Get over it, legal weed is coming
The debate around the sale of recreational marijuana is no longer a moral one. I can't help but put face in palm when hearing the notion of prohibiting sales wafting like so much blown smoke over discussions about how municipalities should handle pending legalization.
Taber, Alta., the town that tried to make kids legally obliged to go inside after dark and ban swearing in public, has Mayor Andrew Prokop taking a hard-line stance and doing everything he can to block sales in their community.
The notion was raised in Penticton by Coun. Andre Martin when questioning whether people will be able to just say no, as it were, during the upcoming public engagement on the subject.
Penticton planning manager Blake Laven said prohibition is an option, but a CBC story says municipalities will have to work with provinces and won't be able to outright ban sales.
This may be one of the few instances in history that plays out like the opposite of the scene in “The Big Lebowski,” where one Lebowski tells the other “the bums lost!”
In a similar vein, those who hold a moral objection to recreational marijuana use need to butt out and let the rest of us talk reality.
At this point saying, “I don’t want marijuana in my community,” might as well be heard as, “I don’t want apples in my community.” Yes, an apple a day keeps the doctor away, and a bong hit a day has detrimental health effects, but so does a beer (available at your nearest liquor store).
I’m sorry if you are just waking up to the long history of marijuana demonization, but if it makes the transition into the future any easier, let us all remember coffee was at one time known as “Satan’s drink.” To clarify, Canada is obviously a free country and you can have a moral objection to liquor, weed or V-neck shirts for all I care, but that side of the argument is over, the bums win this time, Lebowski.
Moral apprehension to marijuana is just regurgitation of the failed war on drugs propaganada and the attempt to use demonization politically.
Fun fact: Drug prohibition started in Canada with the Opium Act of 1908, and cannabis wasn't outlawed until at least 1923. For over 55 years since the birth of the nation the plant, and it is just that, was perfectly legal.
Its popularity was more focused, however, on the many uses of hemp as opposed to recreational use, which didn't get popular until the '60s.
Prohibition didn’t work with alcohol, and the war on drugs clearly didn't work if you take a look around.
So object to marijuana consumption near schools and parks, sure, but keep your holierthan-thou, Carrie Nation-style attitudes to yourself.
Marijuana is inevitably becoming legal, and many stand to get jobs, tax benefits and more out of the world's next big cash crop, so please, let the mature among us carry on with logical solutions.
Dale Boyd is a reporter at the Penticton Herald