CANNABIS MYTHS: MOVING BEYOND THE INFLUENCE

As president of Drexel's chapter of NORML, I want to applaud the City
Council and Officer Jerry Rocks (You rock, man!) for initiating
legislation to ban marijuana paraphernalia and help protect our
children. It makes sense, because even though these products aren't
aimed at children to begin with, their very presence is a threat!
Deal with it, you filthy tobacco smokers and burnout losers, this is
one battle you criminals have lost! Okay, maybe you're already
spending a fair deal money on that evil devil, weed, that kills brain
cells, causes cancer, and renders you violent and insane.

Maybe buying blunts in bulk (as it's still legal to sell in packages
of six or more) will come across as more of an inconvenience, but the
writing is on the wall! I salute you, Rocks and City Council, for
making our streets safer from people who giggle, relax, binge eat,
philosophize and take copious naps. We don't care if you're a decent,
non-violent or even hard-working citizen.

Our rigid, black-and-white view of drug policy refuses to allow a
toxic, deadly mari-hoo-ana plant with no recorded overdoses to be tolerated!

In case you're ... well, ignorant, I'm being sarcastic.

Cannabis is non-toxic, not correlated to cancer, not linked to taking
more dangerous drugs, not proven to cause crime, less physically
addictive than caffeine and alcohol, and does not kill brain cells.

It temporarily produces insubstantial short-term memory problems
that, perhaps barring heavy and long-term usage, reverse when the
user quits. These are facts available to the public that fly in the
face of all the myths that prohibitionists shove in our faces every
day, typically in the form of airing hysterical commercials about
running over little girls or letting infants drown.

Many people don't like to acknowledge this, because drugs in general
are frowned upon (sometimes even with a beer in hand - is that irony
at its greatest, or what?) and many don't take pot-smokers seriously.

Almost every harm that's associated with marijuana, save for a
couple, originate from the fact that it's illegal.

Hasn't the temperance movement taught us anything?

Moreover, why should marijuana be a focal point of drug policy when
there are much more harmful and destructive drugs, like cocaine,
crystal meth and heroin? Of course, there are still people who refuse
to learn from history and facts, so every decade, give-or-take, we'll
still see more irritating people trying to push an agenda on us that
restricts us from being masters of our own domain involving a drug
that's arguably less harmful than alcohol.

Have you ever seen people high on pot get rowdy, loud, obnoxious and violent?

I rest my case.

Regulating and taxing marijuana would not only give citizens a better
selection in choosing intoxicants, but it would help the economy.
Let's face it - with our national deficit at $8.7 trillion, we're in
dire need of strategies to help combat our collective debt. Why not
take the accumulated hundreds of thousands of dollars that smokers of
grass spend each year out of the hands of the black market and put it
to good use? Why not save the money we waste when imprisoning
nonviolent drug offenders?

Since cannabis is far from a public health hazard, there are hardly
any risks or harms associated with its legalization.

I urge anyone who feels passion on this subject to join Drexel NORML,
or simply help raise awareness.

The longer people continue to propagate the same uneducated myths of
harms associated with cannabis, the longer our uphill battle toward
liberty will remain steep and daunting.