“The problems of brain damage, loss of ability to be productive, criminal behavior, etc., are symptoms of addiction that are common to all schedule I drugs.”
You left out alcohol. Especially liquor.
Alcohol causes far more brain damage than marijuana. And it’s permanent, physical damage.
As for addiction, I watched an uncle in DTs for about 4 hours. It was damn spooky.
We got him to the hospital, but he almost didn’t make it.
Alcohol, and it’s withdraw, kills regularly and often.
As I said, the use of alcohol is not even comparable. It takes years of heavy drinking (exceeding the BAC considered to be impaired several times a week) to begin to cause equivalent damage to what even “casual” use of marijuana or other schedule one drugs causes. Marijuana causes physical damage and alters the function of the brain. Furthermore, our bodies have a dedicated metabolic pathway that exists only to destroy alcohol. We have no equivalent for any schedule I drug, so they stay in the body longer, exacerbating the ill effects of the drugs.
I can tell stories of addiction, too. The addicts I’ve known used a variety of substances. The addiction is the issue, not the specific drug used.