[420 Girl]

Regarding James Foster's City Views column "Is society benefiting from the war on pot?". Aug. 20: "Other than lawyers, who benefits from criminalizing pot smokers?," he asks.

Cops, gangsters, court staff, and jailers.

Marijuana was criminalized in Canada in 1923 based on racist lies and supposed "dangers to society" that never actually existed.

In fact, it took until 1937 (a full 14 years!) before the first pot bust happened.

A quick search of Google will show that the real reason pot was criminalized was to demonize its sister plant, hemp.

Hemp is a major threat to Big Oil because everything we make out of crude can be made with hemp (fibre, fuel, polymers, cloth), only it can be done cheaply, locally, and with no damage to the environment.

The main function of marijuana prohibition is control.

The police have control over people of colour, the poor and the young.

The government has total control over the economy, whereas hemp would give the control back to the people.

As for a "good reason" to legalize pot: It has dozens of proven medical applications, and recent science out of Germany shows how cannabinoids stimulate the body's production of TIMP- 1, which helps healthy cells resist cancer invasion (see WebMD Cancer Health Center ? Information on Cancer Types, Symptoms, and Treatments news/20071226/pot-slowscancer- in-test-tube) I think "potential cure for cancer" is the best reason to legalize pot, if "thwarting the black market" isn't a good enough reason in and of itself.

But Big Pharmaceuticals will hear none of it, because they can't profit from it.

Beyond that, if you accept that the government has any say at all as to what you can and cannot put into your own body, then you must accept their ownership.

That means the government owns you like a slave, or pet, or cattle and that you have only the rights that they grant. If you are stupid or weak enough to accept that, then maybe you deserve to have no rights at all.

Russell Barth,
Patients Against Ignorance and Discrimination on Cannabis,
Nepean, Ont.


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