Pubdate: Fri, 23 May 2014
Source: Glendale News-Press (CA)
Column: The Whiteboard Jungle
Copyright: 2014 Times Community Newspapers
Contact:  http://www.glendalenewspress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/167
Author: Brian Crosby

WHERE ARE THE VOICES AGAINST POT LEGALIZATION?

The latest Pew Research Center poll shows that 54% of Americans favor 
legalizing marijuana.

If you are part of that 54%, you must be on cloud nine (high, in other words).

First came states allowing medical marijuana dispensaries.

Then in the November 2012 election, Colorado and Washington citizens 
voted to legalize it for recreational use.

And now, California here you come, get ready for the same to happen in 2016.

Evidently, the adage "if you can't beat them, legislate them" applies 
here as politicians view selling pot as another revenue maker like 
the Indian casinos.

However, do people really want 7-Eleven to sell marijuana cigarettes?

The 420 bacchanal that occurred in Denver on Easter Sunday with 
thousands celebrating the smoking of marijuana seemed like a live 
horror movie. While smoking pot in public remains illegal, it did not 
deter most who now feel emboldened to flaunt their lifestyle while 
authorities turned a blind eye (only 47 citations were issued).

Bad behavior is the new good behavior.

It's not enough for pot smokers to continue their illegal habits in 
the privacy of their own homes. No, they want everyone to accept 
their lifestyle, and to shove it in everyone else's face. The Selfie 
generation makes the Me generation look philanthropic in comparison.

Legalizing marijuana, no matter the 21-years-old minimum-age 
requirement, gives off the message that it is safe. Never mind that 
in March a college student jumped to his death from a fourth floor 
balcony in Denver after eating a marijuana cookie, his death due to 
"marijuana intoxication."

Allowing another mind-altering drug-legal status pulls the rug out 
from under decent parents who devote their lives instilling solid 
values in their children.

Once marijuana is legalized, how do schools' anti-drug campaigns 
respond, and what changes, if any, will occur?

Currently, Glendale Unified has four middle schools and five high 
schools that have a Tobacco-Use Prevention Education program funded 
through 1988's Proposition 99 cigarette tax.

Scott Anderle, the district's assistant director of student support 
services, said that if marijuana ends up legalized, it would still 
remain illegal for minors so the same anti-drug campaign that is 
available in schools today, such as Red Ribbon Week in October, along 
with the tobacco prevention program would continue.

I've seen in my classroom students who are high by the redness of 
their eyes or by the lack of clarity in their thinking. We don't need 
more kids stoned.

It is not much of an extension to think that those people growing up 
in the permissive 1960s and 1970s have passed down to their children 
(who then pass it down to their children) the lax attitude not just 
toward drug use but other moral issues.

Those who have made cigarette smokers the lepers of the 21st century 
should likewise oppose pot smokers. All the things nonsmokers do not 
like about cigarette smoke still apply to marijuana: second-hand 
smoke, ashes and butts on the ground, and don't forget the carcinogens.

Referencing this column's title, it is a jungle out there and I 
increasingly feel powerless counteracting the nastiness that 
permeates our culture.

Over the years, with the help of William Shakespeare, Charles 
Dickens, and Maya Angelou, I've tried teaching students the 
importance of human compassion and people treating one another with a 
common decency.

Where is the organized effort to stand up for the other half who are 
not in favor of legalizing marijuana?

It seems that law-abiding people have to retreat, stay home, shut the 
doors, and keep the decaying social mores away. The pot smokers are 
coming, the pot smokers are coming.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom