conclusion.


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

boatpoker said:


> Just more proof that Darwin had it wrong.
> Having been raised with an alcoholic in the family, I don't find Chichester funny.


Are you speaking of Chichester or me with the Darwin reference?


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

Slayer said:


> Are you speaking of Chichester or me with the Darwin reference?


I don't find drunks/impaired drivers/alcoholics funny regardless of who they are or what they are driving/piloting /rowing.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

capta said:


> So you think it's a good idea to allow the most irresponsible and least educated members of the boating community to drink while on the water? I'm not much of a fan of governmental interference in my life, but this has serious consequences for many.
> Just recently some kayakers ignored (didn't know any better?) the three blasts by a 300' ferry and paddled around the end of the wharf and right into it's path. One died, which is fine, that's Darwinism perfectly played out, but the captain and crew had weeks of legal hassles over the incident.
> Kayakers frequently put themselves in harm's way or create situations where some other boat must put itself into harm's way to avoid them.
> There's a huge difference between some lake or river far from the crowds, and a drunk paddling a kayak in Ontario harbor, but you can't make laws for just a few.


You mean drunken kayakers are so dangerous to society that the full weight of government needs to be brought to bear, to protect us from them - and them from themselves? 

I paddle the backwaters of the lower Colorado River in a flat-bottom canoe my son and I built a few years ago. I usually have homebrews in the ice chest when I push off, and I usually come home with a few less than I started with. Had no idea that makes me a public menace...

Along those lines, I think we should outlaw drinking while walking with scissors. After all, an impaired person could trip and hurt themselves or someone else.


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

boatpoker said:


> I don't find drunks/impaired drivers/alcoholics funny regardless of who they are or what they are driving/piloting /rowing.


I guess some questions are best left unanswered.


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

troy2000 said:


> You mean drunken kayakers are so dangerous to society that the full weight of government needs to be brought to bear, to protect us from them - and them from themselves?
> 
> I paddle the backwaters of the lower Colorado River in a flat-bottom canoe my son and I built a few years ago. I usually have homebrews in the ice chest when I push off, and I usually come home with a few less than I started with. Had no idea that makes me a public menace...


menace ... only to your son. teach him well.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

boatpoker said:


> I don't find drunks/impaired drivers/alcoholics funny regardless of who they are or what they are driving/piloting /rowing.


You're starting to remind me of people who rip into anyone who says the word 'retarded:' _"I'll have you know my daughter is developmentally impaired. How *dare* you try to demean her, by using that word in public?!?"
_
One of my brothers drank himself to death, and another one gave it a good try before something else killed him first. And you know what? I laughed at the Lord Chichester quote anyway.

It's a joke, son. Lighten up a little. Cracking a joke is hardly the same thing as actually encouraging people to slide behind the wheel or take the helm while drunk...


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

boatpoker said:


> menace ... only to your son. teach him well.


I hardly think I'm a menace to my son. 

He's in his mid-twenties, two years out of the Army, and doing just fine. I still manage to teach him something now and then, but we've reached a point where he probably teaches me more than I'm teaching him.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

With all the crazy things going on in the world and in politics, trust the most newsworthy Canadian political news to be about beer, pot and canoes.


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## RegisteredUser (Aug 16, 2010)

Depends on the definition of 'drunk'.

A few drinks canoe camping in the Boundary Waters and....you could be in deep doo-doo.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Arcb said:


> With all the crazy things going on in the world and in politics, trust the most newsworthy Canadian political news to be about beer, pot and canoes.


There's actually something almost comforting about that; it helps keep us grounded. 

We needn't spend all our time sweating the onrushing Apocalypse(s) around the corner...


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## travlin-easy (Dec 24, 2010)

Troy, there is always an onrushing apocalypse around the corner - just like the Galactic Battle Cruisers hovering just outside our solar system waiting to destroy life as we know it on this tiny, little planet. (Damned, I love that movie!)

Back to your regularly scheduled program - the closest I ever came to killing someone with my boat was a drunken kayaker drifting across the Havre de Grace Channel at 2 a.m. on a pitch-black Saturday night. I was returning to the marina late that night because I sat out a storm 30 miles south and when the weather finally cleared, I fired up the engine and motor sailed toward home. This person was damned near unconscious, drifting slowly with the tide and wind right in the middle of the channel, which is heavily used by barge traffic, even during the night. The only reason I didn't crush that kayak like a cockroach was I picked it up on my new 3G radar. I knew there wasn't any buoys where that signal was bouncing back from, so I eased off to starboard, shined by maglight in the general direction, and when I was about 50 feet away, I saw this idiot, sipping from his red Solo Cup. When I went by, he waved and laughed. I guess he eventually made it to shore, because I didn't hear of anyone drowning that night on the local news.

Now, I love my booze as well as the next person, but I didn't live this long without learning some hard, fast lessons about the stupid crap that people do when they're blasted out of their minds on booze. 

All the best,

Gary


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## aeventyr60 (Jun 29, 2011)

capta said:


> I'm sure you probably drink a brew or two and drive a motor vehicle quite capably. After all, that law wasn't really made for you, right?


Only Bud long necks driving down a country road, throwing the empties out as he goes...


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

capta said:


> I'm sure you probably drink a brew or two and drive a motor vehicle quite capably. After all, that law wasn't really made for you, right?


Lets see the data. Please point to the stats that show that muscle-driven boats are a serious danger to owners and fellow boaters. If the data indicates this, I might take this whole discussion more seriously. At this point, it all seems rather silly...


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

capta said:


> I'm sure you probably drink a brew or two and drive a motor vehicle quite capably. After all, that law wasn't really made for you, right?


Strangely enough, I don't approach driving seventy miles an hour on crowded highways as casually as I do paddling around in deserted backwaters. It's just a personal quirk, I guess...

And unlike its laws on drinking and driving, California simply forbids operating a boat under the influence.


> While it isn't illegal to drink alcohol on a boat, it is against the law to operate a vessel while under the influence of intoxicating liquor or drugs. The blood alcohol limit for boating is the same as that for driving a car - 0.08%.
> 
> https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=18578


Considering that you know almost nothing about my drinking habits, and even less about California's boating laws, may I suggest you stow the gratuitous personal insults?


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

aeventyr60 said:


> Only Bud long necks driving down a country road, throwing the empties out as he goes...


You know, I wouldn't really do that - unless I thought I had a good chance of hitting you. 

add: that's a joke, son. I drink my own homebrew, not Bud - and I wouldn't waste my bottles on you.


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## twoshoes (Aug 19, 2010)

troy2000 said:


> You know, I wouldn't really do that - unless I thought I had a good chance of hitting you.
> 
> That's a joke, son. I drink my own homebrew, not Bud - and I wouldn't waste my bottles on you.


Of course it's a joke, no one throws bottles at people. That's what road signs are for.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

twoshoes said:


> Of course it's a joke, no one throws bottles at people. That's what road signs are for.


I dunno about that. But I do know that no one gets one of my homebrews without solemnly swearing (or affirming) that he'll return the empty bottle...


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## Minnewaska (Feb 21, 2010)

Figure this one out. I love kayaking. I hate kayakers. 

Fully support the booze/kayak combo. It should come with a requirement that a kayak has the obligation to remain a min distance from all powered vessels. Moron vacationing kayakers are routinely found gazing at the 20 ton pretty boat, from the middle of the confined channel, and I've assumed they were sober. 

As for the wacky tabacky, it will become legalized. Our society will ultimately regret it too.


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

troy2000 said:


> add: that's a joke, son. I drink my own homebrew, not Bud - and I wouldn't waste my bottles on you.


You may want to rethink your presentation. If you have keep repeating "it's a joke", perhaps you're not as funny as you think.


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

Based on personal encounters, driving or boating, I find general stupidity to be more hazardous than impairment: driving especially.


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## bletso (Oct 17, 2013)

RegisteredUser said:


> Depends on the definition of 'drunk'.
> 
> A few drinks canoe camping in the Boundary Waters and....you could be in deep doo-doo.


Canoes and kayaks are no more tolerant to the vagaries of the water witch. In USCG stats for 2016 a good fourth of the fatalities were in this class of "vessel" with 2/4 for open motorboats and the last quarter all others.

Even a little booze can alter our sense of empowerment over nature. Better to be bigger than smaller. Better yet don't drink and drive, even a canoe or row boat.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

capta said:


> Strangely enough, I don't appreciate those who casually paddle about, completely heedless of the danger they put themselves in and risking my license and livelihood should they cause an incident, drunk or sober. It's just a personal quirk, I guess...


It's absurdly melodramatic to pretend I'm endangering your license and livelihood, by having a homebrew while fishing small water that isn't even accessible to anything bigger than a pirogue or jon boat.

But then, the world is full of people whose personal quirks include being obnoxiously judgmental - under the guise of virtue and righteousness, of course.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

boatpoker said:


> You may want to rethink your presentation. If you have keep repeating "it's a joke", perhaps you're not as funny as you think.


Then there are people whose sense of humor is so stunted they need to have jokes pointed out and carefully explained to them.

I'm definitely funnier than you. And since it seems the alternative would be to start taking sanctimonious old maids seriously, I'll just continue quoting Foghorn Leghorn.
_
"It's a joke, son. I say it's a joke.

That boy's about as sharp as a pound of wet liver..."_


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

This thread is intense. I get the point about places like Toronto and Vancouver Harbour where, there is no doubt I have had some challenges with Kayaks, canoes, SUPs and racing sailboats.

But if I am 100 miles up the Coulonge River, where I can guarantee I am not going to encounter any over sized yachts which can be a serious hazard to small craft, and where folks have been having a glass of wine with their lunch since the Canadian economy was based on trading beaver pelts, whos business is that but my own. 

Same thing if somebody wants to smoke a left handed cigarette. Not my business.


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## Cigarmann (Sep 26, 2017)

Love that quote! While I never get drunk while sailings would certainly help on long passages......


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## RobGallagher (Aug 22, 2001)

This thread needs to be sent to purgatory.


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## aeventyr60 (Jun 29, 2011)

troy2000 said:


> You know, I wouldn't really do that - unless I thought I had a good chance of hitting you.
> 
> add: that's a joke, son. I drink my own homebrew, not Bud - and I wouldn't waste my bottles on you.


Thanks Pops! As I remember it, sitting around that old campfire, you told some tales:

That you won that belt buckle.

The F250 dually was paid for.

That you were only helping that cute sheep get across the fence..

Some sort of backclapping tale about hitting the bullseye on the "MADD" billboard with an IPA home brew bottle...:grin


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

Minnewaska said:


> It should come with a requirement that a kayak has the obligation to remain a min distance from all powered vessels.


Can not see this ever happening, not here, our freedom of navigation is too well enshrined in law, both our constitution and other statutes like the Navigable Waters Protection Act and our Crown Lands Act.

Its not possible to own a navigable water in Canada, not the surface, not the river bed underneath it, so I don't think even some private entity buying up real estate could accomplish this. Its not a privilege, its a right to be able to use the rivers. That goes way back in the countries history to protect fur routes as well as the right to hunt and fish for sustenance and to travel water for commerce.

No way the yachtie lobby group will ever have that kind of clout, especially the way young folks are running from the sport of sailing like its a burning barn. Not hard to see why either.

Not only is it protected in law, but the freedom of navigation is something considered important to the average working Canadian, regardless of their political affiliation, and there are a lot more canoeists than sailors, at all income levels.

Food for thought. Check out the photo at the start of this article.The current Prime Minister of Canada canoeing with his father who was the Prime Minister of Canada from 1968 to 1979 and again from 1980 to 1984. Good luck with that lobby.

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/com...e-iconic-canoe-has-shaped-canada-hepburn.html


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

capta said:


> As I said above, which you so conveniently forget, they cannot make laws for only one segment of a group of enthusiasts, so you on your backwater kayak are probably not the target group. However, you seem to say that you do drink your home brews whether it is legal or not anyway, so what is your point? You and I will most probably never meet while operating watercraft, but the last time I was in Toronto harbor, I was on an 80 foot boat and a drunk kayaker could have caused a serious problem.
> My experiences in Canada have led me to believe there are very few LEO's outside the metropolitan areas, so your chances of being arrested for BWI or whatever they call it up where other vessels can not travel are minimal, at best.


You should read more carefully, because I've said no such thing. In fact, I explicitly pointed out that while operating a boat under the influence is against the law in California, it's perfectly legal to drink on one. I even provided a direct quote from an official California .gov site.

That means the chances of me being arrested along the Colorado River simply for drinking a homebrew in my canoe aren't just 'minimal,' they're nonexistent.

Nor do I think the possibility that you might ram a drunk kayaker in Toronto's harbor justifies criminalizing normal behavior by kayakers and canoists all across Canada, and putting their driver's licenses in peril simply for having a cold one while fishing. Inflicting harshly punitive laws on the general public isn't necessarily the best way to deal with people who engage in undesirable behavior.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

aeventyr60 said:


> Thanks Pops! As I remember it, sitting around that old campfire, you told some tales:
> 
> That you won that belt buckle.
> 
> ...


Stereotype much? 

The truth is, I don't brew IPA's. So it would have to be a saison or brown ale bottle... and I was just helping that poor little sheep across the fence so it could run from you.


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

This change in law was part of a question on the radio game show on NPR, "Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me." Stealing a joke from the show, drinking canoers will no longer have to perform the field sobriety tests, including the alphabet test, which goes like this in Canada: Say A....eh?
B....eh?


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

in the state of Michigan you can get an OWI while floating down a river in a tube!!! I can state for a fact it's not enforced in the least!!! New laws went into effect back in 2015..

A package of stricter laws to prevent drunk boating has just taken effect in Michigan.*
The laws lower blood alcohol limits for people driving boats on Michigan waterways –*and provide stricter penalties for violators.
Tony Wickersham, the Macomb County sheriff, said the new limit has gone from .10 percent to .08 percent, *and it matches the standard for drunk driving.*
People*under 21 years of age may not operate a boat with any alcohol in their systems.
"We want to make sure that people are operating safely," said Wickersham. "And if they're going to operate a vessel, that they're not operating under the influence."*
Wickersham said most serious boating accidents involve alcohol.
The new standards also apply to snowmobiles and off-road vehicles.
"The message that we're sending to our fellow citizens and to our tourists is that we take alcohol abuse seriously in these areas," said state Rep. Dave Pagel,*R-78th District, who co-sponsored the legislation.*
Pagel said there can be a tendency to put alcohol together with recreation. But he said if you are operating a boat or off-road vehicle for recreation, *you should be subject to the same alcohol limits as if you were driving a car.


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## midwesterner (Dec 14, 2015)

boatpoker said:


> Slayer said:
> 
> 
> > I like this quote: "Any damn fool can navigate the world sober. It takes a really good sailor to do it drunk."
> ...


No, Alcoholism isn't funny. Not all drinking while boating endangers people's lives. I often take two or three beers with me when I kayak the marshlands near my home. It is rare for me to encounter another boater.

I don't drink if I'm paddling through any serious whitewater.

I occasionally share the waters of the Missouri River with the barge tows (see my avatar photo). But my boat only draws a draft of 3 inches. I can stay in the shallows. The barges require Mark Twain depths. There is no reason for me to be anywhere near them.


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

Another thing I forgot to add since human powered is pretty much at the top of the COLREGS right away A drunk in their kayak cuts in front of 1000' freighter it be the freighter captain that would be in trouble if there was an accident...

Bob


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

Michigan, I wonder why that would be...

About 1,500 Americans in river party wash up in Canada - CNN


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## Towguy (May 8, 2016)

WEll just to throw in my 2bits,..I have a 25-30 acre lake on my place but it is completely surrounded by my land so if we want to canoe and have a relaxing beer while drifting we will ,but there are a lot of lakes and cabins in our area bringing way to many power boats and partiers......here In Alberta the fish and wildlife officers as well as the RCMP patrol and enforce very well,,but although I have had to tow and impound everything from quads and golf carts to semis,, I have yet to tow a boat of any sort that is not attached to something ,.....just thinking out loud... RALPH


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

snokid said:


> Another thing I forgot to add since human powered is pretty much at the top of the COLREGS right away A drunk in their kayak cuts in front of 1000' freighter it be the freighter captain that would be in trouble if there was an accident...
> 
> Bob


Actually, I doubt that.

He'd be inconvenienced and aggravated by the authorities until it was straightened out, and it wouldn't be any fun for him. But a ship's captain isn't expected to perform miracles; his ship is subject to the laws of physics no matter what the Inland and International Rules say.

This discussion reminds me of the poem we learned in Driver's Ed, back when I was in high school:

_Here lie the remains of John O'day,
Who died defending his right of way.
His right was clear, his will was strong,
But he's just as dead as though he'd been wrong._


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

Troy you may be right.

But let's look at this another way.

you are piloting a boat and you see a kayaker on your port side about 100 yards in front of you they are going the same heading as you. What is your course of action? So you decide to pass him on his starboard but as you get closer he crosses your path, you and your lady friend are below deck playing twister and your vessel takes out the kayaker....

you did the right thing right? up to the point of not paying attention to the kayaker till your were clear of him.


Just because the freighter is bigger doesn't relieve him of his responsibilities to give way.... Plenty of actions he could take which may or may not avoid a bad outcome....

I don't drink so I have no skin in the game, and I want the government out of my like as much as possible 

But how do you make a law that states no operating under the influence but if you are in a kayak in a stream you can be as drunk as you want?

Law makers are lazy much easier to say you can't operate a vessel while under the influence period...

Bob


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## twoshoes (Aug 19, 2010)

It's important to note that there is a distinction between having a few drinks while boating and boating drunk, at least in the States anyhow. Depending upon body weight a person can consume 2-4 drinks and still be under .08 BAC. Add another if the limit in your jurisdiction is .10. You can also start adding another for every hour or so that passes. Important too is that open container laws for automobiles on the road generally don't apply to boats in open water.

I'm not advocating pushing the envelope right to edge of the legal limit. BAC is only one indicator after all, and there are those with low tolerance who would probably fail a field sobriety test after a couple of drinks regardless of BAC. It comes down to personal responsibility but personally, I don't look down my nose outright at a guy with a tiller in one hand and a Coors Light in the other. Just my opinion, others are entitled to theirs.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

I don't think this is laziness on behalf of law makers. I've been following this storey for months (or is it years now?).

This is a democratically elected government, and by no small margin, doing exactly what they promised they would do.

Voters said, we've had enough of government telling us what we're aloud to smoke and drink. Now the system is doing what it was designed to do, it's giving the public what they've been asking for.

I absolutely get the concerns about heavy traffic in harbours, especially Toronto. I have observed commercial vessels hitting kayaks twice there. One in a large schooner, that really couldn't have done much to avoid it. 160' boat with concrete to the right and a busy commercial airport to the left. 

The other incident was a ferry that hit a couple of (presumably sober) 12 year olds in kayaks. Not sure what happened there.

In Ontario, having open alcohol in a boat is still illegal as is being intoxicated in a public place.

Plus you have the shipping act, which has the shall not impede thing in rule 9. Something along the lines of a sailing vessel or a vessel under 20 meters shall not impede the passage of a vessel that can only operate in a narrow channel or fairway.

So there are still federal and provincial statutes covering the issue in Toronto, it just isn't "impaired driving".

In a place like Toronto with such high density traffic, 100's of racing sailboats all claiming above the law status, dozens of tour boats and ferries, confused kayakers, dash 8's, q400's and sea planes dropping in for landings plus commercial docking facilities for cement and sugar ships, I think it's a challenging enforcement environment for the Toronto police.

In the bush though, where most of us are canoeing, and yes you do see the odd OPP, Surete, RCMP, MNR and Park Ranger out there, this makes sense.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

snokid said:


> Troy you may be right.
> 
> But let's look at this another way.
> 
> ...


I'm not sure what you're arguing here. If you're overtaking a kayak, you shouldn't be below playing twister with your lady friend - regardless of whether the kayaker has been drinking.


> Just because the freighter is bigger doesn't relieve him of his responsibilities to give way.... Plenty of actions he could take which may or may not avoid a bad outcome....


I'm not sure what you're trying to argue here, either. If the circumstances were such that the captain had plenty of actions he could've taken, whether or not the kayaker was drunk seems to be beside the point.


> I don't drink so I have no skin in the game, and I want the government out of my like as much as possible
> 
> But how do you make a law that states no operating under the influence but if you are in a kayak in a stream you can be as drunk as you want?


It's easy: you separate muscle-propelled boats from power boats and sailboats, and write the laws accordingly - just like you treat drivers and bicyclists differently.


> Law makers are lazy much easier to say you can't operate a vessel while under the influence period...
> 
> Bob


The fact that it's an easier law to write doesn't make it a good or effective law. We should be able to expect at least a little effort from our legislators...


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

capta said:


> Well, then you would be very very wrong.
> At the very least, there would be a huge investigation that may cost the captain several months of his time or at worst if not prosecuted, termination (because how else is the big ship's company going to show it's sorrow at the kayaler's loss? You just don't have to deal with those sorts of situations up the Colorado River, so you probably haven't the understanding of the repercussions of this sort of maritime mishap.
> It just the same as hitting a bike rider in a state like Fla or Cal (maybe others too?). The bike can be 100% wrong, but it's the car's driver that may get prosecuted, fined or sued. It may not be fair, right or balanced, but that is the way it is!


I believe I did acknowledge that the ship's captain would be 'aggravated and annoyed by the authorities.' But that isn't the same thing as being found at fault, which was the original claim.


> If keeping the BWI laws as they are prevents one mishap, then it is well worth it IMO.


I'm sorry; that's a completely fatuous statement. I can think of all sorts of idiotic laws that could prevent one mishap, or save one life. That doesn't make them sensible, enforceable, or just.

How far are you willing to go? How many freedoms are you willing to sacrifice, how many hardships are you willing to inflict, how much money and how many man-hours are you willing to p** away, in your quest to prevent just one mishap?

And my guess is that unless someone's been conducting regular sweeps to rid Toronto's harbor of drunken kayakers, changing the law won't really change the number of incidents and fatalities they cause.


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

Troy what I'm saying is that if a freighter hits a kayaker it's his fault, may also be the kayaker's fault, but it's the freighter captain that will pay the price.

The freighter captain should keep an eye on the kayaker, signal, maneuver to avoid the kayaker. 

Yes it doesn't matter if the kayaker is drunk or not, but I think you can agree if the kayaker is drunk they are much more likely to cut in front of a freighter.

Yes lawmakers can and should write laws that make common sense, but what have you seen anyone in government have even one shed of common sense?

Bob


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

oh yeah and your in California where most of the goof ball laws come from!!!

Bob


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

want more goofy, I know the officer that issued the ticket, but didn't issue a ticket for OWI...
Michigan Man Swears by His Right to Use Profanity - latimes

Bob


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

snokid said:


> Troy what I'm saying is that if a freighter hits a kayaker it's his fault, may also be the kayaker's fault, but it's the freighter captain that will pay the price.
> 
> The freighter captain should keep an eye on the kayaker, signal, maneuver to avoid the kayaker.
> 
> ...


I'd say changing Canada's laws so people can't lose a driver's license for paddling a canoe under the influence is about as much common sense as we could wish for from legislators.

You can't lose a driver's license in California for drunk paddling. And yet, in spite of having North America's two busiest ports and its largest naval base, we don't have dead kayakers washing up on the beaches.


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

lol Michigan beat California to the punch on something?

yes in Michigan you sure can loose your drivers license for drunk paddling, but like I said earlier it's not enforced...

Bob


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

DUI OWI KAYAK MICIHIGAN ? DRUNK CANOE UP NORTH MICHIGAN | www.AllLegalMatters.com - Michigan Attorneys 586-285-1700 - CT Law

I stand corrected I guess they do enforce OWI in a canoe or kayak in Michigan!!!

Bob


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## RegisteredUser (Aug 16, 2010)

This thread has turned into a jack off competition....


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

capta said:


> I guess you are not familiar with the International Collision Regulations. I guess you don't need to be if you are boating way up a river. But many of us do not boat way up some river, far from other traffic and must have some familiarity with those regulations.
> It is *ALWAYS the fault of both parties in a maritime collision. ALWAYS!
> As snokid said, it would be much more likely that a drunk in a muscled powered vessel would put himself in harm's way and thereby destroy the life of the other boat operator, even if there was nothing that boat operator could have done to avoid the collision.
> You can bet the family of the dead kayaker would sue the ship's captain in the good old USA, cause that's what Americans do, right or wrong. Heck some really stupid woman put a just purchased cup of hot coffee between her legs while driving and became a 1%er. How is that right or fair?
> Captains go to prison more frequently than you might imagine for being the responsible person in charge, even though there was nothing they could have done to alter the outcome of the situation that sent them to prison.*


*You're trying to suggest that both parties are habitually found to be more or less equally at fault, regardless of circumstances. That simply isn't true.

And I don't need some Canuck outhouse lawyer trying to lecture me on American habits and laws, OK? The case you're referring to is Liebeck v. McDonald's Restaurants, where a 79-year old woman scalded her thighs, buttocks and groin - receiving third degree burns over 6% of her skin, and lesser burns over another 16%. She had to undergo skin grafts and two years of medical treatment and disability, and was permanently disfigured. It turned out that McDonald's kept its coffee scalding hot (up to 190 degrees F) compared to other establishments, because it thought the stronger aroma helped drive sales. Documents obtained from the company showed that from 1982 to 1992 it had received more than 700 reports of people burned by McDonald's coffee to varying degrees of severity, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000.

By the way, the judge in the case lowered the jury's figure to $640,000, out of which the lady had to pay her medical and legal expenses. That hardly boosted her into the ranks of the "1%ers."

And I repeat: we don't have Canada's punitive law here in California. But for some reason, our kayakers aren't dying and destroying nautical careers left and right anyway...*


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## capta (Jun 27, 2011)

RegisteredUser said:


> This thread has turned into a jack off competition....


You are absolutely right and I apologize profusely to you all for my childish participation.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

ItI think Capta has made a fair point. The legislation has only been through two readings as far as I know. It isn't law yet. I'm not sure how I feel.

I think Troy has taken way too much slack for, what sounds like, legally drinking a few beers in his canoe. 

I challenge any person on this thread to travel to Eastern Quebec, find a great big lumberjack or miner and tell him he can't drink a labatt 50 while he fishes from his canoe. Film it, it might be a YouTube video I'd pay to see.

I dare you, no, I double dog dare you.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Arcb said:


> ItI think Capta has made a fair point. The legislation has only been through two readings as far as I know. It isn't law yet. I'm not sure how I feel.
> 
> I think Troy has taken way too much slack for, what sounds like, legally drinking a few beers in his canoe.
> 
> ...


I had never heard of the Shawinigan Handshake; had to look it up.

I'm a firm believer in the right to protest, but some folks push their luck.

Add: I've also never had a Labatt 50; had to look that up too. I'm learning all sorts of stuff from this thread...


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## aeventyr60 (Jun 29, 2011)

*I challenge any person on this thread to travel to Eastern Quebec, find a great big lumberjack or miner and tell him he can't drink a labatt 50 while he fishes from his canoe. Film it, it might be a YouTube video I'd pay to see.
*

I thought Labatt's Blue was the drink of choice?

http://www.labatt.com/brands/nationalbrands.php

I won't be taking anybodies beer away either...


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## bblument (Oct 22, 2012)

twoshoes said:


> ... I don't look down my nose outright at a guy with a tiller in one hand and a Coors Light in the other....


I do. Coors Light is awful.

If I felt moved to make a serious contribution to this thread, I'd say that I can accept and appreciate government efforts to protect us from thoughtless, violent, or criminal acts of others, but am not in favor of the government enacting legislation to protect me from myself. Kayaking with a beer, or even a Coors Light (whatever that is) falls squarely into the latter category. Kayaking with a BAC over .08% in an area with other boaters in close proximity, or with under-age people aboard said kayak....well, that's the first caregory. If you're going to legislate, legislate thoughtfully.


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## RobGallagher (Aug 22, 2001)

“We hear of the conversion of water into wine at the marriage in Cana, as of a miracle. But this conversion is, through the goodness of God, made every day before our eyes. Behold the rain which descends from heaven upon our vineyards, and which incorporates itself with the grapes to be changed into wine; a constant proof that God loves us, and loves to see us happy!”

If you can't drink responsibly then sit at home and drink in your bathtub. If one must resort to name calling on this thread then maybe one needs to sit home and get piss drunk in the bathtub.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

> I guess you are not familiar with the International Collision Regulations. I guess you don't need to be if you are boating way up a river. But many of us do not boat way up some river, far from other traffic and must have some familiarity with those regulations.
> It is *ALWAYS* the fault of both parties in a maritime collision. ALWAYS!


I'm going to revisit this statement by capta. If one side is assigned only a very small percent of the blame, I think it's fair to say they were essentially found not to be at fault. In the second place, I have an experienced expert witness who disagrees that both sides are always at fault.


> You can always argue that all of the required actions weren't done soon enough or large enough or good enough, because obviously the result was a collision. I can understand that concept. I agree with it as far as it goes, but the fault can become very small depending upon how well the stand on vessel complied with all of the rules under the conditions at hand. The fault might even drop to a mere 1%. That's pretty close to zero liability. Some experts says that 1% is as close as you can ever get to a no fault collision. I disagree.
> 
> What ever happened to keeping an open mind and letting the facts paint the picture? There are times when a vessel is involved in a collision when, in my opinion, there is absolutely no fault to be assigned to one vessel. Those "no fault" collisions are extremely rare, and involve the give way vessel acting in a grossly negligent or a deliberate way.
> 
> https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-determine-fault-boating-accident-marc-deglinnocenti


I'd say that a drunken kayaker cutting in front of a freighter so suddenly the freighter has no chance to react fits the definition of 'acting in a grossly negligent or a deliberate way.'

It's a well-written, easy-to-read essay. I'd recommend it to anyone who's interested in learning more about how fault is determined...

And by the way, capta: you should check your assumptions at the door, if you want to have an intelligent conversation. I haven't lived my whole life _'way up some river, far from other traffic;'_ I spent a good chunk of my younger years in the US Navy and Merchant Marine. My copy of the Navigation Rules is old and may be outdated, but I do own one.


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## Minnesail (Feb 19, 2013)

Tell these guys they can't drink a beer in their canoe.


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## RegisteredUser (Aug 16, 2010)

troy2000 said:


> .... I think it's fair to say.....


I think it's fair to say that the once great and proud herd of dead horses has been decimated.
Dead horses are now being listed as an endangered specie.


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## ScottUK (Aug 16, 2009)

RegisteredUser said:


> I think it's fair to say that the once great and proud herd of dead horses has been decimated.
> Dead horses are now being listed as an endangered specie.


I think it is fair to say Troy has made the most sense throughout this thread.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

See, now this is the appropriate tone to take with this discussion.



Arcb said:


> ...I challenge any person on this thread to travel to Eastern Quebec, find a great big lumberjack or miner and tell him he can't drink a labatt 50 while he fishes from his canoe. Film it, it might be a YouTube video I'd pay to see.


Or better still this:



Minnesail said:


> Tell these guys they can't drink a beer in their canoe.


BTW, it's "cinquante" in Quebec, which is about the only place you still find "50". It's the same crap as all the other boring lagers, but Canadians will come to blows over which one: Blue, Canadian, 50 or (Ex)port, etc. is the best.

Coors/Bud Light is just soda water. Why even bother&#8230; :wink


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## jephotog (Feb 25, 2002)

capta said:


> Well, here's a good idea. Let's take the unquestionably most ignorant (of boating regulations, at least) group of boaters out there and let them blunder about on the water, putting themselves and others in mortal danger, *DRUNK*! Yeah, Canada!


Why all the hatred for kayakers? Maybe you're just jealous?

I am giving up sailing for kayaking and moving to Canada.


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

jephotog said:


> I am giving up sailing for kayaking and moving to Canada.


Just walk across the border, state that you are a political refugee and your free dental care, eye glasses, hearing aid and 100% free other health care will be waiting for you. Your first welfare cheque may take a week or so as we have a huge backlog at the moment but we'll put you up in a hotel until that comes through.


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## jephotog (Feb 25, 2002)

boatpoker said:


> Just walk across the border, state that you are a political refugee and your free dental care, eye glasses, hearing aid and 100% free other health care will be waiting for you. Your first welfare cheque may take a week or so as we have a huge backlog at the moment but we'll put you up in a hotel until that comes through.


If I only knew, I was up there this summer and have some neglected dental work I should have had taken care of. Is that how to get Canadian Citizenship, say you are a refugee of Hurricane Donald?


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## Rocky Mountain Breeze (Mar 30, 2015)

The problem is the lower level of blood alcohol the governments have determined is "impaired" for all things alcohol. Paddling a canoe or kayak while downing a few is not a problem as your body is burning off the alcohol as you exercise and drinking a few beers in a day does not make you an alcoholic. If they legalize pot smoking you will regret it. People lack motivation to support and be responsible for themselves as is but once people are allowed to be stoners without consequence you will wish for the day people only drank beer. Basing law on "what if" scenarios is a poor policy. To be fair, if you base your worst case scenario on what if you also have to consider the best case what if which never happens......


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

MikeOReilly said:


> ...BTW, it's "cinquante" in Quebec, which is about the only place you still find "50". It's the same crap as all the other boring lagers, but Canadians will come to blows over which one: Blue, Canadian, 50 or (Ex)port, etc. is the best.
> 
> Coors/Bud Light is just soda water. Why even bother&#8230; :wink


I'm sure it only matters to beer geeks and home brewers, but apparently Labatt 50 isn't a lager. Never had it, but I've read that unlike Labatt's other offerings, it's a light ale instead of a lager. Which means that even though it's 'light,' there may be a detectable difference.

Ales are fermented and conditioned at warmer temperatures, using a different family of yeasts (top fermenting v. bottom fermenting) and as a result tend to have stronger, more complex flavors and aromas. Unfortunately, modern popular taste in beer seems to have swung away from beer you can actually taste and smell, and embraced the 'clean, crisp taste' (i.e., bland emptiness) of mass-produced lagers.

Yeah, I'm being a little hard on lagers; I admit to being prejudiced. I think of most of them as thirst quenchers and 'lawnmower beers' - something you guzzle and cool down with, when you're mowing the lawn on a hot summer day. Whereas a good ale is something you sit down with and savor in the evening, as a satisfying end to a long day.

How do I square that with taking homebrewed ales fishing? Simple: I brew lighter, less alcoholic 'session beer' and stash it for occasions like fishing or 4-wheeling, when I'd otherwise be drinking commercial lagers. I also put it in screw-top aluminum bottles, so I don't risk leaving broken glass laying around.

OK, I'm done hijacking the thread to expound on one of my personal obsessions. I'm returning control of computers, tablets and smart phones to the listener... 

add: in the interest of full disclosure, I'll admit there are good lagers - and that brewing a good one takes more time (and arguably more expertise, because there's less room for error) than brewing the average ale. I have all the respect in the world for those who can manage it. But I prefer ales anyway.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> The problem is the lower level of blood alcohol the governments have determined is "impaired" for all things alcohol. Paddling a canoe or kayak while downing a few is not a problem as your body is burning off the alcohol as you exercise and drinking a few beers in a day does not make you an alcoholic. If they legalize pot smoking you will regret it. People lack motivation to support and be responsible for themselves as is but once people are allowed to be stoners without consequence you will wish for the day people only drank beer. Basing law on "what if" scenarios is a poor policy. To be fair, if you base your worst case scenario on what if you also have to consider the best case what if which never happens......


I'm going to respectfully disagree with you about the pot smoking, Rocky; I think you're stereotyping.

I've been around people who smoke pot my entire adult life (I am from Southern California ), and I smoked my share before landing a job that requires random drug tests. Just like the average casual drinker, the average casual pot smoker handles the real world just fine. And if I had to choose between a hardcore drunk and a hardcore stoner, I'd take the stoner every time. He's much less likely to do serious damage to himself and others than a drunk...

My younger brother Robert was a drunk. He destroyed his career and his family life, and died alone in his early fifties.

My older brother Sherman is a stoner. He's 69 years old, and still going strong. He's still taking care of business, and still has strong relationships with his offspring and the woman in his life.


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## jephotog (Feb 25, 2002)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> If they legalize pot smoking you will regret it. People lack motivation to support and be responsible for themselves as is but once people are allowed to be stoners without consequence you will wish for the day people only drank beer.


Are you saying baked people will be too unmotivated to pull themselves out of the water or just too lazy to even want to go kayaking? If you really hate pot smokers you are living in the wrong state.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

troy2000 said:


> I'm sure it only matters to beer geeks and home brewers, but apparently Labatt 50 isn't a lager. Never had it, but I've read that unlike Labatt's other offerings, it's a light ale instead of a lager. Which means that even though it's 'light,' there may be a detectable difference.
> 
> Ales are fermented and conditioned at warmer temperatures, using a different family of yeasts (top fermenting v. bottom fermenting) and as a result tend to have stronger, more complex flavors and aromas. Unfortunately, modern popular taste in beer seems to have swung away from beer you can actually taste and smell, and embraced the 'clean, crisp taste' (i.e., bland emptiness) of mass-produced lagers.


Yup, long time home brewer here as well. Trust me Troy, while both "50" and "Ex" claim to be ales, they ain't. At least, not by any perceptible taste.

It's amazing to me how all the mass-market beers all pretty much taste the same. There is the wonderful resurgence of "craft" brewing now. Amazing stuff being made and sold now. Almost as good as the stuff I used to brew in my basement.

BTW, there are beautiful lagers. Nothing wrong with the process or the style.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

Just think, in 9 months time, people will be able to have these same discussions about strains of herb. Indica or Sativa instead of Lager or Stout.


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## Bleemus (Oct 13, 2015)

Sativa!


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

MikeOReilly said:


> Yup, long time home brewer here as well. Trust me Troy, while both "50" and "Ex" claim to be ales, they ain't. At least, not by any perceptible taste.
> 
> It's amazing to me how all the mass-market beers all pretty much taste the same. There is the wonderful resurgence of "craft" brewing now. Amazing stuff being made and sold now. Almost as good as the stuff I used to brew in my basement.
> 
> BTW, there are beautiful lagers. Nothing wrong with the process or the style.


You'd probably appreciate my latest 5 gal batch. The grain bill was 8 1/2 lbs. Maris Otter malt, 3 lbs. wheat malt, 3/4 lb. Special Roast malt - and 3 lbs. dark-roasted mesquite bean pods, along with 1 lb. Belgian candi sugar. Mashed @ 155 degrees, used Willamette for both bittering and aroma hops, fermented @ basically room temp with a double dose of Belle Saison yeast.

I just bottled it, and I think it's going to be very good. If it is, I'll send you a bottle.

Yeah, I know. I'm off-track again. Oh well, I think we've pretty well hammered the original topic anyway...


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## gonecrusin (Aug 23, 2016)

This thread makes me want a drink.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

Arcb said:


> Just think, in 9 months time, people will be able to have these same discussions about strains of herb. Indica or Sativa instead of Lager or Stout.


About bloody time! This insanity about legally sanctioned recreational drugs (alcohol, nicotine, caffeine and the whole slew of 'pharmaceuticals') vs the illegal stuff is based on classist power imbalance. It's been perpetuated by the real addicts; the black market profiteers and the governments and police/legal/incarceration industries that benefit from the status quo.

If (when?) we did away with all illicit drugs:

#1. Canadian civilization would not descend into a drug-incuded hellscape.
#2. There would not be a huge uptick in addicts.
#3. There would be a big decrease in the power of organized crime since one of their easy revenue sources would be removed.

AND

#4. There would be a HUGE financial benefit mostly as we stop wasting money on useless enforcement and incarceration. We'd also generate modest additional tax revenue, _a la_ a new sin tax.

Indica or Sativa or whatever the heck its all called&#8230; _Bring It On!_ Not my cup of tea, but decriminalizing it all would be far better for society than the current failed prohibition model.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

troy2000 said:


> You'd probably appreciate my latest 5 gal batch. The grain bill was 8 1/2 lbs. Maris Otter malt, 3 lbs. wheat malt, 3/4 lb. Special Roast malt - and 3 lbs. dark-roasted mesquite bean pods, along with 1 lb. Belgian candi sugar. Mashed @ 155 degrees, used Willamette for both bittering and aroma hops, fermented @ basically room temp with a double dose of Belle Saison yeast.
> 
> I just bottled it, and I think it's going to be very good. If it is, I'll send you a bottle.
> 
> Yeah, I know. I'm off-track again. Oh well, I think we've pretty well hammered the original topic anyway...


Oh man &#8230; like Pavlov's dog, you've got me salivating at the thought. Sounds like it should be a delicious darkish malty beer but the Willamette should bring a lighter, slightly spicy flare to it. I have no idea what the mesquite bean pods would taste like - Yum! Send it on!

I was always partial to Cascade, Fuggle, Northern and Nugget for my hops. I also liked to incorporate a lot of local flavours into my beers. I made a beautiful blueberry beer one season, maple another, then local sarsaparilla and even rose petal. I had access to local honey so got into making mead (both beer and wine versions).

I recall my drinkin' buddy (who happen to be the local Anglican priest) showing up one day on my doorstep with a bundle of some local weed. He kinda thrust it in my face and said: "HERE! Put this in your beer!" You never say no to a priest, and it turned out quite nice as I recall. Still don't know what it was...

I haven't brewed a batch in years now since we've moved onto the boat. I can't figure out the space and water issues onboard. I might try making wines though - they're a lot easier than beer. But I'd love to taste yours.


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

just like booze people can't seem to figure out not to drive while impaired..
Study: Colorado sees car crash claim rates increase after legalization of marijuana | FOX31 Denver


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

snokid said:


> just like booze people can't seem to figure out not to drive while impaired..
> Study: Colorado sees car crash claim rates increase after legalization of marijuana | FOX31 Denver


May I piggyback on your post to clarify one of my earlier ones? When I compared my two brothers (one a drunk and one a stoner), I didn't mean to imply there are no negative consequences to being a stoner. I just think the downside to being a drunk is usually worse...


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## snokid (Oct 25, 2016)

My I'm sounding like an old fuddy duddy!!!

I guess it comes from all the years behind the wheel of a truck, I have seen more people killed than I would of liked, part of the reason why I retired at the ripe old age of 52.

I have seen a family in a mini van wiped out from OWI seen a guy on a motorcycle killed by a texter. Seen a teenage girl killed by another drunk. I have been hit by a women playing with her phone, no harm to me she ended up upside down in the ditch. 

I really don't care if you partake just don't get in a vessel and put me or my family in danger...

Bob


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## Rocky Mountain Breeze (Mar 30, 2015)

I have known plenty of stoners in my life, even before Colorado legalized it and I do not see an upside. The stoners I have known lacked initiative and couldn't remember what they did ten minutes ago. In any serious technical trade it is a serious problem, especially since the THC remains in the bloodstream for such a long period of time. Get hurt on the job and return a positive on your pot blood test and you just kissed your workman's comp payments goodbye. Please don't think I am trying to control any of you, just giving you observations from years of experience. The modern education system is dumbing down the population quickly enough without adding any more barriers to clear thinking.

Just out of curiosity, how many of you who embrace pot smoking believe those who smoke tobacco cigarettes are pariahs? Can you explain how pot smoking carries fewer health hazards than tobacco?


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## travlin-easy (Dec 24, 2010)

I saw hundreds of stoners when I worked in the medical field, most had the intellect of a turnip by the time they were 40. Now, I am all for medical marijuana, especially for cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy - for them it's a wonder drug. 

I can get all the highs I need playing music. 

Gary


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

troy2000 said:


> May I piggyback on your post to clarify one of my earlier ones? When I compared my two brothers (one a drunk and one a stoner), I didn't mean to imply there are no negative consequences to being a stoner. I just think the downside to being a drunk is usually worse...


A drunk guy will blow through the stop sign. A stoned guy will just sit there and wait for it it turn green.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

Up


Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> In any serious technical trade it is a serious problem, especially since the THC remains in the bloodstream for such a long period of time. Get hurt on the job and return a positive on your pot blood test and you just kissed your workman's comp payments goodbye.


Keep in mind, some of us live in places (Canada) where random workplace drug and alcohol testing isn't really a thing. Even when they do test (say after a serious workplace accident) they can only really screen for impairment, how you spend your week ends isn't your employers business.

I've worked in technical trades my whole life, but I have never been the target of random drug and alcohol testing.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

Alcohol and various pharmaceuticals do far more damage to society than all the illicit drugs put together. If people were serious about not wanting drugs then booze would be banned.

… oh wait, we tried that. Worked out as well as the prohibition against marijuana.


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## midwesterner (Dec 14, 2015)

travlin-easy said:


> I saw hundreds of stoners when I worked in the medical field, most had the intellect of a turnip by the time they were 40. Now, I am all for medical marijuana, especially for cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy - for them it's a wonder drug.
> 
> I can get all the highs I need playing music.
> 
> Gary


We started talking about two different things on here. There are addictions to any of these substances and then there are people who are able to keep it to casual recreational use. These two things are very different.

There are people who become addicted to gambling and end up losing their home because of it. There are alcoholics who must drink every day to keep themselves pickled. There are people who are habituated to marijuana and smoke it all day long to keep their high.

These people are addicted and are using to the point that it negatively affects their life. This is different from the casual user who drinks a few beers or the pot smoker who smokes some weed on their day off to watch scary movies.

There will always be some people who become addicted to things that are pleasurable and it is a problem that has to be addressed in our society. As someone pointed out above, in the US we once had a well organized group of people who pushed through a law prohibiting all alcohol use because of the few who had their lives ruined by it. It didn't work out well for us.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Would note back in the 80s a reknown geneticist wrote an opinion on the last page of scientific american. Her premise was medical advances had caused a disconnect between the biologic quotient and behavior which would lead to untoward social impacts. Darwin said any behavior or physiologic trait that lead to a decreased probability that it would have viable offspring who would in turn be able to reproduce would over time drift out of the gene pool. Heavy drinkers have decreased fertility. In the past heavy drinkers die younger. However with better treatment of liver failure and marked improvement in trauma services this is mitigated. Her article didn’t speak to drinkers but rather obesity, intelligence, income and other factors. She noted the inverse relationship between wealth, general genetic factors leading to healthy living and number of offspring. In the past each was positively correlated with number of children living long enough to reproduce. A total flip in the late twentieth century. She was severely castigated and ridiculed. In short Darwin may not have been wrong.Rather society is bailing out the lower end of the gene pool if you accept her premise.
The big brother society has been a concern since Orwell. However the big mother society maybe a more pressing concern for sailors. Have had occasion to speak with European cruisers. The crap they deal with is several magnitudes higher the either Canadians or Americans.


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## travlin-easy (Dec 24, 2010)

I wonder how those that believe someone who is casual drug user and a wee bit stoned would be replacing a heart valve in YOUR HEART. "No big deal, today is Monday and he was blown away on Sunday night, so he/she should be just fine by now" NOT!

Good luck,

Gary


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## ScottUK (Aug 16, 2009)

outbound said:


> In short Darwin may not have been wrong.Rather society is bailing out the lower end of the gene pool if you accept her premise.


Or it could be the lower end of the gene pool helps with variability fitting nicely with Darwinian theory (law).


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

travlin-easy said:


> I wonder how those that believe someone who is casual drug user and a wee bit stoned would be replacing a heart valve in YOUR HEART. "No big deal, today is Monday and he was blown away on Sunday night, so he/she should be just fine by now" NOT!


Why does this apply to one drug but not another? Doctors, amongst other professionals, can be subject to hangovers following a night of drinking. They can be influenced by other drugs as well.

When I was a kid, my parents had a good friend who was an on call surgeon and fell asleep on the way to a call in the middle of the night on his Honda Gold Wing, nearly died when his bike went off the road and hit a tree. I would think he might have been a little tired for operating?


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Gary served as chairman of the credentials committee at regional hospital. Have run across this exact issue too many times to count. It would be a one and done locally. All staff and even patients or their families can serve as reporting sources. Fear of tort, loss of license, criminal not just civil action restricts this occurance. The problem is not so much operating privileges but rather working with statewide “impaired physician” committees to achieve monitoring and services that both protect physician “rights” and patient safety. Always a trying circumstance but as time goes by fortunately recurring incidents are less likely to occur.
Big issue with cannabinol is its fat soluble. So monitoring and distinguishing between acute intoxication and intermittent occasion use will be problematic not only in the medical setting but also for law enforcement.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

outbound said:


> Gary served as chairman of the credentials committee at regional hospital. Have run across this exact issue too many times to count. It would be a one and done locally. All staff and even patients or their families can serve as reporting sources. Fear of tort, loss of license, criminal not just civil action restricts this occurance. The problem is not so much operating privileges but rather working with statewide "impaired physician" committees to achieve monitoring and services that both protect physician "rights" and patient safety. Always a trying circumstance but as time goes by fortunately recurring incidents are less likely to occur.
> Big issue with cannabinol is its fat soluble. So monitoring and distinguishing between acute intoxication and intermittent occasion use will be problematic not only in the medical setting but also for law enforcement.


And these committees measure sleep deprivation/impairment how?


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## nautidawg (Oct 1, 2017)

Sounds odd. I remember back in the 80's in FLA a friend getting pulled over from riding his bicycle under the influence. He got a citation...how is that different than a kayak?


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Ran a sleep lab for awhile. One can easily measure wakefulness/sleepiness. Commonly measure sleep latency in the lab to rule out narcolepsy. Given 5 or 6 nap opportunities. Measure sleep latency and judge presence of early onset REM. Compare to normative values. 
However you’re entirely right in the hospital or day surgery setting near impossible. However most ORs and surgeons are observed. In my experience the RNs and anesethiologists are the usual break on this behavior. Gas passers because they are at risk with an adverse outcome. OR nurses because of training and hospital policy. Have encountered events leading to referral to impaired physician or medical Dx. (OSA, hypothyroidism etc.). OR privileges were restricted until issue resolved.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

Right, so maybe this isn't the best comparison, but it's not the worst either.

Doctors sleep patterns are not tested in a clinical environment. The doctor has a responsibility to manage his own sleep (as no doubt his boss likely has some resonsibility as well).

This is similar to the shipping industry in Canada. There is no mandatory or periodic drug testing without cause. Unless there's a mistake made, at which time a drug test may be administered to determine if drugs may have been a contributing factor, and possibly to lay charges.

The threshold for marijuana impairment is being defined in Canadian law (I'm not sure how) and to be charged, you need to meet that threshold. A little bit of thc stored somewhere in the blood isn't relevant if it doesn't meet that threshold, except possibly as a finding to potential contributing factors.


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## chef2sail (Nov 27, 2007)

In order to tolerate and understand this thread I need a big hit from a bong followed by a nice glass of Pinot Noir. 

Seriously guys you throw around statements and “facts” like the news media does today. 

People have the right to do what they want in their own house/ domain. That changes when around others.


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## twoshoes (Aug 19, 2010)

outbound said:


> Would note back in the 80s a reknown geneticist wrote an opinion on the last page of scientific american. Her premise was medical advances had caused a disconnect between the biologic quotient and behavior which would lead to untoward social impacts. Darwin said any behavior or physiologic trait that lead to a decreased probability that it would have viable offspring who would in turn be able to reproduce would over time drift out of the gene pool. Heavy drinkers have decreased fertility. In the past heavy drinkers die younger. However with better treatment of liver failure and marked improvement in trauma services this is mitigated. Her article didn't speak to drinkers but rather obesity, intelligence, income and other factors. She noted the inverse relationship between wealth, general genetic factors leading to healthy living and number of offspring. In the past each was positively correlated with number of children living long enough to reproduce. A total flip in the late twentieth century. She was severely castigated and ridiculed. In short Darwin may not have been wrong.Rather society is bailing out the lower end of the gene pool if you accept her premise.
> The big brother society has been a concern since Orwell. However the big mother society maybe a more pressing concern for sailors. Have had occasion to speak with European cruisers. The crap they deal with is several magnitudes higher the either Canadians or Americans.


Your post reminds me of the opening scene of one of my favorite bad movies. (language warning):


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## longjonsilver (Oct 18, 2014)

Arcb said:


> Same thing if somebody wants to smoke a left handed cigarette.


Never heard them called that. Waiting for them left handed ciggys to be sold here in La Belle Province :grin
jon


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

travlin-easy said:


> I saw hundreds of stoners when I worked in the medical field, most had the intellect of a turnip by the time they were 40. Now, I am all for medical marijuana, especially for cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy - for them it's a wonder drug.
> 
> I can get all the highs I need playing music.
> 
> Gary


I'm willing to bet those 'hundreds of stoners' you're talking about were really hardcore druggies who used anything and everything they got their hands on, starting with booze and pot and working their way down the line.

Trying to blame it all on the pot is just bogus.... I'm 68 years old, I've been around pot smokers my entire adult life, I smoked it myself up into my middle forties, and I've never known anyone who fried his mind just smoking pot. Such ridiculously exaggerated claims destroy the credibility of anti-drug messages, and encourage people to ignore legitimate data and honest warnings.

Going by my personal experience, I'd say pot smoking's biggest downside is that it can inhibit initiative, and can encourage paranoia. I'm not saying it inevitably will, but it can. But that hardly makes it the brain cell killer you're trying to paint it as...

To me, the biggest red flag I've seen on pot was a study in which pilots made landings on a flight simulator, first while sober and then while stoned. Not surprisingly, they tended to drift off center a lot more when they were stoned. The alarming thing was that 24 hours later, when they showed no symptoms at all of being high, their performance was still noticeably worse than it had been before they smoked the pot.

That's something to think about: if you're planning a cross-country drive, you might not want to celebrate your departure by getting high with your friends the night before.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Rocky Mountain Breeze;2051232713[quote said:


> Just out of curiosity, how many of you who embrace pot smoking believe those who smoke tobacco cigarettes are pariahs? Can you explain how pot smoking carries fewer health hazards than tobacco?


Apples and oranges; I've never known anyone who smoked a pack of joints a day. Which might explain why I've never seen a study strongly linking pot smoking and lung cancer...


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

outbound said:


> Would note back in the 80s a reknown geneticist wrote an opinion on the last page of scientific american. Her premise was medical advances had caused a disconnect between the biologic quotient and behavior which would lead to untoward social impacts. Darwin said any behavior or physiologic trait that lead to a decreased probability that it would have viable offspring who would in turn be able to reproduce would over time drift out of the gene pool. Heavy drinkers have decreased fertility. In the past heavy drinkers die younger. However with better treatment of liver failure and marked improvement in trauma services this is mitigated. Her article didn't speak to drinkers but rather obesity, intelligence, income and other factors. She noted the inverse relationship between wealth, general genetic factors leading to healthy living and number of offspring. In the past each was positively correlated with number of children living long enough to reproduce. A total flip in the late twentieth century. She was severely castigated and ridiculed. In short Darwin may not have been wrong.Rather society is bailing out the lower end of the gene pool if you accept her premise.
> The big brother society has been a concern since Orwell. However the big mother society maybe a more pressing concern for sailors. Have had occasion to speak with European cruisers. The crap they deal with is several magnitudes higher the either Canadians or Americans.


I don't buy most of that. In the first place, whether something's a positive or negative survival trait is highly variable, hard to prove, and subject to the attitudes and beliefs of researchers and the public in general.

A simple example: alcohol use. We're all aware of the potential negatives of alcohol abuse, so you'd think that the urge to drink would've been bred out of us a long, long time ago. Why hasn't it been? Maybe because there are unexplained benefits to drinking alcohol that in the long run outweigh the results of abusing it. Maybe because the attraction to alcohol isn't a simple on/off switch, but the result of complex interactions between genetics, culture and environment. Or maybe it's just random...


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

travlin-easy said:


> I wonder how those that believe someone who is casual drug user and a wee bit stoned would be replacing a heart valve in YOUR HEART. "No big deal, today is Monday and he was blown away on Sunday night, so he/she should be just fine by now" NOT!
> 
> Good luck,
> 
> Gary


I wonder how those that believe someone who is casual drinker and a wee bit tipsy would be replacing a heart valve in YOUR HEART. "No big deal, today is Monday and he was dead drunk on Sunday night, so he/she should be just fine by now"


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

nautidawg said:


> Sounds odd. I remember back in the 80's in FLA a friend getting pulled over from riding his bicycle under the influence. He got a citation...how is that different than a kayak?


One difference between him and a kayaker in Canada is that Florida couldn't yank his driver's license for bicycling under the influence.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

chef2sail said:


> In order to tolerate and understand this thread I need a big hit from a bong followed by a nice glass of Pinot Noir.
> 
> Seriously guys you throw around statements and "facts" like the news media does today.
> 
> People have the right to do what they want in their own house/ domain. That changes when around others.


And when what they want to do in their own house/domain affects what they're doing later, when around others?

As usual, the Devil is in the details.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Troy totally agree correlation does not prove causation. However there is much epidemiological evidence of an inverse relationship between intelligence and birthrate in the studies I recall her citing. This was not true in the past. Much the same that handsome men and pretty women make more money hence should be able to support more kids and be less likely to be without sexual partners. However you still see a host of ugly people. Please note I didn’t say I agree with her. Rather just wanted to use the reference to refute the statement that Darwin was wrong.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

I love how these threads meander &#8230; really.

Medical professionals, and physicians in particular, are well known to have a higher level of drug addition than most. It's a well-studied area. This recent Medscape article sums it up nicely:

Drug Abuse Among Doctors: Easy, Tempting, and Not Uncommon

As for the whole Darwinian drift, I'm not sure I want to touch it. Gets too close to eugenics.

One thing I will point out regarding the use of drugs; humans are not unique in this regard. Many mammals, including other primates, seek out drugs to get a high. It is as natural as sex or eating.

This is why it is pure foley for our societies to try and stamp out drug use. Might as well try and stamp out getting laid.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

outbound said:


> Troy totally agree correlation does not prove causation. However there is much epidemiological evidence of an inverse relationship between intelligence and birthrate in the studies I recall her citing. This was not true in the past. Much the same that handsome men and pretty women make more money hence should be able to support more kids and be less likely to be without sexual partners. However you still see a host of ugly people. Please note I didn't say I agree with her. Rather just wanted to use the reference to refute the statement that Darwin was wrong.


IQ tests are so new (relatively speaking) that I don't think they can be used to compare today with what mankind has done, or not done, 'in the past.' And there's also a chance that survival rates among the educated elite and survival rates among the unwashed masses may involve different traits. 

Such tests are also subjective, and in my opinion heavily weighted towards verbal and reading skills. After all, if you don't understand a question you can't answer it, right? And the faster you can read and understand it, the more time you can spend thinking about your answer.

Prime example: when I was in my teens, I scored 148 on two standard IQ tests. Am I really that smart? C'mon... I like to think I'm smarter than the average bear (to quote Yogi), but there's no way in H*** I'm a near genius. 

So where did those scores come from? When I was growing up, my father had an entire living room wall of books. He sat me on his lap and taught me to read using comic books when I was four and five; we lived in the country with few neighbor kids to socialize with and no TV; and I became an inveterate bookworm. I firmly believe those tests were mostly just measuring my test-taking skills - being able to read quickly and accurately, and being able to take a deep breath and perform under pressure. Neither skill is intrinsic proof of intelligence.


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## Rocky Mountain Breeze (Mar 30, 2015)

It is pretty obvious that you are smarter than everyone else here Troy. You should not poo-poo the test results, but instead allow them to dictate your attitude for dealing with your inferiors......


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> It is pretty obvious that you are smarter than everyone else here Troy. You should not poo-poo the test results, but instead allow them to dictate your attitude for dealing with your inferiors......


Maybe you should consider working on your attitude, Rocky. I at least make an effort not to be personally insulting in my posts, even though I sometimes fall short.


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## boatpoker (Jul 21, 2008)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> It is pretty obvious that you are smarter than everyone else here Troy. You should not poo-poo the test results, but instead allow them to dictate your attitude for dealing with your inferiors......


Think he pretty well has that mastered


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## jephotog (Feb 25, 2002)

nautidawg said:


> Sounds odd. I remember back in the 80's in FLA a friend getting pulled over from riding his bicycle under the influence. He got a citation...how is that different than a kayak?


I live in a state Wyoming where up till 2007 you could drive while drinking a beer. You could not be drunk but you could but you could ask the police officer to hold your beer while you found your license and registration.

My experience is Canada takes it's DUI laws very seriously, it's marijuana laws not so much. When in Nanaimo this summer my wife wanted to check out the marijuana dispensary there for academic research only. We both walked in even though it was a private club. The patrons were sitting at tables smoking openly. The "pharmacist" was packing some electronic smoking thing for the patients to sample the different offerings. This dispensary was next to the courthouse and was surrounded by law offices on all sides.

I think BAC rules should be eased based on the risk of injuring another person. As a pilot you can't legally fly if you have had a drink for 8 hours or have a BAC of .04.

My proposal is the following DUI levels

pilots .04
Drivers .08
kayakers/cyclists .12
Pedestrians: don't create a scenes, start fights or pee in public.


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## jephotog (Feb 25, 2002)

outbound said:


> Troy totally agree correlation does not prove causation. However there is much epidemiological evidence of an inverse relationship between intelligence and birthrate in the studies I recall her citing. This was not true in the past. Much the same that handsome men and pretty women make more money hence should be able to support more kids and be less likely to be without sexual partners.


I would say the lack of offsprings by intelligent people is a sign of evolution. In the past you had many kids to ensure someone work the field and support you in old age. Today raising children and sending them to college is expensive and will make it less likely you get to retire early and go sailing.



MikeOReilly said:


> Medical professionals, and physicians in particular, are well known to have a higher level of drug addition than most. It's a well-studied area. This recent Medscape article sums it up nicely:
> 
> Drug Abuse Among Doctors: Easy, Tempting, and Not Uncommon


I would like to see this same drug and alcohol correlation compared to other high stress, long hour, high paid professions like attorneys, athletes, and movie stars. Doctors can just write their own scripts.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

J- actually not. No pharmacy will honor a ‘script a doc writes for him/herself for any scheduled med. In past diversion out of hospital med cabinets, ORs, surgicenters and the like was the big issue. Now that dispensaries, med cabinets, and trays are computerized this is much less likely but continues to occur. Issue remains docs tend to smarter then the average bear so continue to be able to game the system.
T-Regardless of environment there is evidence of some degree of genetic loading for intelligence. Smart people tend to have smart kids. Smart people are more likely to have kids( cohabitate or marry) by other smart people. Intelligence is multifactorial. Both polygenetically driven as well as both influenced by intrauterine and postpartum environment. So yes I agree many measures of intelligence are task specific but disagree that this changes the fundamentals of this argument. 
Pot is a difficult subject. We know alcohol remains responsible for more deaths than opiates and have yet to have evidence of increased mortality directly ascribable to pot. We also know judging intoxication is difficult as there a difficulties with available field tests. No breathalyzer. For present would take a libertarian view of this and non mechanically powered vessels. Do what you want but if you hurt/kill or damage property of another person the law will fall on you like a ton of bricks.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Troy going to try this another way. My antecedents were serfs scattered throughout Europe. Their was no survival benefit to their being able to quote Spinoza or have an understanding of string theory. However having the intelligence to survive long enough to reproduce resulted in me. Now there is a disconnect between that and biological quotient. Similarly Horatio Alger stories abounded in our society. Now vertical movement is increasingly difficult and the society continues to stratify at a accelerated rate. Furthermore people increasingly live in their own bubble. Living with, talking to, listening to and having sex with those of similar thinking and attributes. This increases stratification. 
In the past the canoeist who had a few beers and lowered his BP as he contemplated the glory of nature lived longer, was more effective in his day to day and had more kids that survived. Now the drunk is less likely to die than he was in the past from his own stupidity and more likely to have more kids by more partners. Due to societal and medical support systems the kids are more likely to survive to point of reproduction. That was the point of the SA article. I don’t like where this thinking is going. The possibility of using it to justify social Darwinism is repugnant to me. I’d rather there be stronger incentives for people to have to deal with the consequences of their actions rather than have society at large continue to bail them out. Canada’s mommy state is not where I would choose to live. The idea you can’t have a beer while fishing or drifting in your canoe is just silly.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

jephotog said:


> ...I would like to see this same drug and alcohol correlation compared to other high stress, long hour, high paid professions like attorneys, athletes, and movie stars. Doctors can just write their own scripts.


Yes, that's the general findings. Docs tend to be in high-stress professions. This makes them as susceptible as any other similar person to develop a drug dependancy. The difference is the access. Docs (and nurses, and other health professionals) have easier access to narcotics.

&#8230; not really very surprising.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

outbound said:


> Troy going to try this another way. My antecedents were serfs scattered throughout Europe. Their was no survival benefit to their being able to quote Spinoza or have an understanding of string theory. However having the intelligence to survive long enough to reproduce resulted in me. Now there is a disconnect between that and biological quotient. Similarly Horatio Alger stories abounded in our society. Now vertical movement is increasingly difficult and the society continues to stratify at a accelerated rate. Furthermore people increasingly live in their own bubble. Living with, talking to, listening to and having sex with those of similar thinking and attributes. This increases stratification.
> In the past the canoeist who had a few beers and lowered his BP as he contemplated the glory of nature lived longer, was more effective in his day to day and had more kids that survived. Now the drunk is less likely to die than he was in the past from his own stupidity and more likely to have more kids by more partners. Due to societal and medical support systems the kids are more likely to survive to point of reproduction. That was the point of the SA article. I don't like where this thinking is going. The possibility of using it to justify social Darwinism is repugnant to me. I'd rather there be stronger incentives for people to have to deal with the consequences of their actions rather than have society at large continue to bail them out. Canada's mommy state is not where I would choose to live. The idea you can't have a beer while fishing or drifting in your canoe is just silly.


OB, I would challenge many of the assumptions and assertions in your statement. First off, while it's true some parts of the world are becoming more insular ("live in their own bubble") it's also true global populations have never been more integrated. A couple generations ago travel beyond a couple 100 km was rare and impressive. Today large percentages of the planet's human population routinely move around the globe (although most still stay put).

The measure of "intelligence" is a highly problematic task, and is biased towards the tester's social standards. Being able to understand string theory is as much (or more) of an educational accomplishment as it is an evolutionary adaption. Almost anyone can learn anything given sufficient resources. Intelligence as a measure of how well adapted a human critter is to his/her surroundings makes the most sense (to me) as a way to measure intelligence. In that regard, the drunk canoeist might be perfectly adapted to his environment.

BTW, there is evidence that shows our brains are actually getting smaller compared to **** sapient hunter-gatherer populations of the pre-agricultural revolutions (~10,000 years ago). Neanderthal brains were quite a bit larger. By this measure, we're all getting dumber &#8230;. which seems to work for us right now


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## Waterrat (Sep 8, 2007)

One problem. Most religions need total suspension of reason, and critical thinking skills and are strongly encouraged to use the most ineffective birth control methods. Therefore we are breeding idiocy. 

For most drugs. 10% of users use 90% of product. Lets focus on the 10%. 

The old reefer madness is strong on this thread. 

I have both smoked pot and drank beer for many thousands of mile in canoes and Kayaks with zero negative incidences. I have saved many other sober and none sober individuals during those thousands of miles. Granted I don't like being drunk or blown out, Just enough to take the edge off. One to three beers and a few tokes. 

I have spent lots of time around drunks and stoners and drunks are way more scary then stoners. I would take a stoned surgeon over a drunk surgeon any day but off course I prefer sober. I know more pot smoking doctors, biologist, chemist, and engineers then none technical career smokers but that probably has more to do with who I know and hang out with.


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## hellosailor (Apr 11, 2006)

I think there's still confusion about pot these days, caused by the larger number of ex-smokers from the 60's and 70's who may have quit during the paraquat scares and not gone back. The weed today has been bread to be incredibly more potent and, while even the Jefferson Airplane complained about soaring pot prices, gone up an easy tenfold in price as well.

But there has also been a big push for "edibles" with the dispensary market. And unlike smoking, edibles can take some time to put the stuff in your bloodstream. So apparently new users (especially) are chowing down on the edibles, then stuffing down more because 'hey man I'm not stoned yet' and then getting rushed by, yes, literally a pot overdose. Something that was unknown and inconceivable back in the day. 

Kinda like putting down a quart of whiskey all in one chug: All of a sudden, alcohol poisoning instead of a hangover.

The "pot lobby" that is used to the concept of "So what? You get stoned, you fall out, how can that hurt anyone?" literally has no idea of what "edibles" have brought to the table.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

Overdose on weed. Otherwise known as consuming a bunch of samosas, goat cheese and Perrier then taking a nap.


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## RichF28 (Jun 17, 2015)

hellosailor said:


> The weed today has been bread to be incredibly more potent and, while even the Jefferson Airplane complained about soaring pot prices, gone up an easy tenfold in price as well.


That just means that responsible people just smoke much less of it to get the same effect. Much healthier too. There will always be knuckleheads that over indulge. Over indulge in alcohol, fall down or get violent, over indulge in pot, curl up and sleep it off. There is really no contest which is generally less harmful at this point.....


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Mike we’re more in agreement and it seems I expressed myself poorly.
Brain volume correlates poorly with any measure of intelligence as does the rough measure used by pediatricians that being head circumference. Exception is once either higher or lower than normative values risk of poor intelligence increases. A better measure is to integrate body volume, muscle mass, sensory systems when looking at brain volume. Crows are quite smart. Ostriches not so much. Ostriches have bigger brains. Pigs surprisingly are quite clever. Cows not so much. Cows have bigger brains. Measures of associative cortex volumes or measures of dentritic field density in non eloquent brain areas are better measures. 
You’re further right as regards travel. However there is a marked difference in how people travel. You can go just about go anywhere in the world and not be there. You can choose to never leave the American experience. Eat your Micky D’s, speak English and only see what the cruise ship director or travel guide exposes you to. You can even travel your own country and choose to not leave your own strata.
Took my kids to Disney with my first wife ( been with second for 20+ years now). She did research at a Harvard teaching hospital. All her life only interacted with people with initials after their name. Bus we were to take broke down. Driver emptied bus and flipped engine access open. While he was working walked up and chatted him up. He was from the panhandle where they think teeth are a precancerous lesions so most of his were gone although he was around 30. At the time I had a one off used for a OSTARI got at a good price and converted to a cruiser.But it had a Lehmann diesel that was funky. He was the nicest guy and incredibly knowledgeable about diesels. I learn so much about troubleshooting diesels from that brief encounter. Afterward my wife gave me a ration of poop. Angry I talked to him. Angry I showed him respect for his knowledge and skill. Angry my kids met him and enjoyed this presumed “cracker “. In short she was in sanitized Disney and wanted to stay there. I was in Florida. My chat with him was the best part of the trip. We exchanged phone numbers. I called him time to time and stayed in touch. He was into bass fishing. About 10 years later he came to Boston. I got to spend an afternoon with him surf casting off Duxbury beach. He loved it. Even caught a keeper.


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## Rocky Mountain Breeze (Mar 30, 2015)

I guess you geniuses will explain to me the number of "self inflicted deaths" involving people who have come to Colorado to sample the "harmless" marijuana brownies and other edible treats that the press is reluctant to report. As I originally stated, tell me the positive benefits of pot smoking. Two wrongs don't make a right so don't tell me that it is less harmful than alcohol as a benefit. Despite Troy's high IQ test results the fact that people who smoke pot hold the unfiltered smoke in their lungs far longer than anyone who smokes filtered tobacco cigarettes probably does not impact the impact of smoking fewer joints than cigarettes. If you really are concerned about the health affects of smoke in the lungs you would naturally be against any smoke in the lungs...... Go head Troy, try to insult me more. I enjoy it.......


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> I guess you geniuses will explain to me the number of "self inflicted deaths" involving people who have come to Colorado to sample the "harmless" marijuana brownies and other edible treats that the press is reluctant to report.


Don't help the evil mainstream media keep secrets; go ahead and give us actual facts and figures on deaths from marijuana edibles.


> As I originally stated, tell me the positive benefits of pot smoking.


*Recreational benefits:* It helps people unwind and relax. It enhances their enjoyment of everything from sunsets and food to music and sex. Despite what puritanical fundamentalists from Mecca to the Deep South would have us believe, something that makes people feel good isn't automatically sinful and bad for them.

*Medical benefits:* It lowers eye pressure in glaucoma patients; helps control epileptic seizures; decreases symptoms of Dravet's Syndrome; suppresses nausea and anxiety caused by chemotherapy; eases pain from multiple sclerosis and arthritis, reduces tremors from Parkinson's disease... I could keep going, but I think I've made my point.


> Two wrongs don't make a right so don't tell me that it is less harmful than alcohol as a benefit.


WTF does comparing the ill effects of marijuana to the ill effects of alcohol have to do with 'two wrongs making a right'? And how did you twist 'not being as harmful' into 'being a benefit'?


> Despite Troy's high IQ test results the fact that people who smoke pot hold the unfiltered smoke in their lungs far longer than anyone who smokes filtered tobacco cigarettes probably does not impact the impact of smoking fewer joints than cigarettes. If you really are concerned about the health affects of smoke in the lungs you would naturally be against any smoke in the lungs


That's your argument? "_Probably_"? 

Here's a little factoid for you, Rocky.


> According to a study published in Journal of the American Medical Association in January 2012, marijuana does not impair lung function and can even increase lung capacity.
> 
> Researchers looking for risk factors of heart disease tested the lung function of 5,115 young adults over the course of 20 years. *Tobacco smokers lost lung function over time, but pot users actually showed an increase in lung capacity.*
> 
> ...





> ...... Go head Troy, try to insult me more. I enjoy it.......


I haven't been insulting you, Rocky; I've been disagreeing with you. There's a difference.

If I decide to start insulting you instead, you'll have no trouble telling the difference.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

outbound said:


> Took my kids to Disney with my first wife ( been with second for 20+ years now). She did research at a Harvard teaching hospital. All her life only interacted with people with initials after their name. Bus we were to take broke down. Driver emptied bus and flipped engine access open. While he was working walked up and chatted him up. He was from the panhandle where they think teeth are a precancerous lesions so most of his were gone although he was around 30. At the time I had a one off used for a OSTARI got at a good price and converted to a cruiser.Buho got t it had a Lehmann diesel that was funky. He was the nicest guy and incredibly knowledgeable about diesels. I learn so much about troubleshooting diesels from that brief encounter. Afterward my wife gave me a ration of poop. Angry I talked to him. Angry I showed him respect for his knowledge and skill. Angry my kids met him and enjoyed this presumed "cracker ". In short she was in sanitized Disney and wanted to stay there.


I can understand why she's an ex...

One of my girlfriends and I started drifting apart after she sneered at one of my friends for being a gas station attendant/mechanic (back in the days before self-serve). I tried to explain to her that he fulfilled a necessary function, and therefore deserved respect and even gratitude. She didn't even try to wrap her head around the concept; she was just appalled that I would use the word 'respect' regarding someone who got his hands dirty at work.

Good thing she was gone before I went into construction...


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

outbound said:


> Mike we're more in agreement and it seems I expressed myself poorly.
> Brain volume correlates poorly with any measure of intelligence as does the rough measure used by pediatricians that being head circumference. Exception is once either higher or lower than normative values risk of poor intelligence increases. A better measure is to integrate body volume, muscle mass, sensory systems when looking at brain volume. Crows are quite smart. Ostriches not so much. Ostriches have bigger brains. Pigs surprisingly are quite clever. Cows not so much. Cows have bigger brains. Measures of associative cortex volumes or measures of dentritic field density in non eloquent brain areas are better measures.


All true OB, and I certainly don't want to be the one suggesting brain size equates to intelligence. There be a mine-field none of us should want to go. My comment about shrinking brain size in modern **** sapiens compared to our hunter-gatherer ancestors seems to indicate natural selection may, by some measure, be making us dumber.

This is not my thesis (I'm not qualified to makes such a thing), but some researchers are suggesting this has to do with the increased benefits of human (brain) specialization in our current agricultural mass-civilization phase. We increasingly only need to know a few things to live (and procreate) very well. This is as opposed to our hunter-gatherer phase (which is the vast, vast majority of our evolutionary time) where we had to know everything to survive.

It's an intriguing hypothesis. What does seem clear is our brain masses are smaller today than pre-agricultural revolution.



outbound said:


> You're further right as regards travel. However there is a marked difference in how people travel. You can go just about go anywhere in the world and not be there. You can choose to never leave the American experience. Eat your Micky D's, speak English and only see what the cruise ship director or travel guide exposes you to. You can even travel your own country and choose to not leave your own strata.


Yes, but what you describe ("vacationing") is only one aspect of the global movement of human populations, and most likely the least significant. People move for jobs, for better lives, they are able to flee conflicts and environmental disasters. By any measure we are now far more mobile and far more integrated as a species than ever in our history (except perhaps that DNA bottleneck where almost all of us died for some reason&#8230.

As for your ex&#8230; I'm so glad she is (your ex). Love is blind, but I too would have a hard time not seeing someone display that kind of attitude towards others.

Back on the farm&#8230; I don't think anyone is arguing pot smoking is "good" for you; although there are clearly a lot of benefits to intoxicants of all sorts. Seeking to be buzzed is as natural as being gay or liking country music (although not all of us are or do). Many species, including **** sapiens, use drugs to achieve altered states. It seems to conveys some evolutionary benefit, otherwise as has been pointed out, it would likely have disappeared from the gene pool a long time ago.

Trying to use laws or force to control what's _bread in the bone_ is usually a fruitless and wasteful exercise. This is why the prohibition against drug use is stupid. Doesn't mean there will be no negatives. Life is never black and white.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

Interesting to see what happens now that crispr technology allows us to play god.


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## Minnesail (Feb 19, 2013)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> I guess you geniuses will explain to me the number of "self inflicted deaths" involving people who have come to Colorado to sample the "harmless" marijuana brownies and other edible treats that the press is reluctant to report.


Do you have any links to this epidemic? That's exactly the sort of lurid story that brings in viewers and readers, I don't see why any media outlet would be reluctant to report it. "Reefer madness!"

I think that, much like the prohibition of alcohol, the prohibition of marijuana does more harm than good.

Prohibition is a boon to organized crime, it's costs a fortune for us to enforce, it costs a fortune for us to imprison people, it tears families apart when someone is imprisoned, it hurts future job prospects if a person has an arrest record, and it's a fortune in lost tax revenue.

This was all true of the prohibition of alcohol, it's all true of the prohibition of marijuana.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Minnesail said:


> Do you have any links to this epidemic? That's exactly the sort of lurid story that brings in viewers and readers, I don't see why any media outlet would be reluctant to report it. "Reefer madness!"
> 
> I think that, much like the prohibition of alcohol, the prohibition of marijuana does more harm than good.
> 
> ...


My wife and I were foster parents for years, and usually had four girls at a time in the house. Most of them were taken from their homes due to drug offenses by their parents, had been bounced through multiple group and foster homes, and were in pretty rough shape by the time they came to us. It's my firm opinion that as a general rule, yanking kids away from their families does them more damage than leaving them with their druggie parents.

A note for those of you who want to indignantly recite anecdotal horror stories: I said, "as a general rule."


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

Arcb said:


> And these committees measure sleep deprivation/impairment how?


In law enforcement impairment is measured somewhat with the Standardized Field Sobriety Test. It's validity is supported my research done by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. They are usually preceded by divided attention tests, which require operators to concentrate on more than one task: such as producing license and registration. A skill needed to safely operate a motor vehicle: looking both ways as you pull into trafffic.

So called drug recognition experts also use the field tests to determine if someone is impaired by drugs. Basically, the DRE's determine whether the person is impaired, and only then do they try to determine what drug category is causing the impairment. And part of this process is to eliminate the possibility that the person is impaired by alcohol.

I don't think it would be difficult in a controlled study to correlate sleep deprivation with impairment. Determine a baseline for how an individual performs the test with adequate sleep, then test the subject as you deprive him or her of sleep.


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## Arcb (Aug 13, 2016)

I agree with you Slayer, a determined post incident investigator can figure out quite a bit, when he has cause for suspicion.

My comment was in response to the suggestion that cannabis impairment might be too difficult to detect. 

If there is no incident or suspicion of wrong doing, there is no reason to investigate.

I think it would be easier, probably much easier to build a coherent case based on cannabis impairment than sleep impairment, and yet nobody is telling kayakers or their cardiac surgeon counterparts they can't stay up late at night


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## Slayer (Jul 28, 2006)

Arcb very recently in my state: Mass. SJC: Roadside Drunken Driving Tests Not Valid for Marijuana - NECN. But this just relates to admissibility in court.


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## Rocky Mountain Breeze (Mar 30, 2015)

Troy: I guess the fact that the State Legislature passed laws last year to define the acceptable level of THC in baked goods isn't good enough for you to believe that Colorado has had multiple cases of people consuming baked goods containing pot and stepping from balconies that were not ground level. Whatever, I have little concern with what you believe or post.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> Troy: I guess the fact that the State Legislature passed laws last year to define the acceptable level of THC in baked goods isn't good enough for you to believe that Colorado has had multiple cases of people consuming baked goods containing pot and stepping from balconies that were not ground level. Whatever, I have little concern with what you believe or post.


You're right; it isn't good enough. I asked you to back up your claims with actual facts and figures on deaths from marijuana edibles, not a progress report on the legislature's new regulations.

But here's an article on what they passed last September, which I assume is what you're talking about.

http://www.westword.com/marijuana/o...ation-fight-back-against-pot-industry-9564376

Looks like mostly common-sense consumer protection and product labeling requirements to keep people from accidentally getting more stoned than they intended to, along with limiting how much a person can buy at one time to the equivalent of eighty doses. Since people are still allowed to buy enough brownies or candy at one time to get high 80 times over, it would seem the legislators weren't all that worried about an epidemic of 'self-inflicted deaths' from marijuana edibles...


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

There’s a huge literature documenting the surprising severity even mild sleep deprivation produces. Some states and countries already treat it legally in much the same manner as intoxication. This makes sense as the practical result is the same. Already there are rules for long haul drivers and OSA screening requirements for certifying physicians. Same holds true for commercial pilots. 
This thread has devolved into a Hobbes/Rousseau.
One side: this behavior produces this bad result. We will outlaw the behavior.
Other side: this behavior in moderation is enjoyable and enhances life. Only in excess produces bad results. We will outlaw the bad result.
Huxley(hallucinogens), deQuincey ( opiates),Hemingway (alcohol), Freud (cocaine), and so many others were functional addicts. One could argue they all were injured by their addictions. Still pragmatically given our limited resources and natural repugnance toward living in a police state seems using a mix of outlawing some behaviors and some outcomes is the desired course of action.

However in the states we are currently paralyzed by the lack of general understanding of civic principles and duty in one segment and a smarter than thou attitude devoid of basis in reality in another.

For awhile thought to get a PhD. Was in the lab of an individual who went on to Nobel. At the time his lab was working through brain dopamine chemistry. Appears different people are predisposed to addiction to different substances. Some due acetylation chemistry in their liver should just stay away from alcohol. Some from mu receptor chemistry should be careful with opiates. Some don’t get high from pot but dysphoric. Others find cocaine or amphetamines unpleasant. But most have that one substance which puts them at risk of addiction if exposed in the right background setting. Eating nothing but Big Macs and fries washed down with a coke is not an illness. But once youre morbidly obese, hypertensive and diabetic you’re sick. Should we outlaw sugary drinks and fast food?


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

outbound said:


> Interesting to see what happens now that crispr technology allows us to play god.


So true. We are into interesting times indeed. Technologies like CRISPR allow us to take the random mutation and long-duration limitations out of natural selection. In some sense, we are stepping outside of Nature and Darwinian evolution. Where this goes is anyone's guess.

In general, I suspect we're headed for disaster b/c humanity seems unable to accurately assess long-term consequences of the manipulations we bring to our biosphere. But genetic manipulation also holds untold promise of great and wonderful benefits. As with all new advances, it will be a double-edged sword of benefits and negatives.



Minnesail said:


> I think that, much like the prohibition of alcohol, the prohibition of marijuana does more harm than good.


This is the simple reality that prohibition proponents don't seem to get. Drug use clearly brings serious negative costs to individuals and society. But the damage caused by our attempts to keep it out (the so-called "war on drugs") is far, far worse.


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## MikeOReilly (Apr 12, 2010)

outbound said:


> ...Eating nothing but Big Macs and fries washed down with a coke is not an illness. But once youre morbidly obese, hypertensive and diabetic you're sick. Should we outlaw sugary drinks and fast food?


Agreed &#8230; if you are a proponent of outlawing all potentially harmful activities, then things such as skydiving, kayaking (drunk or not) or sailing a smallish boat offshore also should be banned. By "normal" standards, these activities look crazy and should be made illegal. It's a slippery slope that we should all be wary of if we value freedom.

I'm not an extremist in this regard. I think we should all have the right to do crazy things, as long as the harm mostly falls on the individual making the choice. I say "mostly" b/c it's nearly impossible to have society bear zero cost to individual actions. This is why some things can legitimately be criminalized, but I think this category should always be kept small, and constantly questioned.


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## hellosailor (Apr 11, 2006)

It has been said that the only thing Prohibition accomplished in the US was the beatification of Organized Crime.

And more recently, folks like the late Milton Friedman (Nobel Laureate in Economics, U of Chicago) had pointed out that EVERY Congressional or Presidential committee that had been appointed to look into "the drug problem" came to the same conclusion. If you legalized drugs, you could tax them and control them. If you didn't legalize them...you'd only make organized crime stronger.

If they'd only make beer cans larger (half gallon and up?) and rolling papers wider (two-handed splifs?) then folks might just not be able to get up and do damage, they could just pass out quietly in place.


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## Rocky Mountain Breeze (Mar 30, 2015)

Colorado is currently having a bit of a problem with the "control and tax" aspect. They have successfully taxed most of the legal outlets but the number of illegal growers and distributors are skyrocketing. The old methods of locating grow operations don't work anymore because of the proliferation of legal ones; there seems to be very little checking these days. We do a lot of work on environmental chambers for a company from Canada. They supply a lot of chambers for grow operations further north but not so much here due to the temperate climate. Medicinal uses aside, I still have yet to meet anyone who has excelled because they were a "recreational" pot smoker. 

As for the positives prohibition of alcohol: The Kennedy family fortune....


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## RegisteredUser (Aug 16, 2010)

Until the legal and illegal selling prices become even close to equal, this will always be. Natch...

Yeah, the Joe K family is fubared for generations beyond.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

Rocky Mountain Breeze said:


> Medicinal uses aside, I still have yet to meet anyone who has excelled because they were a "recreational" pot smoker.


That seems an odd thing to say. I've never met anyone who excelled because they were a recreational drinker, either.


> As for the positives prohibition of alcohol: The Kennedy family fortune....


I'm not sure the Kennedy family fortune qualifies as a 'positive' result of Prohibition...


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## hellosailor (Apr 11, 2006)

Rocky, if Colorado knew how to find grow operations in general, when they were all illegal, then it still knows how to find them all. And, it now could and should easily have a database of the legal ones. Subtract one list from the other, voila, you get a list of the illegal ones. Then you send people out on the ground to check it out.

It ain't rocket science. Maybe it is more complex for whatever reason, but whenever someone says "Oh, that can't be done, there's no way to do it" I've usually found that it means they just don't know how to do it. Remote sensing, monitoring of electric bills, databases, registrations...there's all kinds of magic that can be done. The same way that the IRS nailed Al Capone for income tax evasion. They do the same thing today to deli owners who think they can hide cash income: They'll send an IRS agent in every day for two weeks to buy "lunch for the office" and they'll literally count every napkin, pickle, slice of tin foil, slice of tomato, slice of meat, and they'll get the ratios of all of them. And no matter how clever the deli owner is, at least one of those suppliers isn't going to have matching receipts. Quite clever they can be. Or, as with some elected officials we know, quite the clueless buffoon.


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## troy2000 (Apr 7, 2013)

hellosailor said:


> Rocky, if Colorado knew how to find grow operations in general, when they were all illegal, then it still knows how to find them all. And, it now could and should easily have a database of the legal ones. Subtract one list from the other, voila, you get a list of the illegal ones. Then you send people out on the ground to check it out.
> 
> It ain't rocket science. Maybe it is more complex for whatever reason, but whenever someone says "Oh, that can't be done, there's no way to do it" I've usually found that it means they just don't know how to do it. Remote sensing, monitoring of electric bills, databases, registrations...there's all kinds of magic that can be done. The same way that the IRS nailed Al Capone for income tax evasion. They do the same thing today to deli owners who think they can hide cash income: They'll send an IRS agent in every day for two weeks to buy "lunch for the office" and they'll literally count every napkin, pickle, slice of tin foil, slice of tomato, slice of meat, and they'll get the ratios of all of them. And no matter how clever the deli owner is, at least one of those suppliers isn't going to have matching receipts. Quite clever they can be. Or, as with some elected officials we know, quite the clueless buffoon.


I think that more often than not when someone says, "that can't be done," they're really saying they're either too lazy to do it, or just don't want to.


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## Rocky Mountain Breeze (Mar 30, 2015)

I never said it couldn't be done, just that it isn't being done. I went sailing today before we get our blizzard on Monday. Perhaps you guys should go sailing.....


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