Posted on 02/20/2002 6:08:45 AM PST by Magician
My first reaction is WHY NOT?
It’s a question of common sense.
Our marijuana laws do not work. They never have, and they never will.
Their stated goal being to rid society of the so-called affliction of marijuana use, the harsh reality is that since prohibition, usage rates have increased drastically.
Either we legalize it, and fast, or we get busy locking up millions of Canadians. With one out of three Canadians admitting to having tried marijuana, we may very well be locking up our best and brightest, not ruined by drugs, but ruined by the criminal sanctions that go with getting caught for what amounts to a common social practice. I can’t even begin to count how many elected officials admitted to having used it, yet everyday hundreds of average citizens are arrested for marijuana offences.
So, why are there so many users, and why is marijuana so easy to acquire?
In a strange twist, prohibition is to blame.
When a product is illegal, the profit margin skyrockets. Prohibition turns an agricultural product (a plant that’s very easy to grow) into a drug worth its weight in gold. Without prohibition, marijuana would cost pennies to produce. No wonder some adventurous modern day prospectors are setting up in their own back yards and basements to try and get in on the gold rush. Who could blame them? They aren’t hurting anyone, they’re making good money, and most of all customers are willing, grateful participants in the process.
We must come to grips with the fact that the demand for marijuana is never going away and find a better way of dealing with it. Imagine the billions of dollars spent on marijuana and enforcement going to more noble causes like health care and other social programs.
The general public understands this. Support for legalizing marijuana recently reached the much sought after 50%+1 majority. Recent polls show that 51% of Canadians support legalizing marijuana, a slim, but very real majority.
And with more and more advocates, the trend is just taking off. Several European countries like Belgium, Switzerland, Holland and Germany are successfully leading the way towards tolerance with legislation aimed at helping drugs users, not by treating them as criminals, but as human beings deserving of respect. There is no reason why Canada should lag behind. We should be on the cutting edge of this new international movement.
Now it is time to step onto the world stage and assert our sovereignty by legalizing marijuana once and for all. I would venture a friendly wager that the international community would stand by Canada on this issue. Our inevitable success would then make us a world leader in marijuana reform—an example for others to follow.
(I can hear it already): But marijuana is dangerous!
For the record, marijuana is NOT dangerous. It is no worse than coffee and much safer than alcohol. Marijuana is also much less addictive then cigarettes. Chronic use is rare as the majority do not smoke it everyday. Try that with tobacco!
What little risks that may be present with marijuana are no worse then any other risks deemed "morally acceptable". Should we ban music because, if played too loud it might hurt your hearing?
French fries and gravy are far more dangerous for our health then marijuana. Should we ban fast food and send overeaters to mandatory fitness camps?
Who are we, as a society to judge? What exactly are marijuana users guilty of? Who are they hurting? What have they done wrong?
To deny marijuana users the right to choose what they want to consume is nothing more than an arbitrary decision based on moral values, not public interest......
Legalization does not mean promoting use. It means providing medical care, support, education, quality standards and proper labeling. We then trust that responsible adults will make their own choices. This is what makes legalization healthy for our society. At least legalization would force retailers to be accountable for what they sell.
Under prohibition, the government has waived its responsibility for the well being of marijuana users, and is only responsible for their arrest and persecution.
This total disregard for their rights drives a wedge between them and the rest of society and breeds contempt for our legal institutions. If society does not tolerate pot smokers, how are pot smokers supposed to tolerate society? This does not make for a healthy social climate and even less a basis for sound policy.
If a policy so deeply flawed as prohibition not only fails to reach its goals, but actually makes the situation worse, it should be radically changed.
Prohibition is the problem, and legalization the solution.
In places where marijuana is tolerated use actually decreases.
Of course, don’t count on the politicians to have the courage to change the law—it’s not in their nature. Look instead to the Supreme Court. That is where most significant legal change comes from anyway. Gay rights and abortion issues were resolved there, and, some time this year our land’s highest court will also rule on the constitutionality of marijuana prohibition. I strongly urge government to make a wise decision and end this madness now. Millions of bright, productive, patriotic pot-smoking Canadians are counting on it.
Most sincerely, Marc-Boris St-Maurice Le Parti Marijuana
What the logic that marijuana is just a benign little weed?
Btw, I will ask you again if pot is not a part of the drug culture why does the quintessential pot magazine, "High Times",have articles and list prices for other drugs such as cocaine, LSD, and psychedelic mushrooms.
What are you trying to prove---that people who consider themselves a part of the "drug culture" enjoy drugs other than pot? There's a Navy no-shitter for you.Not all beer drinkers are keg-standing frat boys, Skid Row 100-proof vodka guzzlers, etc. Why, then, do you insist that all pot smokers must be Cheech & Chong/Wavy Gravy/Studio 54/Heroin Chic-ers?
What offends you more, pot itself or what you perceive as the "drug culture"?
The drug culture which pot is a major part of and none of the Libertarians on FR will admit.
Look pot is part of the leftist culture. I just was on another thread where a pot defender was castigating the internal combustion engine, because it "kills children" in Iraq(ignoring the fact that Saddam Hussein is the one who gasses his own people), while the "peaceful" pot smokers were being persecuted(while no doubt some of those "peaceful" pot smokers are members of the Earth Liberation Front, who destroy private property).
That is basic enviro whacko dogma. I wouldn't doubt that pot is a big part of ELF's(Earth Liberation Front) political philosophy as it with the Green party.
The drug culture, IMHO, is the home of the anarchist, enviro whacko, and a whole host of other Marxist causes.
Nope, I'm just a guy who is sick and tired of people like you disrupting the forum with lies. The fact that you and the morons like you are still allowed here is one of the great disappointments with the management of this site.
Debate about differing opinions and beliefs is the essence of this site as far as I am concerned, but when people have no interest in that but only in their demented, childish agenda which they advance by lying about others and their beliefs, the whole thing falls apart.
Phrases like "put down your bong pipe" etc., are attempts to stain those who you disagree with, with lies. Particularly from people like you, drug users, drug pushers, drug traffickers and hypocrites.
Debate about differing opinions and beliefs is the essence of this site as far as I am concerned, but when people have no interest in that but only in their demented, childish agenda which they advance by lying about others and their beliefs, the whole thing falls apart
IOW, I(ThomasJefferson) can't stand someone showing the sunlight on the drug culture and I(ThomasJefferson) will have temper tantrums and get rally nasty.
Go right ahead, Thom, you post your vitriol all you want, nobody is stopping you.
There is such a thing as right and wrong, it's just that you don't know the difference.
This country is founded on mostly Christian principles and God is written into many of the founding documents. There isn't a mainstream Christian faith that is for illegal drug use.
There ya go, claiming that God has somehow commanded you to use guns and violence to lock people in cages for having vices. You will have a lot of explaining to do at the judgement.
So don't attempt to transplant your evil as being just another kind of morally acceptable view. It isn't.
Your brand of "morality" is repugnant.
Marijuana prohibition was the brainchild of a federal bureaucrat about to lose his job enforcing alcohol prohibition, and looking for a way to keep his seat on the gravy train. The justifications for outlawing it consisted of some wild stories about smoking it and being turned into a bat that flew around the room, and ending up in an ink well. There was also some racist drivel about it making white women want to have sex with black men. The only representative of the medical community in attendance was allowed to say about two sentences before he was dismissed as irrelevant.
Since then the government has commissioned researchers to conduct clinical trials and present recommendations. When the data came back showing that marijuana was a relatively harmless drug, and the researchers recommended that it be re-scheduled or de-criminalized, the bureaucrats ignored the recommendations and tried to bury the research data.
They lied to us in the beginning, they've lied to us right along, and they're still lying to us now. You're defending them only encourages them to keep right on doing it.
What do you mean? I'm an actual member of the LP, and I'll admit it right now: pot is a part of the "drug culture," whatever that is. It's not a secret.
The drug culture, IMHO, is the home of the anarchist, enviro whacko, and a whole host of other Marxist causes.
You've got to ask yourself this question: is it the drugs that beget the politics or culture, or is the politics that attract the sort of people who'd want to identify with the drugs/drug culture?I'm no fan of anarchists, envirowhackos, or Marxists either. But potsmoking doesn't make them anarchists, envirowhackos, or Marxists any more than scotchdrinking makes one Republican. As a matter of fact, good, proper, dogmatic Marxists are rabidly anti-drug.
I think I'm beginning to understand your position, Dane. You seem to hate the things you associate with potsmoking, like the drug culture, and that's why you're so pro-W.o.D. I really wish you'd consider that people can smoke pot and be opposed to leftists, socialists, and the "drug culture" as much as you are.
Sorry pot's place in the modern day drug culture was assured by the leftist mid-60's counterculture of Timothy Leary and his "merry" band of drug addicts.
He claims to hate them because they remind him of his use of all kinds of drugs. He has committed crimes because of drugs and he is reminded that he is a weak willed loser whenever he sees someone use them who isn't overcome by them.
A very small part. Most of those who revel in the drug culture are anarchists or big time socialists, such as Geroge Soros.
I know, I know, you will bring up William Buckley, but the driving force(such as giving money and pushing for free needles for addicts) are mega socialists like Geroge Soros.
Did you know those guys or were you too coked out to remember?
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