Those people are now in their 60s and 70s. By far the biggest voting block and when prop 19 was on the ballot, that age bracket was most against it. People in their 20s during the 1960s early 70s where hippies so why are they most opposed to legalizing marijuana now? what happened when they said its gonna be legalized eventually?
I doubt a lot of hippies vote haha. They were against all the government control remember? Haha. And yes I know that is a pretty big generalization but whatever haha, trying to spark a discssion
they never changed their lifestyle, so they just kept living as if they were college students and never ran for office. all the people in politics today are the ones who stayed away from drugs. And let's be honest the popular vote has such little power in todays politics (not to mention the lack of voter turnout) that the people at the top of the political food chain will keep things the way they are for the sake of their investors (i.e. their money). Sadly I believe fully legal marijuana is a far way off.
I believe I read that the highest amount of voters is in the 30s to 40s range. Most seem to have no use for legal marijuana. Married, good careers, kids etc
They were probably never really that into weed. A lot of people like to smoke with friends or once in a while but few take it and continue through their whole lives. Just a stage for some people.
As long as the "Only Hippies smoke pot" mentality lives it will be an up-hill battle. I think if more people said things like, "I use Marijuana to relieve my insomnia" we would stand a much better chance of reaching our goal. MMJ is a step in the right direction, although it will be one state at a time. Even if all three states pass in November we will as a nation have less than 50% of the states on-board for MMJ. The whole decriminalize movement will have to follow the MMJ movement.
[quote name='"RC Flyer"']As long as the "Only Hippies smoke pot" mentality lives it will be an up-hill battle. I think if more people said things like, "I use Marijuana to relieve my insomnia" we would stand a much better chance of reaching our goal. MMJ is a step in the right direction, although it will be one state at a time. Even if all three states pass in November we will as a nation have less than 50% of the states on-board for MMJ. The whole decriminalize movement will have to follow the MMJ movement. [/quote] Agreed, unfortunately the hippies did give it a bit of a bad rep, unintentionally obviously, but you could also argue the fact that had the hippies not made marijuana SO popular and well-known, would we even be near where we are in the legalization battle?
For every action there is an opposite and equal reaction.. so For every hippie fighting the power there was some hitler wanna be that starting dabling into politics at their local republican club... Ive yet to see a democratic club tho.. Do they not exist?
Lol.. Hippies and Congress don't mix to well. How are hippies going to change anything when none of them got voted in as members of the Senate or House of Representatives? Sure, as an ordinary citizen they still have a voice to be heard, but honestly just having a voice usually doesn't get anything done when it comes to mind altering substances. You need to have a majority of lawmakers agree on something. And there wasn't enough hippies out there to get that kind of majority.. You would need like a billion hippies to hope that a few hundred of them would make it into the House or Senate...
I keeeeeed... But seriously, I think alot of the hippies of the 60's might have seen weed as an experiment of the time and have been drawn into the gateway drug theory... then they started spewing that nonsense to the next generations. The late 70's and 80's didnt help too much either. If we had 1/2 the courage, conviction and love they had back then we may have a chance with pot legalization... We can try but will ultimately fail to get back to the community spirit you saw at woodstock.... Remember the failure that was woodstock 99?? My faith is waning... My 20 year old cousin told me at a bbq last week that she loves to go out and binge drink with her friends and go to hookah bars for the baccy, but pot is really bad because it can lead to more harmful things. lol
From what I always understood, Jimmy Carter ran for President in the late 70's sporting a legalization/decrim platform in order to get the vote from all the hippies and stoners and whatnot and get elected through this political standpoint. However, (as I understand) what happened was pretty much one of his higher ups in the campaign got caught with cocaine and it was of course made a huge deal in the media and in the political arena. And thus he could not afford to be seen as 'soft on drugs' even though MJ was not an issue at the time. And it was all downhill from there. Nixon didn't exactly help either after already being highly against drugs.. and starting the DEA
They weren't about organized fundamentals..they just tried to live by their own terms and doing lots of drugs was part of that.
As do I, point being the slang remains the truth for the uninformed voters. MJ has the rebellious aspect to it, the "Stoner" image and until the consumers of MJ begin working towards changing the image, the uninformed voters will keep their mindset and remain uninformed. What I'm saying is that we the users of MMJ or MJ need to present a new image to the people that can make a difference. We can't just post on a forum that the government should see it from our point of view and change the laws while we continue to behave/speak as if we are rebellious. Most people wear a button up shirt and tie to court regardless of their stature in the community. Dress for success!