TIME TO SAY MORE THAN JUST "NO"

Our country seemingly remains hell-bent on continuing to waste billions of
dollars year after year on the longest waged war in U.S. history. Prison
systems are overflowing with drug users and low level drug dealers;
incarceration of youth is given a higher priority than educating them; and a
huge and costly governmental/ corporate complex is erected, ostensibly
designed to wage a war against drugs, but, in reality, completely dependent
on the continued presence of "the enemy" in order to justify its very
existence.

Our officially sanctioned policy of "Just Say No Or Say Nothing" serves not
to prevent drug abuse, but rather to bar a necessary,
all-informed-viewpoints-welcome, including divergent and alternative
perspectives, public dialogue from taking place. The goal of such a
discussion should be the formulation of an effective, intelligent, humane,
protective of civil liberties and individual rights, national policy on
drugs.

I urge that such a dialogue recognize these facts:

Current drug policy has created vicious and ever expanding criminal networks
that corrupt society, including police forces, and cause far worse damage
and destruction than the substances being regulated.

It is the war against drugs, not the drugs themselves, which has turned drug
dealing into an enormous profit making machine, resulting, as was the case
with prohibition, in gangs and cartels killing each other, as well as
innocent members of their communities, in the pursuit of the greenback
dollar bill.

The harmfulness of a drug has nothing do with its legality or illegality.
Compare these facts: estimated U.S. deaths in the year 2001 attributed to
tobacco: 400,000; alcohol: 110,000; prescription drugs:'100,000; aspirin and
related painkillers: 7600; marijuana: 0.

Drugs have always been associated with human populations and are here to
stay, if only because the biological impulse to get high rivals the
biological impulse for food, water and sex.

Drug use must be distinguished from drug abuse. Drug abusers are those in
bad relationships with drugs, whether legal or illegal.

Preventing drug abuse is a viable goal. We can teach people how to satisfy
their needs and desires without recourse to drugs. We can also teach people
how to form good relationships with drugs so that if they choose to use
drugs, they remain users and not abusers.

As described in my recently published book," Deep Spirit & Great Heart:
Living In Marijuana Consciousness," responsible, respectful and disciplined
use of marijuana affords one the insight that it is a plant teacher
possessing potential enormous beneficial and healing qualities, that heaven
is not a place, but a state of consciousness, in which a joyous daily
existence, awareness of eternal truths, sexual ecstasy, heightening of
ecological awareness, and spiritual enlightenment can become a life reality.

It is time for the silence to be broken, for the truth to be told. America
needs to adopt a drug policy that heals not harms our county and its people.
We must learn from our past mistakes. We can do better than destroying the
village in order to save it.

Louis Silverstein is a professor in Liberal Education at Columbia College of
Chicago. His book "Deep Spirit & Great Heart: Living In Marijuana
Conscious-ness" is available at The Hemp Store in Paia, Miracles Bookery in
Makawao and online from www.amazon.com and www.bn.com .


Pubdate: Thu, 8 Aug 2002
Source: Maui Weekly (HI)
Contact: info@mauiweekly.com
Copyright: 2002, Maui Weekly
Website: http://www.mauiweekly.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2345
Author: Louis Silverstein
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)
Note: For more on medical cannabis and cannabis eradication in Hawaii go to
http://www.mapinc.org/areas/Hawaii