Reefer Sanity: Seven Great Myths about Marijuana - Kevin Sabet

Published in 2013, it would be a mistake for present day governments to ignore Reefer Sanity: Seven Great Myths about Marijuana. It was written by Kevin A. Sabet, an assistant professor of psychiatry -- though not a medical doctor, his detractors remind us -- and Director of the Drug Policy Institute at the University of Florida. A graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, and of Oxford University, where he received his Doctorate in social policy, Sabet is enemy number one to the frenzied, far-flung and demanding hurry-up-and-legalize-marijuana industry.
Sabet -- who has served both Republican and Democratic federal administrations -- is not an hysterical opponent to the pro drug group; indeed, he does not even reject every form of lawful weed. This more aptly describes your humble book reviewer. No, Sabet makes allowances for all kinds of sanctioned toking, including for certain medical illnesses, as well as by making laws regarding possession and small-time dealing completely inconsequential. So it is simply ludicrous that he draws such vehement reactions. More on that later.
   Though rarely acknowledged, marijuana policy is always an ideological issue, with both sides usually having non-mysterious emotional ties to their position. Is it any surprise that the majority of those who favour legalization have smoked up since they were teenagers? Is it surprising that many anti-legalization zealots have suffered due to addiction or addicted relatives? Thus, it is praiseworthy that Sabet appears to remain relatively neutral on the subject, as he successfully rises to the challenge of explaining why weed is no better for society than cigarettes, and may be worse.
   Reefer Sanity's seven myths include: Marijuana is harmless and non-addictive; Smoked or eaten, marijuana is medicine; Countless people are behind bars simply for smoking marijuana; The legality of alcohol and tobacco strengthen the case for legal marijuana; Legal marijuana will solve the government's budgetary problems; Portugal and Holland provide successful models of legalization, and; Prevention, intervention and treatment are doomed to fail -- so why try?
   In disproving these myths, Reefer Sanity -- which I read as an e-book -- is carefully argued. The evidence is backed up by the most recent and scrupulous research and professional opinions. Many scientific medical clinical trials are cited in both the text and almost 250 footnotes In fact, some of the reading is quite laborious.
   In dealing with the first myth, Sabet lists numerous former users, scientists, health experts and others -- including editorial board members -- who have thoroughly changed their positions with respect to marijuana's affects on the human mind and body, because of recent research. In 1997, Britain's The Independent launched an ultimately successful campaign to decriminalize the drug. "If only we had known then what we can reveal today," began an apology editorial in the paper ten years later. "There is growing proof that skunk [high potency marijuana] causes mental illness and psychosis."
   The notion that grass is the same potency as it always was -- a common argument by the pro-drug side -- is soundly crushed in this book. Sabet explains that, though roughly the same number of people smoke up as did in 1991, emergency room visits relating to the noxious substance had increased nearly twenty-five fold by 2008, from 16,251 to 374,000 respectively.
   From the pro-legalization group, there is no end to the condemnation, name-calling and outright vilification being hurled at Sabet personally. He's been called everything from an idiot, a monster, a liar and a non-physician, to -- and this might be the worst -- a "headline-grabbing right-winger" obsessed with "moral entrepreneurship."
   Take writer and physician Sunil Kumar Aggarwal, for example. He is supported by countless marijuana proponents and addicts, as evidenced in the lengthy comments section of his 2013 on-line article, entitled "5 Biggest Lies from Anti-Pot Propagandist Kevin Sabet." The piece is published on the "progressive, liberal, activist" news website AlterNet.
   After castigating Sabet for his Oxford degree, Aggarwal -- identified as a New York-based physician -- blasts him for co-founding Project SAM (Smart Approaches for Marijuana), an organization dedicated, according to its website, to science-based marijuana education and sound public health dope policy.
   The five myths in Aggarwal's article include: There’s no need to smoke it; The plant has dangerous unknown elements; Marijuana use stunts intelligence; Today’s pot is much stronger than it used to be; and 1 out of 6 youngsters get hooked. Here is how he deals with the last myth: "Eager to diagnose, the studies [used by Sabet] ignore the impact that aggressive policing of cannabis has on users. The illegality of marijuana not only affects what subjects will be willing to disclose to researchers, but the stress of engaging in behavior that can lead to 'social death' -- suspension, arrest, loss of job, benefits, etc. -- may be more psychologically trying than the drug itself."
   If that last statement sounds reasonable to you, you must read Reefer Sanity.

As with most books on Lynne Like's, you can get this on Amazon.ca.