Medical marijuana according to a new, shows smoking pot to be much less harmful to users lungs than tobacco. Having studied 20 years worth of data from over 5,000 adults, significant lung damage in the tobacco smokers was commonplace.

 The more they had smoked, the worse their lung volumes were, yet people who had averaged only one joint a day passed lung function tests with flying colors, air flow rate actually going up slightly in marijuana users.

 Of course, the comparison could be different again if the user smoked ten joints a day, but  this study, published in the Journal of American Medical Association, and measuring air flow rates) in 18-30-year-old adults from Birmingham, Oakland, Chicago, and Minneapolis, showed clearly that occasional use of Marijuana was actually beneficial.

The findings do not point to health benefits from heavy marijuana use, stating that findings did actually suggest accelerated decline in pulmonary function with such use, proving that moderation in marijuana use is considered the best option.

There is one soda company in Colorado that have taken Marijuana use to another level by developing a line of sodas containing the drug and. available to anyone with a prescription for medical marijuana from Dixie Elixirs

Eight different flavors are offered, pink lemonade, root beer and grape among them, but as Marijuana is only legal to consume in 14 states with a prescription from a doctor, you have to live in one of them to get a taste of these concoctions, as well as being one of the estimated half-million people who is a medical marijuana patient.

Dixie Elixirs say they developed their line of mary-jane drinks was to remove the stigma associated with marijuana, and should voters in 
California decide to make recreational marijuana legal this November, these organic sodas might end up right next to the stuff from Pepsi and Coke in grocery and liquor stores. 

If you thought tobacco use was fairly recent, think again. Archaeologists have found the first physical evidence of tobacco use by the Mayans, through traces of nicotine in a vessel 1,300 years old, from around

700 A.D., and produced in Southern Campeche, Mexico, during the Classic Mayan period. Hieroglyphic texts on the two-and-a-half-inch wide and high clay vessel indicate it to be a house of tobacco as indicated by the inscription translations.

It was twenty years ago that the last such vessel – containing cacao was found –  though analysis proved that no nicotine by-products associated with smoking of tobacco were present, the tobacco in the container was probably not used for smoking, and was likely a powered product.

What the research did indicate was that this tobacco – known to the ancient Mayas but not modern man – was far stronger than any plant grown today and possibly strong enough to be hallucinogenic, so it seems probable that it was used by shamans for the practice of their religious beliefs.

Other uses could have involved mixing with lime, before being chewed, consumed as snuff or added to alcohol to make for stronger drinks, as well as the use of the powder as snake repellent and fly-killer. Tobacco has been around, it seems, for much longer than previously believed.

In a series of experiments, Schifferstein tested the effect of orangeessence (relaxing), peppermint (stimulating) and seawater(neutral) with more than 800 subjects. All smells made ​​the youngdance and have fun again, appreciate better the music, its own mood.

Please, do not continue reading if you are at all sensitive to crimes against animals and are under age. This is not a pretty subject.

In a typical Crush film, a woman, often wearing stiletto high heeled shoes, crushes various things such as dolls or food, and even stomps, kicks, or crushes animals to death. Typically the animals are insects and frogs, but more and more often they are cute and innocent kittens, rabbits, chicks, and so forth.

Photo Source http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Acrylic_Heels.jpg

As of the time of writing this, July 2009, there are no laws against the crushing to death of live invertebrates (animals without a back bone, such as insects, snails, etc.). It was only in 1999 that the United States criminalized creating or owning films showing killing of what we call higher lifeforms (those with backbones). Worse still in 2008 the law was challenged under the Freedom of Speech clause in the First Amendment to the US Constitution. Oral arguments in the case are likely to be heard later in the fall of 2009.

You can follow the story of The United States vs. Stevens here.

In the films the woman may start out by playing with the animal, only to turn and stomp on it.

Believe it or not, these films are seen as being sexual in nature, and are considered a turn-on for some individuals. The psychology of why some men, or even women, are attracted to this is perverse and not easily understood. Chances are if a person enjoys these fetishes they are not going to seek professional mental help to understand or deal with it.

Photo Source http://www.flickr.com/photos/samdogs/3360244613/

It has been suspected that the women in the films are often coerced or forced into it. In fact investigations have found this to be true when some rings of film production have been broken up. The women are often drug users, young girls, and those with nobody to care for them. Even if the woman was a willing participant, the animal clearly was not.

It is interesting to note that there is another level of films, known as “Snuff Films” in which people are the victims. To which I will add that many serial killers have stated that they began by torturing and killing “Free to good home” pets, then progressing to humans. Very likely crush films open the door to a mans desire to explore watching a human being the victim and will seek out snuff films to satisfy those urges.

Causes and Warning Signs

Parents should watch for warning signs in their children. As with serial killers who later killed other peoples pets, many also killed their own pets, often while living at home as children with their parents.

It is not uncommon for a parent to observe a child becoming interested with killing insects. Some times parents even encourage children to crush insects, rewarding them for stepping on a spider or ant that has entered their home. Clearly only a small portion of children grow up to have crush fetishes, but if there is nay chance that parenting can be a contributing factor, it should be addressed. A boy who spends too much time fascinating over watching an animal suffer might be one who should be quickly taught lessons of compassion.

Other concerns have been raised that the enjoyment of these films is linked to a mans desire to see a woman in the position of power over life, stealing it away from the innocent, preferring the death to be slow, torturous, and drawn out in the process, then continuing as if nothing unusual happened. Suspected causes of this are young boys watching their mothers squish bugs under foot then continuing on. This is almost the reverse of the above, the child is enthralled at how callous his mother is about killing the bug, a creature that perhaps the child had compassion for.

Either way, the end result is the same, animals are being killed for the sexual perversion of a few individuals, and it is wrong.

Links to Other Poorly Known Animal Cruelty Situations

The PMU Industry:  How some women are unknowingly contributing to the slaughter of thousands of foals.

Cruelty done to Shellfish

Cruelty in the Aquarium Industry