Why is marijuana illegal in the United States?For a long time, I have been under the impression that marijuana has some bad side-effects like some known-name drugs. This is obviously due to how the media and the law treat marijuana.
I'm taking a college Psychology class, and in our latest chapter we're discussing psychoactive drugs and their affect on the brain and nervous system. In it, it goes into detail about the healing properties of THC and how it's used for treatment in several things including epilepsy, hypertension, nausea, glaucoma, and asthma. Since THC doesn't appear to have addictive properties (please correct me if i'm wrong), why is this drug illegal in the US?
Provide sources to back up statements too, please.
Midnight, is this passed-on knowledge, or is this from a reputable source?
Posted by Kevin
The same reason that there are so many entitlement programs....everything the government does turns to crap.
We need a SMALLER government with more FREEDOM!
Posted by I Am Responsible for Jonestown
Isn't so much the physical effect, It's more to do with trafficking. A large percentage of Marijuana is imported from south america and asia. A lot of people are murderd and killed due to these drug lords trying to make money for them selves.. It ruins societys in these countrys. For example, Mexico.. There is litteraly a drug war going on.. But to be fair that does have more to do with cocaine than anything..
Home grown Marijuana is getting some acception.. Just look at legal Medical marjiuana! That's a break through, right?
Posted by kot
Well, regular SMOKING of marijuana, apparently, increases your risk of lung cancer nearly 6 times. Other means of taking it are safer, but smoking remains the most common. There are other seriously unpleasant long term effects.
But the main corner-stone of the anti-cannabis policies is the so called "Gateway Drug" theory -- that people, who try marijuana are more likely to then try harder (and dangerously addictive) drugs like cocaine or heroin.
Posted by midnightmoon
It was made illegal as part of the personal political agenda of the first dea agents. Marijuana use was common with Mexican's, in jazz culture, and with african americans. The propaganda at the time said that it made the mexican's crazy and made the black men rape the white women, and made the white women want to be promiscuis.
Since then, it has remained illegal under a massive mountain of untruthful propaganda - from saying it is super super addictive to saying its a gate way drug and that it causes mental illnesses and all kinds of other crap.
This stuff was pounded into the heads of our parents generation, and their parents generation. Since they trusted the sources giving them this information (gov, law enforcement, etc), they believed it.
Today, we have a culture of youth who have recognized the lies, and are starting to fight back for legislation now that we are old enough to vote. But, its a hairy battle between our generation who is sick of being lied to, and their generation - the ones who believed (and still believe) the lies about marijuana.
Beyond all that, a LOT of people make a LOT of money from marijuana being illegal. It produces a lot of funding for law enforcement agencies - and since mj is the largest illegal drug, employees a lot of law enforcement. Court costs drive up a lot of municipality funds. Pharmaceutical companies are charging and arm and a leg for synthetic thc (marinol, a legal rx that is fillable nation wide) and the other medications used in its place that actually ARE chemically addictive, like morphine, oxycontin, xanax, ativan, compazine, and others.
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