Public Seeing Through Government Lies About Marijuana

When the Marijuana Tax Act was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1969 (in Leary vs. United States), the government replaced it with the Controlled Substances Act. That law classified marijuana as a Schedule I drug -- the same classification as dangerous drugs like heroin, and a class above drugs like cocaine or morphine. This has always been a ridiculous move, since marijuana is not at all dangerous. And anyone who claims marijuana causes death or addiction is either ignorant or a liar.

The truth is that most over-the-counter drugs (like aspirin & other pain-killers, cough syrups, and cold medications) are more dangerous than marijuana. And many legal recreational drugs (like tobacco and alcohol) are much more dangerous than marijuana. Marijuana wasn't outlawed because it was dangerous. It made illegal as a tool to control people the government didn't like (minorities, hippies, activists, etc.) -- it being much easier to find (or plant) marijuana on these people and send them to jail, than it was to prove they were committing a real crime (since most of them weren't).

But the government knew they could never get away with that if the people knew how harmless marijuana really was, so they had to lie, classify it as a Schedule I drug, and engage in an ongoing program of propaganda to convince Americans it was dangerous -- and that's what they did for decades. Fortunately, the American people are starting to realize that they've been lied to and manipulated, and many no longer believe those lies.

The charts above come from a recent survey on drugs by the Pew Research Center (done between February 14th and 23rd of a national sample of 1,821 adults, with a margin of error of 2.6 points). Note that a huge majority of the public knows that the legal drug alcohol is far more dangerous than marijuana to a user (or to society). And since alcohol is legal, why shouldn't the far less dangerous drug of marijuana also be legal?

The answer of course is that it should be legal for any adult to possess and use marijuana. To be blunt, it should never have been illegal. Currently about 54% of Americans think marijuana should be legalized -- a 12 point margin over those who would keep it illegal (and the largest margin recorded so far). And an even larger percentage (76%) think marijuana users should NOT be sent to jail.

The tide is turning in this country. Two states (Colorado & Washington) have already legalized marijuana, and other states are sure to follow soon. Alaska will vote on legalization in August, and California will probably again vote on legalization in November. Of course the right-wingers will continue to fight legalization (not wanting to give up their tool of social control), but I think we have passed the tipping point (and soon marijuana will be legal across the nation. I certainly hope so. It's about time we stopped trying to destroy the lives of decent and otherwise law-abiding people just because they use the gentle herb.