Frankie Wilde comments

@Antiquesaving….. Amphetamine was first synthesized by Lazar Edeleanu, a Romanian chemist in 1887 and which was taken by British and American soldiers in the form of Benzedrine. Methamphetamine was first made in Japan in 1893 and taken by the Japanese (Hiropon) and also by the Germans in the form of Pervitin. Those are facts not rumors.

Methamphetamine was invented by a Japanese scientist called Nagai Nagayoshi in 1893. It was given to the military to use during World War 2 and was available as an over-the-counter medicine called hiropon until 1951. There has always been a market for meth in Japan.

I read (and this may not be true) that when it was taken off the market the Yaks stole a whole warehouse full of it and started selling it on the black market. The government at the time did a deal with them and said you can keep the meth business but if you start bringing opiates into the country we will come after you and you will pay with your lives.

That seems to be how it is to this day in Japan with heroin hard to find while meth is widely available and one of the few illegal drugs in Japan that seems to be controlled by the Japanese mafia.

The average life expectancy in Singapore in 2023 (which has extremely harsh drug laws) was 82 years old.

The average life expectancy in Portugal in 2023 (where all illegal drugs have been decriminalized for personal use) was 82.65 years

Europeans used to execute women for being witches-turned out that was a bit silly. Executing drug smugglers? Would you execute the people who disregarded prohibition in America and smuggled/manufactured alcohol during those times?

@Japantime What are you talking about? I know a bar in Tokyo where the manager decided to remove the tops of the toilets because they were always covered in cocaine by the end of the night due to people snorting lines off the enamel while they had the privacy of their own cubicle-and that was 25 years ago!

@Pocket monster. That is the point. They couldn’t do anything to him before, especially if he was Japanese because it wasn’t a crime to use marijuana. It was a crime to possess it, transport it etc but it wasn’t a crime to have used it. It is now as of this week so your friend would be arrested and drug tested. THC is stored in the fat cells of human beings so is detectable for about a month after using it using standard drug testing the last time I checked. If your friend was a foreigner they could have refused him entry to Japan which is what happened to a friend of mine because they found a box which had traces of marijuana in it. Basically they could just smell it but if he was Japanese nothing would have happened to him. Now he could face prison time. Japanese embassies are putting up posters warning Japanese people not to break Japanese law and consume marijuana overseas. How this stands up in court remains to be seen but you will need a lot of money, a good lawyer and probably still spend a long time behind bars while you are waiting to go to trial. If you are a foreigner or Japanese and you consumed the marijuana in Japan you are going to prison. If you are a foreigner and you consumed the marijuana outside of Japan you might get off with a good lawyer. If you are Japanese you will probably end up in prison.

A 2019 survey found that 1.8 percent of people in Japan had used marijuana at least once in their lifetime, compared to 44.2 percent of Americans and 41.5 percent of Canadians, while a 2018 survey by the National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry  found that 1.4 percent of people in Japan aged 15 to 64 (or 1.33 million people) had used marijuana. The total value of the cannabis market in Japan was estimated at ¥24 billion (US$218.68 million) in 2023.

Read the numbers -1.33 million Japanese have tried marijuana according to official estimations. I have no idea if the real number is higher or lower but if we presume these numbers are correct. What percentage of the 1.33 million does the government think it can imprison? Even 1 percent? Many Japanese people love marijuana and use it regularly. If you think Japan is marijuana free then you don’t live here or you live a very isolated life. I was sitting 10 meters from the Koban a few weeks ago in Omotesando when two young Japanese guys sat down next to me and sparked up a joint. It is very common here, it is just that most people hide their use of it more than the two guys I just mentioned due to the severe penalties for possession that already existed before this new change in the law.

The Japanese government wants to prosecute Japanese people who use marijuana even if they use it outside of Japan in a country where it is legal. Guam for example is a popular Japanese holiday destination where it is legal to process up to 28 grams. Think about that for one minute. Imagine somebody visiting Japan from a country where alcohol is illegal and then they are imprisoned on their return because the authorities find evidence they had been drinking sake while in Japan. Well that is what a country looks like when you have no human rights. If you don’t have sovereignty over your own body and can’t choose what food you eat, what you drink, which medicines you take and which recreational drugs you use, even if you are outside of Japan (even if you don’t live in Japan but have a Japanese passport) then you don’t have any human rights. The ones you are told you have are just pretend. Marijuana products are becoming more and more common in many countries all over the world. Do you really believe someone should go to prison because they ate a marijuana pizza while they were on holiday in Thailand or drank a THC infused drink in America?

The article says he tried to grab at the officers. What does that mean? It doesn’t say hit. Perhaps he was trying to reach for a pencil or a pen from one of the policemen. Maybe he went to school with one of the police officers who used to beat him up at school because he was the school bully, or maybe the police officer had an affair with his wife. Maybe the police officer was trying to stick his hand up his bottom, looking for a hidden smartphone. Nobody knows what happened unless they were there, in that room or there is video footage of what happened.

The point is that restraining people is a Japanese police policy that results in unnecessary deaths.

And if you think I exaggerating,

https://japantoday.com/category/crime/man-arrested-for-hitting-wife-with-banana-peel-denies-it-can-be-called-domestic-abuse

Well let’s see. Never went to court, so never had a chance to prove his innocence. Could have been self-defense, you never know. He wasn’t in prison, he was in a police station. So innocent until proven guilty. As for tying up somebody who is already stressed, probably highly agitated and has high blood pressure (if that is indeed true) What do you think is going to happen to his blood pressure? You don’t need a medical degree to figure that out. So yes..they probably killed him. If he had been left alone in a cell to calm down he would probably still be alive. And remember, even if he was guilty of assault under Japanese law, husbands can be arrested for assault for throwing the newspaper at their wife (and vice versa) in this country. They don’t deserve to die in a police station.

@Ossan, That is one Judge’s opinion.

As you know from the same article

The ruling overturned a Seattle trial judge's decision siding with the protesters and tossing out a lawsuit filed by a group of Japanese whalers seeking a court-ordered halt to the aggressive tactics, many of which were broadcast on the Animal Planet reality television show Whale Wars.

US District Judge Richard Jones had sided with Sea Shepherd on several grounds in tossing out the whalers' piracy accusations and refusing to prohibit the conservation group's protests.

He determined the protesters' tactics were nonviolent because they targeted equipment and ships rather than people.

The judge also said the whalers were violating an Australian court order banning the hunt and so were precluded from pursuing their lawsuit in the United States.

It sounds like Mr Watson believes he has a very strong case. Strange that he is reluctant to present it here.

Not really, you don’t go to court in Japan unless you have already been found guilty. That is why they have a 98 percent conviction rate. Even on the slight chance he was found not guilty he would probably still spend close to a couple of years in prison waiting for a trial. Not a good prospect for anybody, let alone someone of his age.

According to a BBC interview with Mr Watson, these so-called explosives were actually butanoic acid which is just old rancid butter. Basically, stink bombs to make the deck of the whaling ship smell so bad that they wouldn’t be able to put any whales on it. You can hold it in your hands, it isn’t dangerous. The actual injuries to the whaling crew were caused by the whalers spraying pepper spray at the protesters and it blowing in the wind back onto themselves. The whole incident is on video, Mr Watson wasn't even on the boat involved at the time and according to him it is the Japanese whalers who are breaking international law due to their activities. I am not an expert on international law but I am pretty sure if you have explosives and you want to sink or damage a ship by throwing them at it it would be a pretty easy thing to do. Did the whaling ship sink? No. Was it damaged? As far as I know, No. Do you think Paul Watson would get a fair trial in Japan? With articles in newspapers like this leading the way, Probably not.

@semperi

https://www.gwpharm.com/healthcare-professionals/sativex

@semperi https://www.marrinc.org is an organization based on the AA to help Alcoholics

@Semperfi www.drugfreeworld.org is an organization funded by the Church of Scientology!!

Sounds to me like the guy just needed a little Ahhhmen after the Rahhmen

Japan will have to change its marijuana laws at some point in the not so distant future as more and more pharmaceutical products come on the market derived from the marijuana plant. Epidiolex (CBD) is expected to pass phase 3 trials soon and to deny sick children medication that can prevent brain damage/death from epilepsy would be politically insane. Once there is a review of the law that states no medications can be derived from marijuana leaves and flowers (not the stem) a more honest and credible debate about marijuana in Japan might begin. Until that that time, if you are thinking about bringing it into Japan-leave it to the professionals.

This guy is dangerous. He has made his fortune hurting other people albeit in the name of sport. An athelete yes but a person prepared to kill for the sake of his career. That is what professional boxing is about. As far as his prior drug use goes- what? I didn't like marijuana when I smoked it at age 15 so I think all marijuana smokers should be gunned down. Moron-

Actually it was even earlier than 1919. Akira Ogata synthezised methamphetamine hydrochloride otherwise know as desoxyn and perscribed to children and adults for hyperactivity disorder. Methamphetamine was first synthesized in 1893 by Nagai Nagayoshi and used by the Japanese military and public alike, sold under the brand name Philopon. I first came across it in 1994 in Prague sold as pervatine.

0.1 gram is just the left overs in a pipe. The Japanese have been using meth since Akira Ogata first synthesized it in 1919. This is a good article on meth. http://score.addicaid.com/japan-land-of-the-rising-meth.

All illegal drugs were once legal. Some of them were legal for thousands/millions of years. The question should really be which illegal drugs should be relegalized?

I wonder if C4 was used or just bog-standard explosives.

I love alcohol, it will probably kill me one day and I also love tobacco, which will also probably kill me one day. No doubt some of these loophole drugs are dangerous but a blanket ban on new recreational drugs denies people a legal pathway to a more interesting, and perhaps, a safer way to live. When was the last time any government said ok we have a new drug. You can use it in your business meetings, after work, during wedding celebrations, birthday parties, funeral parties and it is on sale in the local convenient store alongside the triple expressos, sugar and salt laden foods, alcohol and tobacco. The drug war is a war based on fear and based on control. Change vs somebody else's idea of the status quo and there will always be casualties In such a situation. The future will bring better recreational drugs and we have to fight for them.

Tried that, doesn't work for some reason but I will try again. <> By the way speaklikegandi, substitute the word black, fat, gay or korean instead of Tattoo in your last post and you might begin to understand that even in a democracy, most develped countries have laws to protect against discrimination, something that Japan lags behind in. The history of Tattoos in Japan goes back some 12000 years to the Jomon people. It is only in recent history during the Edo period that a less than democratic government of the day started to persecute the Ainu women for their Tattoos and in more recent history it was the Japanese governments worry that the Chinese would regard the Japanese as barbarians due to the abundance of tattoos among the working class that they were outlawered.

I will try again, <>http://www.vanishingtattoo.com/tattoo_museum/chinese_japanese_tattoos.html<> <>http://www.vanishingtattoo.com/tattooing_among_japans_ainu.htm<>

This is the correct link http://www.vanishingtattoo.com/tattoo_museum/chinese_japanese_tattoos.html

@gandi The culture of Tatttoos spread from Japan to the west! The earlist known Japanese Tattoo dates back to 5000BC http://www.vanishingtattoo.com/tattoo_museum/chinese_japanese_tattoos.html Attitudes to tattoos are varied and change, even in Japan! As for drugs, Japan has plenty, legal and illegal. As for guns, it seems that every year I read a story about an elderly Japanese hunter shooting somebody by mistake. As for sexual abuse in Japan. Don't make me laugh. This country only recently outlawered possesion of child pornography. Oh and by the way, which country would you send the countless number of Japanese with Tattoos to?

the Japan Tourism Agency should publish a list of onsens that are owned by the Yakusa and are tattoo friendly or force businesses in Japan to stop discriminating against people because of the colour of their skin.

Smoking pot or smoking tobacco is bad for your health, period. There are no benefits to inhaling smoke. Actually there are benefits to smoking a drug. You are far less likely to overdose on a drug by smoking it compared to eating, injecting or snorting it. Plus you don't need to smoke it you can vaporize it. Check out http://www.syqemedical.com. This is for use at home and in hospitals in Israel. Medical vapourized marijuana!