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Marijuana Smokers Shouldn't Be Labeled As Criminals
Michael Hugman | Collegiate Times | 03/24/2006

Last Tuesday was the Great Debate, and I spoke for the Libertarians at Virginia Tech on the issue of marijuana laws. I am in favor of the complete legalization of marijuana, since I believe that anything less is just an absurdity. My main point is this: according to the government-funded Monitoring the Future study, one third of college students (almost 6 million people) have smoked marijuana in the last year. So if the marijuana prohibitionists are to be believed, all of these students are criminals. Though the anti-legalization Republicans don’t say so, that implies that they think that one in three Virginia Tech students is a criminal.

The College Republicans think that they can somehow justify that. They speak of marijuana as if it is some sort of plague on our society that needs to be stamped out. That is not reasonable. One can reasonably argue about whether marijuana is relatively harmless or whether it is as harmful as alcohol and tobacco, but it is completely unreasonable to argue that marijuana is any more harmful than that. I don’t see alcohol and tobacco as plagues on our society, and since marijuana can’t possibly be worse than either of those, it is not a plague either.

Republicans might argue that marijuana is about as bad as alcohol and tobacco, but out of the three, only marijuana should be illegal, since we don’t need more legal drugs. That position is inconsistent and hypocritical. What kind of government throws people in jail for one substance while it keeps equally harmful substances perfectly legal?

The only two consistent stances the Republicans can take are A) that alcohol and tobacco are plagues that should be stamped out too (I can imagine how popular that will make them) or B) that marijuana really is more harmful than alcohol or tobacco, which justifies making it illegal while keeping tobacco and alcohol legal.

It was unclear which stance the Republicans took in the debate. I really don’t think they traced out the logical conclusions of their beliefs very well. But I’ll assume that they aren’t taking stance A, since I don’t think they want to become the most unpopular organization on campus. That leaves stance B, which is unreasonable, or neither stance, which is inconsistent.

Stance B, however, is just so far beyond reason that no one who knows anything about marijuana could advocate it. It is just very obvious that aside from possible long-term consequences, marijuana is not a profoundly harmful drug.

For instance, it is virtually impossible to overdose on it. Marijuana intoxication is also quite different from alcohol intoxication. Unlike alcohol, marijuana doesn’t cause anyone to become violent or aggressive. It does not greatly impair people’s ability to drive, according to a study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. It is not especially addictive either: according to a study by the Institute of Medicine, withdrawal symptoms for marijuana are mild and short-lived, if they occur at all. In addition, the report found that marijuana is significantly less addictive than either alcohol or cigarettes.

There is a possibility that smoking marijuana a lot could damage your health in the long run. However, I don’t think that the scientific evidence supports that claim. In the Sep. 20, 2003 issue of the British Medical Journal,

Dr. Stephen Sidney wrote, “Although the use of (marijuana) is not harmless, the current knowledge base does not support the assertion that it has any notable adverse public health impact in relation to mortality.” A study by Dr. Daniel Ford, a researcher at Johns Hopkins Medical School, found that marijuana use is not associated with head, neck, or lung cancer.

There are studies that claim to show that marijuana is more harmful than I believe it is. I don’t buy into those studies, but one could make a somewhat reasonable argument based on them. But to my knowledge, no respectable scientific studies show that marijuana is significantly more harmful than tobacco or alcohol. Claiming that would be unreasonable. Thus, stance B is unreasonable.

So Republicans have a choice: do they want to be ridiculous (stance A), unreasonable (stance B), or inconsistent (neither)? I have a feeling that they won’t like any of those choices. There is however, another choice: join the Libertarians in advocating the complete legalization of marijuana. That stance has become increasingly popular among Americans, since it is so obviously right. According to a 2005 Gallup poll, 36% of Americans agree that marijuana should be legalized, and according to a recent CNN poll, 72% of Americans want some degree of decriminalization.

Republicans have backed themselves into a corner by advocating prohibition. They can’t avoid the fact that millions of Americans smoke marijuana, and by criminalizing marijuana, they are criminalizing all of those people. Though Republicans argue that low level marijuana users are not severely punished, the fact is that it is wrong to want to punish millions of nonviolent Americans, period. They can’t justify their position without being ridiculous, unreasonable, or inconsistent. Republicans: just give up, the tide is turning against you, and that is because you’re wrong about marijuana. Nothing less than full legalization is acceptable (I’m talking to you too, Democrats). We don’t need to prevent marijuana users from smoking, we don’t need to rehabilitate them, and we definitely don’t need to throw them in prison.

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