Stirring the Mary-Jane Pot

Liberal leader Justin Trudeau has gone out of his way to bring the welfare of the Canadian middle-class under the broad umbrella of his musing concerns, expressing dismay presumably matching their own that family earnings have not maintained their upward momentum, falling behind while inflation eats up more of disposable income. He has now extended his concern to the topic of legalizing marijuana. Once alcohol was prohibited and it is now, by force of social pressures, legalized and heavily taxed, as is tobacco.

These substances are both avowedly and through scientific-medical research attested to represent health-averse materials whose constant use constitutes a threat to the integrity of users' bodily health. They are both heavily taxed, as a kind of moral penance. The idea being that taxes raise their cost to the consumer and in this manner make them less attractive to purchase. But people become accustomed to paying high prices for certain items, and go on to consume them regardless.

Presumably the taxes, which go into government general revenue streams, help pay for the cost to society in treating the eventual health consequences of their over-use. Both are well enough known to cause organ breakdown; heart, liver and lungs, aiding in the eventuality of strokes and heart attacks. Now, it seems, we can add another substance inimical to health. Not to hold Justin Trudeau to account for any of this; recreational drug use is a reality, and marijuana is the lesser of all such drug use.

Legalizing its growing, marketing and use would make it more accessible, more acceptable within society and lead to greater use. On the other hand, even as an illicit substance it is widely used, including among those too young to fully comprehend how it might conceivably deleteriously impact their lives. The operative word here is "might", since light, casual social use likely would never result in ill effects.

But drug use of any kind is a portal to the potential of abuse of far more potent drugs. And statistics appear to pinpoint that while the incidence of driving while under the influence of alcohol has been falling in prevalence, there has been an alarming rise of impaired driving relating to the use of drugs. Marijuana is a relatively light, casual, recreational drug but it is a drug and smoking it can cause ill health effects.

...it would be fallacious to conclude that because the chemicals in marijuana have been found to present fewer dangers than some very harmful substances, the medical or recreational use of marijuana is perfectly safe. In a recreational context, marijuana has been shown to affect health, brain function, and memory. And in a medical context, marijuana is like any other powerful prescription drug: it has potentially dangerous side effects, and the decision to use it to treat patients must involve the same balancing test as the one required for chemotherapy or AZT: do the therapeutic effects of the drug outweigh its harmful effects? Though there are many more studies to be done on this issue, current data shows that the answer to this question may not always be "yes."
Harvard University Berkman Center for Internet & Society

"I'm actually not in favour of decriminalizing cannabis. Tax it, regulate. It's one of the only ways to keep it out of the hands of our kids because the current war on drugs, the current model is not working. We have to use evidence and science to make sure we're moving forward on that", he said to an audience in Kelowna, B.C. this week. A statement that will find him in wild favour among the voting youth contingent in the country.

An April-released UNICEF report cited 4% of children aged 11, 13 and 15 reported smoking cigarettes "at least once a week"; 16% of that age group reported having been under the influence of alcohol on at least two occasions, and to round out the good tidings, fully 29% of young respondents reported "having used cannabis in the last 12 months." Canada ranks 29th on the UNICEF report; last among "rich" nations.

The Netherlands, Estonia, and Belgium where marijuana is decriminalized or legalized boast a lower number of children using (17%, 15% and 13% respectively). Compare those numbers to restrictive jurisdictions like Sweden with 5.5%, Norway with 4.6% and Iceland with 7% child usage of marijuana. The puzzle as to why and how it is that Canadian youth use is so relatively high isn't addressed.

This is a difficult topic to tackle. The 'war on drugs' has worked just about as well as the period of crime, bootlegging, cross-border smuggling and alcohol syndicates that arose when alcohol was under prohibition in the United States and Canada. Eventually it was recognized that more harm than good came out of the prohibition legislation.

Perhaps that will be the direction in which all national jurisdictions will eventually guide themselves. Latin America, where incendiary crime is associated with drug cartels costing innumerable lives, is now considering the feasibility of relaxing its prohibition laws. Human beings engage in self-destructive activities of all kinds, the insistence on prohibiting substances deleterious to health and longevity is a choice that cannot always be controlled.

Even if and when the greater society is left to pick up the sometimes disastrous results.