United States Governments False Portrayal of Marijuana :: Government Marijuana weed Drugs Essays

United States Government's False Portrayal of Marijuana Abstract I believe that the government’s handling of marijuana has been unethical because they used propaganda and lies to misinform the American population about marijuana. In my casebook, I address how the government made propaganda films and other media to misinform the American population. Some powerful evidence that I used is from the book, On the Trail of Marijuana, in this book the authors illustrate their eight stages of marijuana intoxication: Stage One: Characteristic euphoria, or feelings of unnatural well-being and lightheadedness. Stage Two: Intellectual excitation, dissociation of ideas, and exaggeration of emotion. Stage Three: Illusion in regard to time and space. Stage Four: Intense auditory sensibility, where every musical sound is distorted. Stage Five: Fixation of ideas, which are derived by the suggestibility of near-by stimuli. Stage Six: Overbalancing emotional disturbances. Stage Seven: Culmination of the sixth stage, where the overexcited and distraught subject may commit violent irresponsible acts due to irresistible impulses of suggestive origin. Stage Eight: Hallucination, varied and often terrifying. The opposing argument is supported not by opinion, but by scientific proof. There have been many studies done on the effects of marijuana, but I chose On Being Stoned because the author realized that the effects are only â€Å"potential†. Marijuana is illegal in the United States and in the past, there have been many changes in legislation regarding marijuana possession, production, and use. The knowledge of marijuana usage has been warped and twisted by the American government beginning in the early 1900s. According to the Webster’s Dictionary definitions, ethics are principles of right conduct or a system of moral values, morals are the lesson or principle contained in or taught by a fable, a story, or an event, and government is the act or process of governing, especially the control and administration of public policy in a political unit. It bothers me that neither ethics nor morals were included in the definition of government.