Legal Pot Can Mean Legal Right For Employers To Fire Off Duty Users

It's a shame that the government can't seem to remove pot from Schedule 1 status after all these years but can quite easily pass the gay marriage rights package in a heartbeat ...
 
WhatInThe said:
In Oregon and some other states legal recreational off duty pot use can be a fireable offense if there is a zero tolerance drug use policy ie a DFWP/drug free work place.
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Yes, and even when it is used for medical purposes. I do not believe this is right, unless they can also fire people for use of other prescribed medical drugs, such as codeine, oxy, anti-anxiety drugs, etc. UNLESS it could be proven that the residual drug in your system could interfere with your safe and effective performance of your job. STILL don't understand why so many people get their panties all in a twist over marijuana, especially for medical use.


 

Debby said:
Then they should be firing anyone who drinks. Fairs fair. 'you had a glass of wine last night....pick up your pink slip'.
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The problem with that is the rate of elimination from the body. Alcohol disappears at somewhere around .015 BAC per hour, so even after a binge drinking session you will probably test OK a day or two later.

Traces of pot usage stay in the body much longer - up to a month - and with the current testing protocols you will be considered just as inebriated 30 days after you smoke that joint as if you had just toked 5 minutes ago.

Not fair, I agree.
 
Part of the justification is that under federal law pot is still an illegal drug. Yeh presence in the system doesn't bode well but courts are basing decisions on federal law.

I will opine and say from observation and the news pot is not as harmless as it is perceived to be. I know with prescription painkillers I was told don't operate machinery and do not enter into legal contracts while using them. Meaning some of this stuff could affect someone at a desk as well as on an assembly line or in a shop.
 
Well I'd agree with you on some of what you've mentioned here. But not all. I would suggest that of alcohol, pot, cigarettes and prescribed pharmaceuticals, pot is the least harmful. Heck, even smoking it doesn't seem to cause lung cancer the way cigarettes do. So seems to me that if you're going to support the illegality of pot, you need to also support prohibition and the end of all tobacco sales and a serious curtailing of prescription drugs which have been responsible for a multitude of deaths (not to mention the horrors of the long list of side effects).

You could even go so far as to say that marijuana is good for the planet! Doesn't require the continual application of pesticides, doesn't require horrendous applications of water, can take the place of wood pulp in the production of paper and other products and grows back new every year instead of requiring decades to replace......I even heard of it's potential application in making automobile bodies. http://techland.time.com/2010/09/01/canadian-government-sponsors-the-ultimate-green-car/

Just think, you could cut down on harmful emissions in auto production because you don't have to make steel which means there's a cutback in oil usage (and all the emissions that go along with that).
 
SifuPhil said:
The problem with that is the rate of elimination from the body. Alcohol disappears at somewhere around .015 BAC per hour, so even after a binge drinking session you will probably test OK a day or two later.

Traces of pot usage stay in the body much longer - up to a month - and with the current testing protocols you will be considered just as inebriated 30 days after you smoke that joint as if you had just toked 5 minutes ago.

Not fair, I agree.
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At the cellular level, you're probably right. I've never looked into that. But it seems to me that the 'drunk' is effectively drunk far longer than a pot smoker is high, so which is really worse? The biggest danger that could come from legalized pot is a major advance in obesity rates I think whereas people can drink themselves to death in an evening, destroy their livers, are more violent and bigger risk takers.
 
I don't know I know some pot smokers that are obviously stoned hours after consumption and seem immune to any calming effects. They might act sedated but their attitude does not change.

Setting aside the intoxicating effects if you have an employee that is doing ILLEGAL drugs do you think they would think twice about violating company policy/procedure or ignore the company work rules?
 
Actually my husband had a window cleaning company for 35 years in Vancouver (high rise work in the downtown core) and a good number (if not most of them smoked pot and drank) and for the most part, they saved it for after hours. So yeah, I think that just because someone likes to smoke pot recreationally doesn't mean they are lunatics or addicts who only think about the next toke. He did have one employee that was a full blown alcoholic

And being spaced out for a few hours over the course of an evening is far different than the person who gets drunk and staggering and wakes up wobbly and shaky and with a massive headache, while the pot smoker wakes up and is 100% fully functional.
 
WhatInThe said:
Part of the justification is that under federal law pot is still an illegal drug. Yeh presence in the system doesn't bode well but courts are basing decisions on federal law.
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And it is often thought that it is largely because of the privatized prison system that makes so much money from incarcerating pot smokers that the Feds still haven't removed pot from their Schedule 1, even though there are tons of evidence of its medical value and that it is in no way, shape or form the equal of heroin and other Schedule 1 drugs.

I will opine and say from observation and the news pot is not as harmless as it is perceived to be. I know with prescription painkillers I was told don't operate machinery and do not enter into legal contracts while using them. Meaning some of this stuff could affect someone at a desk as well as on an assembly line or in a shop.
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And my viewpoint is that it has still not gotten beyond its demonization from the '30's ... there are far more problems caused by abuse of prescription drugs, but THOSE you see constantly advertised on TV.

You can die from drinking too much water - that doesn't mean it should be banned, only that you should use some (not-so-common) sense when imbibing it. Same with alcohol, pot and every other substance.
 

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