say “cannabis” instead

Stop saying “marijuana”, its offensive. Say “cannabis” instead. It’s more politically correct. I blinked and stared and said, wait what now? Can you explain that to me, I don’t get it? I’ve been calling it weed, grass, dope and pot my whole life. Marijuana seems more like its proper name to me and has all this time and never once has it ever sounded like an offensive word to my white, American middle-class, suburban ears. But that, of course, is my problem and it’s also why this concept of the word “marijuana” as being offensive never occurred to me. Insulated from experiences and with limited exposure to different perspectives, I grew up oblivious to the idea that this nation’s drug war was really more about cashflow and racism than serving and protecting the people. in the 80’s, at the height of this nation’s youth targeted war on drugs, me and my teenage friends found a connection and bought pot from whomever had some at the time. Very little thought was given to where it came from and I certainly didn’t know anything about it other than it’s an illegal substance and I better not get caught with it or there would be trouble. And that was the game. The risk was worth the reward, and lets face it, with this freckled, pinkish-white complexion, any trouble I faced was going to be very mild – especially compared to consequences other kids my age – other kids with dark skin – were facing out in their own communities for the same offense. I’d maybe get a slap on the wrist for holding a quarter ounce in my possession if I got caught but the truth is, I never got caught, never got in trouble. Again, I was lucky, oblivious and self absorbed and unaware that others have had it way tougher than I could have ever known.

Satanic music, jazz and swing result from marijuana use

So I’ll get right to it. About a hundred years ago there was this guy named Harry Anslinger. This guy was a bureaucrat and powerful prohibitionist, meaning he believed it was his life’s mission to lock up drug users and he led the nation’s fight against moral decay as leader of the Federal Narcotics Bureau under Hoover which later became the DEA. A law and order zealot, there’s all kinds of quotes attributed to Harry Anslinger that point to him being a racist xenophobe too, fearful of any culture besides his own which was white, influential and rich. Here’s a quote I’ll use as an example of his powerful rhetoric from the time, “There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz and swing result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others.”.

Anslinger, Anslinger, Anslinger…

This guy, Anslinger, he’s a hateable guy. I don’t want to go about him too much but I encourage you to read a little about him and you’ll see right away what I’m trying to say. In Anslinger’s day, he was able to use a word like ‘marijuana’ and associate it to those he characterized as bad actors. He perpetuated stigma and manufactured propaganda through racist fear mongering and exploitation and his ideas persist today and perpetuate social inequity.

Anslinger was instrumental in the passage of the Marijuana Tax Act in 1937 which effectively made marijuana illegal giving him and his ilk a broad field in which to pursue his enemies. Newspapers from the time jumped on the bandwagon and used sensational headlines to highlight the scourge of pot and stoke fear. Anti-drug zealots like Anslinger substituted the word “marijuana” or “marihuana” for the term “cannabis” whenever possible and newspapers fell in line with headlines like “‘Killer Drug’ Marihuana Sweeping The U.S.”.

cannabis and marijuana

I’ve used the phrases “cannabis” and “marijuana” interchangeably myself leading up to a little over a year ago when I began reading some really great history of cannabis books and listening to podcasts that provided a comprehensive education and helped me to understand the links between America’s drug war and the underlying racism that permeates it. I read about Anslinger and grew to loathe his entire biography and his place in our history of victimizing the most vulnerable and controlling them through unjust laws and vengeful prosecution. I’ve also come to understand that the word ‘marijuana’ likely originated in Mexico and when Americans began participating in smoking it in the 19th and early 20th centuries, it arrived from places south of here. The supply would be transported from places like the Caribbean, Brazil and Mexico. It would come through port cities like New Orleans and it made its way to black jazz musicians there who would network it to their colleagues and friends throughout the southern U.S.. Anslinger was on a personal, racist mission to catch and prosecute jazz musicians for drug possession at this point in history and in that geographic area of the U.S. and he most definitely called it ‘marijuana’, while the people using it referred to it by other names like ‘loud’, ‘guage’ and ‘jive’ were just some of the names it was known by then.

…and more Anslinger

Anslinger had influence on this country’s drug legislation into the 1960s and his blueprint for criminalizing drug use is still with us today. Nixon declared his war on drugs in the 70’s, in large part influenced but the racist motivation to essentially attack his political enemies at the time; the anti-war left and black people. He emulated Anslinger’s strategy by associating hippies with marijuana and black people with heroin and he succeeded in disrupting those communities and incarcerating a lot of people along the way. Then the Reagans came along with their “Just Say No” campaign in the 80s which turned into another race baiting tactic of associating crack with black people and imprinting racist stigma on kids in schools, grooming them into a fixed mindset of hyper vigilance against all things drug related. As a white person, watching tv aimed at a white audience by a predominately white media, although I was looking directly at it at the time, I never knew the the hardest hit by the war on drugs were also predominately people of color. It’s undeniable, after examining the tactics of those that have directed the drug wars for the past hundred years it’s so clear to me now the tactics of racial and economic division, fear mongering and the use of propaganda were targeting black and brown people disproportionally and that continues to be on full display today. When states began decriminalizing cannabis and writing laws that allowed for medical sales first and then recreational sales later – legislators did not race to the aid of all those people that sat incarcerated for minor possession or other low level cannabis offenses. No, prioritizing expungement of records and freeing otherwise productive American citizens for minor cannabis related infractions was not a priority for those that write the laws. Our lawmakers were eager to get to the business of making money by selling pot to a new legal market but they were not rushing to right the wrongs of the previous administrations who misunderstood and have gone on to mischaracterize everything there is to know and appreciate about cannabis. Sadly, Social Equity is not on the minds of our representatives in our governments – but it should be.

cannabis is NOT an addictive and dangerous narcotic substance

The use of the word ‘marijuana’ in my mind is derogatory. It harkens to the propaganda of the 1930s, 40s, 50s on up until now and implies that cannabis is an addictive and dangerous narcotic substance and not an ancient herbal remedy and medicine as some of us recognize today. That word brings to mind the racist tendency to associate crime to a minority and supports racist stereotypes that once were very convincing to a gullible public. Singling out people of other nations or cultures and villanizing them for participating in using a plant to enhance their life is wrong. I choose to use the word ‘cannabis’ instead. Social Equity ought to be on the minds of everyone working on this complex puzzle that is the legal cannabis industry. We should be striving to find social equity and we should be granting assistance to those whose lives were altered by minor drug offenses with cannabis. No one is free as long as innocent people are locked up and denied their rights because they found themselves on the wrong side of laws that are swiftly changing across the nation. As a society we have a responsibility to make those lives whole again and make up for opportunities that were lost due to the stupid “War on Drugs” that persists in ways even as states open their new legal dispensary doors to a willing, and paying, public that shrugs off the previous struggles of activists and pioneers that came before us and stood up to the likes of Anslinger and his agenda to get us where we are today.

“cannabis”

The more I learn by paying attention to the cannabis pioneers and activists the givers of compassionate care and resisted in the streets to fight back at the establishment, the more I become uncomfortable with using a word like ‘marijuana’ – because by saying it out loud I seem to play by the rules of those that put it into the public consciousness in the first place. They’re interests were not aligned with mine and I refuse to promote their legacy of hate and fear. Their warped version of reality never existed and should not be propped up today. Their drug war is and always has been a proxy war against the government’s political enemies and marginalized communities. The tactics they’ve used rely largely on misinformation, propaganda, and racist rhetoric and I feel it’s very important to recognize these patterns and do what I can to combat their efforts at every opportunity that presents itself. I’ll start by saying the word “cannabis” instead.