Jacob Redmond
Well-Known Member
A small crowd gathered around a stage set up on the far corner of Pioneer Courthouse Square. People dressed in marijuana-themed outfits, some wore small green ribbons on their shirts, a few held signs: "Free the Weed," "Help End Marijuana Prohibition," "F*** the DEA."
It was Portland's local demonstration in a worldwide day of protest called the Global Cannabis March. This year marks the 16th for the event, which is expected to go on in nearly 300 other cities.
Organizers say it's a rally cry for "the protection of our civil liberty and the need to end discrimination against cannabis consumers," but attendees had more specific goals in mind. Recreational marijuana use was legalized last fall, but as rally-goers were happy to remind, there are many more issues at hand.
Scenes From A Protest
The Portland event kicked off at 11 a.m. Saturday, with sets from local bands and speeches from activists echoing through the downtown corridor into the afternoon. By 3 p.m. the crowd had thinned. Many sat scattered along the brick steps around the square, all waiting for the 4 p.m. march.
Dave and Deanna Perkins, a middle aged couple from Clackamas, had been there from the start. Each wore a pair of pot leaf sunglasses with leis of plastic leaves draped over their shoulders. They thought the march started at noon, like it does every year, but they didn't mind hanging around a few extra hours.
"We come every year that we can," Deanna smiled. "I love it, it's a blast!"
She's a medical marijuana patient herself, she explained. She takes it to help her seizures, and for her it really works. It's nice that recreational use is legalized, the couple said, but a lot of medical users are afraid that the new legislation will rope them in with everybody else.
Walking up across the square were Melissa Patton and Kori Mitchell, two young mothers there with their families. They squinted in the bright afternoon sun, pushing strollers loaded with blankets and signs.
Patton said she really started supporting medical marijuana when her mom, who is terminally ill, started using it regularly.
"We didn't have any other options," she said. "It saved my mom's life."
They headed off toward the stage where local musicians Mack & Dub and the Smokin' Section played a pre-march set. The two guys fronting the band invited a man named Justin James Bridges onstage, telling the crowd that marijuana saved his life too.
"The last time I saw this man he was in a wheelchair," one of the two frontmen told the crowd. "He hasn't done pharmaceuticals in two years, it's been massage therapy and cannabis!"
They started rapping "massage therapy and cannabis" over and over, the band backing them up with a tight groove. Then, all of a sudden, Bridges took the microphone and unleashed a head-spinning freestyle about his experience. It lasted some 16 bars, and when he was done he thanked the cheering crowd and stepped gingerly off the stage.
Off to the side of the square he told his story. He had been at the Occupy protests in Portland, doing sign language interpretation for the protestors. When police came to clear it out, they slammed him into the ground, he claimed. He couldn't feel his legs, but they took him into custody anyway. He was wheelchair-bound for three years, and, like everybody else, credits medical marijuana for his recovery.
But he said he fears that the national prohibition on cannabis is part of a conspiracy, and that the only solution is to give it to the people.
"It's all about money, it's all about profiteering," he said. His voice grew louder as he became more animated. "They're trying to find ways to keep people in trouble, to keep prisons running!"
It seemed hard for any of the protesters to even fathom a world where marijuana — what they use as medicine — is considered highly dangerous and medically useless. That sentiment has lead to an overhaul of marijuana laws in Oregon, but it's also embroiled the laws with complications.
Who gets to grow it? How much can they grow? Where can it be sold? Do we need medical dispensaries and recreational shops? Should the government tax it? How much? What about home grows? Can local municipalities issue moratoriums in their towns? Can kids have access to non-psychoactive compounds for medical use? Is it safe? Is it healing? Is it some kind of wonder drug?
Legalization was not the end; that much the protesters made abundantly clear. And it was for those myriad complex reasons that they gathered in Portland to march.
"Hemp, Hemp, Hooray!"
At a quarter to four, marijuana attorney Leland Berger took the stage, leading the crowd with a "hemp, hemp, hooray!"
"Why are we still marching?" he asked when the group quieted down. "We are still marching because people are still in prison, we are still marching because people still can't get their records expunged."
Sporadic cheers punctured the silence.
"What's left?" he asked. "We need to be active! We need to be engaged! We need to come together and march!"
The crowd roared, and with that they gathered in a line to take the streets. People came off the brick steps to join them. Organizers handed out signs and reminded the crowd not to get rowdy, especially in light of the May Day protests the day before.
"We want Portland to see our beautiful legalized smiles!" an emcee shouted.
The people listened. Nobody was destructive. Nobody was disruptive. It was an honest to goodness peaceful protest. Organizers at the front even encouraged the marchers to slow down at times, to walk at "indica speed."
A medical marijuana activist who goes by the name Porkchop marched near the front, limping with a cane on a leg he said will be amputated in a matter of days.
Barry Joe Stull, who emceed the very first march in 2000, walked toward the back of the pack, strumming a mandolin and singing Bob Marley's "Three Little Birds."
In the middle, Joe and Kerry Rose Kimbrough walked with their two daughters, 3-year-old Alice and 6-month-old Iris. They smiled as the march turned the corner onto Naito Parkway, cars stopped waiting for the protest to pass.
"As surprising as it sounds, it really does help," Kerry Rose said of the drug. "For a lot of things."
She got her medical marijuana card for her crippling migraines, but later found that it helped with her asthma as well. She doesn't support recreational use for anyone younger than 21, she explained, holding Alice's hand, but said the plant's medicinal properties can't be ignored.
That was the overwhelming message of the movement. Many people marching are medical marijuana patients themselves, and the way they see it, there's no reason to keep this organic medicine from the people.
Of course, lawmakers — and a large segment of the public — see reason in approaching the issue with caution. And there's certainly an argument to made for rolling out legalization with some strong organization and oversight.
But as long as there are legal roadblocks to the uninhibited use of marijuana — for medical and recreational use alike — there will be people marching in the streets against them. Activists at the Global Cannabis March will make sure of it, as long as they have the momentum to do it.
As the crowd finally worked its way back to Pioneer Courthouse Square, the tired masses lowered their signs and sighed. Porkchop, the activist with the soon-to-be-amputated leg, limped down the brick steps.
"I feel good, I feel alive," he said about the march. "I feel like I want to put in another year." He smiled as the crowd came in behind him. "Free the weed!" he yelled into the square.
News Moderator: Jacob Redmond 420 MAGAZINE ®
Full Article: The people who march for marijuana: Scenes from the 2015 Global Cannabis March in Portland | OregonLive.com
Author: Jamie Hale
Contact: jhale@oregonian.com
Photo Credit: None Found
Website: Oregon Local News, Breaking News, Sports & Weather - OregonLive.com
It was Portland's local demonstration in a worldwide day of protest called the Global Cannabis March. This year marks the 16th for the event, which is expected to go on in nearly 300 other cities.
Organizers say it's a rally cry for "the protection of our civil liberty and the need to end discrimination against cannabis consumers," but attendees had more specific goals in mind. Recreational marijuana use was legalized last fall, but as rally-goers were happy to remind, there are many more issues at hand.
Scenes From A Protest
The Portland event kicked off at 11 a.m. Saturday, with sets from local bands and speeches from activists echoing through the downtown corridor into the afternoon. By 3 p.m. the crowd had thinned. Many sat scattered along the brick steps around the square, all waiting for the 4 p.m. march.
Dave and Deanna Perkins, a middle aged couple from Clackamas, had been there from the start. Each wore a pair of pot leaf sunglasses with leis of plastic leaves draped over their shoulders. They thought the march started at noon, like it does every year, but they didn't mind hanging around a few extra hours.
"We come every year that we can," Deanna smiled. "I love it, it's a blast!"
She's a medical marijuana patient herself, she explained. She takes it to help her seizures, and for her it really works. It's nice that recreational use is legalized, the couple said, but a lot of medical users are afraid that the new legislation will rope them in with everybody else.
Walking up across the square were Melissa Patton and Kori Mitchell, two young mothers there with their families. They squinted in the bright afternoon sun, pushing strollers loaded with blankets and signs.
Patton said she really started supporting medical marijuana when her mom, who is terminally ill, started using it regularly.
"We didn't have any other options," she said. "It saved my mom's life."
They headed off toward the stage where local musicians Mack & Dub and the Smokin' Section played a pre-march set. The two guys fronting the band invited a man named Justin James Bridges onstage, telling the crowd that marijuana saved his life too.
"The last time I saw this man he was in a wheelchair," one of the two frontmen told the crowd. "He hasn't done pharmaceuticals in two years, it's been massage therapy and cannabis!"
They started rapping "massage therapy and cannabis" over and over, the band backing them up with a tight groove. Then, all of a sudden, Bridges took the microphone and unleashed a head-spinning freestyle about his experience. It lasted some 16 bars, and when he was done he thanked the cheering crowd and stepped gingerly off the stage.
Off to the side of the square he told his story. He had been at the Occupy protests in Portland, doing sign language interpretation for the protestors. When police came to clear it out, they slammed him into the ground, he claimed. He couldn't feel his legs, but they took him into custody anyway. He was wheelchair-bound for three years, and, like everybody else, credits medical marijuana for his recovery.
But he said he fears that the national prohibition on cannabis is part of a conspiracy, and that the only solution is to give it to the people.
"It's all about money, it's all about profiteering," he said. His voice grew louder as he became more animated. "They're trying to find ways to keep people in trouble, to keep prisons running!"
It seemed hard for any of the protesters to even fathom a world where marijuana — what they use as medicine — is considered highly dangerous and medically useless. That sentiment has lead to an overhaul of marijuana laws in Oregon, but it's also embroiled the laws with complications.
Who gets to grow it? How much can they grow? Where can it be sold? Do we need medical dispensaries and recreational shops? Should the government tax it? How much? What about home grows? Can local municipalities issue moratoriums in their towns? Can kids have access to non-psychoactive compounds for medical use? Is it safe? Is it healing? Is it some kind of wonder drug?
Legalization was not the end; that much the protesters made abundantly clear. And it was for those myriad complex reasons that they gathered in Portland to march.
"Hemp, Hemp, Hooray!"
At a quarter to four, marijuana attorney Leland Berger took the stage, leading the crowd with a "hemp, hemp, hooray!"
"Why are we still marching?" he asked when the group quieted down. "We are still marching because people are still in prison, we are still marching because people still can't get their records expunged."
Sporadic cheers punctured the silence.
"What's left?" he asked. "We need to be active! We need to be engaged! We need to come together and march!"
The crowd roared, and with that they gathered in a line to take the streets. People came off the brick steps to join them. Organizers handed out signs and reminded the crowd not to get rowdy, especially in light of the May Day protests the day before.
"We want Portland to see our beautiful legalized smiles!" an emcee shouted.
The people listened. Nobody was destructive. Nobody was disruptive. It was an honest to goodness peaceful protest. Organizers at the front even encouraged the marchers to slow down at times, to walk at "indica speed."
A medical marijuana activist who goes by the name Porkchop marched near the front, limping with a cane on a leg he said will be amputated in a matter of days.
Barry Joe Stull, who emceed the very first march in 2000, walked toward the back of the pack, strumming a mandolin and singing Bob Marley's "Three Little Birds."
In the middle, Joe and Kerry Rose Kimbrough walked with their two daughters, 3-year-old Alice and 6-month-old Iris. They smiled as the march turned the corner onto Naito Parkway, cars stopped waiting for the protest to pass.
"As surprising as it sounds, it really does help," Kerry Rose said of the drug. "For a lot of things."
She got her medical marijuana card for her crippling migraines, but later found that it helped with her asthma as well. She doesn't support recreational use for anyone younger than 21, she explained, holding Alice's hand, but said the plant's medicinal properties can't be ignored.
That was the overwhelming message of the movement. Many people marching are medical marijuana patients themselves, and the way they see it, there's no reason to keep this organic medicine from the people.
Of course, lawmakers — and a large segment of the public — see reason in approaching the issue with caution. And there's certainly an argument to made for rolling out legalization with some strong organization and oversight.
But as long as there are legal roadblocks to the uninhibited use of marijuana — for medical and recreational use alike — there will be people marching in the streets against them. Activists at the Global Cannabis March will make sure of it, as long as they have the momentum to do it.
As the crowd finally worked its way back to Pioneer Courthouse Square, the tired masses lowered their signs and sighed. Porkchop, the activist with the soon-to-be-amputated leg, limped down the brick steps.
"I feel good, I feel alive," he said about the march. "I feel like I want to put in another year." He smiled as the crowd came in behind him. "Free the weed!" he yelled into the square.
News Moderator: Jacob Redmond 420 MAGAZINE ®
Full Article: The people who march for marijuana: Scenes from the 2015 Global Cannabis March in Portland | OregonLive.com
Author: Jamie Hale
Contact: jhale@oregonian.com
Photo Credit: None Found
Website: Oregon Local News, Breaking News, Sports & Weather - OregonLive.com
