TAKE CRIMINAL ELEMENT OUT OF MARIJUANA

Re: 'An organized crime gang war,' News, Oct. 24.

Another grow-op, another shootout. Another comparison to Chicago during
alcohol prohibition and yet another police spokesperson who doesn't get it.
Enough. It's time to get the profit motive and the criminal element out of
this business. It's time to stop coming up with specious, easily disproven
health reasons for not treating marijuana like tobacco and alcohol.

It's time to stop using children as an excuse that we might send the wrong
message when they have an easier time buying marijuana than cigarettes and
beer because drug dealers don't ask for proof of age. It's time to stop
butting into the private lives of people who prefer marijuana to martinis.

It's also time to stop treating everyone like children because some people
make the bad choice to drive after smoking pot (even though it has been
convincingly argued that impairment is minimal compared to cellphones, CD
players and liquor).

It's time to stop listening to special interests like the police unions,
ill-informed MPs bent on scoring political points and the United States, who
we now know fight wars, be it drug or conventional, based on lies. It's time
to legalize, regulate and gently tax marijuana.

It's also time for closet cannabis consumers - and there are many in
Scarborough - to speak out for our community and put an end to the violence
that organized crime brings to underground markets. More police resources
and more intrusions of privacy are not the answer. A half-hearted
decriminalization bill that makes it easier to bust people isn't either.

Tim Meehan, Communications director

Ontario Consumers for Safe Access to Recreational Cannabis