STUFF STONERS LIKE ENDORSE PROP 64
We refuse to align with police, prosecutors, prison guards and prohibitionist. Today Stuff Stoners Like officially endorse California’s Proposition 64 the Adult Use of Marijuana Act. After a decade of writing this blog and fighting to end prohibition—MARIJUANA LEGALIZATION IS ON THE HORIZON! We believed in legalization back in 2010 endorsing California’s last legalization effort and we continue to believe in legalization today.
Sure we’re hella against a corporate takeover of cannabis but we just can’t ignore the fact that California still continues to arrest 20,000 people for marijuana crimes each year. Plus thousands more serve time or are on parole or probation for a plant. And that ridiculous, racially-rooted, plant-based crime clings to their record eliminating opportunities for housing, education, employment and the like. That’s fucked up. That’s reason alone to end marijuana prohibition in our state this November.
But we’ll give you some more reasons to legalize it. Legalization will finally put an end to all the no knock raids, lying narcs, sleazy informants, warrantless surveillance, racial profiling, ruined lives and wasted resources associated with policing a plant. Have you ever seen a DEA agent kill a marijuana plant or rip a huge safe out of a dispensary—permanently destroying livelihoods? We have. It happened to Oaksterdam University’s Richard Lee the guy who funded CA’s last legalization effort and we watched in horror as it played out in the streets of Oakland. Legalize it and that shit won’t happen again.
Have you ever watched as someone withered away on their deathbed then wondered if they’d still be alive if they refused to believe lies? We have and it’s heartbreaking. Legalization will end all the heartbreak and the needless suffering in the absence of good medicine. And furthermore legalization in California will send a strong message to the Feds, the nation and the rest of the world that the marijuana movement was right all along and that law enforcement was wrong. The blood is on their hands (and we won’t forget.)
Legalization in California doesn’t mean that Wall Street, big pharma or any other corrupt corporate interest will take over weed. You kept a farm alive in Humboldt County for decades under some seriously hostile conditions—DEA agents have guns suits do not. You’ll be rewarded in the post prohibition future. Sure a few suits have swooped in and have been eating our lunch lately, but the marijuana movement isn’t going to let them continue. We’ll simply repay them for funding our legalization efforts by organizing against them. It’s because the marijuana movement organized in the first place and kept moving forward that sixty percent of Americans are on our side now. Their favorable opinion of weed isn’t because billionaire tech titan Sean Parker or any other Richy Rich donated money. It’s because of our collective hard work changing laws and attitudes towards cannabis.
We’re winning and we’ll continue to win. We’ll continue to draw on our victories—wins in spite of a violent and senseless, decades-long and completely unjust war—in the face of fierce opposition from political parties, the media, the medical establishment and the nation’s prison-industrial-complex. We’ve beaten those dudes since 1996 when California first legalized medical weed. And we’ve continued to beat them nationwide as more and more states legalize weed for recreational and/or medical use. As editor David Bienenstock says in his latest High Times post titled, You’re Not Against Cannabis Legalization, You’re Against Corporate Weed (And That’s Cool, But…) The weed heads need to ban together to keep out the greed heads.
“For while every other segment of the global economy is already tightly controlled by vast capital and deeply entrenched political interests,” he writes, “cannabis legalization offers a wholly unique opportunity to build a truly progressive industry from the ground up, one that addresses income inequality, labor rights, environmental sustainability, and unchecked corporate power. And once we’ve established a thriving cannabis industry based on those principals, we then use that example to push every other industry on Earth towards such radical practices as paying a living wage, marketing responsibly, and not destroying the planet.”
So we aren’t the only ones who think that stoners can ultimately take over or at least greatly shape the industry in our favor. There are more of us than them. Stay focused and don’t believe their hype just keep up the fight. Sure Prop 64 isn’t perfect, and the future is always uncertain, but it’s hella better than prohibition. So we encourage you to VOTE YES ON AUMA.
Need more convincing on Prop 64? Check out Russ Bellville’s two info-packed post (including footnotes!) on why he and High Times are all for AUMA. Bellville, who runs the CannabisRadiio Network, is the hardest working dude in weed and if anyone’s in the know—it’s him. Worried about taxation? He points out that with legalization supply goes up, prices go down. Prop 64 kills off medical marijuana in California, right? Wrong. Bellvile points out how the new legislation protects and strengthens our states medical weed program. Anyhow have other California cannabis legalization concerns? Bellville’s probably already addressed ’em—so go check out his posts.
But before you go leaving our page here are a few highlights of Prop 64 so keep them in mind as you vote YES:
- All criminal penalties related to cannabis are significantly reduced or eliminated (see chart below), except for sales to minors and home butane extraction, which remain felonies. Anyone 17-years-old or younger can only receive a non-fined infraction for any marijuana violation, and at age 18 their record is sealed.
- Anybody with a California based cannabis conviction on their record will be eligible to have their record either reduced or expunged. And anybody currently incarcerated for a crime that is affected by Prop 64 can petition to have their sentence reduced or for immediate release.
- A five-year ban on the largest commercial licenses and strict bans on monopolies will allow small-scale growers, processors, distributors and retailers a chance to take root before facing competition from “Big Marijuana.” And that ban on the largest licenses can be extended indefinitely if, after five years of regulated sales, the California Legislature determines that the state’s cannabis supply needs are being adequately met.
- A`prior drug conviction can not be used as a reason to deny someone a license to work in the cannabis industry.
- License fees are scaled based on the size of the business, so they’re not an undue burden on small business.
- Small-scale operators can apply for a special, vertically integrated “micro-license,” which permits the cultivation of a cannabis garden 10,000 square feet in size or smaller, which can then operate like a winery tour, including the ability to process, infuse, sell and consume cannabis on-site.
- With local approval, on-site consumption cannabis lounges will be permitted to provide safe, social spaces, free from alcohol, where adults can gather to share and enjoy cannabis.
- Tax money collected from cannabis sales will go towards researching medical cannabis; studying impaired driving; youth drug treatment, prevention, and education; environmental restoration of damage caused by illegal grows, and a $50 million per year community re-investment fund to help the communities most adversely affected by the war on drugs.
- Prop 64 does not affect or repeal any aspect of Prop 215 (California’s original medical cannabis law), but it does add child custody protection for patients, caps the fee for ID cards at $100 (with free cards for the indigent), and protects the privacy of medical records.
Will you be voting for the legalization of marijuana for adult recreational use in California? How about voting for legalization in your state? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section below…
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