After David Brooks, a columnist for the New York Times, explained his support for marijuana prohibition, I couldn't help but question his view on laws and their role in shaping the society we want.
His statement read:
"Laws profoundly mold culture, so what sort of community do we want our laws to nurture? What sort of individuals and behaviors do our governments want to encourage? I’d say that in healthy societies government wants to subtly tip the scale to favor temperate, prudent, self-governing citizenship. In those societies, government subtly encourages the highest pleasures, like enjoying the arts or being in nature, and discourages lesser pleasures, like being stoned."
When he says "DISCOURAGES" so casually at the end of his sentence, it doesn't fly as under-the-radar as he may have hoped. Perhaps to those people who do not understand nor use cannabis or are fine with their doctored view of the substance, this seems like a legitimate argument. Until of course you substitute marijuana for one of your beloved vices/freedoms (alchohol, tobacco, even having a car capable of anything above the speed limit).
What really is evident here is the absolutely MASSIVE gap between the "discouraging" motives of the government and the alarmingly high arrest rates for the possession of cannabis.
In 1992, the City of New York made 812 cannabis-related arrests. In 10 years that number has multiplied to the tune of 32,230 arrests.
Being arrested for something as harmless as Cannabis is a joke in itself, but there is nothing funny about the havoc that even one of these arrests can have on an individual's life. Should the punishment really be so harsh and widespread when the government wants to simply "discourage" the "lesser pleasure" of being stoned?
See the video below.
