Pubdate: Sun, 22 Sep 2002
Source: Toronto Star (CN ON)
Copyright: 2002 The Toronto Star
Contact:  http://www.thestar.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/456
Author: Ben Rayner
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?218 (Canadian Senate Committee on 
Illegal Drugs)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

PUT THAT IN YOUR PIPE AND PASS IT AROUND

Legalize Pot Already And Stop The Tedious, Tiresome Debate

For the better part of a century, the great marijuana debate has been a 
source of puzzled bemusement for many and a trigger for complete, 
blithering outrage amongst others who fail to see why any debate should 
exist at all in the first place.

The argument remains, and always will remain, an irresolvable one.

Such is the nature of the entire drug question.

For every rational, reasoned point one can raise in favour of a permissive 
attitude towards the use or sale of mood-altering substances, there'll 
always be someone collapsed on the sidewalk outside a nightclub somewhere, 
twitching and foaming at the mouth in the throes of an overdose, to present 
an equally valid argument in opposition.

Talk of liberalizing the laws governing pot in Canada has flared up off and 
on for about as long as the laws themselves have been in place. Our very 
own Prime Minister recommended a change in legislation while serving as 
Justice Minister under Trudeau. If, however, any progress has actually been 
made against bureaucratic stall tactics - a lengthy, inefficient "official 
commission" is the most common - it's usually been rendered meaningless 
when a change of government swats the whole, tiresome process back to 
square one again. Which is, of course, exactly what each nervous 
administration to wade into the marijuana fracas was praying would happen 
all along.

The players change, the arguments on both sides are updated to fit the 
temper of the times, but some things have always held true. The most vocal 
and passionate opponents of pot use have likely never smoked a joint in 
their lives, and probably should. Meanwhile, those who've enthusiastically 
adopted pot legalization as their cause celebre are all too often genial, 
dreadlocked space cases in Rusted Root T-shirts who fit and define a rather 
obvious but enduring marijuana-advocate stereotype that doesn't preach 
terribly well to the unconverted. And, no matter how many "smoke-ins" are 
held and legal hemp "test crops" are cultivated and cautiously pot-positive 
government reports are tabled, at the end of the day nothing ever changes.

Since the mid-'90s, though, pro-cannabis forces have gained new legitimacy 
thanks to the gradual institutional acceptance of marijuana's medicinal 
qualities. Compassion for the sick, suffering and dying has softened the 
hearts and made grudging supporters of traditionally conservative forces in 
the public and in office. And, since the federal Liberals will apparently 
be in power until the end of history, they've had no choice but to 
acknowledge that a growing majority of the public really doesn't think weed 
is necessarily an instrument of the Devil, a psychotic agent or the 
"gateway" to heroin addiction.

The government has to do something soon, anyway, since it's sitting on an 
enormous crop of medicinal marijuana grown deep in an abandoned mine in 
Flin Flon, Man. - amidst, of course, the kind of impregnable security 
typical of U.S. missile bases - that it can't legally distribute to those 
who need it.

Let's get on with it, already. And, not to undermine medicinal marijuana's 
worthy cause, let's also stop pretending that this is all about AIDS 
patients, wondrous hemp products and a renewable fuel source.

Let us, once and for all, concede that the recreational smoking of pot is 
no big deal, that some drugs are much less potentially harmful than others 
and that it's ridiculous to legislate against a weed that can grow easily 
in ditches.

I'm exceedingly fond of pot, myself, and I'd be hard-pressed to name more 
than a couple of people I know who don't light up from time to time. My 
mother, bless her, is about the only person I know personally who feels the 
act is particularly unnatural or dangerous. To me, it's a means of chemical 
relaxation preferable even to my beloved beer, a facilitator for abstract 
creative thought, a way of getting into those Beachcombers reruns on APTN, 
the reason I sometimes conduct heartfelt attempts to broker peace between 
my roommate's cat and my neighbour's dog. That's not so bad.

I've known a couple of dedicated potheads, true, who became inert blobs of 
goo permanently fastened to the couch and Incredible Hulk cartoons, but - 
overlooking the side effects of smoking anything and the possible hazards 
of driving while under the influence - that's about as nefarious as 
marijuana gets. Career potheads are a far less objectionable lot than, for 
instance, career crackheads. Heavy pot smokers tend to be a Happy 
Gilmore-loving, stop-and-smell-the-roses breed, as opposed to 
fire-the-stolen-automatic-wildly-into-the-rose-bushes-'cause-"they've-been-followin'-me-all-week-tryin'-to-steal-my-sh--" 
variety of drug user.

The federal government - fearing, no doubt, a Panama-esque invasion from 
U.S. troops fighting the War on Drugs (remember that one?) - will never 
stampede straight towards legalizing pot outright, as suggested in the 
recent, contentious Senate-committee report responsible for kicking the 
marijuana debate into high gear earlier this month.

The fact that the feds let that enormous trial balloon float up with 
remarkably little fuss suggests, however, that they're close to opting for 
the more conservative tactic of official decriminalization. Whatever 
happens, of course, it'll make very little difference to the hundreds of 
thousands of Canadian pot smokers who've never paid any attention to the 
law as it stands, anyway.

It would be a refreshing change, though, if a government actually allowed 
its citizens something that made them feel good for a change, besides the 
booze and tobacco it tacitly endorses through the collection of 
ever-increasing tax revenues.

Not all of us are content to escape the penury of daily existence simply 
through vigorous exercise, the accumulation of wealth and goods and Prozac 
prescriptions, after all, and an artificial high is very often preferable 
to a natural low.

Plus, cable TV, Creamsicles and Method Man and Redman make a helluva lot 
more sense when you're baked. That counts for something. I think.

How'd you get in here, anyway?
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MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager