B.C. ELECTION PROFILE - MARC EMERY, B.C. MARIJUANA PARTY

B.C.'s Prince of Pot is bringing his message to Fort
Langley-Aldergrove - and not everyone is going to be impressed.

The leader of the B.C. Marijuana Party has some hard opinions of
Langley residents, and some radical ideas for pot, education, and
healthcare reform.

And he's not scared to share them.

Langley is filled with "old people who are intolerant and bigoted and
hate young people," and those old people support marijuana
prohibition, said Marc Emery.

As well, the outspoken pot advocate said the public education system
needs to be abolished and tax money should not be spent on seniors'
healthcare.

Emery, who lives in Vancouver's Coal Harbour, is running in the Fort
Langley-Aldergrove riding in the upcoming provincial election.

He doesn't expect to win a seat in Victoria, but he does expect to
stimulate debate. "I like to think I'm stirring people's intellectual
consciousness and perhaps their consciences, to boot," he said.

The founder of the BCMP is not concerned publication of his harsh
criticisms of riding residents will alienate him from the community.

"If you write it accurately," he said in a recent interview with the
Langley Advance News, "I shouldn't tick off the intelligent, thinking
people of Langley; they should be in agreement with me because they've
observed the same phenomena - won't they?

"After all, bigots rarely recognize themselves in the mirror, so I
don't expect any kind of acknowledgement from them, except for hostility."

Emery, 47, isn't a newcomer to the political scene. He's run for
civic, provincial, and federal seats in B.C. and Ontario.

He's also an old-hand at social activism. He's been sent to jail to
support the right for stores to open on Sunday in Ontario, went to
court to strike down Canada's obscenity laws, and has led tax
resistance to government-funded events.

The publisher and editor of Cannibas Culture Magazine and owner of
Emeryseeds.com and pot-tv.net is best known in B.C. for his public and
vocal stand on the legalization of marijuana.

The former bookstore owner has come to Langley to face his arch enemy,
B.C. Solicitor General and current Liberal MLA for Fort
Langley-Aldergrove Rich Coleman.

Emery's first public foray into Langley was at the recent marijuana
forum hosted by Langley MP Mark Warawa [Panel blasts pot law, April 1,
Langley Advance News].

After being uninvited from the forum panel, he showed up to voice his
opinion anyway, and was met with the "raw hatred of the seniors" there.

"Old people like complacency and conformity," Emery said, "and they
don't want anything to change in their community, and Langley is
perhaps the most embarrassing example of it, because I saw more
ignorance and more hatred vented at that meeting by largely white
seniors than I've ever seen anywhere else in the province."

Emery does't like seniors' healthcare, either. He is advocating a
system in which no tax money is spent on hospitalization of anyone
over the age of 70.

"Old people are the biggest welfare recipients of our medical system,"
he said. "We spend far too much of our taxpayers' money on a rapidly
growing population of old people. We're spending lots of money keeping
_ many many millions of old people _ alive when it would be much more
honourable to let them die in a dignified way."

Emery has ideas for education as well. He wants children aged five to
16 to have their own tutors for four hours a day, followed by two
hours of supervised activity of their choosing.

"We should abolish this cold, heartless architecture that we have in
this school system where we have built these cold, unloving buildings
with unionized teachers that basically preach conformity and allow
this bullying _ to go on and intimidate our young people," he said.

Emery's and his party's main platform is the legalization of marijuana
under state control - just like the production, sale, consumption, and
taxation of alcohol.

Legalization of marijuana, he said, would delete the criminal
component and its associated costs.

"We've manufactured crime," Emery said.

More and longer jail terms "raise the price the marijuana," he said.
"Legalizing marijuana would totally repress the market."

The final outcome of the May 17 election is not his ultimate goal -
societal change is: "It doesn't matter about the vote. It matters
about changing people's minds, because were talking about the
integrity of our society in the future."