New Voice: Amendment 2 should offend more millennials.
I recently caught up with an old friend who asked me what I’ve been doing for a living since I saw him last. “I serve as political director on the campaign to defeat John Morgan’s marijuana initiative,” I told him.
“Wow,” he said. “So basically in Florida you’re that millennial who all the millennials don’t know to hate.”
Honestly, I couldn’t have put it better; but the exchange left me wondering why there aren’t more millennials who see it my way.
There’s evidence our generation demonstrates less tolerance for corruption, schemes, phonies or — in other words — politics. That intolerance for the disingenuous is precisely why more millennials should be offended by Amendment 2.
As far as I can tell, people support Amendment 2 for three reasons:
1) They believe it will help the sick.
2) They believe even if it doesn’t help, it couldn’t hurt.
3) They believe marijuana should be legalized and that Amendment 2 either accomplishes this goal, or is, at the very least, a clever next step in doing so.
The first motive is perfectly reasonable until you understand there’s no conclusive evidence marijuana is an effective treatment for anything. This is the position of the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians and the American Epilepsy Society, which all oppose state medical-marijuana programs because the research simply isn’t there.
In essence, the opposition stands exclusively on emotional anecdotes, testimonials and public opinion — not on any substantial body of research. When you point this out, opponents tend to digress into paranoid conspiracy theories, claiming we’re paid for by Big Pharma, despite the fact that we’ve never received a dime (it’s public record). Otherwise they will try and explain away their lack of conclusive evidence as a result of marijuana’s status as a Schedule I drug. At this point, they’re hoping you won’t notice their efforts should actually be directed at lobbying the Drug Enforcement Administration to reclassify marijuana, not at blindly legalizing marijuana for medicinal benefits which, as far as we know, don’t exist.
In any case, we absolutely do harm the sick by building false hope around a street drug whose alleged medicinal benefits could be just as counterfeit as the benefits of snake oil. And the myth that marijuana is harmless is purely rooted in anecdotes and public opinion as well. Not to mention, the jury’s still out on whether marijuana’s linked to schizophrenia, or a hefty drop in IQ. But for what it’s worth, I have my own emotional anecdotes to corroborate both.
Finally, reasonable people disagree about legalization. But to use Amendment 2 to accomplish this goal is to legalize marijuana through disingenuous means — means which require parading the sick and suffering around as mere props in a political scheme. And which end in granting dishonest doctors a constitutional right to sell what could be no more beneficial than snake oil to patients who’ve been led to believe — by you — that marijuana’s their last hope. It’s difficult to imagine a more unforgivable scheme than this.
It’s never a comfortable position having to point out that the world’s not perfect. That there’s no magic pill, cure-all plant or fountain of youth. That we may never find a solution to a particular problem. But it’s certainly more rational and moral than the blatantly anti-intellectual position of my opponents who are intent on convincing the public that we are better off abandoning 21st-century medical standards — trading in the physician only to welcome back the witch doctor.
And with that, I leave you. Knowing full well that very soon I’ll be in the position of repeating (for I don’t know how long) one of two things. Either, “you’re welcome;” or, “I told you so.”
I pray it’s not the latter. Andrew Sutton, 24, of Belle Isle earned his bachelor’s degree in English from Florida State University in 2014. He now serves as political director for the Vote No on Amendment 2 campaign.