Cannabis and Prohibition Debate: Majority of Argentines Support Legalizing Adult Use

With the law on active medicinal use and the project to promote the production and marketing of plant-based products with a half-sanction in the Senate, Argentina faces an inevitable debate: ending criminal prosecutions against consumers and producers and regulating adult and private use of marijuana.

The discussion, which has lasted more or less for decades, took hold last weekend after Alberto Fernández returned to the subject at the II Federal Law Meeting and declared that the big problem for young people is alcohol, that it is legal, and that in the face of marijuana there is “social hypocrisy”: “It is a debate that will have to be given at some point”.

The President of the Nation also noted in this interview that “the law always goes after the culture” and “Now another debate is opening, which is about the use of marijuana, specifically for recreational purposes”. In this sense, an opinion survey carried out among 1,000 Argentinian citizens over the age of 18 shows that almost 6 in 10 (55%) are in favor of legalization.

In this way, it is clear that there is a social questioning of the cannabis plant, of which possession for consumption is prohibited by law 23 737, sanctioned in 1989, at a time when the argument that monopolized the discussion was based on myths without scientific evidence: that marijuana destroys neurons, that it is the “gateway” to other drugs, that it generates violence among those who use it and criminals.

The survey, carried out by the online consulting firm Kantar, also indicates that 3 in ten people consulted (28%) do not yet have an opinion on the issue, so only 17% oppose it regulating the use and cultivation of marijuana.

The belief that the criminal law of narcotics must be changed and that the state must give it a different approach, without persecuting or imprisoning users and producers, is slightly more marked in women than in men, where approval of legalization reaches 58%.

Perhaps because of the large amount of information about the plant circulating on the internet, with virtually free access, or because the revision of the ban is being debated around the world, the new generations no longer demonize the use of the plant. According to the study, 58% of millennials (those born between 1980 and 2000) consulted think that it is better to legalize. In the case of the next generation, the centenarians (born after 2000), the figure rises to 62%.

This age preference is reflected in social networks, or 71% of conversations about legalization are positive, while positive sentiment reached 54% in conversations about medicinal use.

“The declaration of the President of the Nation is correct when he says that ‘the law runs after culture’. According to data from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), around 192 million people use cannabis at least once a year globally, representing the most consumed illegal substance ”, he explained to Infobae Mariano Fusero, lawyer and member of the organization Reset, devoted to drug policy.

The specialist agrees with what the survey reflects: “There is a growing demystification of the uses and effects of cannabis, which have been crossed by unscientific prejudices for decades when it was a substance with less capacity for individual or collective damage than alcohol and tobacco ”.

In this sense, the survey shows that stereotypes are starting to fall under their own weight. 46% of people no longer limit the association of cannabis use to a particular segment of the population, and it is mainly linked to therapeutic use (83%) compared to adult use (49%). And a very interesting fact: more than 80% of Argentines consulted consider that future consumption will focus on relieving not only physical pain but also emotional pain.

The National University of Quilmes with Center for the Study of Cannabis Cultivation (CECCA) conducted a survey in 2020 in which 60,000 people participated. The results are underway, but the president of the organization, Luis Osler, has agreed that there is a trend in Argentina which is on the way to definitive acceptance of the adult use of the plant.

“The situation responds to several factors, such as the information circulating or the laws in other parts of the world, but above all the main reason is the scandalous failure of the ban and its disastrous consequences on the lives of ordinary citizens, that their health, their rights and their freedom are affected on a daily basis ”, explained the lawyer.

“Today Marijuana regulation is in the hands of illegal supply networks, who seek profits whatever the toxic quality of the substances they sell, favoring the sale to minors, the bringing together of people who consume cannabis towards other more harmful illegal substances, police corruptibility. A legal regulation in the hands of the State would make it possible to control who produces, under what conditions, according to what requirements and quality controls, who sells, where, under what conditions, who is authorized to buy, neutralizing the sale to adolescents, ”added Fusero.

Last Saturday, Alberto Fernández opened the doors to the debate on the subject by comparing the damage caused by alcohol to young people compared to that caused by the consumption of cannabis. “We must win and debate an issue that has to do with the social hypocrisy in which we live. There is a part of us that supports a certain hypocrisy. That marijuana is toxic is not in question. But also tobacco is poisonous and also alcohol is poisonous. And yet there is a whole industry set up behind tobacco and alcohol where toxicity takes a back seat. The biggest addiction problem our youth suffer from isn’t precisely marijuana, it’s alcohol. Our young people are damaged and their physique first of all by alcohol. An entire industry has settled there that it is very difficult to question, ”said the president, when he had already spoken in favor of a change in legislation, as in June 2019, when he said that “The solution is not to drive out those who smoke a joint.”

For activist Nico Milione, president of the Buenos Aires group Action on cannabis and a member of the Cannabis collective in Congress, “it is positive that the President opens the debate” because “once the debt to medicinal users and the production of both hemp and medicinal cannabis have been paid, we can fully concentrate on decriminalization and regulation of adult use ”.

“We must remove marijuana from the list of narcotics and we must see how to deal with the legislative process based on these sayings. There are several projects in Congress with parliamentary status to get to this point, so it generates a lot of expectations, we know that it is only just beginning, ”said Milione.

Emilio Ruchansky, journalist and member of the Cannabis Regulation Agreement in Argentina, he added: “We are developing a legal regulation project based on aspects of public health. We are interested in getting out of the discussion about whether marijuana is good or bad and thinking the bad thing is lurking. It is the third psychoactive substance consumed in the country and it is not a minor market. To speak in terms of the market is to think of a regulation to get the affairs out of the mafias as has been done in Canada and Uruguay and the United States. It is positive that the debate is open, the regulation must be agreed between safety eyes, production and social justice ”.

Indeed, they are 16 states in the United States that have previously regulated adult use (and 33 who did so, in addition, for medicinal use). In addition, Canada and Uruguay legalized all uses and Mexico he hopes to pass the law through the Senate before the end of 2021.

The reconversion of the gaze on cannabis is not exclusive to Argentina. In the United States, the first country to ban marijuana in 1936 (after Egypt, which did so in 1884) and from there to promote the global ban throughout the 20th century, support for the legalization has grown exponentially over the past 20 years.

According to a 2018 Gallup poll, 53% of Republican voters and 75% of Democrats were in favor of regulation. In addition, 8 in 10 Americans aged 18 to 34 also support legalization.

In one of the most lucid speeches on the subject, the former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, pointed out that it was a duty to decriminalize drugs because a drug-free world is an illusion: “Drugs are infinitely more dangerous without leaving them in the hands of criminals, who don’t care about health or safety. Legal regulations protect health “.

KEEP READING: