Pot Is More Mainstream Than Ever, So Why Is Legalization Still Taboo?
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- spacemikey [removed]
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It's deadly serious when more than 800,000 people a year are arrested for it. Obama's "chuckle," he says, was emblematic. When legalizing marijuana was the top issue cited by visitors to Obama's transition Web site, the president dismissed it with a joke implying that there must be a lot of stoned people on the Internet.
"It's still an issue people are giggling about, not taking seriously," says Noelle Davis, former head of Texans for Medical Marijuana.
State legislators who have sponsored marijuana-related bills say that the two biggest obstacles are fear and cultural stereotypes.
"Elected officials are largely very concerned about being labeled 'soft on drugs,'" says New York State Assemblyman Richard Gottfried. Gottfried, a Manhattan Democrat who sponsored the state's 1977 decriminalization law, has introduced several bills to legalize medical marijuana.
Polls have shown medical marijuana to have the support of 70 to 80 percent of New Yorkers, he says, but "many legislators are afraid to touch it."
(Oh and thank you Current for no longer allowing people to attach photos of their choice to submitted stories, yeah that's great.)
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- groups:
- H.E.M.P., Make Marijuana Matter More
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Conniepae
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It's still taboo, because mainstream media has not vetted cannabis facts to the American public. Cannabis hemp facts are still not widely known. Until ordinary Americans hear the words of Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington and John Adams, people will still think cannabis is taboo. Lack of education about cannabis hemp leads people to believe spin and distortion, over 'Voices of Reason'.
"Two of my favorite things are sitting on my front porch smoking a pipe of sweet hemp, and playing my Hohner harmonica." - Abraham Lincoln (from a letter written by Lincoln during his presidency to the head of the Hohner Harmonica Company in Germany)
"Hemp is of first necessity to the wealth & protection of the country."
- Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President"Make the most you can of the Indian Hemp seed and sow it everywhere."
- George Washington, U.S. President"We shall, by and by, want a world of hemp more for our own consumption."
- John Adams, U.S. President - 2 years ago
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Conniepae
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spacemikey [removed]
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The current drug policy is just wrong and arguably more irresponsible than legalization. I'm offended at having an "elitist" president that likes to have his water imported from Fiji, scoffing at the idea of legalization:
http://current.com/items/90724933_fiji-water-spin-the-bottle.htm
I mean, I understand it's typical of an; insane, oppressive, elitist, ignorant, selfish government to act this way, but that doesn't make it right. I don't know anyone any of these politicians represent other than special interests and their own bank accounts. Anyone not believing that Marijuana generates A LOT of money (with it outlawed) for; judges, lawyers, police officers, the prison "industry" is just ill informed.
The people are sick of it, the powers that be just aren't willing to admit they're wrong. They know it could generate more money if it were legal, they know it's the fair and right thing to do. They also know by legalizing it (and other drugs while were at it), they will be relinquishing power that they have no right having.
Look at history, look at the very outright rebellious founding fathers and many of their usages of Hemp & Marijuana, look at the use of Marijuana & Hemp as a whole which basically predates recorded history.
Are the passed what is it 80 some years of prohibition right, was every other point in the history of man wrong?
Prohibition is stupid, and it's a weak attempt by power hungry people to control the masses. Not only that it doesn't stop anything, just increases the problems related to what ever is prohibited....
- 2 years ago
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spacemikey [removed]
