This is a three-part series on the Cannabis Community Controversy. Part 1 (Infighting in the Cannabis Community) was published on Sunday, January 8; Part 2 (Finding Common Ground) is published here; and Part 3 (How We “Win” the War on Drugs) will be published on Tuesday, January 10. Subscribe if you would like notification emailed to you whenever articles are published by Jennifer Alexander.
FINDING COMMON GROUND
Both strategies have their failings - the wellness strategy fails to highlight any potential harm that may be caused by marijuana, regardless of how unlikely that may be since it is one of the safest substances known to mankind. However, the efforts at further reform for personal use often sound callous and hurtful to those who depend upon the protections granted by medical marijuana laws, regardless of how limited those protections may be. Both strategies are also very much needed at the same time – they both address vital components of the cannabis community. There are many benefits to marijuana that are not known, and marijuana has been shown to contribute to wellness in a diverse range of health complications, including severe and chronic pain, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, nausea, anxiety, depression and even as an antitumoral. But this does not necessarily mean that "all use is medical" as Dennis Peron stated in an earlier controverisal speech. Alcohol has tremendous medical benefits(and not just in drinking it, as some studies have demonstrated, but also used as a substance to extract many other medicines and is naturally found in the human body, apple juice and even wheat bread), but that doesn't mean that "all alcohol use is medical" either, as any alcoholic can most definitely attest to!
On the other side, often too much focus is placed on "recreational use" - which is an inadequate term for what legalization proponents are typically fighting for. Legalization isn't just about allowing recreational users to use marijuana, as implied by the use of the term, but instead is about allowing any user of marijuana do so without criminal or civil penalties for their use. This would include recreational users, of course, but also includes those who use marijuana for industrial uses (hemp), spiritual uses (as a sacrament) and yes, even medical users of marijuana. Unfortunately, to the prohibitionists, all use is "recreational use" and just a "scam."This focus on recreational use, by both advocates and opponents alike, confounds the real issues and often puts patients in the middle of the storm.
LEGISLATIVE STRATEGIES
Going a step further, the issues in Washington and California with the proposed initiatives illustrate the complications of any actual language to alter the laws regarding marijuana. In California, opposition resulted from the limited garden size, the limited possession amounts and the potential removal of protections found in Prop 215 due to suspcious wording discovered by proponents for medical marijuana patients - resulting in typical supporters for marijuana reform opposing the initiative and being dubbed "Stoners Against Legalization" (again confusing the issues, since most of these advocates weren't "stoners" but instead patients, medical marijuana providers, and supporters of the overall medical marijuana cause).
Yet opponents to Prop 19 who always oppose marijuana reform identified completely different issues with the measure, including driving under the influence of marijuana - especially school bus drivers, potential loss of federal funding, preventing employers from addressing marijuana use in safety sensitive jobs, and presumed increased drug use in society after passage. Ultimately, on November 2, 2010 Prop. 19 failed with 46.5% in favor and 53.5% opposed.
Advocates in Washington attempted to address these concerns with New Approach Washington, but the end result has been just as divisive. Advocates for other Washington efforts at ending prohibition began advocating against I-502, primarily due to the DUID provisions, which were intended to overcome voter's concerns about intoxicated drivers. The New Approach FAQ on this issue highlights tax revenue allocations for future studies on intoxication and marijuana and the potential for the 5 ng/mg level to be adjusted as more research becomes available. A new bill in the works by Washington Senator Jeanne Kohl-Wells may resolve this concern, according to the Cannabis Defense Coalition: "Disallows conviction of DUI for qualifying patients based solely on the presence, or presence in a certain concentration, of components or metabolites of cannabis. Proof of actual impairment is required." However, it remains to be seen whether this will be sufficient to calm patients' concerns.
FINDING COMMON GROUND
Ultimately, it remains certain that marijuana reform efforts will always be plagued with concerns from the differing perspectives of advocates. This is true of any legislative issue, and becomes most apparent when specific concepts are introduced and both intended and unintended consequences are identified. It demonstrates immense progress that we are able to discuss these issues on the merits of the specific provisions, and not just the broad concept of the need for reform of marijuana laws in general.
However, when the polls are just barely starting to reflect a majority of support for legalization of marijuana, we should remain focused on the general arguments without becoming stuck in the quagmire of infighting. What we need to do is fight the common cause of ending marijuana prohibition. Alcohol prohibition was overturned when a diverse group of people, with varying individual interests quite similar to our diversities today, stood together for the common cause of ending alcohol prohibition. Some just wanted their beer, others wanted to remove the criminal element inherent in prohibition to protect society and children, and still others wanted to co-opt the vote as the Democrats did when they ran on a “wet-ticket” in order to appeal to the working class to overturn the Republican control of the White House.
The solution was found when they established common ground, namely that alcohol prohibition had failed. According to an opinion piece by Ethan Nadelman, Executive Director of Drug Policy Alliance:
The Americans who voted in 1933 to repeal prohibition differed greatly in their reasons for overturning the system. But almost all agreed that the evils of failed suppression far outweighed the evils of alcohol consumption.
The change from just 15 years earlier, when most Americans saw alcohol as the root of the problem and voted to ban it, was dramatic. Prohibition's failure to create an Alcohol Free Society sank in quickly. Booze flowed as readily as before, but now it was illicit, filling criminal coffers at taxpayer expense.
Some opponents of prohibition pointed to Al Capone and increasing crime, violence and corruption. Others were troubled by the labeling of tens of millions of Americans as criminals, overflowing prisons, and the consequent broadening of disrespect for the law. Americans were disquieted by dangerous expansions of federal police powers, encroachments on individual liberties, increasing government expenditure devoted to enforcing the prohibition laws, and the billions in forgone tax revenues. And still others were disturbed by the specter of so many citizens blinded, paralyzed and killed by poisonous moonshine and industrial alcohol.
Supporters of prohibition blamed the consumers, and some went so far as to argue that those who violated the laws deserved whatever ills befell them. But by 1933, most Americans blamed prohibition itself.
When repeal came, it was not just with the support of those with a taste for alcohol, but also those who disliked and even hated it but could no longer ignore the dreadful consequences of a failed prohibition. They saw what most Americans still fail to see today: That a failed drug prohibition can cause greater harm than the drug it was intended to banish.
Part 3 (How We “Win” the War on Drugs) will be published on Tuesday, January 10
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