Opinion | Americans are ready for legal marijuana

The initial push for cannabis criminalization, which began in earnest in the early 1900s, had little to do with legitimate concerns about public health or safety. Rather, it was based primarily on myths and xenophobia. In many cases, these have persisted through modern day — resulting in the arrest of an estimated 30 million Americans for marijuana-related violations.

By 2012, however, the public had seen and heard enough. That’s when voters in Colorado and Washington decided in favor of citizen-initiated ballot measures legalizing and regulating the adult use, possession, production and sale of cannabis.

In the ensuing years, 20 additional states and D.C. followed suit. None of these states have repealed or even rolled back their laws, and public support for these policies has never been higher. That is because these policies are largely working as intended and are preferable to prohibition.

After a century of failed policies and canna-bigotry, Americans are ready to move in a different direction, one that legalizes, regulates and educates. Such a policy shift is far from rapid; it’s long overdue.

Paul Armentano, Washington

The writer is deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

We all need to be educated about potential harms of cannabis, such as usage during teenage years, during pregnancy or breastfeeding or by someone susceptible to psychosis. But we need to discuss these without exaggerating them. This is the only way that the medical community can regain some credibility of this issue — credibility largely squandered by a half-century spent on the wrong side of the War on Drugs.

In her op-ed, Leana S. Wen wrote, “30 percent of people who use the substance suffer from marijuana use disorder.” But there are severe flaws in our diagnostic criteria for “cannabis addiction.” For example, a patient needs to satisfy only two of 12 criteria to be deemed addicted to cannabis. These qualities include tolerance and withdrawal, which ropes in many medical marijuana patients. We are needlessly pathologizing millions of medical and recreational cannabis users.

The medical and lifestyle benefits of cannabis appeared invisible to Dr. Wen, who dismissed them along the lines of, “Marijuana users frequently tout its beneficial effects of helping people feel relaxed and happy.” My brother found that it greatly enhanced his ability to tolerate chemotherapy and to maintain his weight during the last year of his life in his unsuccessful fight with leukemia.

Dr. Wen seems to misunderstand why millions of Americans celebrated the 4/20 cannabis holiday. We are celebrating freedom from persecution, not drug use. We have had more than 20 million cannabis arrests over the past half-century — mostly people of color, for simple cannabis possession. It is, indeed, cause for celebration that this war on cannabis users is continuing to wind down.

Peter Grinspoon, Newton, Mass.

The writer is the author of “Seeing through the Smoke: A Cannabis Specialist Untangles the Truth about Marijuana.”