Pubdate: Thu, 12 Oct 2000
Source: Anchorage Daily News (AK)
Copyright: 2000 The Anchorage Daily News
Contact:  http://www.adn.com/
Author: Dianne Geissinger

POT SMOKERS DON'T DESERVE JAIL

I am in my forties with a son in his mid-twenties who has smoked marijuana since he was about 14. I did not want him to and don't want him to now, but he is an adult and makes his own choices. He has his own business, has a nice relationship, and is otherwise a respectful citizen. He is a good person.

I am voting for Proposition 5 because I do not want him to go to jail. I don't want him to go through the nastiness of the criminal justice system simply because of his choice of which molecules he uses to relax at night. Talk of "protecting children" makes me boil when the politicians won't fund schools. You want to do something "for the children," try fully funding schools.

You have a minority of businessmen making a lot of money by persecuting a large segment of our society. That money would be better directed toward giving our children a real drug education and not just trying to scare them. It didn't work for my son and now I fear the government won't recognize that it failed my son if they arrest him. When you are alone in that voting booth, can you vote to continue a system that offers nothing to protect kids, but keeps in place a system that simply fills prison beds after they turn 18? If you or someone else's adult child is making these choices, ask yourself: Do they belong in prison for it?
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