U.S. media went crazy this week over Miley Cyrus smoking a joint on stage at the European Music Awards in Amsterdam. Never have I thought one of my columns would be inspired by Miley Cyrus, but I caught myself thinking about the great conflicts between three major influences of drug use in the United States: America’s drug culture, a flawed legal system and a lack of medical care for drug addicts.
The only solution to the problems posed by all three is to take a wrecking ball to how Americans think about drugs on every level.
The discussion of America’s drug culture often doesn’t match with scientific fact, nor does drug education in America’s schools. The key to changing culture is to give true facts, not scare tactics as education to the youth.
There is this myth we were all given during health class that marijuana is a “gateway drug.” However, there is no conclusive scientific evidence that links marijuana use to narcotic use. There are just too many outlying variables.
It is important to teach children the health risks posed by drug use, but giving honest answers is the key to education — who would have thought?!
Two major types of drugs, depressants and stimulants, have a huge difference in their effects on the brain. Marijuana is more comparable to alcohol in this perspective, making it much different from stimulants like cocaine and methamphetamine. In the scientific community, there is a great distinction between the two types. In drug education, there is not as great of a distinction. In America’s pop culture, there seems to be no distinction.
Cyrus has stated that both marijuana and ecstasy are “happy drugs.” Although she is not alone in her ignorance, to say they are the same is dangerous. Marijuana should not be considered “similar” to ecstasy or other hallucinogens or stimulants, but American drug culture often gets this wrong.
Any stoner can tell you that marijuana is illegal because the government wants to use the curtailing of marijuana usage for social control and is threatened by hemp as a commodity. There is a truth to this; in 1909, the American government made opium illegal. Yes, there are great health hazards to opium usage, but the government was not concerned about health. They were concerned about a lot of American dollars going to the Orient when Americans could be spending their hard-earned dollars on alcoholism, not opiates.
In 1913, the first anti-marijuana laws were passed in California. These laws banned the preparation of hemp. Of course, this was not because of any deaths, but because when Andrew Mellon appointed Harry J. Anslinger to the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, the financial tycoons saw the threat that hemp, a renewable resource, posed to their oil and paper industries. They teamed with William Randolph Hearst to throw in some scary headlines on the “perceived effects of marijuana usage.” Movies like “Reefer Madness” ensured the American population would associate the usage of this drug with car accidents, rock ‘n’ roll music and kids not wanting to eat their vegetables.
As I have [stated in previous columns](https://www.themaneater.com/stories/2013/10/30/improve-society-and-protect-citizens-focus-mental-/), I believe the mental health systems in this country are severely lacking. People with addictive personalities might move from marijuana usage to harder narcotics, but this might not be because they have tried marijuana but because they have addictive personalities. Addiction is recognized by the American Psychological Association and by the American Medical Association as a physiological dependency.
Despite this knowledge, we criminalize dependence. It would be in our best interest to decriminalize marijuana so that minor offenders do not go to jail and become hardened criminals. Repeat offenders receive no help in recovery for these addictions because our prisons are riddled with drug use. Allowing them to receive rehabilitation treatments would be more cost-effective and might actually solve the problem.
Legalizing marijuana would allow regulation of the substance. Yes, it is dangerous to drive under the influence of marijuana, but it is also dangerous to drive under the influence of alcohol. Yes, smoking marijuana can have negative health effects, but so does smoking _tobacco_. Yet, we legalize, regulate and tax these substances. Think of how many public school programs could be funded off of the taxes gathered during Burning Man. If we were to help those with deeper drug dependencies, we would be solving the problem, not throwing tax dollars toward a corrupt prison system.
It is pertinent that this country create a regulation and a fair judicial system for drug offenders. The first step in this is to legalize marijuana. We must also change how we educate those at risk of trying controlled substances without scare tactics and with truly educational, informed materials. Until we can change our culture, our legal system and our biased legislature, we are going to continue to waste money on people who are not criminals but addicts.