Oakland -- once a byword for social deprivation and poverty -- has undergone a total transformation in recent years, fueled by an influx of revenue related to the California's pioneering medical marijuana laws. The change has been so stark that Oakland has now been tagged "Oaksterdam" by many.
Yes, America does have a problem when it comes to marijuana, and that problem could be best described as schizophrenia.
So which is it? Is weed a dreaded social problem that demands harsh punishment and government suppression? Or is it truly the benign drug that its advocates claim -- a medicinal herb that can be used to cure pain, combat nausea, help with insomnia and give a pleasant, mild euphoria?
Well, it depends who you ask. Funnily enough, the people who seem to be the most adamant about the dangers of pot -- that it's a "gateway" drug that users can get addicted to -- are the people who claim they don't smoke it.
I was a drug user for many years -- if I could smoke, snort or inject it, I would do it. My addiction to opiates led to physical dependence and homelessness, so I am certainly familiar with the culture of AA meetings and in-patient drug rehabs. Funnily enough, none of the ex-addict drug counselors I ever talked to gave credence to the whole "gateway theory" of pot. They were addicts and placed blame for their condition strictly on "the disease" -- that hazily understood mix of genetics and brain chemistry -- rather than some long-ago, youthful puff on a joint.
No, the truth is that not many people who have actually smoked marijuana on a regular basis give any credence to the idea that it can lead to harder drugs. In fact, many claim that it can have the opposite effect. Seven years ago, when I was detoxing from my decade-long addiction to heroin and methadone, it was marijuana that I turned to when the depression, the insomnia and the urge to use heroin were almost unbearably strong. I certainly felt better about using something natural like marijuana for these protracted withdrawal symptoms than the hard-core antidepressants that the doctors were offering me.
The idea of an "addiction" to marijuana is laughable, too. There can be no physical dependence to weed, and when people talk about being "addicted to marijuana" this says more about the abuse of the word "addiction" in today's world than anything about the psychopharmacology of the plant itself.
Still, it's easy to laugh when irritating celebrities get busted for pot. We all love giggling over the sorry-looking mugshot and the guilty look on their faces when they have to go before a judge.
But let's remember that the Chase Crawfords, Aaron Carters and Bobby Browns of this world are only the public face of America's ill-informed war on marijuana. The stories we don't hear about are more representative of how the war on drugs is affecting out friends, our neighbors and our children.
Stories like the unnamed Florida college student raped by a cellmate in 2003 while serving a weekend sentence for delivering pot. Or 27-year-old quadriplegic Jonathan Magbie, who was given a 10-day sentence for marijuana possession in Washington, D.C., that turned out to be a life sentence. Magbie needed a ventilator to breathe, and the jail was unequipped to provide for his considerable medical needs -- he died on the way to the hospital after experiencing breathing difficulties in his cell.
As a father, would I be horrified to find that my child was smoking pot while she is at college? Well, no. Not at all. Not as horrified as I would be to find out that she was drinking herself blind on a regular basis, as seems to be the culture on U.S. college campuses. The great danger of lumping marijuana in with truly dangerous psychoactive substances like opiates, alcohol or tobacco is that once our children realize we are misinforming them about the dangers of pot, they'll be less inclined to believe us when we rightly warn them that most other drugs can easily kill when taken recklessly.
I believe the only way forward is to follow the harm-reduction model: offer impartial information on the respective danger of drugs and allow young adults to make informed decisions for themselves.
Right now, marijuana prohibition is costly nonsense that criminalizes our youth, wastes police time and resources, and leads to tragedy ... as well as the odd amusing TMZ headline.
Tony O'Neill is author of the new novel "Sick City" (Harper Perennial) as well as "Down and Out on Murder Mile" and co-author of the "Neon Angel" and the New York Times best-selling "Hero of the Underground."
Source: AOL News
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