Film

Film

Legalization: A Debate

In the United States today, there is much controversy about the legalization of certain drugs. In a book written by Eliot Marshal entitled Legalization: A Debate, he talks about such circumstances. Not only does he just talk about the U.S., but the laws on drugs around the world. “Laws regulating drug use vary widely from country to country. In Malaysia, for example, substance abuse is a violation of religious law and drug trafficking is automatically punished by death. In Nepal, by contrast, the government not only tolerates the use of psychoactive substances but collects taxes on the drug trade. Policies concerning drug abuse in the United States lie somewhere between these two extremes and are constantly changing as evidence concerning the dangers and consequences of drug use accumulates.”

In the book, the talk about Prohibition comes up. The author writes, “In time, Prohibition came to be seen not just as a failure but as a desperate and foolish mistake. Today, many people who oppose controls on “recreational” drugs - particularly controls on marijuana - cite Prohibition as evidence that it is futile to try to outlaw a popular intoxicant. The heart of this argument is that, even if it was desirable in theory, prohibition cannot be carried out in practice. People will find a way to get what they want, the argument goes, and outlawing a drug merely sends drug seekers into an illegal black market.”

Another chapter in the book, which is discussed by the author, is Illicit Drugs as Medicine. The author talks about a man named Robert Randall. Robert Randall is a man who can just walk into a pharmacy and pick up a prescription that contains about 300 neatly packed marijuana cigarettes. He had taken this idea all the way to the court as being “marijuana therapy”. The marijuana is cultivated on a farm run by the federal government in Mississippi and processed under federal government. He had said that the marijuana eased the pain caused by his illness known as glaucoma. Glaucoma, is a progressive disease of the eye and optic disc that often results in blindness. Randall does not have to pay for the marijuana, because the government does not want to put itself in the awkward position of selling marijuana, an illegal activity. Marijuana has also been proven to help out other illnesses. For example, marijuana has been proven useful in preventing the nausea and vomiting common in cancer patients treated with strong chemicals and radiation.