This is an example of we are the media with the Internet. Addiction is a big part of the cannabis issue. This was a particularly well-crafted explanation of addiction from a commentor with a screen name of runderwo at CannabisNews.com-
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread20849.shtml#23Addiction is a condition characterized by three separate things. The first is habituation, where an activity produces pleasurable (reinforcing) effects, and thus the activity becomes a normal part of the daily flow. Anything pleasurable can cause habituation. You simply seek out and do things that make you happy and/or satisfied because as an organism, that is what you are designed to do. Methampthetamine, cocaine, and alcohol are highly reinforcing because they act directly on the brain's pleasure mechanisms.
The other half is the combination of tolerance and withdrawal. Tolerance is the gradual necessity of more of that activity (or substance) to achieve the same pleasurable effect. Specifically with drugs, the body builds up chemical tolerances to some, and simply becomes flooded with others. With nicotine and heroin for example, each replaces a natural neurotransmitter that the body produces (acetylcholine and endorphins respectively), and the body adjusts to their presence by producing less of the natural components. With cannabis, the tolerance comes from the body being flooded with broken-down THC and CBD/CBN which produce little to no psychoactive effect, so there are no cannabinoid receptors left for freshly consumed THC to attach to.
Withdrawal is when mental or physical symptoms arise from ceasing an activity. With drugs such as heroin, barbiturates, and alcohol, the body can be anywhere from feeling sick to in a life-threatening state of shock, because it has adjusted to the presence of the intoxicant and must now readjust to the absence of it. With cannabis, one feels a longing but that is about it, because the body has not made such adjustments. The withdrawal is purely mental.
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Since cannabis produces little to no withdrawal, and is not as reinforcing as some other drugs are, it is difficult to believe that it is the drug addiction threat it is made out to be. One must only look at alcohol, a drug which satisfies all three criteria as well as having a life-threatening withdrawal, albeit one which is legal, to see why cannabis poses relatively little threat to society through addiction.
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