It's High Time

In my first year of uni, I got super into politics. I had just turned 18, it was election year, and I was going to VOTE! Not only that, I was going to do my damned best to convince everybody around me to vote as well. At some point in every conversation I had that year, I would ask ‘so who are you voting for?’ or ‘are you enrolled to vote?’ earning many eye-rolls from my new uni mates. As far as I was concerned, I was an adult now, and I had a responsibility, nay, a DUTY to take my place in our nation’s democratic system. I did my research and learned exactly what I was going to be voting on: a party vote, a local MP vote–and two referendums. One of which I was very interested in.

Before that year, I didn’t know a lot about cannabis. My only experience with it so far was a joint made from stale weed and a peach flavoured rolling paper (ew) that had burnt my throat so much, I swore I’d never smoke again. It hadn’t even made me feel anything, except for maybe a bit sick and a bit grumpy at my friends. But even after that, I knew that my experience was not universal. The fact is, there are a lot more reasons to legalise cannabis than there are to keep it illegal.

The need and demand for medicinal cannabis is a big reason. Medicinal cannabis can be used to ease many ailments, including chronic pain, nausea, anxiety, and insomnia. Medicinal cannabis is legal in New Zealand through prescription, but the process of being prescribed with it is frustrating, difficult, and pricey. According to the NZ Drug Foundation website, 266,700 kiwis use cannabis for medicinal purposes. The site also states that ‘Official Information Act requests and patient estimates calculated from the NZ Health Survey’ show that only 6% of that 266,700 access that cannabis through a legal prescription. Kali Mercier, the NZ Drug Foundation policy director, says that ‘the current medicinal cannabis regime is simply inaccessible for many people. It is hard to get a prescription because many doctors won’t prescribe or aren’t sure how to prescribe the products. And price is another huge barrier. The drugs aren’t funded, so CBD oil can cost a patient $150-350 per month, with other products costing even more.’ With medicinal cannabis being this difficult to get your hands on, who can blame people for going through illegal channels to ease their pain?

The law against it is, in itself, ridiculous. I cannot think of a single good reason to treat the use of marijuana as a legal issue, rather than a health issue. No one should be arrested for just getting their vibe on, especially as Māori people are disproportionately arrested for the use of cannabis. The PMCSA (Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor) website states that Māori are ‘three times more likely to be arrested and convicted of a cannabis-related crime than non-Māori’. This claim is based on a study from 2003, and there is another study in the Harm Reduction Journal that states that Māori are still more likely to be convicted than non-Māori in 2022. You’d think the Police would have better things to spend their time and money on, but no. On the New Zealand Police website, they proudly state that ‘each year Police target the people who grow and supply cannabis, through aerial searches throughout New Zealand.’ They did decide to stop these searches in 2021 (yay!) as they felt the searches were ineffective and a waste of resources, but now they’re doing them again (boo!). According to Stuff, these operations cost over 700,000 dollars a year. New Zealand is spending way too much money and time on a law that is ineffective, redundant, and racist.

I guess my final point here is that weed really isn’t that terrible in comparison to other drugs. It actually makes a lot of things better: food, jokes, sex. The only danger I ever seem to experience is watching a movie and forgetting the plotline as it happens. Of course, there are real dangers to weed, but the fact is, making it legal would actually make it safer. There is a lot more chance that weed is going to be safe if you buy it from a licensed cannabis retail outlet, than if you score it off your dodgy neighbour. The risks of cannabis actually appear to be less than the risks of alcohol, so why is only the former still illegal? I think most of us already know this too, especially as the referendum results were so close. It’s definitely time we leave this law behind.