Legalization of Marijuana or Myths about the marijuana plant

Why should marijuana be legalized? It has many valuable medical uses, is relatively safe, and prohibition of the drug not only is ineffective, it’s costly and dangerous. In the past year 20 million Americans have used marijuana, and 11 million continue to do so regularly. Marijuana is one of the most popular recreational drugs, ranking right behind alcohol and tobacco, two substances scientifically regarded as more hazardous. “Marijuana is far less dangerous than alcohol or tobacco. …

…but unlikely to create serious harm for most individual users or society. In the years since, thousands of additional studies have been conducted, and together they reaffirm marijuana's substantial margin of safety. Reviews of that body of work reveal an occasional study indicating greater toxicity than previously thought. But in all such cases, the methodologies were seriously flawed and the findings could not be replicated by other researchers.” ” (Open Society Institute/The Lindesmith Center, October 1995).