Marijuana has the same status as Alcohol in the USA

Although I live in a very liberal state when it comes to criminal laws regarding possession of marijuana, I wonder what would have to happen for it to have the same status as alcohol at this point of time. I've researched this subject, but I think that the collective minds of this forum could provide a few insights that even I looked past. What do you think out there?
 
Less pot use by the 60s counter-culture. Don't see Hippies and 60s Youth smoking somthing their fathers had after a hard day in the office.
 

Sachyriel

Banned
I'm thinking the U.S. looks at hemp and goes "Even if Mexicans and Black people use this to seduce white women, we need it as an industrial product".

Come about to their senses in a roundabout way. Racism can't exactly be wiped out, but you can certainly get them to want to maintain their industrial production outputs.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
Perhaps one of the more major PODs would be having marijuana not criminalized in the first place, though this would involve butterflying away the corporations (like Hearst) that wanted it gotten rid of because it was a threat to their businesses, and crazy folk like Henry Anslinger, who was just a monumental prick.
 

Sachyriel

Banned
Perhaps one of the more major PODs would be having marijuana not criminalized in the first place, though this would involve butterflying away the corporations (like Hearst) that wanted it gotten rid of because it was a threat to their businesses, and crazy folk like Henry Anslinger, who was just a monumental prick.

So we will need a motivated pro-hemp lobby! None of this sitting around all day reading comics stuff, they need to go to Washington and present economic facts to Congress to make sure they are seen as an established business (which they are) with potential for growth (which it has) and a vital role in the economy (which it very well was).
 
I'm thinking the U.S. looks at hemp and goes "Even if Mexicans and Black people use this to seduce white women, we need it as an industrial product".

Come about to their senses in a roundabout way. Racism can't exactly be wiped out, but you can certainly get them to want to maintain their industrial production outputs.

Maybe have pot associated with Queen Victoria and Napoleon's troops who were bringing it back to France from Egypt than the so-called "undesirables" of American society in the early 20th century.
 
If ganja has the same status as booze, then alot fewer people will be in prison and lots of tax dollars will be saved. Police and Federal Law Enforcenment can go after dangerous criminals instead.

tobacco will have some major competition as marijuana becomes another favorite smokable.

Imagine advertisments for joints, come smoke Phillip Morris new more satisfying "Delight Deluxe" now with methol.
 
Yea, you really need to disassociate it with "Mexican delinquents" and "uppity Negro jazz musicians" that "seduce our innocent White school girls" to avoid the criminalization.

Maybe if it somehow found an early home in western frontier culture?
 
Flashing forward to 2009 ITTL, expect a clamp down on marijuana, after all its got tobacco in it and there's the chance of various mental illnesses dependent on strength and dosage.

Temperance groups latch onto it as a 'clean' vice alternative to alcohol, makes people mellow and relax at home with the family (the image of 1950s PSBs with father coming home to slippers and hash pipe), rather than carousing with friends in bars, fighting, being sick and skipping work.
 

Sachyriel

Banned
Flashing forward to 2009 ITTL, expect a clamp down on marijuana, after all its got tobacco in it and there's the chance of various mental illnesses dependent on strength and dosage.

Temperance groups latch onto it as a 'clean' vice alternative to alcohol, makes people mellow and relax at home with the family (the image of 1950s PSBs with father coming home to slippers and hash pipe), rather than carousing with friends in bars, fighting, being sick and skipping work.

Well I can see where the ATL becomes OTL!

I would say that you would see a dramatic increase in traffic violations, DUI's, and fatal crashes.

I would say that is because non-stoned driers are angry at pot heads driving so carefully they ram each other while yelling at these hot boxed cars instead of paying attention to the road.
 
Although I live in a very liberal state when it comes to criminal laws regarding possession of marijuana, I wonder what would have to happen for it to have the same status as alcohol at this point of time. I've researched this subject, but I think that the collective minds of this forum could provide a few insights that even I looked past. What do you think out there?

Prohibition never gets repealed.

:)
 
Um, I honestly don't see the Hearst connection as logical. Hearst was a very smart man, and a very greedy one. If he could save money by using hemp, he would've. Blaming the corporations for not being able to get baked is just stupid.

To make it legal... well, I'm not sure. It would be made illegal at some point anyways, just like tobacco will be (at least here in the States). As to being a clean alternative to alcohol, I don't see that either, since you can drink without getting drunk. You can't do hits without getting high. And I'd rather be around a bellicose drunk than a stoner. They are way too annoying, smelly, and self-righteous. It's like evangelicals, but with 100% more "WOAH" and "brah".

On topic, have Rastas become the dominant protestant sect in the US. Catholics support wine, etc., Rastas support weed.
 

Dom

Moderator
To make it legal... well, I'm not sure. It would be made illegal at some point anyways, just like tobacco will be (at least here in the States). As to being a clean alternative to alcohol, I don't see that either, since you can drink without getting drunk. You can't do hits without getting high.

I'm pretty sure you can smoke weed without getting high, you build up a tolerance, like with Alcohol.
 
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