NO VICTIM YET STILL PUNISHED

I think cannabis should be legalised because I do not think that people
should be punished for taking it whether as a recreational relaxant, a
sacrament, or as a vital relief from what can be incurable ailments.

Hundreds of millions of pounds a year of taxpayers' money is being spent on
punishing people for committing a victimless crime. All this results in is
intolerably overcrowded prisons and the alienation from society of
countless, otherwise lawabiding, citizens.

The problems normally attributed to cannabis use, such as the 'gateway
theory' (that suggests it leads to hard drugs) and that people steal to
obtain cannabis are both, ironically, caused by prohibition. If it were
legalised people wouldn't purchase it is places where illegal hard drugs
could be offered to them. Also, it would significantly reduce the amount of
people stealing to obtain cannabis as they could grow their own.

You must remember that cannabis is only a plant. Ingesting it is safer than
most garden plants. Why are they not illegal?

The Government apparently has hidden motives for prohibiting a plant that
can grow without the use of pesticides and chemical fertilisers and replace
cotton which does require pesticides, can be used as a fuel to replace
petrol, would effect the sale of alcohol and tobacco if made legal,
although millions of intelligent and healthy adults enjoy using regularly.

Whilst people are not allowed to make informed decisions about what they
put into their bodies, they are forced to buy cannabis on the illegal
market, pushing the profits into the hands of gangsters and meaning that
consumers of this substance would have to take things they would not wish
such as barbiturates and plastic (impurities), because their supply of this
Godgiven plant is not pure.

Melissa D.