Let's talk about pot.
There's no more ignoring the big green elephant in the room.
And it's BIG.
The left coast, Washington State and California, my beloved home state, have led the way with Colorado following. Now Florida will vote on the issue before we can say, "Whoa! That's some bad stuff!" (Picture stupified look behind a billow of smoke).
There are so many questions to ask about this issue. The first one is Why is the seedy substance is in such demand?
For medicinal reasons, some say. Medical Marijuana is the biggest justification for decriminalization. Pot is management for chronic pain. The magic weed could cure cancer and so many other heinous diseases. Did that many people just get sick all of a sudden? If it's purpose is for medicine only, why doesn't it stay in the doctor's office or pharmacy, instead of popping up in every little head shop along the side streets of LA?
No, marijuana is the heinous disease upon our nation; our Cannabis Nation.
Can't argue that it is a pain reducer. It eases the aggravation of daily life for so many. We can feel good for a moment with less chance of addiction, side effects, and physical risk than using harder drugs.
But that's a Lie.
The moment's escape from our soul's ache doesn't cure its problem.
Pot is a window drug. After a while it gets boring. We look for the new high, the new drug of choice; a harder drug. The universal law of Diminishing Returns applies.
Pot is an ambition killer. That's bad for personal and economic productivity. The pot head's vocabulary is boiled down to 3 words. "I Don't Care." With maybe a "Whatever, man!" thrown in. Because you don't care. You don't care about anything but the next buzz.
I wish I could say I never experienced the mind-numbing wave that wafts over your brain at the first ecstatic toke. But I do. And I did. Inhale. Swept up in the teenage culture of the 70's, I tried and partied with the stuff. It's delights were known and appreciated.
My boyfriend did harder drugs and wanted to take me out to the desert to take more serious substances. Thankfully that never happened and I was rescued by Jesus out of that culture.
But the boyfriend? He was in and out of drugs his whole adult life. Even after marriage and buying a home, he was arrested for cooking methadone on his driveway at age 39. Afterwards he lost his house and separated from his wife. His grown son runs a marijuana dispensary in California.
I.
Think.
That.
Is.
So.
Sad.
That's not the occupation I would wish on any of my sons. But it's lucrative, some argue. In fact I read an article stating 12 reasons why we should legalize pot and they were ALL monetary.
If money were the object of life, then we would all be prostitutes, pimps and pushers.
Personal economics is not the only criteria in choosing a career. Benefit to family and community should be a consideration. Our jobs should contribute to society, not tear it down. Life isn't all about the money. God save us if it is.
Pot has dark side that no one seems to want to address. It's not a harmless drug that will reduce drug related crimes. Yeah, you might argue, look at Prohibition. Crime thrived during Prohibition, so if we decriminalize pot, crime will go down. Has it? Has drug related crime shrunk in those states?
Is America escaping from the plague of depression? Why are we all so messed up? Is it the emotional wreckage that broken families have caused? Why are we all clamoring for quick relief?
Feeling good is not an objective. It is a by-product: a result of doing good, of righting wrongs, of mending relationships. When we pursue feeling good for the sake of feeling good, it usually ends up in destructive behavior, adding to our discomfort rather than reducing it.
Jesus took the pain and righted all our wrongs. When we lay it on him, should we not feel better and free-er and happier?
It seems so simple. Yet, there are chemically deficient people who really battle depression solely from imbalances in levels of dopamine and other enzymes that produce the feeling of well being. We all get tired and it feels like depression, the blues, being down.
But pot is not the answer.
Let's debate and consider the long term implications of our national attraction to weed. Let's wrestle the facts before we vote rather than just float on the sweet smelling cloud of popular opinion.
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