--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, new.morning <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Marijuana was outlawed for two reasons. In the southwestern states, > it > was outlawed because "All Mexicans are crazy and marijuana is what > makes them crazy." In the northeastern states, it was outlawed > because > of the fear that heroin addiction would lead to the use of marijuana - > exactly the opposite of the modern "gateway" myth. When it was > outlawed at the national level, the head of the Federal Bureau of > Narcotics stated that marijuana drove people insane. As proof, he > offered the example of a young couple who smoked a joint and became > so crazed that they eloped and got married.
Very colorful. Also mainly untrue, just the urban legend version. Marijuana was made illegal in the US after a concerted lobbying and propaganda cam- paign started by William Randolph Hearst, for the oldest of reasons, money. He had nothing against its use as a drug -- he wanted to make *hemp* illegal because it was being proved to be a better source of paper than trees, and he had vast holdings of forest lands and paper mills to support his publishing business. The real story has been thoroughly researched and documented in a film, the name of which I don't seem to be able to find right now, but I'll look for it this weekend when I'm in Amsterdam. It's a pretty amazing story. The clincher seems to have been playing the race card. A "study," purporting to have come from an established research lab (which turned out to never have existed) was sent to every Congressman and Senator in the US. The study claimed that they had proved conclusively that when black men smoke marijuana, they tend to rape white women. The next day, marijuana was illegal in the United States. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Great things are happening at Yahoo! Groups. See the new email design. http://us.click.yahoo.com/TISQkA/hOaOAA/yQLSAA/UlWolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
