Even after all these years, there still are people in our midst who believe that marijuana is an evil substance, a gateway drug.
I noticed this continuing phenomenon, which has reached the sensibility of the Salem Witch Trials of the 17th century, in the wake of the news that the Wayland City Planning Commission will have its first public hearing regulating the sale, possession and distribution of “the evil weed.”
I have grown more than weary of the hysteria that has surrounded this so-called issue that I thought finally was settled, at least in Michigan, by 56 percent of voters statewide who four years ago approved a ballot proposal to make recreational marijuana legal. A proposition in 2008 to legalize recreational marijuana use was passed handily in 2008.
And now comes a proposal in the U.S. House of Representatives to make recreational pot legal nationwide.
Opposition to making weed legal largely has been the crusades of religious fundamentalists, the prison industry, the alcohol lobby and the pharmaceutical industry. The latter three have an obvious financial interest in continuing the horribly failed policies of the past that made otherwise law-abiding citizens into criminals.
I remember Jack Webb on TV’s “Dragnet” in 1969 referring to marijuana as a gateway drug, arguing that a high percentage of cocaine and heroin addicts started out on pot. My response was that his stat was meaningless because probably 99% of all alcoholics started out on milk.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I did indeed smoke marijuana during my college years, from 1968 to 1970 and then quit out of fears of getting caught. But rather than tell everybody I was glad to get off the evil weed, I declared that, “I had a good time.”
Way back in those days there were those who held on to the ridiculous notion that marijuana was addictive. Some believe it to this day. I listened to two township board trustees wax eloquent about their concerns for babies born addicted because their mothers had smoked the stuff.
I remember all too well President Richard M. Nixon declaring War of Drugs in 1971, a war that was hopelessly lost and tossed a whole bunch of public money down the toilet. I remember taking pictures of proud police officers with their harvests of weed they found in out of the way locations, foolishly thinking they somehow had made the world a better place.
On a more personal note, I had a friend in college who was caught selling marijuana and was sentenced to 60 days in jail and was deported back to his native England. I never saw him again and I was glad he never squealed on me and my comrades.
After all of those years in the Dark Ages I came to the conclusion that making pot illegal was a lot like Prohibition of alcohol from 1919 to 1933, a worthless adventure that only served to increase crime.
Yet fears of “brain chromosome damage” and other tall tales live on even to this day, proven by the reluctance of authorities and lawmakers to implement provisions approved twice by a majority of voters in Michigan.
I was glad to hear that the state-wide ballot proposal approved in 2018 would regulate pot much like alcohol because people shouldn’t use it when they drive and they shouldn’t be able to toke up anywhere they wish. Like so many other things, it needs to regulated with common sense rules.
Know this, people. The public hearing May 10 will not encourage any debate about the pros and cons of marijuana use. That ship sailed a long time ago. The discussion will be about where, when and how marijuana can be bought, sold, distributed and processed. That is all.
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