Things we must consider before diving head-first into Legalization

Legalization is closer now than it ever has been. But we can't just say "legalize it and do what you want with it" to the government and allow them to regulate it. There are things that must be guaranteed to the citizens before legislation is made.

1. We MUST be allowed to grow our own plants. "Legalization" with private cultivation outlawed is NOT legalization AT ALL. What that is called is "giving the oligarchy complete control," which is VERY BAD. Unrestricted, unlimited, unregulated, and unmonitored private cultivation must remain lawful, and it must remain a very private matter, just like growing daisies in your windowsill. Also, a maximum-plant restriction (i.e. only allowed a max of 10 plants) is still NOT GOOD. That means that the law has the right to come into your home and count your plants. I don't want the law counting my plants. What's the difference between 10 plants and 11 plants? Or 10 plants and 1,000 plants? There is no difference. Keep the establishment out of our legal gardens.

2. Private citizens MUST be allowed to start cannabis-growing-and-retail businesses if they want, just like they can start wool-hat-knitting-and-retail businesses (or off-sale alcohol retail businesses) if they want to. And as long as they apply an age restriction and photo-ID check (it'll probably be 21 because the average non-smoker always equates weed with alcohol which is wrong; it should be 18) then there MUST be NO restrictions against that business that the wool-hat business doesn't also receive.

These two guarantees ensure against a corporate monopoly which would certainly ruin cannabis and its culture as we know it.

2b. However, a license must be obtained in order to sell cannabis, similar to the license required to sell alcohol. A private citizen with a cannabis retail business MUST be able to obtain this license, although it ought to be easy to lose if you sell to a minor. (It's bullshit losing your license for selling to someone under the influence though; I know I'm gonna be buying weed high all the time, it's no big deal.) Saying it ought to be easy to lose if you sell to a minor doesn't, however, mean that the business ought to be "watched" more closely than an off-sale alcohol retailer. That's bullshit.

3. Cannabis used as hemp MUST have no drug-related restrictions applied at all. It shall be promoted as an extremely useful, plentiful, easily manageable source of fiber, pulp, and renewable energy. Farmers growing hemp shall not be subject to any kind of search or investigation any more than a farmer growing corn. EVEN IF SOME OF HIS PLANTS HAVE NOTICEABLY DANK HIGH-THC FLOWERING BUDS (unlikely on an industrial scale). Who cares if some or even all of his crop has the potential to get someone high? It's all going to get mulched into paper or woven into clothing anyway. We've got to remember that smokeable weed is just cannabis flowers, and cannabis is naturally a flowering plant, so if you see some "flowers" on a farmer's hemp crop, it DOES NOT MEAN he is explicitly growing marijuana. It means he is growing a flowering plant that naturally flowers in an attempt to procreate because it is a flowering plant. Industrial hemp contains both male and female plants, anyway, so any females sprouting smokeable flowers will likely be "deflowered" by the males, which essentially makes it useless to smoke.

4. The restrictions, if any, against driving under the influence of cannabis MUST NOT be any more harsh than the restrictions against driving under the influence of alcohol. In fact, I'm going as far as to say that they MUST be MORE LENIENT than current drunk-driving laws. "The punishments for a drug must not be more harmful than the drug itself." - Jimmy Carter. This applies to driving under the influence of those drugs, as well. Drunk driving is an absolutely monstrous offense and costs thousands of innocent lives every year. I advocate for STRICTER drunk-driving laws. But driving under the influence of cannabis is simply not comparable to alcohol. Personally, although I can't speak for everyone, I drive with INCREASED care and attention when I'm high. That's not to say that a first-time user who smoked way too much weed wouldn't be a danger behind the wheel of a car. They probably would be. I wouldn't have been able to safely drive a car the first time I got high. (Similar to being moderately drunk - although people drive moderately drunk all the time.) Now, I don't know the solution to this problem, but I just want it acknowledged that frequent/habitual/regular users of cannabis who are experienced with the effects are no more a danger on the road than anyone else. Sure, I accept that a person can be "too high" to drive, regardless of their tolerance. Be responsible. If you know you're going driving, maybe don't demolish five huge gravity bong hits beforehand. Just do one or two. All I'm saying is that if a person gets randomly pulled over by the cops or hits a police check-stop and his or her eyes are red and they smell like weed, they should NOT be immediately punished based on those criteria alone. Driving performance should be the only determinant of punishment. The officer should acknowledge that the driver is high, tell the driver that he knows he or she is high, perhaps give an unofficial warning, remind him or her to drive safe, note the vehicle and maybe pull it over if he sees it again during the night just to check up on it, but he should NOT be allowed to punish the driver in any way unless the driver violates a traffic law. Overall, the general public MUST realize that driving high is NOT AT ALL similar to driving drunk, and DOES NOT deserve the same restrictions.

5. There should be NO legal restrictions against smoking cannabis in a public outdoor environment. There should, however, be legislation in place that prohibits cannabis smoking in typically crowded areas such as bus stops and the like. If a police officer happened upon a cannabis smoker in a crowded area full of people that are clearly disapproving of his or her activity, he should tell him or her to take it somewhere else, perhaps give him or her a small fine, similar to alcohol in public. However, a person smoking weed in a park somewhere out of everyone's way and minding their own business should NOT be criminalized. An alcohol drinker in the same situation WOULD be criminalized. Here's the difference: There are many buildings in which you can legally drink alcohol but CANNOT smoke. So if a cannabis smoker was restricted from smoking outdoors, the only place they could legally smoke would be their own home and "vapor lounges" designed specifically for weed smoking. (Even if some other building (restaurant, bar, whatever) still allowed cigarette smoking they would still obviously disapprove of weed smoking, so weed smokers would have very little places to go.) A group of people passing a pipe in the corner of some vacant park out of peoples' way should NOT be criminalized.



OK, that's all I can think of. This is getting long enough anyway.

So yeah, these five things must be assured if we want PROPER legalization. I'm sorry it's so long. Thank you for reading.

 

While I agree that a lot of what I said is wishful thinking, I think the first point, that we ought to be allowed to grow our own plants, should be taken very seriously. If private cultivation is not allowed when it's legalized, then it will have all been for naught. If you take anything away from this thread, let it be this. We must hold on to private cultivation!

Edit: This point is also pretty important: ... if a person gets randomly pulled over by the cops or hits a police check-stop and his or her eyes are red and they smell like weed, they should NOT be immediately punished based on those criteria alone. Addendum: Having weed in the car with you should not be grounds for punishment either. Driving around with buddies smoking weed is one of the best ways to smoke. It is in no way similar to driving around with booze in the car, which I do believe is wrong. It's perfectly fine, it doesn't get in anybody else's way, and depending on outdoor-smoking laws, it might be the only other place we can smoke besides our home.

There are lounges like that in Vancouver. Marc Emery owns one, it's cool. Bring your own bud, chill and smoke with other people... You can rent a vaporizer, hence the name vapour lounge. Video games, pool, outdoor patio, etc. Very cool.

 

Haha, I believe that, for sure.

Thanks for the positive replies, guys. I didn't expect this much support initially. This is great.

As a footnote, I realize that we may not get all this when we get legalization. We'll be lucky to even get one. I'm also familiar with the phrase "beggars can't be choosers." But if we could have our cake and eat it too, this is what it would look like, to me. Btw, I still think not being immediately criminalized for driving high and private cultivation are worth fighting for.

 

Hahaha yeah, how right you are. Unfortunately.

I find it hilarious and outrageous at the same time that people who have never been high seem to automatically know everything about it because Nancy Reagan told them to Just Say No.

I think the reason, ultimately, why legalization is such a difficult uphill battle for us is because the public STILL doesn't know the truth. I think we're getting ahead of ourselves by trying to legalize BEFORE trying to completely justify (or justifize ) cannabis as relatively safe compared to every other drug, legal or not. (I know we've been doing that as well, but simply as a REASON for legalization, not as an end in and of itself.) Completely justifying weed is probably not realistic however because of how fickle and easily-persuaded the masses are, especially under corporate smear. In reality, it probably is easier in the long run to just keep pushing for legalization before securing the truth, but it seems backwards in hind-sight.