65. How Conspiracy Theories Helped Get Marijuana Legalized in the USA, Part II
Plus old ladies getting high
Dear Readers,
When you receive this, I’ll be on vacation. Probably swimming, or fishing, or just staring at the sky.
Right now I’m on a plane home from Buffalo. The old ladies next to me have been talking at full volume about visiting cannabis dispensaries, flying with weed, and various other previously taboo subjects. Things have definitely changed in America.
Which, conveniently, is just what we’ve been discussing!
In my last post I had been explaining how National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) founder Keith Stroup fostered the myth that the movie Reefer Madness had been released in 1936, a date that suggested that the film had played an important role in marijuana’s federal prohibition the following year. And I was pointing out that this was all bullshit—the movie hadn’t even gone into production until 1938. But it was nonetheless very influential bullshit, ultimately contributing to the success of the marijuana-legalization movement.
And that…
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