Cannabis enthusiasts falsely assume legalization is the answer. Wrong. Legalization is not about medical access to cannabis for those who need it, nor is it about embracing libertarian notions of consenting adults doing what they please. And it's damn sure not about giving folks an avenue toward self-reliance or some control over their income.
It's all about getting growers and smokers to pay into a tax scheme for their cannabis use- just another tax on your daily activities.
Years back I read all the anti canna people saying prop215 in CA was just the first step toward full legalization. I didn't want to believe that, but it seemed pretty damn clear to me that that was the agenda here in CO.
When more laws developed to protect the rights of mass producers, distributors and retailers, while simultaneously overlooking the reality of patients rights and needs, I could see that "medical access" was just a marketing tool.
So many call for legalization not realizing that it goes out of our hands when it's legalized, and into the realm of big business. Most cannabis users are too idealistic to recognize that legalization isn't the answer they have always conceived it to be.
When I was about 25 my grandfather gave me a few firearms, just old revolvers. Collectors pieces as opposed to weapons per se. I asked him if I was supposed to register them and he said "only if you want the government to own it".
Cannabis is the same.