A recent poll commissioned by an anti-cannabis group attempted to suggest that Americans don’t overwhelmingly want legalization, but the results actually show how unpopular federal prohibition has become.
Though Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM) says it does not want to demonize cannabis and defines itself as a non-partisan group, it openly admits it campaigns against legalization.
This makes it unsurprising that despite its poll results, which found that 78% of Americans disapprove of current federal policy, they attempted to spin the findings as proof of dwindling support for access to the plant.
According to the press release about the survey, titled, “New National Poll Shows Support for Marijuana Legalization Dips Below 50% When Voters Are Given Other Policy Choices”:
“In the poll, 49% of likely voters supported legalization whereas 50% supported other policies. One percent were undecided.”
This is true, and it seems to indicate that the pro-legalization percentages from polls by organizations like Gallup skew high because those surveyed aren’t given other options to choose from.
“This poll shows that we need to move beyond this false dichotomy between prohibition and legalization, especially for individual users,” said Kevin Sabet, Ph.D., President of SAM. “These results clearly indicate the oft-touted vast public support for marijuana legalization has a shakier foundation than marijuana investors would have you believe. This should give pause to politicians and marijuana financiers alike.”
However, the other “options” in the survey were decriminalization, defined as “removing the possibility of jail time for possession and also allowing for medical marijuana, but keep the sale of marijuana illegal,” and legalizing “the use of marijuana for physician-supervised medical use.”
Between the 49% of respondents who advocate full legalization, the 29% who prefer medical legalization, and the 5% who support decriminalization, the poll overwhelmingly shows federal policies are not lining up with what the vast majority of people want.
According to the anti-cannabis group, 78% of people polled oppose current prohibition measures, suggesting the poll backfired despite the organization’s efforts to cast doubt on growing tolerance for marijuana.
Medical marijuana is still illegal at the federal level, and federal drug laws still impose jail time and/or fines for individual users.
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In some ways we were a lot better off in MA with decriminalization, when it was decriminalized then if you had pot in your car you would get a $100 civil fine, they no longer had anything to harass kids and minorities about, now that it is legal if they catch you with a bag of weed in the car they will hit you with a criminal DUI and open container violation, now they have something to once again arrest young people and minorities for. So we went from a situation were you got a small ticket to one where you get your life ruined by the criminal justice system. When it was decriminalized they could not search your car if they smelled weed because possessing weed was a civil offense and thus smelling it was not evidence of a crime, now of course that is all gone.
Oh there's still harassment. In Maryland it's decriminalized but the police are still shaking down citizens who they know will have cannabis on them as frequently as they can with bogus traffic stops. You only get to have 3 citations before they can make the decision to incarcerate you. Even for medical patients in Maryland. The police will confinscate your medicine despite your medical card on the side of the road and issue a citation anyway. Sure you can go to court with your paperwork and the charges will be thrown out but they've destroyed $100's of your property at that point. It's hard enough for patients to afford their medicine as it is considering there's no help from insurance companies.
Maybe one day people will become smarter.
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No way to stop it now. Totally legalized up here in Canada in July. Great post @careywedler
Great post, shared to almost 7000 people on twitter!
It's time for us to stand up nationally! We shouldn't be afraid anymore!
In general it is good to see that cannabis is getting legalized more step by step. But I think conservative politicians (especially elder ones) need to disappear first with their stubborn motives to get cannabis even more accepted in society.
It's all about the money trail for the right. There concern IS NOT with the citizens, it's in their pockets.
I love that the survey backfired on them.