You know Kevin Sabet, the head of Project SAM, the think-tank dedicated to maintaining arrests of marijuana users for the purpose of forcing them into rehab with urine tests backed by the threat of incarceration. Imagine my surprise when I get this tweet from @KevinSabet:
Just out: 39% of HS students in Washington state report getting their marijuana from a “medical” marijuana dispensary.seattleschools.org/modules/cms/pa…
— Kevin Sabet (@KevinSabet) May 22, 2013
Wow! Two out of five high school students statewide are getting their pot from dispensaries? That’s shocking! So shocking I had to look it up for myself…
That’s odd. Instead of “39% of HS students in Washington state report getting their marijuana from a “medical” marijuana dispensary”, it seems like within the past month, 1.4% of students in Seattle ”usually” got their marijuana from a dispensary. Gosh, Kevin wouldn’t just try to turn 1.4% into 39% to scare us? There must be some other data point to justify this 39% figure…
OK, now we’ve got a number showing that 14.9% of high school seniors in Seattle used some pot that came from a dispensary within the past month. I imagine that if any kid has about a 1.5% chance of “usually” getting their pot from a dispensary and that kid may have a circle of ten pot smoking friends with the same chance, maybe that gets the figure to almost 15%. But still, where does this 39% figure come from. He didn’t just add the percentages from 9th through 12th grade, did he?
3.8 + 8.5 + 12.0 + 14.9 = 39.2. He did just add percentages.
If statistics isn’t your strong suit, let me explain with a simple analogy. You have a pie and you eat 25% of it. Kevin has a pie and he eats 25% of it. I have a pie and I eat 50% of it. That doesn’t mean 100% of all pies have been eaten (25% + 25% + 50%), it means 33% of all pies have been eaten (25% + 25% + 50% = 100% / 3 pies = 33%).
After being embarrassed by MPP’s Dan Riffle over the obvious error, Sabet offered this tweet:
CORRECTION: 9.4% of HS students 15-18 used MJ from a dispensary in past 30 days.Cancer epidemic in WA state?Backpain? seattleschools.org/modules/groups…
— Kevin Sabet (@KevinSabet) May 22, 2013
Ah, yes, when you’re caught exaggerating a marijuana stat by a factor of over 400%, go back the classic “they’re faking it to get medical marijuana” canard. But Kevin, I doubt these kids are actual medical recommendation holders. They’re getting that weed by diversion from someone who is a patient. That’s not a good thing, obviously, but is it a worse thing than the status quo? What I see in that statistic is a reduction from 100% to 90.6% of teenagers using marijuana that came from an unsafe, untested vendor whose profits support an illegal black market.
He continues to dig…
17% of 12th Grade Males got Marijuana from a dispensary according to WA survey. MJ use flat overall. Wonder what will happen post-502?
— Kevin Sabet (@KevinSabet) May 22, 2013
Hmm, so as Washington State made legal the possession of 24 ounces of usable marijuana and 15 plants and quasi-legal dispensaries popped up all over Seattle, marijuana use remained steady. In other words, high school seniors kept using marijuana at the same rate, but 17% of the market was shifted from completely illegal to quasi-legal. I’m trying to find the scary part of this fact, but it eludes me.
And now, he’s doubling down:
Actually I was right. 39% of kids who use pot get it from dispensaries. In Seattle. Raw data release soon, I just confirmed w/author. #
— Kevin Sabet (@KevinSabet) May 22, 2013
I’m looking forward to it, Kevin. I’m a big fan of raw data. I can’t wait to see how a report that posits “Total: 9.4% with 7.5% – 11.6% range in a 95% confidence interval and N = 1,608” becomes 39% of those 1,608 students surveyed.