“Medical Marijuana – Who Really Won?”

In 2008 63% of Michigan voters approved The Michigan Medical Marijuana Act, effectively making it legal for residents with certain medical conditions to cultivate, smoke, and bake their favorite buds. This was celebrated throughout the cannabis community as it signified a new day for the sick and depressed among us who chose cannabis over mass-produced drugs. And in spite of the fact that this law has benefited all cannabis users just by existing, it has also given us a number of additional challenges.

#1. Mind Fuck=Paranoia. The System’s favorite ally. Sure they’ll give you something. But then they’ll weasel their way out of it, and even sabotage you once you’re not looking. It’s also called the old Bait & Switch. We’ve been hornswoggled for so long, a lot of us are used to it. But if you get used to being compromised, you’re doomed. Even though medical marijuana has been legal for more than 2 years, sick patients and their caregivers are still being taken down and their lives still disrupted. Is there no relief?

#2. Us & Them. Additional pressures are being put on the recently liberated. Under the Michigan law you can be cited and jailed for sharing your medicine with a non-card carrying person. Which means they can set up a narc in your midst, and if you pass them a joint of that bad-ass bud your grower just laid on you, you could be on your way to the hoosegow. What has been the effect of this thus far? Certified medical patients are scared shitless and they close themselves off in hopes of remaining undetected. So, let’s review. The voters approved medical marijuana (by a substantial margin I might add), and sick patients are now more closed off and paranoid than ever before. Funny thing, laws. Eh?

#3. A bill is already circulating in the Michigan Senate that will harass and eventually forbid compassion centers from coming into your neighborhood. After all, who wants a bunch of sick people in wheelchairs gumming up the place? Many local authorities have referred to compassion clubs as ‘criminal enterprises’, setting up task forces to close them down. And to the average American you’re still just a “burner’. What we learn here is this: Our fight is as one culture. Not medical and recreational users separate, but Cannabis Smokers United. Union 420! You may think you’ve been liberated, but the slave owners are already working on getting their slaves back.

#4. The list of acceptable conditions to become “Legal” reads like the log at a Hospice Center. You pretty much have to be at death’s door or on the road to ruin. The MMMA, while well-meaning has addressed only part of the War On Cannabis. I would argue that its main redeeming value is instead of smoking Regos we’re now huffing Sour Diesel. Whoops. There goes that criminal element again!

In summary, medical marijuana is being challenged at all levels, in every municipality. Prejudice against cannabis users is still being felt, and some might say it’s getting worse. Voters seem to be OK with Medical uses but bring up Recreational and the thumbs start twitching downward. As long as cannabis is being classified as a drug, it will be treated as such. And I don’t want to have to contract a serious condition to enjoy de herb. Do you?