Eighty-eight thousand died last year from an item that is in nearly every american household. Eight million more died from a death related to an item found in nearly all drug, grocery, and convenience stores. Alcohol and tobacco have been legal in the United States for more than eighty years. Throughout this time the two have obviously affected the health of our citizens, but they have not been made illegal. Therefore, the question has recently arised, why should marijuana be illegal? Marijuana has been heavily attacked throughout the 20th century as a gateway drug that harms children, destroys family, and ruins the lives of working citizens. The United States should legalize marijuana for both recreational and medical uses while letting states regulate it like alcohol and tobacco.
As of today, more than half of the United States has legalized marijuana in some form. Marijuana use is quickly becoming a prevalent topic in the United States and many do not know the origins or the history of the substance. Marijuana has been a natural substance for thousands of years, used generation after generation. It has been used as an agent for achieving euphoria since ancient times; it was described in a Chinese medical reference traditionally considered to date from 2737 B.C. This was the first direct reference to a cannabis product as a psychoactive agent, and was found in the writings of the Chinese emperor Shen Nung “The focus was on its powers as a medication for rheumatism, gout, malaria, and oddly enough, absent-mindedness”. Marijuana is not a man made drug like the ones it is classified with. It is a natural substance of which has been used for thousands of years. As time continued marijuana use became more and more prevalent, specifically in the United States. Marijuana was listed in the United States Pharmacopeia from 1850 until 1942 and was prescribed for various conditions including labor pains, nausea, and rheumatism. A campaign conducted in the 1930s by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Narcotics (now the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs) sought to portray marijuana as a powerful, addicting substance that would lead users into narcotics addiction. By the 1950s it became an accessory of the beat generation; in the 1960s it was used by college students and “hippies” and “became a symbol of rebellion against authority.” This growing view of marijuana made people across the country see it as a large gateway drug that ruined people’s lives. By the 1970’s The Controlled Substances Act classified marijuana along with heroin and LSD as a Schedule I drug, i.e., having the relatively highest abuse potential and no accepted medical use. Throughout the 80’s marijuana held the stereotype of a deathly gateway drug causing rebellion; however, in 1990 after over a decade of decreasing use, marijuana smoking began an upward trend, especially among teens.
Many People see the growing trend of recreational and medical marijuana as a large concern and would like to keep it illegal in both recreational and medical forms. One major concern of the anti marijuana movement is that people will become addicted and will then move on to stronger drugs, this is also known as the “gateway drug” argument. This is continued from the view in the 70’s which believes marijuana will lead people to more dangerous narcotics. Furthermore, there is unknown effects of marijuana on children and teenagers brains. As stated in a CNBC article, “marijuana users would not be limited to adults if marijuana were legalized, just as regulations on alcohol and tobacco do not prevent use by youth.” Marijuana can pose a large risk to young teens, leading them to more drugs and a continued life of substance abuse. Lastly, the common conception many had when growing up was that marijuana will kill brain cells. This idea came from a research paper which looked at data from a longitudinal study done on 1000 people from Dunedin, New Zealand. The study followed subjects from age 13 to 38 and conducted IQ tests a both these ages. The findings revealed that people who were chronic users of marijuana, which are those that had a physical dependence to the drug, before the age of 18 had a drop in IQ of 8 points by the age of 38.
Contrary to popular belief, marijuana or “weed”, does not, biologically lead users to stronger substances. Marijuana is no more of a gateway than alcohol. If you are going to use the gateway drug argument, than at least stand by it completely and vote for a prohibition of alcohol. Based on statistics from the “Addiction Centers of America”, following alcohol, marijuana and tobacco were widely used as second and third substances of choice. "Alcohol was the most widely used substance among respondents, initiated earliest, and also the first substance most commonly used in the progression of substance use," the researchers concluded. Later in the study by the “Addiction centers of America”, they found that alcohol caused “far more personal and social damage than any other drug. Illegal drugs comprise less than 20 percent of substance-use disorders in the U.S.”
After looking at the findings it is seen that alcohol is a gateway into marijuana just as much as marijuana is a gateway into more drugs. Marijuana isn't a "gateway" to harder drugs in the same way that ordering an appetizer isn't a "gateway" to an entree: One comes before the other, but you're eating both because you're already at the restaurant. Based on an article from “The Atlantic”, the scientist who coined the "gateway" term recently came out with a new paper showing that it's actually nicotine that is, biologically, the most potent of gateway of all: “When rodents were primed with nicotine, then given cocaine, they liked the cocaine much more. In that case, the fact that e-cigarette use has tripled among teens in the past year should be the more worrisome trend.” Calling marijuana a gateway is a futile argument and ignores the many medical benefits it brings. Another large concern of marijuana is how it will affect our health however there is no studies showing it to be dangerous to our mental stability or the way our body functions. No one has ever died of a marijuana overdose (as opposed to alcohol), “in 2010, 38,329 people died from drug overdoses. Sixty percent of those were related to prescription drugs. In that same year, 25,692 people died from alcohol-related causes” (Huffington Post). According to a Discovery Health article, marijuana has been extremely successful in relieving nausea, which is extremely good news for cancer patients suffering from nausea as a side effect of chemotherapy. The drug also helps with people who have loss of appetite due to diseases such as HIV/AIDS. Furthermore, it helps relax muscle tension and spasms and chronic pain.
As for the theory that marijuana kills brain cells, there are three important things to note about the study:
“First, the people who were shown to have a decline in IQ are significantly small – 38 out of 1000, or 3.8 percent. Second, these individuals were using significantly more marijuana (four days per week) than the average marijuana user. Finally, they were using more marijuana consistently for much longer (20 years) than the average marijuana user.”
Just like constant use of alcohol will lead to disease and decreased health, constant unrestrained use of marijuana will lead to the same effects. Everything ranging from nicotine and cocaine to technology and cell phones contains a dangerous risk of overuse and negative effects. This gives no excuse to ban marijuana and prevent citizens from using it at their own discretion.
More and more states continue to legalize marijuana for good reason. Marijuana should be legalized across the country for both recreational and medical use as keeping it illegal contradicts the core belief America is based on. In a meeting with CNN, Ron Paul addressed Steve Bannon and his animosity towards marijuana users:
The war on drugs, to me, is a war on liberty. I think that we overly concentrate on the issue of the drug itself, and I concentrate on the issue of freedom of choice, on doing things that are of high risk…We permit high risk all the time. … Generally, we allow people to eat what they want, and that is very risky. But we do overly concentrate on what people put into their bodies. People should have the right or responsibility of dealing with what is dangerous. Once you get into this thing about government is going to protect us against ourselves, there's no protection of liberty. (qtd. In CNN)
In order to preserve the freedom and liberty of which America is based on, it is important to allow the people to make their own decisions regarding their health. United States citizens, who are of age, have constant access to alcohol however it still resulted in more than 25,000 deaths just this year (Huffington).
Marijuana is quickly becoming a topic in congressional and legislative meetings all across the country. In 2018, twelve more states are poised to consider legalizing marijuana in some fashion. According to the St. Louis Post Dispatch, in November 2018, Missouri will be voting for a possible legalization of medical marijuana. It is the job of the voters and citizens to become educated on this matter and depart from the dated views of the past.