I don't use cannabis, never have, and probably never will. But still, I'd love for my country to introduce a law like this just because I think I'd quite enjoy growing a cannabis plant, even if I...
Under the new legislation, put forward by Germany’s ruling coalition party, adults can cultivate up to three plants for private consumption and be allowed to possess 50g at one time at home, and 25g in public, starting from April 1.
I don't use cannabis, never have, and probably never will. But still, I'd love for my country to introduce a law like this just because I think I'd quite enjoy growing a cannabis plant, even if I never did anything with it. If I did have cannabis plants I'm sure I'd try it, but it's really more for the pleasure of growing it anyway. Also, limiting to 50g seems quite small, especially if you have 3 plants. I'd assume that the total yield from 3 plants would be more than 50g, so hopefully nobody gets done for that. (Perhaps this revealing my ignorance on the whole process)
Like 100-200g per plant, so... kind of weird. In BC, the law is 30g in public and 1000g at home (which is based on generous expectations for the yield of 4 plants), which is far more reasonable.
Like 100-200g per plant, so... kind of weird. In BC, the law is 30g in public and 1000g at home (which is based on generous expectations for the yield of 4 plants), which is far more reasonable.
That's interesting, and those are numbers I would roughly expect. 1kg seems like a lot of cannabis though, so I can understand why they don't have it that high. Hopefully the 50g rule is more code...
That's interesting, and those are numbers I would roughly expect. 1kg seems like a lot of cannabis though, so I can understand why they don't have it that high. Hopefully the 50g rule is more code for "if we suspect you're illegally profiting from this we'll punish you", and not "if you have 51g (or say, 250g) we'll punish you"
It's kind of silly though, if harvesting one single plant would instantly exceed that limit, and they even allow three plants. And laws that are designed to allow selective enforcement, if that's...
It's kind of silly though, if harvesting one single plant would instantly exceed that limit, and they even allow three plants. And laws that are designed to allow selective enforcement, if that's what they're doing, are a source of a lot of abuse of power and I think should be avoided.
I definitely agree, it is silly. I wonder if there's any official guidance as to what to do if (when) you do exceed those numbers? Are you supposed to throw it away (is having more than 50g of...
I definitely agree, it is silly. I wonder if there's any official guidance as to what to do if (when) you do exceed those numbers? Are you supposed to throw it away (is having more than 50g of cannabis in your trash illegal?), or is there some government sanctioned way to dispose of excess? If not, even growing one plant could be illegal, and as you say, could be used nefariously to punish/detain/get a warrant for unrelated issues.
German here, any German citizen can soon own max. 50g of weed. 50g at home / 25g outside is the rule. The amounts get summed together. You are not allowed to have 50g at home + additionally 25g...
German here, any German citizen can soon own max. 50g of weed.
50g at home / 25g outside is the rule. The amounts get summed together. You are not allowed to have 50g at home + additionally 25g outside.
Who will control this? Most likely no one. But those are the rules.
A fresh harvest from the plant is usually 4-5 times heavier + you also have to trim the buds. So if a plant gives 200g of fresh buds, you are still in the range.
If you really reach more than 50g dried you either bite the bullet and throw it away, or decide to break the law.
Some German lawyers have suggested to get a very clean "trash can" and throw it away in there.. :D
Anything over 50g but less than 60g gets you a fine similar to a parking violation. Anything over 60g is illegal and lands you in court.
Respectively, anything between 25g-30g outside gets you a fine, anything over 30g lands you in court.
We do have an additional rule which allows dropping the case if the amount was really not meant for selling or because you grew too much by accident.
Not sure how this will be practically applied though.
Imo, 50g at home is not enough. But it's better than 0g and a drug raid.
I would rather set up a huge tent once per year, grow a kg and have enough for years, than to always have a smaller tent running throughout the year. But it's a very big step forward. I'm officially not a criminal anymore! (At least when it comes to weed). :D
Realistically, I guess no one would really care unless you boast about your "big budz" on facebook.
Previously a call from a concerned neighbor about weed smell could land you a raid.
This is not the case anymore, so how should the cops know about the amount you have at home?
I guess most of the 60+g cases will be more of a by-product from other crimes.
The main consensus (except for the old boomer conservatives) is: "not great, not terrible".
People are not criminalized anymore, they will not lose their driver license anymore because they smoked weed two days ago.
The law could have been better and less "German-y". That we even get this far, was unbelievable for me and for many others.
The next big plan are actual dispensaries and full legalization, but this is currently against EU law, which is why we went the partial way first.
… if you ask the current government’s coalition. But looking at the election polls recently, it seems like conservatives CDU/CSU and/or far right AfD are more likely going to be part of the next...
The next big plan are actual dispensaries and full legalization
… if you ask the current government’s coalition. But looking at the election polls recently, it seems like conservatives CDU/CSU and/or far right AfD are more likely going to be part of the next government than not (shudder), at least if nothing else changes until then, which is not a given.
But given the trend in both public opinion on the matter and e.g. the CxU’s good ratings currently, I’m not even sure if they were to see a need to reverse this legislation. But they sure as hell won’t push it further forward either nationally or on EU level…
but this is currently against EU law, which is why we went the partial way first.
… which I wonder when, if ever, that’d change. All member states would have to come to a consensus for this to happen, right?
Yeah the polls are not in our favor. This is of course only the plan of the more progressive parties. The conservatives are whining and spread lies as is tradition. Media is helping them a lot by...
Yeah the polls are not in our favor. This is of course only the plan of the more progressive parties.
The conservatives are whining and spread lies as is tradition. Media is helping them a lot by mostly inviting prohibitionists.
It's really sad how much energy they have invested to get the law into halt. 13 year olds can get weed at any school, but the decriminalization kills our kids. People forget so quickly how bad the country was handled the last 16 years, but the greens and left leaning parties are the cause of any problem we have right now. Sigh.
I hope that the next 18 months show the good effects of the law. Maybe they let the law be and public consensus rises.
They either need to go into coalition with the AfD or need to force another partner to revert their own law somehow.
If they really go into coalition with the AfD nothing will matter anymore anyway. I'm pretty much set to leave the country if it comes to this.
… which I wonder when, if ever, that’d change. All member states would have to come to a consensus for this to happen, right?
Yeah exactly. Other countries are looking onto us right now. Maybe that raises support in the EU in the long term.
No idea where this will lead at all. I'm still surprised this law even comes into effect. :D
I never ever have thought that I will grow weed at home. Things change, I guess.
I agree that the CDU are likely to end up on top next election (much to my chagrin) and are certainly unlikely to push legalization forward, but the AfD being part of the government would be an...
and/or far right AfD
I agree that the CDU are likely to end up on top next election (much to my chagrin) and are certainly unlikely to push legalization forward, but the AfD being part of the government would be an absolute massive change in status quo. CDU already had to walk back when they said they'd cooperate with an AfD mayor if one was elected, so I don't think we're (yet) to the point where AfD are likely to end up in the national government. Most likely we'll get a coalition between CDU and SPD again. Or maybe FPD. But I don't think German politics have quite descended to a coalition or with AfD yet.
I believe the 50g is supposed to be a monthly amount of dried produce, given that this summer a construct called 'Anbauvereinigungen' ('cultivation associations'?) will be created. These are...
I believe the 50g is supposed to be a monthly amount of dried produce, given that this summer a construct called 'Anbauvereinigungen' ('cultivation associations'?) will be created. These are basically non-commercial, organized groups of up to 500 people with a dedicated facility used for cultivating plants for everyone in the association. The maximum amount an association is allowed to dispense (not sell!) per registered member, is 50g per month but no more than 25g per day iirc.
I understand the 50g as "ready to smoke". Likewise the 25g in public doesn't make sense if we're talking about a potted plant. You can have a big plant and just make a few grams of consumable...
I understand the 50g as "ready to smoke". Likewise the 25g in public doesn't make sense if we're talking about a potted plant.
You can have a big plant and just make a few grams of consumable product from it I guess?
It's similar for me, except that I have absolutely no interest in growing marijuana. II just want to grow hemp in my garden and experiment with processing, spinning, and weaving it. That is not...
It's similar for me, except that I have absolutely no interest in growing marijuana. II just want to grow hemp in my garden and experiment with processing, spinning, and weaving it. That is not something I will be legally be permitted to do (I would need a license and they don't grant them to hobby growers) until it's legal to grow cannabis as well.
I also want hemp products in general to be cheaper and more readily available, like hemp fabric and hemp seed flour. It's so frustrating that farmers can't grow it freely like they can other crops solely because it looks too similar to marijuana.
Good for them! Not too into German politics but being in a neighboring country, I do follow it on the sidelines. It's kind of wild to me that such a conservative (overall) country legalized it...
Good for them! Not too into German politics but being in a neighboring country, I do follow it on the sidelines.
It's kind of wild to me that such a conservative (overall) country legalized it before we in Denmark did. Instead, it's all about law and order, increasing penalties, bigger and better police, more surveillance, longer prison sentences, shutting down Christiania, etc. Anything but legalization seems to be on the table here.
Some politicians from the border region are also all panicky as they expect a lot of smuggling from Germany to start happening. But no, seems like they see no possible solution to this problem lol
Germany 180'd hard on this because this was their common stance towards the Netherlands and their drug policy. Turns out that yeah, there's smuggling, but there probably will be regardless of...
Some politicians from the border region are also all panicky as they expect a lot of smuggling from Germany to start happening.
Germany 180'd hard on this because this was their common stance towards the Netherlands and their drug policy. Turns out that yeah, there's smuggling, but there probably will be regardless of legality.
Still unbelievable that Germany went ahead on this before anyone else. At this point the endorsement policy of the Netherlands is outdated.
Oh, that surprises me. From our newspapers, I often get the feeling that Denmark is more conservative than Germany. How do you feel about that? Do you think there's some truth to this?
Oh, that surprises me. From our newspapers, I often get the feeling that Denmark is more conservative than Germany. How do you feel about that? Do you think there's some truth to this?
"Our" newspapers - where are you from? The internal Danish understanding is that we are one of the most progressive countries in the world. And we used to believe that others saw us that way too....
"Our" newspapers - where are you from?
The internal Danish understanding is that we are one of the most progressive countries in the world. And we used to believe that others saw us that way too. This is because of things like liberating porn, legalizing gay marriage civil unions, good system of welfare, etc. as one of the first countries.
But that veneer has definitely fallen the last decade or so. I'm not surprised that Denmark is seen as conservative now but it still depends what you're talking about. Though overall, I still think Germany is more culturally conservative than Denmark, but some aspects are a lot more progressive. Like immigration policies have gotten to a very hard-right "Denmark first" type of policy.
Oh, I'm sorry, I thought this was obvious because of the context. I'm German. Thanks for your response, it sounds reasonable. I love Denmark and visit it almost every year and I also feel like...
"Our" newspapers - where are you from?
Oh, I'm sorry, I thought this was obvious because of the context. I'm German.
Thanks for your response, it sounds reasonable. I love Denmark and visit it almost every year and I also feel like most of the Danes are much more open and less conservative than the average German. (Although maybe Berlin and other big cities are the exception here.)
The German self-understanding is also that we have a pretty progressive and open country. We also have strong social support systems (although we're definitely not a welfare state), are (supposedly) gay-friendly and have a somewhat diverse population. Then again, our population is not that diverse, we have very strong far-right forces in our country, and Germans have a certain "everything is better in Germany" or "this would never have happened in Germany" mentality.
As for Germany's perception of Denmark, there is usually a lot of respect towards Scandinavian countries in general. Especially your educational system is admired here. However, German newspapers (even those I consider good) tend to mostly report negative things about our smaller neighbours – such as Denmark's recent far-right policies that you have mentioned. (Germany in general seems to be only interested in France and Poland and doesn't pay too much attention to our other neighbours. At least that's the feeling I get when reading the news.)
As an immigrant here in Germany, I think this is a pretty fair and balanced perspective on what it's like here. I'd say that Germany is rather progressive and open when compared to many of its...
The German self-understanding is also that we have a pretty progressive and open country. We also have strong social support systems (although we're definitely not a welfare state), are (supposedly) gay-friendly and have a somewhat diverse population. Then again, our population is not that diverse, we have very strong far-right forces in our country, and Germans have a certain "everything is better in Germany" or "this would never have happened in Germany" mentality.
As an immigrant here in Germany, I think this is a pretty fair and balanced perspective on what it's like here. I'd say that Germany is rather progressive and open when compared to many of its neighbors, but that Germany is also much slower to change than most. Germans do have an "everything is better in Germany" mentality sometimes but even more so there's an aversion to change -- there's a reason we only got e-rezepts like a year ago and so many businesses still only take cash. We'll probably get heat pumps and air conditioning when I'm in my 90s.
The far-right forces and specifically racism/islamophobia are worrying, but I don't think Germany's neighbors are much better here. That's a Europe-wide problem, I'd say. I do think that a perception of one's country as being a progressive one can lead to some willful ignorance of those issues, but again that's definitely not unique to Germany.
In general I think this new marijuana policy is much like Germany's trans healthcare policy (which I'm more intimately familiar with) -- woefully inadequate and far too strict, but still better than most if not all other European countries. I don't plan to take advantage of the new law really, but I'm hoping it makes it easier to get cheaper and nicer indoor gardening set-ups that I can use for chilis.
I don't use cannabis, never have, and probably never will. But still, I'd love for my country to introduce a law like this just because I think I'd quite enjoy growing a cannabis plant, even if I never did anything with it. If I did have cannabis plants I'm sure I'd try it, but it's really more for the pleasure of growing it anyway. Also, limiting to 50g seems quite small, especially if you have 3 plants. I'd assume that the total yield from 3 plants would be more than 50g, so hopefully nobody gets done for that. (Perhaps this revealing my ignorance on the whole process)
Like 100-200g per plant, so... kind of weird. In BC, the law is 30g in public and 1000g at home (which is based on generous expectations for the yield of 4 plants), which is far more reasonable.
That's interesting, and those are numbers I would roughly expect. 1kg seems like a lot of cannabis though, so I can understand why they don't have it that high. Hopefully the 50g rule is more code for "if we suspect you're illegally profiting from this we'll punish you", and not "if you have 51g (or say, 250g) we'll punish you"
It's kind of silly though, if harvesting one single plant would instantly exceed that limit, and they even allow three plants. And laws that are designed to allow selective enforcement, if that's what they're doing, are a source of a lot of abuse of power and I think should be avoided.
I definitely agree, it is silly. I wonder if there's any official guidance as to what to do if (when) you do exceed those numbers? Are you supposed to throw it away (is having more than 50g of cannabis in your trash illegal?), or is there some government sanctioned way to dispose of excess? If not, even growing one plant could be illegal, and as you say, could be used nefariously to punish/detain/get a warrant for unrelated issues.
German here, any German citizen can soon own max. 50g of weed.
50g at home / 25g outside is the rule. The amounts get summed together. You are not allowed to have 50g at home + additionally 25g outside.
Who will control this? Most likely no one. But those are the rules.
A fresh harvest from the plant is usually 4-5 times heavier + you also have to trim the buds. So if a plant gives 200g of fresh buds, you are still in the range.
If you really reach more than 50g dried you either bite the bullet and throw it away, or decide to break the law.
Some German lawyers have suggested to get a very clean "trash can" and throw it away in there.. :D
Anything over 50g but less than 60g gets you a fine similar to a parking violation. Anything over 60g is illegal and lands you in court.
Respectively, anything between 25g-30g outside gets you a fine, anything over 30g lands you in court.
We do have an additional rule which allows dropping the case if the amount was really not meant for selling or because you grew too much by accident.
Not sure how this will be practically applied though.
Imo, 50g at home is not enough. But it's better than 0g and a drug raid.
I would rather set up a huge tent once per year, grow a kg and have enough for years, than to always have a smaller tent running throughout the year. But it's a very big step forward. I'm officially not a criminal anymore! (At least when it comes to weed). :D
Realistically, I guess no one would really care unless you boast about your "big budz" on facebook.
Previously a call from a concerned neighbor about weed smell could land you a raid.
This is not the case anymore, so how should the cops know about the amount you have at home?
I guess most of the 60+g cases will be more of a by-product from other crimes.
The main consensus (except for the old boomer conservatives) is: "not great, not terrible".
People are not criminalized anymore, they will not lose their driver license anymore because they smoked weed two days ago.
The law could have been better and less "German-y". That we even get this far, was unbelievable for me and for many others.
The next big plan are actual dispensaries and full legalization, but this is currently against EU law, which is why we went the partial way first.
… if you ask the current government’s coalition. But looking at the election polls recently, it seems like conservatives CDU/CSU and/or far right AfD are more likely going to be part of the next government than not (shudder), at least if nothing else changes until then, which is not a given.
But given the trend in both public opinion on the matter and e.g. the CxU’s good ratings currently, I’m not even sure if they were to see a need to reverse this legislation. But they sure as hell won’t push it further forward either nationally or on EU level…
… which I wonder when, if ever, that’d change. All member states would have to come to a consensus for this to happen, right?
Yeah the polls are not in our favor. This is of course only the plan of the more progressive parties.
The conservatives are whining and spread lies as is tradition. Media is helping them a lot by mostly inviting prohibitionists.
It's really sad how much energy they have invested to get the law into halt. 13 year olds can get weed at any school, but the decriminalization kills our kids. People forget so quickly how bad the country was handled the last 16 years, but the greens and left leaning parties are the cause of any problem we have right now. Sigh.
I hope that the next 18 months show the good effects of the law. Maybe they let the law be and public consensus rises.
They either need to go into coalition with the AfD or need to force another partner to revert their own law somehow.
If they really go into coalition with the AfD nothing will matter anymore anyway. I'm pretty much set to leave the country if it comes to this.
Yeah exactly. Other countries are looking onto us right now. Maybe that raises support in the EU in the long term.
No idea where this will lead at all. I'm still surprised this law even comes into effect. :D
I never ever have thought that I will grow weed at home. Things change, I guess.
I agree that the CDU are likely to end up on top next election (much to my chagrin) and are certainly unlikely to push legalization forward, but the AfD being part of the government would be an absolute massive change in status quo. CDU already had to walk back when they said they'd cooperate with an AfD mayor if one was elected, so I don't think we're (yet) to the point where AfD are likely to end up in the national government. Most likely we'll get a coalition between CDU and SPD again. Or maybe FPD. But I don't think German politics have quite descended to a coalition or with AfD yet.
I believe the 50g is supposed to be a monthly amount of dried produce, given that this summer a construct called 'Anbauvereinigungen' ('cultivation associations'?) will be created. These are basically non-commercial, organized groups of up to 500 people with a dedicated facility used for cultivating plants for everyone in the association. The maximum amount an association is allowed to dispense (not sell!) per registered member, is 50g per month but no more than 25g per day iirc.
I understand the 50g as "ready to smoke". Likewise the 25g in public doesn't make sense if we're talking about a potted plant.
You can have a big plant and just make a few grams of consumable product from it I guess?
It's similar for me, except that I have absolutely no interest in growing marijuana. II just want to grow hemp in my garden and experiment with processing, spinning, and weaving it. That is not something I will be legally be permitted to do (I would need a license and they don't grant them to hobby growers) until it's legal to grow cannabis as well.
I also want hemp products in general to be cheaper and more readily available, like hemp fabric and hemp seed flour. It's so frustrating that farmers can't grow it freely like they can other crops solely because it looks too similar to marijuana.
Good for them! Not too into German politics but being in a neighboring country, I do follow it on the sidelines.
It's kind of wild to me that such a conservative (overall) country legalized it before we in Denmark did. Instead, it's all about law and order, increasing penalties, bigger and better police, more surveillance, longer prison sentences, shutting down Christiania, etc. Anything but legalization seems to be on the table here.
Some politicians from the border region are also all panicky as they expect a lot of smuggling from Germany to start happening. But no, seems like they see no possible solution to this problem lol
Germany 180'd hard on this because this was their common stance towards the Netherlands and their drug policy. Turns out that yeah, there's smuggling, but there probably will be regardless of legality.
Still unbelievable that Germany went ahead on this before anyone else. At this point the endorsement policy of the Netherlands is outdated.
Oh, that surprises me. From our newspapers, I often get the feeling that Denmark is more conservative than Germany. How do you feel about that? Do you think there's some truth to this?
"Our" newspapers - where are you from?
The internal Danish understanding is that we are one of the most progressive countries in the world. And we used to believe that others saw us that way too. This is because of things like liberating porn, legalizing gay
marriagecivil unions, good system of welfare, etc. as one of the first countries.But that veneer has definitely fallen the last decade or so. I'm not surprised that Denmark is seen as conservative now but it still depends what you're talking about. Though overall, I still think Germany is more culturally conservative than Denmark, but some aspects are a lot more progressive. Like immigration policies have gotten to a very hard-right "Denmark first" type of policy.
Oh, I'm sorry, I thought this was obvious because of the context. I'm German.
Thanks for your response, it sounds reasonable. I love Denmark and visit it almost every year and I also feel like most of the Danes are much more open and less conservative than the average German. (Although maybe Berlin and other big cities are the exception here.)
The German self-understanding is also that we have a pretty progressive and open country. We also have strong social support systems (although we're definitely not a welfare state), are (supposedly) gay-friendly and have a somewhat diverse population. Then again, our population is not that diverse, we have very strong far-right forces in our country, and Germans have a certain "everything is better in Germany" or "this would never have happened in Germany" mentality.
As for Germany's perception of Denmark, there is usually a lot of respect towards Scandinavian countries in general. Especially your educational system is admired here. However, German newspapers (even those I consider good) tend to mostly report negative things about our smaller neighbours – such as Denmark's recent far-right policies that you have mentioned. (Germany in general seems to be only interested in France and Poland and doesn't pay too much attention to our other neighbours. At least that's the feeling I get when reading the news.)
As an immigrant here in Germany, I think this is a pretty fair and balanced perspective on what it's like here. I'd say that Germany is rather progressive and open when compared to many of its neighbors, but that Germany is also much slower to change than most. Germans do have an "everything is better in Germany" mentality sometimes but even more so there's an aversion to change -- there's a reason we only got e-rezepts like a year ago and so many businesses still only take cash. We'll probably get heat pumps and air conditioning when I'm in my 90s.
The far-right forces and specifically racism/islamophobia are worrying, but I don't think Germany's neighbors are much better here. That's a Europe-wide problem, I'd say. I do think that a perception of one's country as being a progressive one can lead to some willful ignorance of those issues, but again that's definitely not unique to Germany.
In general I think this new marijuana policy is much like Germany's trans healthcare policy (which I'm more intimately familiar with) -- woefully inadequate and far too strict, but still better than most if not all other European countries. I don't plan to take advantage of the new law really, but I'm hoping it makes it easier to get cheaper and nicer indoor gardening set-ups that I can use for chilis.