Well, it's official. Our friendly neighbor to the north, Canada, has now fully legalized cannabis effective today, October 17, 2018. The actual law doing so, Bill C-45, was passed a few months ago in June, but officially goes into effect today. That makes Canada the second country in the world (after Uruguay in 2014) to officially and fully legalize it nationwide.
The details vary from province to province, but cannabis is generally legal in all 13 Canadian provinces and territories now. Age limits for purchase and possession are 18 or 19 depending on the province. It will be the same as the drinking age, with the notable exception of Manitoba whose drinking age is 18 but whose toking age is 19, because reasons. Thus, Alberta and Quebec will be 18 and everywhere else will be 19. Not perfect, of course, but still WAY more progressive than the USA, in which only a fraction of the states have full legalization and all of such legalization states set the age limit at 21. You know, kinda like the ageist abomination that is the 21 drinking age--which really needs to be lowered to 18 yesterday (along with the toking age as well).
Other advantages of the Canadian model of legalization include the fact that the prices/taxes of legal weed will be set low enough to undercut the black market, something that the legalization states in the USA still have yet to do. This, combined with a lower age limit than the USA, would lead to the black market collapsing much sooner. And once it is gone, it will be gone forever within a few years from now, and then prices/taxes can then be raised just high enough to discourage overconsumption without resurrecting that very same black market.
We can certainly learn a lot from our friendly neighbor to the north. So what are waiting for?
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The organizations which support Cannabis legalization in the United States are led by ageist bigots. Those organizations only want Cannabis legalized if it is regulated like alcoholic beverages, which is oppressive at 21. Those same organizations only refer to adults as being 21 or older. When the leaders of those organizations talks they only want Cannabis if they get a minimum age of 21. Fortuantely, in Canada, the reverse is true. Canadians understand that discrimination against young people is unethical and counterproductive. Canada's legalization of Cannabis is ideal in that for the most part, the age of majority is acknowledged as being the right minimum age for smoking Cannabis. It's my belief that the U.S. will never get there. The U.S. is inherently oppressive and ageist.
ReplyDeleteIndeed, and the cowards that run groups like NORML have gone on the record saying that they are neutral and equally support 18 or 21 for cannabis. Though marginally better than being pro-21, such a lukewarm neutrality is still cowardly nonetheless.
ReplyDeleteIt is cowardice because without courage, then the minimum age for smoking Cannabis will never be 18-19.
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