In Madison Bush Couch's recent blog post Legalize Cannabis, she makes the point that the benefits of marijuana outweigh its negative effects, and I completely agree-- marijuana has performed wonders in the world of medicine.
Back in the early 1900s, marijuana was first outlawed by the United States, even though cannabis was already widely used. Fear of Mexican immigrants, who called this substance "marihuana," was the primary cause of the marijuana ban in the western part of the country and fear of African Americans using cannabis to "take advantage" of white women was the primary cause in eastern states. Basically, outlawing marijuana was a form of outlawing non-whites.
Obviously, there are negative side effects of marijuana use, which are the reasons for its continued prohibition. However, the author makes the compelling point that alcohol and tobacco are harmful yet legal substances. Interestingly enough, alcohol was prohibited at one time in American history but after 13 years was deemed legal. Although alcohol consumption fell at the beginning of Prohibition, it increased to about 60 to 70 percent higher than pre-prohibition levels, and we could be seeing a similar pattern with marijuana. With certain regulations, marijuana should legalized nationally so we can learn more about its positive effects in medicine.
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