I think the turning point for me was when I saw the medicinal uses were not limited to the “holistic medicine” crowd.
I used to think pot was a purely recreational drug and if it disappeared from the face of the earth, we still have beer. Now I see that it serves a medial role that cannot be easily or cheaply filled by anything else.
I used to do a lot of pot when I was in college but I stopped almost as soon as I graduated. Most of my friend stopped and the ones that didn’t were going to abuse something, whether it was pot or alcohol.
Or maybe as they got older and faced health challenges they realized they might benefit from medical marijuana. Many, many people are unempatheic about other peoples’ problems until it happens to them or someone they care about.
For me, at least, it was just more information being available, including that which fought misinformation. It being less dangerous and far less addictive than drinking really meant a lot to me. Plus it seemed that, despite being illegal, tons of people use it anyways, and to no real ill effect. It also helps that the world seems shittier and thus I see more reason that people might want to drink or smoke pot to take a break.
Nothing about any of that seem special to me, so I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the same for others. Though I do also want to add one more thing for me: the connection between why marijuana was scheduled like it was and racism, and that, even to this day, there’s disproportionate enforcement against black people.
That may be a liberal reason to support it, but my experience is that liberals tended to support it without all that. And conservatives tend to ignore or disagree with that shit.
This was a factor for me too. I think that’s why I stopped really thinking about it all that much. I knew people who did it, and they were perfectly fine people on or off marijuana. Not that I ever believed in reefer madness, but it is like many other things. We fear what we don’t know or understand, and with familiarity comes comfort and acceptance. That’s why the gay people (especially famous people) who came out early are so important and brave. Them coming out, and letting the world see that, yeah, people you like and admire are gay, and so being gay is not a big deal.
The change began when we reached the point that more than 50% of the population had either used it themselves with little or no ill effects or personally knew others that had used with little or no ill effects. Once the lie of marijuana being ultra-harmful was known and acknowledged as a lie, it was just a matter of actually changing the laws. Inertia is a powerful force, tho, so it’s taking a bit (which is fine: let the process play out, eh).
I agree with your 1st point to some extent, but I think there are a couple of twists when it comes to marijuana. I can imagine what they saw as drug-fueled depravity in the 60s is one reason why some people became conservatives in the 1st place, but then again many conservatives continued to oppose legalization because they saw it as “liberal”.
But nowadays there are some conservative who–with uncharacteristic consistency–support legalization to be in keeping with their libertarian beliefs.
If you think this is new, you’re blind. Or maybe you can explain the Religious Right falling in line behind the deficit hawks, as if Jesus cared about national deficits.
I think that reasonable people may be responding to observable decades long evidence that they have been fed loads of refer madness bullshit about May Jane’s harmfulness, and can see that imprisoning otherwise lawful and threatless citizens is barbaric and counterproductive, and further recognizing that we could be making shitloads of money from the legal sales of it.
Is it just me or is “we could be making shitloads of money from the legal sales of it” a terrible reason to legalize a drug? Even if that drug were plain pure water?
In my dream hippie world it would be just like growing tomatoes in the back yard and handing a few over the fence to the neighbor- no one would give a shit. But I live in Illinois, and realistically the only way it would ever be legalized is if the state was gonna make big bucks off of it. And that’s a compromise I could live with.
If water was illegal, I probably wouldn’t get too hung up on the details.
But it’s not actually a terrible reason. Within some limits, taking something from the black market and putting it into the regular economy is a good thing in a well functioning society.
Exactly 100%. It’s reason overcoming superstition, plain and simple. Nothing else is really involved, though of course other things do happen at the same time.
I generally agree with you all, but when I was younger and tried it, a couple of times I got paranoid as hell. If I didn’t have someone there to get me through, I don’t know what would have happened.
What caused that? All I hear is how wonderful it is.
The main active ingredient, THC, is a stimulant and a psychedelic. A low dose of stimulant is unlikely to cause paranoia but even a light dose of psychedelics can strongly amplify negative emotions and thoughts. You were probably feeling apprehensive at the prospect of using pot and that anxiety fed on itself in a self-reinforcing loop.
It’s not all wonderful and it’s not for everyone. A thread about the realistic liabilities of pot might actually be interesting.
Pretty much all I thought was necessary too. The compromise isn’t awful, and better than continuing the demonstrated weed philosophy that has cost society so much.
Yeah, it only enhances whatever feelings are already there. It doesn’t just magically take bad feelings and turn them into good ones. And yeah, it can create paranoia. I never smoke if I’m feeling shitty. I know it’ll just make me feel shittier. I know people for whom it doesn’t have this effect though; they will smoke no matter what their current situation is, no matter what trouble is going on in their lives…I just can’t do that. But different people are different. Also, different kinds of weed are different.
I am positive that if weed had been legal for the past 20-odd years, scientists would have figured out ways by now of tailoring the effects of different strains of weed very very specifically, so that you can know with virtual certainty exactly what kind of effects any given variety of it will produce. But since it hasn’t been legal and so it can’t be studied properly, this isn’t possible. I do think it will happen within the next few decades though.
See, if there was a ‘like’ button, I would have it it several times, but theses three point out to me that the support for decriminalization/legalization is a multifaceted answer. Personally, the Rockefeller Drug Laws in NY State are the most archaic laws in NY (IMHO, no cite) as they have destroyed the lives of many non-violent people…as our society gets more permissive (some for the good, some for the bad), I think we Boomers are looking at the issue as not being a big deal…I’m not sure I agree with legalization of everything, but marijuana is not an issue…again, JMHO…