Legalization of Marijuana Thesis Statement: Marijuana was first made illegal based on facts that have now been proved wrong and many people believe it is finally time to rightfully legalize it. Many people say that marijuana should stay illegal, but is that really the best option? Two states in the U. S have already legalized marijuana for recreational use – Colorado and Washington.
An additional eighteen states have legalized it for medical use. Also, all of Canada has legalized it for medical use. So, should it be legal for recreational use everywhere in Canada?On one hand, people look at the effects of marijuana and think it should stay illegal recreationally for those reasons. The short-term effects include: distorted sense of time, paranoia, anxiety, depression and short-term memory loss. These are some pretty serious issues for some people. Marijuana became illegal in the first place because people thought it made you mentally unstable- or crazy.
Now, we have found out the real side-effects of smoking marijuana and those reasons are strong enough for many people to want to keep it illegal recreationally.Additionally, the long-term effects that studies have shown may be quite serious as well. Things like decreased enjoyment in activities once enjoyed, decreased ability to learn, difficulty concentrating and respiratory problems if smoked. These issues are mainly present in heavy smokers, and are not near as serious or even existent in casual smokers. A common mistake people make is thinking that marijuana causes cancer, which is not true.
These facts can be argued either way because obviously the effects on heavy smokers is a huge reason for keeping marijuana illegal because those are very bad effects.Alternatively, it can be argued the other way because people want the drug to be used recreationally, like how many people use alcohol. It would not be a constant, all-day, every day thing for the majority of people. Also, the effects of decreased ability to learn, difficulty concentrating and loss of interest is mainly present in people who started smoking marijuana before the brain was fully developed.
On the other hand, people can look at the good effects marijuana can have. These include: euphoria, feeling relaxed, happy, increased laughter and sense of well-being.Also, some studies seem to show that marijuana can actually shrink benign as well as cancerous tumours. Many “facts” and theories of marijuana that made it and kept it illegal have since been proved wrong.
The “gateway” theory – a theory that says marijuana users are almost guaranteed to go on to use harder drugs- has been proved wrong because only 1 in 31 marijuana users ever use a harder drug. Also, another fact that many pro-legalists use is that nobody has ever died from overdosing on or the effects of marijuana and thousands of people die from cigarettes and alcohol every year, which is legal.Also, another argument for pro-legalization is how much money the government would save – and make! – by legalization, regulating and taxing marijuana. Instead of spending money to keep marijuana illegal- spending it on arrests, court costs, jail costs for trafficking- the government could actually make money by selling and taxing it! But with regulating it comes new problems, as Washington and Colorado have found. The question is, how do you go about regulating it? Will there be stores, like liquor stores, that sell marijuana? How should it be taxed?Should there be a limit on how much you can buy? There are so many questions and concerns about how to do it and those states are realizing how challenging it will be.
In conclusion, there are many pros and cons to the legalization, and many that have not even been mentioned. The conflict of whether or not to legalize this drug has been happening for years. Some people think it should stay illegal but some really think the benefits outweigh the negatives in this situation and that the time has finally come to legalize. So, what do you think?
