I plan on presenting this in my senior US history class. I'm 18 lol, feedback wanted. EDIT: This is a very rough draft so the structure and stuff isn't that good, just the information. I of course plan on citing tons of sources as well.
its pretty good for a high school paper. some grammatical/word choice errors, so id read over it and fix those. theres a lot of claims in there with no citation (not sure if they're needed though) also id reupload a copy to grass city that dosent have your full name on it. good luck on the paper mang.
Ya I know the errors and such it was more about the info. I will most likely be presenting it as a speech and not a paper.
ah well if your going to be reading this to a class then it should be fine. it may seem a little bias and make you sound like a stoner at points but hey thats not a bad thing now is it? if your concerned about that, then play devils advocate and present some arguments from the other side although that would be really hard to do, for me at least.
No worries. Imperfection adds to authenticity, making your presentation sound more like a personal perspective and less like canned rhetoric. As always though, I strongly advocate steering away from the "worse than" arguments, which sound to non-consumers as an attempt to legalize based on being the lesser of two evils. Focus instead on the moral arguments that everyone can get behind: -War in Mexico -Penalties being much more damaging than consumption -The proven, yet disregarded, medical benefits -The way in which legalization profits criminals -The corruption, in government and law enforcement, caused by prohibition -Parallels to alcohol prohibition and it's detrimental effects on our nation -The costs of enforcement and incarceration -The concept of Victimless Crimes, namely simple possession -The deplorable state of our prisons systems -The racial motivation and racial disparities in our prisons. Just to name a few. Everyone can understand these arguments, consumer or not.
Rock on brother! Its nice to see a younger person standing up even if it may mean trouble. As I was reading it I could just see the look on your teachers face and even imagine him/her shutting you down after a few lines of your speech. If that happens, and even if it does not, I would urge you to polish that paper up and add some of the other topics that have been posted here so you have a seriously killer paper and then print off a load of copies and pass them out at your school. Im sure a ton of high school kids are advocates for legalization, but do they know WHY? All the prohibition cheerleaders today say that we are influencing the youth. Good! We need to influence the youth so as to stop perpetuating these lies and myths! If you need or want any help in writing or polishing this paper, feel free to drop me a PM. I dont really like writing too much but as a paradox I happen to excel at it and was even offered a paid position in the writing department of my college as a tutor. I would be happy to donate some of my time to peer review and fix and errors in your paper so you have a razor sharp edge to hack away at the bullshit with
You definitely need to check out Granny's MMJ Ref List. http://forum.grasscity.com/medical-marijuana/645925-grannys-mmj-list-july-2010-a.html You're pretty much guaranteed an A if you can logically refute points on such a taboo subject with legitimately credible sources. Just make sure you include some of the real risks associated with it, like inhaling combusted plant material, which can damage the lungs if it's smoked.
on page 5 you say there is over 48 million dollars spent annually by the government on cannabis prohibition, but it costs taxpayers an estimated $10 billion annually. About Marijuana btw when is your paper due, i have a research paper i got today thats due in 2 weeks that could be helpful to you if you have time.
Great paper... Did a paper myself my senior year of high school. My teacher was weary of my topic on the paper because she said most of those papers were crap. But in the end gave me an A+ for it and on graduation day told me if I every ran into her outta school we'd have to test some green to prove those theories lol She was a pretty cool teacher! Win them over sir... stay true to your points and list lots of legit reference ect....
My teacher refused my 32 page term paper on the War on Drugs and made me rewrite it on another topic in 1/2 the allowed time or he would fail me. I rewrote it on martial arts, got an A. That was in '98.
Ok he is letting me present it and its quite a bit longer now. I have a long time to finish it though.