Please enjoy this post from NORML podcaster ‘Radical’ Russ Belville, from the NORML Daily Audio Stash blog:
The latest prejudicial stereotyping of cannabis consumers comes as part of the ONCDP’s “Above the Influence” ad campaign. It is a website and interactive Flash video called “Stoners in the Mist”, and it copies the look and feel of a National Geographic-style safari documentary, complete with a white-mustachioed “explorer” in a pith helmet introducing us to the hunt for his elusive prey:
It is a beautiful day. And while most people are out and about enjoying friends, activities, life in general…the creature that we seek is sedentary, uninspired, and remarkably unmotivated. My associate and I are in search of the lair of a magnificent specimen: the mature stoner.
Oh, goody! I wonder which mature, sedentary, uninspired, unmotivated stoner he’s seeking out? Ricky Williams, that former NFL running back? That guy is so lazy, what with his two-a-day workouts, yoga, and 3% body fat. Willie Nelson? Yup, there’s a mature stoner who never amounted to anything. Montel Williams? Talk about amotivational syndrome, hosting a TV show and running an MS foundation! Too bad Carl Sagan is dead, because there you had one completely uninspired stoner.
In this interactive feature, we will explore and attempt to explain the social interactions and natural responses of this elusive and baffling creature. I am your host, Barnard Puck and this… is Stoners in the Mist.
Apparently, “Dr.” Puck and his assistant have no problem being peeping Toms. Well, this should be fun. More screenshots and offensive stereotypes follow after the jump…
April 7, 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt fulfilled a campaign promise to hasten an end to alcohol Prohibition when he signed a modification to the Volstead Act, allowing the sale of 3.2 percent beer in advance of the formal end to the 21st Amendment being ratified.
His reward? The first case of beer delivered directly to the White House.
Let’s hope for sanity’s sake that British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is not as bonkers as so many editors and producers are today in the United Kingdom regarding the issue of cannabis. After foreshadowing his intent last week to re-classify cannabis to fetch a harsher penalty and direct police to make more arrests, Mr. Brown will apparently face a much anticipated advisory report from the highly respected, and rarely unobserved, Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) that, like virtually every major government report or commission review, advises for more, not less tolerance and punitive measures for cannabis consumers.
Will Brown kowtow to this current (and really bizarre) epoch of British media Reefer Madness or respect the ACDM’s logical and pragmatic recommendation not to increase the penalties for cannabis? Why does the British Home Office (and apparently the opposition Tory leader David Cameron as well) continue to pretend The Netherlands–and their ongoing, 35-year positive experience with controlled cannabis sales–does not occur just 95 miles away?
NORML members have an opportunity to be part of history by hosting and attending special screenings of the comedic documentary Super High Methis April 20th. As you may have guessed from the title, this is a takeoff on the film Super Size Me—only in this case, Hollywood funnyman (and NORML supporter) Doug Benson replaces eating McDonalds with ingesting marijuana. He literally smokes, vaporizes, and eats medical marijuana around the clock for thirty days, all the while undergoing a number of tests to show exactly what the effect of marijuana on the human body is.
Most everyone has read or seen government-funded propaganda or questionable science regarding the health effects of cannabis, so enjoy the humorous exploration therein found in Super High Me (check out a clip).
Below is this week’s summary of pending state legislation and tips to help you become involved in changing the laws in your state.
Minnesota: Minnesota’s House Ways and Means Committee may soon be voting on a medical cannabis bill, Senate File 345, along with its companion bill, House File 655. From Ways and Means, it would go to the House floor, and if passed there, the Governor’s desk. If passed, this legislation will help to ensure that medical marijuana patients in Minnesota will no longer have to fear arrest or prosecution from state law enforcement. However, Governor Pawlenty has indicated that he is inclined to veto this bill if it gets to his desk. Minnesotans can urge their Representatives and the Governor to support these bills via NORML’s online advocacy system.
California: In another victory for cannabis law reformers, Assembly Bill 2389 – which sought to require drug testing for recipients of state benefits and welfare – was defeated in the Assembly Committee on Human Services with six members voting no, and only one yes. AB 2389 drew opposition from a wide range of groups, including the ACLU, NOW, the California Nurses’ Association, the California State Association of Counties, and the County Alcohol and Drug Program Administrators Association. It was supported by the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s office. California NORML Director Dale Gieringer submitted testimony against the measure, available here.
Hawaii:House Bill 2675, which would set up a medical marijuana task force to examine and make recommendations to correct the problems facing medical cannabis patients in Hawaii, passed the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously unamended. If passed, this task force would examine issues regarding adequate supplies of medical marijuana for qualified patients, distinguishing between mature and immature plants under current law, the feasibility of constructing secure growing facilities for medical marijuana patients to use to produce their medicine, and study inter-island travel issues related to medical marijuana. Hawaiian supporters can email their state senators via NORML’s online advocacy system.
Rhode Island: The Rhode Island Senate Committee held a hearing on Senate Bill 2693 on Thursday, April 3. SB 2693 would set up a dispensary system for Rhode Island’s state-qualified medical cannabis patients. The committee heard testimony in favor of the bill from Buddy Coolen of Warwick, who was recently robbed at gunpoint while attempting to obtain the cannabis he is permitted under state law. Rhode Islanders can write their Senate and House members in support of this bill and its companion, House Bill 7888, through NORML’s online advocacy system.
What it didn’t say is: “Since the mid-1990s, drug offenders have accounted for nearly 50 percent of the total federal prison population growth and some 40 percent of all state prison population growth.”
In what I believe is a classic example of a commercial conflict of interest, TV weatherman for the Today Show, Al Roker, sat down this morning on the Today Show couch to plug his new ‘reality’ show DEA.
DEA, set to premiere tonight, April 2, on Spike TV (which is owned by MTV) follows in the footsteps of the long-running video-verite show COPS. The show is co-owned by Al Roker Entertainment.
Fortunately, more rational minds know differently. Most recently, a Canadian research team took the time to actually interview various cannabis consumers. Their findings appear in the current issue of the journal Substance Use and Misuse, and provide a telling, albeit predictable, look into the motivations of the ‘typical’ marijuana user.
Why do tens of millions of adults all over the world smoke pot?
Substance Use & Misuse, Vol. 43, Issue 3 & 4, February 2008: pages 539-572
The primary purpose of this study was to develop a better understanding of what motivates a selected group of adult[s] to use marijuana and to explore the social contexts in which it is used. …. Using interviews to gain insight into the subjective experiences of the participants, this research corroborated the results of previous studies that found that most adult marijuana users regulate use to their recreational time and do not use compulsively. Rather, their use is purposively intended to enhance their leisure activities and manage the challenges and demands of living in contemporary modern society. Generally, participants reported using marijuana because it enhanced relaxation and concentration, making a broad range of leisure activities more enjoyable and pleasurable.
The latest prejudicial stereotyping of cannabis consumers comes as part of the ONCDP’s “Above the Influence” ad campaign. It is a website and interactive Flash video called “Stoners in the Mist”, and it copies the look and feel of a National Geographic-style safari documentary, complete with a white-mustachioed “explorer” in a pith helmet introducing us to the hunt for his elusive prey:
