To Americans who grew up when all so-called recreational drugs — barring, of course, for mysterious reasons, alcohol and tobacco — were illegal, the societal changes being rung can seem to come head-spinningly fast.
First it was the medical marijuana “dispensaries,” open to those with a prescription from a doctor.
Then very quickly there was a wide-open weed shop on seemingly every downtown hipster block, serving all comers with a fantastical array of expensive cannabis products, like some fever dream from an old High Times centerfold.
But in the great sweep of human history, the laws against the demon reefer were actually created quite recently. In the United States, the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 was the first regulation. Then cannabis was outlawed for any use, including medical research, by 1970’s Controlled Substances Act. That act is still in use, though states are doing end-runs around it.
Psychedelic drugs were also unregulated in our time. LSD, for instance, was not made illegal in the U.S. until 1968, as politicians in Washington, D.C. freaked over Timothy Leary’s attempts to get a college generation to “turn on, tune in, drop out.”
A bill in the California Legislature would restore liberty and common sense, in California at least, after decades of governmental drug scares. Senate Bill 519, authored by state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, would decriminalize psilocybin (magic mushrooms), LSD, MDMA and some other drugs for personal use, and expunge criminal records for people with prior convictions for possession. It would also open the door to promising breakthrough treatments involving the use of psychedelic substances for mental health issues including PTSD.
Except for the doctor-supervised psychedelic sessions the bill would approve, of course there are dangers to the use of powerful mind-altering substances.
But those dangers aren’t eased by criminalizing the drugs. None in the bill are physically addictive, unlike plenty of legal medications.
The point we are coming to understand, as a century ago with alcohol, is that prohibition doesn’t work, and putting people in behind bars for drug use is simply barbaric.
If we are to move beyond prohibition, proposals like SB 519 must be approved.
