Marijuana controversy
Specific issues, such as the controversy surrounding the use of marijuana have throughout recorded history increasingly been looked at from different points of view. Our beliefs concerning the non-medical use of drugs, more specifically marijuana, have largely been dependent on what type of information is available for us, and whom we are receiving it from. The beginning of the marijuana controversy throughout North America, in reality, did not even surface until the early 1920s. In 1922, Emily Murphy, Canada's first female judge and respected figure, generated awareness when she wrote, "The Black Candle", Canada's first book on drug abuse. Since then, attitudes concerning the use of marijuana have been constantly changing, and thus have created ongoing arguments between two opposing forces within North American culture. Through an assessment of the material provided, this paper will focus on and explain how attitudes towards the use of marijuana have evolved over time. In her article, Murphy includes a variety of evidence concerning the use of marijuana. Her evidence consists of information provided by doctors, authority figures, fictitious literature, and writers who chose to express their feelings towards either marijua
Again, the latter comment was conceived before any scientific studies of marijuana had been done, and therefore, Anslinger was either making his own information up or actually conducting research and believing what he had found, as was the case with Murphy. " By the 1960s, when it was becoming obvious that the campaign to stop the use of marijuana was not working, State legislatures, influenced by Anslinger's advice, decided to intensify enforcement, and to increase penalties. The marijuana available on the streets today is 25 times more potent than it was in the 1960s, making it even more addictive, according to the policy makers. By this time marijuana had started spreading north, and Murphy certainly must have been informed about this and was, most likely, influenced by the information. These stories are really quite harmless, however, when Murphy read them she was obviously thinking about the racial differences involved in the stories. It grew very well in the Eastern and upper Southern States, including Pennsylvania, Virginia, and South Carolina. The State even left the decisions up to the Universities regarding whether or not they wanted to discipline their students for possession. " Marijuana is also on schedule 1 of the Controlled Substances Act, which classifies it as one of the most dangerous drugs along with heroine, whilst cocaine remains on schedule 2. Furthermore, marijuana produces premature cancer, coordination and perception impairment, a number of mental disorders including depression, hostility and increased aggressiveness, general apathy, memory loss, reproductive disabilities, and impairment to the immune system, again, according to the policy makers . Another issue that may have generated concern with Murphy is the issue of marijuana moving towards the north as the 1920s approached. All of these issues, understandably, would have generated enough motivation to write a book concerning the non-medical use of drugs. In "The Black Candle" Murphy refers to the convention held at The Hague in 1912, when Italy suggested a study of marijuana, claiming that its use would increase as the opium traffic was suppressed. Prior to the surfacing of Chinese immigrants, the use of laudanum was common, and up until then, acceptable in the non-medical sense as well. Before the 1920s marijuana was generally accepted in most places, for use in making hemp fabrics, or simply for ritual purposes.
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