The history of marijuana and its legalization
How a simple agricultural plant, used for ropes and textiles, ended up classified as one of the country’s most dangerous drugs by the US Drug Control Administration. UU.? The journey that the cannabis plant makes to become the marijuana drug is really a strange trip.
In this final part of the series on marijuana, of the Unified Prevention Coalition (UP!) From Doña Ana County, we deepen the history of drugs to bring perspective to its historical use and misuse, and better understand why controversy around its use. Continue today.
Cannabis is the Latin name of medicinal, recreational and fibrous plants that belong to the Cannabaceae family. The plant originated in Central Asia, and its fibrous stem lent it to be cultivated as a source of ropes, textile and paper material. As agricultural cultivation, it spread rapidly through Asia, Africa and Europe.
The plant was also used for spiritual and medicinal purposes for centuries and appears written in China from 2737 to. C. The medicinal use of cannabis is included in the oldest Chinese pharmacology text, the Shennong Bencaojing, written in the year 100 D.C.
The crop was cultivated worldwide as one of the main agricultural crops for centuries.
The European settlers, which founded Jamestown, Virginia, brought cannabis to grow in 1607. Although, the crop was probably already established in North America before that time by slaves of Africa.
Throughout the world, cannabis is one of the most popular drugs, and is located behind caffeine, nicotine and alcohol, according to Martin Booth, author of the book ‘Cannabis: A History’.
It was not until the early twentieth century that public opinion about cannabis became more poisoned and finally qualified as illegal.
The real impact occurred when the United States approved the prohibition, the 18th amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which was the national prohibition of alcoholic beverages from 1920 to 1933. Without access to their favorite drug, alcohol, people were looking for a recreational substitute that found cannabis.
At the end of the prohibition, the concern went from alcohol to the other emerging drugs, such as cannabis, which was prohibited for recreational use in the 1937 marijuana tax law, which also required a license rate for producers, importersand manufacturers.
The revolution in Mexico in 1910 caused a wave of Mexican immigration to the United States. The word ‘marijuana’ – the word in Spanish for drugs – then became popular as it was consumed among the new Mexican immigrants. There were political factions in the USA. UU. That would benefit from demonizing cannabis. They exploited the fear of Mexican immigrants to influence public opinion on drugs.
Later, marijuana continued to be associated as a drug consumed by marginal and socially problematic groups, such as jazz musicians, beatniks and the counterculture of the late sixties.
To politicize and demonize even more the use of marijuana, the DEA included it as a drug from list 1, described as without medical use and with a high potential for abuse with the potential to create a severe psychological or physical dependence. This classified it with the heroin, LSD, ecstasy, metacualone and peyote.
Being a drug drug also prohibits research on marijuana. There are ways to avoid this legality, but it can be expensive for investigators and can force deficient research studies. The limited investigation that has been carried out a complicated picture of the substance.
Marijuana has short -term effects that have made it attractive to recreational use, such as the alteration of the sense of time, improved senses, relaxation and drowsiness;However, long -term effects are worrisome due to the effects on brain development.
However, as the National Institutes on Drug Abuse, of the studies that have been carried out there are contradictory results.
“Some studies suggest that regular marijuana consumption in adolescence is associated with an altered connectivity and a reduced volume of specific regions of the brain involved in a wide range of executive functions such as memory, learning and impulse control compared toPeople who do not consume it. Other studies have not found significant structural differences between the brains of people who use and do not use drugs ’.
Clearly, doubts about the medical and recreational effects of cannabis. Therefore, it may be useful for the medication to be reclassified outside of list 1, which will allow more research on its value. Maybe that is the best ‘next step’ before discussing legalization.
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