Today is April 20th, 2013... a celebrated holiday to millions of Americans. What they are celebrating is a plant with amazing and mystifying properties... a healing plant and one that brings enlightenment to it's users. The plant is called cannabis. It's history of use goes back hundreds of thousands of years. It's use includes as a medicine, as a shamanistic purveyor of visions, a recreational means to let go of the stresses of life and to unwind, safely, in the majority of cases.
"Started in 1971 as a codename for San-Rafael high-schoolers on the hunt for an elusive and now mythical marijuana patch, 420 has turned into an annual celebration and over the years April 20 has become some kind of national holiday for marijuana activists." Quote from an anonymous source. But the history is well documented.
"Marijuana"... on the federal level is a Schedule One narcotic, with the alleged dangers for being extremely addictive, without any medical value, and a plant that is so dangerous that since 1971 and passage of Nixon's "Drug Control Act" has cost the American tax-payer trillions of dollars in prohibition efforts and eradication intervention. Today marijuana provides millions of dollars of benefits to law enforcement, prisons, and drug rehabilitation centers. Millions of Americans use what's called marijuana, many on a daily basis, like alcohol or tobacco, which are also drugs, however, marijuana is a drug in a class considered an exception to those drugs that are legal. Despite the deaths and destruction caused by alcohol and tobacco use, marijuana is considered far more dangerous to society, and yet, not one recorded, documented death is due to the use of marijuana.
Despite hundreds of thousands of years of the use of marijuana and no documented, verified harms as a result of it's use, millions of citizens lives has been ruined either through imprisonment or criminal penalties which become a criminal record and that interfere with gainful employment, education or simply, promote alienation that interferes with individual marijuana users from sharing similar passions.
How can this be?
Normal explanations seem to fail to express the truth or reality; they've been tried so many times in the past by myself and others and those efforts yield blank stares or disbelief by onlookers and those who make the laws.
This disbelief is the result of an exceptionally well thought out, successful and biased propaganda effort begun by the free press, aka newspapers/journalists, what was called yellow journalism back in the early 20th century (early 1900's). This group became an invaluable partner to the federal government when, after the end of alcohol prohibition, after the end of the Great Depression, after the end of the Civil War, passage of the Emancipation Proclamation made Blacks (Negroes) free and equal to all American citizens; something that didn't sit well with many pro-slavery advocates. There was something else that didn't sit well with many Americans, especially those in the southern states. Just like today, illegal immigration from Mexico was deemed a problem - a big problem, as back then, after the great Depression there were limited jobs as it were for American citizens. The one difference compared to today is that there wasn't a drug war, there wasn't a concern that drugs were being smuggled over the border.
Cannabis, ganja, hemp were all legal. But America had a problem - not all of America, but enough people and enough politicians that there was a problem to solve.
1) How to prevent interracial sex between Black men and White women. As late as 1978 I spoke with a elderly woman quite upset with the still ongoing trend where Black men and white women mingle. She point out your routine blood poster that for a college student shows different types of blood. One type was called normal blood. Another type shown on the poster was labeled, sickle cell. This she said, pointing to the sickle cell blood is "niggers blood". And they are spreading it to Whites. She concluded, "they don't have the same blood as Whites.
I tried to explain to her that sickle cell was a disease, not the blood of Blacks. I said, "we all share the same kind of blood, human blood. She was unconvinced and I left her with her illusion.
2) There happened to be something Mexicans enjoyed a lot. They called it marijuana. It just so happened that Black Americans were hitting the high times with their Jazz music. These Black Jazz artists just happened to have a wild flock of followers - White women.
1 + 2 = 4. Anti-Emancipation groups along with southern states were demanding the federal government do something. At first, there seemed to be nothing they could do. They couldn't interfere in relations between Blacks and Whites, and they were only having limited success preventing Mexican's from crossing the border to find work in the US. Until one unnamed genius in one of the southern states stuck upon the fact that Mexicans enjoyed marijuana.
William Randolph Hearst (Wikipedia Link) is best known for the birth of Yellow Journalism (Wikipedia Link). We have his legacy and empire to thank for the for the most successful sham on the American public and indeed, the world, something unprecedented in it scale and the consequences. Yellow journalist were able to rouse an unconcerned public with the news that Black jazz musicians were doping White women with a powerful new drug supplied my Mexicans. Movies were made, the most famous being Reefer Madness - 1936 (Wikipedia Link). And to add horror to the mix, the drug was allegedly being pushed on unsuspecting children and teenagers.
The dangers of marijuana became a firestorm in Washington, with a newly created department of the federal government, and it's first commissioner, Harry J. Anslinger at the helm. His job, prevent loss of tax revenue due to trafficking of illegal drugs. There was just one problem, ganja wasn't illegal in the US. That's what Mexican's used, only they called it marijuana. Marijuana was a plant, an invaluable plant used in industry and medicine. Harry's job wasn't to bust ganja users in America, it was to control hard drugs and eradicate a loss of tax revenue to the federal government. Yellow journalists saw it differently. Several corporations saw it differently. Mexicans had to go; Blacks had to be put back in place; marijuana and hemp had to go - hemp fiber used to make rope and fabric was a hindrance to corporations creating new synthetics fibers. Cannabis as medicine, hardly considered - at Congressional hearing in the 1930's only one doctor was interviewed as to his opinion on the dangers of cannabis, and prohibition. He stated it was a medicine and was quite opposed to restrictions. He was of course ignored.
Harry J. Anslinger had only one big problem - there were still insufficient grounds to outlaw a plant. It would be like demanding he outlaw coffee or tobacco. At first he refused. But then he struck on an idea. The solution to machine-gun wielding thugs during prohibition was to charge an enormous tax to own a machine gun. Of course you had to present the machine gun first to pay the tax, which meant you were arrested for possessing a machine gun illegally as you hadn't paid the tax. Those worthy of owning a machine gun like law enforcement or reputable dealers were of course proved with the required tax stamp. So Harry decided to do the same with cannabis, and the birth of the Marihuana Tax Act was born.
No I did not misspell marijuana, Congress did. As I said, in America we knew it by three names, cannabis, ganja and hemp. Mexican's called it marijuana. Congress, or some clerk typed marihuana, and to this day all legal decrees bear the name marihuana.
Not only is it misspelled, prejudicial and the science is wrong about any alleged dangers... but for 75 years people have been hounded and punished for possession and use of a plant that was never a concern to the population in the first place. Whole generations of people have been misled and prohibited fro being equal members of society for choosing a plant instead of synthetics, alcohol or tobacco. Lovers, those seeking can advertise interest in the aforementioned, but risk the law if they share an interest in cannabis.
And after 75 years, all that is about to change - two states, Colorado and Washington have legalized cannabis for personal use and plan to market it as alcohol. More than 15 other states have legalized it for medicinal use, and all this despite the fact the federal government placed cannabis in a federally controlled category of the most dangerous and addictive drugs in the world, as Schedule One, without any medicinal value, and as such, medicinal studies about cannabis are forbidden without a license from the federal government, assuring that any research be biased towards it's dangers not it's benefits. Ironic then the the federal government owns the only patent on cannabis as a medicine, showing proven of it's active ingredient, THC.
Again... Happy 420 - hope everyone had a really great celebration!
About me, celebrating? I had to replace a fuel-pump in my car that died after the one year warranty expired and I'm drinking beer. I would prefer a joint (cannabis cigarette) but alas, I'm 58 and out of touch with the younger generation that has access to the plant. See, although Congressman Rand Paul might believe cannabis is something you grow out of by age 28, a fade, so to speak - to take up drinking beer and whiskey, or like Vice President Biden hopes we'll all grow up and "buy a shotgun" instead of a handgun, truth is, there are actually many millions of people over age 28 that prefer the handgun as much easier to carry than a shot-gun and the cannabis much safer than the beer and whiskey. That's plain, common-sense reality.
Stop The Hurt! End the War!
"Started in 1971 as a codename for San-Rafael high-schoolers on the hunt for an elusive and now mythical marijuana patch, 420 has turned into an annual celebration and over the years April 20 has become some kind of national holiday for marijuana activists." Quote from an anonymous source. But the history is well documented.
"Marijuana"... on the federal level is a Schedule One narcotic, with the alleged dangers for being extremely addictive, without any medical value, and a plant that is so dangerous that since 1971 and passage of Nixon's "Drug Control Act" has cost the American tax-payer trillions of dollars in prohibition efforts and eradication intervention. Today marijuana provides millions of dollars of benefits to law enforcement, prisons, and drug rehabilitation centers. Millions of Americans use what's called marijuana, many on a daily basis, like alcohol or tobacco, which are also drugs, however, marijuana is a drug in a class considered an exception to those drugs that are legal. Despite the deaths and destruction caused by alcohol and tobacco use, marijuana is considered far more dangerous to society, and yet, not one recorded, documented death is due to the use of marijuana.
Despite hundreds of thousands of years of the use of marijuana and no documented, verified harms as a result of it's use, millions of citizens lives has been ruined either through imprisonment or criminal penalties which become a criminal record and that interfere with gainful employment, education or simply, promote alienation that interferes with individual marijuana users from sharing similar passions.
How can this be?
Normal explanations seem to fail to express the truth or reality; they've been tried so many times in the past by myself and others and those efforts yield blank stares or disbelief by onlookers and those who make the laws.
This disbelief is the result of an exceptionally well thought out, successful and biased propaganda effort begun by the free press, aka newspapers/journalists, what was called yellow journalism back in the early 20th century (early 1900's). This group became an invaluable partner to the federal government when, after the end of alcohol prohibition, after the end of the Great Depression, after the end of the Civil War, passage of the Emancipation Proclamation made Blacks (Negroes) free and equal to all American citizens; something that didn't sit well with many pro-slavery advocates. There was something else that didn't sit well with many Americans, especially those in the southern states. Just like today, illegal immigration from Mexico was deemed a problem - a big problem, as back then, after the great Depression there were limited jobs as it were for American citizens. The one difference compared to today is that there wasn't a drug war, there wasn't a concern that drugs were being smuggled over the border.
Cannabis, ganja, hemp were all legal. But America had a problem - not all of America, but enough people and enough politicians that there was a problem to solve.
1) How to prevent interracial sex between Black men and White women. As late as 1978 I spoke with a elderly woman quite upset with the still ongoing trend where Black men and white women mingle. She point out your routine blood poster that for a college student shows different types of blood. One type was called normal blood. Another type shown on the poster was labeled, sickle cell. This she said, pointing to the sickle cell blood is "niggers blood". And they are spreading it to Whites. She concluded, "they don't have the same blood as Whites.
I tried to explain to her that sickle cell was a disease, not the blood of Blacks. I said, "we all share the same kind of blood, human blood. She was unconvinced and I left her with her illusion.
2) There happened to be something Mexicans enjoyed a lot. They called it marijuana. It just so happened that Black Americans were hitting the high times with their Jazz music. These Black Jazz artists just happened to have a wild flock of followers - White women.
1 + 2 = 4. Anti-Emancipation groups along with southern states were demanding the federal government do something. At first, there seemed to be nothing they could do. They couldn't interfere in relations between Blacks and Whites, and they were only having limited success preventing Mexican's from crossing the border to find work in the US. Until one unnamed genius in one of the southern states stuck upon the fact that Mexicans enjoyed marijuana.
William Randolph Hearst (Wikipedia Link) is best known for the birth of Yellow Journalism (Wikipedia Link). We have his legacy and empire to thank for the for the most successful sham on the American public and indeed, the world, something unprecedented in it scale and the consequences. Yellow journalist were able to rouse an unconcerned public with the news that Black jazz musicians were doping White women with a powerful new drug supplied my Mexicans. Movies were made, the most famous being Reefer Madness - 1936 (Wikipedia Link). And to add horror to the mix, the drug was allegedly being pushed on unsuspecting children and teenagers.
The dangers of marijuana became a firestorm in Washington, with a newly created department of the federal government, and it's first commissioner, Harry J. Anslinger at the helm. His job, prevent loss of tax revenue due to trafficking of illegal drugs. There was just one problem, ganja wasn't illegal in the US. That's what Mexican's used, only they called it marijuana. Marijuana was a plant, an invaluable plant used in industry and medicine. Harry's job wasn't to bust ganja users in America, it was to control hard drugs and eradicate a loss of tax revenue to the federal government. Yellow journalists saw it differently. Several corporations saw it differently. Mexicans had to go; Blacks had to be put back in place; marijuana and hemp had to go - hemp fiber used to make rope and fabric was a hindrance to corporations creating new synthetics fibers. Cannabis as medicine, hardly considered - at Congressional hearing in the 1930's only one doctor was interviewed as to his opinion on the dangers of cannabis, and prohibition. He stated it was a medicine and was quite opposed to restrictions. He was of course ignored.
Harry J. Anslinger had only one big problem - there were still insufficient grounds to outlaw a plant. It would be like demanding he outlaw coffee or tobacco. At first he refused. But then he struck on an idea. The solution to machine-gun wielding thugs during prohibition was to charge an enormous tax to own a machine gun. Of course you had to present the machine gun first to pay the tax, which meant you were arrested for possessing a machine gun illegally as you hadn't paid the tax. Those worthy of owning a machine gun like law enforcement or reputable dealers were of course proved with the required tax stamp. So Harry decided to do the same with cannabis, and the birth of the Marihuana Tax Act was born.
No I did not misspell marijuana, Congress did. As I said, in America we knew it by three names, cannabis, ganja and hemp. Mexican's called it marijuana. Congress, or some clerk typed marihuana, and to this day all legal decrees bear the name marihuana.
Not only is it misspelled, prejudicial and the science is wrong about any alleged dangers... but for 75 years people have been hounded and punished for possession and use of a plant that was never a concern to the population in the first place. Whole generations of people have been misled and prohibited fro being equal members of society for choosing a plant instead of synthetics, alcohol or tobacco. Lovers, those seeking can advertise interest in the aforementioned, but risk the law if they share an interest in cannabis.
And after 75 years, all that is about to change - two states, Colorado and Washington have legalized cannabis for personal use and plan to market it as alcohol. More than 15 other states have legalized it for medicinal use, and all this despite the fact the federal government placed cannabis in a federally controlled category of the most dangerous and addictive drugs in the world, as Schedule One, without any medicinal value, and as such, medicinal studies about cannabis are forbidden without a license from the federal government, assuring that any research be biased towards it's dangers not it's benefits. Ironic then the the federal government owns the only patent on cannabis as a medicine, showing proven of it's active ingredient, THC.
Again... Happy 420 - hope everyone had a really great celebration!
About me, celebrating? I had to replace a fuel-pump in my car that died after the one year warranty expired and I'm drinking beer. I would prefer a joint (cannabis cigarette) but alas, I'm 58 and out of touch with the younger generation that has access to the plant. See, although Congressman Rand Paul might believe cannabis is something you grow out of by age 28, a fade, so to speak - to take up drinking beer and whiskey, or like Vice President Biden hopes we'll all grow up and "buy a shotgun" instead of a handgun, truth is, there are actually many millions of people over age 28 that prefer the handgun as much easier to carry than a shot-gun and the cannabis much safer than the beer and whiskey. That's plain, common-sense reality.
Stop The Hurt! End the War!
