December
2000
1.
Introduction
2.
Basic Botany: Cannabis spp.
3.
Chemistry: Cannabinoids (Cannabis terpenoids) and
THC Potency
4.
Dosage
5.
Ethnobotany, Cultural Use and Terminology in India
6.
The Ŗgveda: Ancient Origins
7.
Soma: A god, a plant, an elixir
8.
Soma: Far more than just a plant
9.
Snapshots of the Origins and History of Cannabis
10.
Legal Issues and the Practical Solution
11.
Political Issues
12.
Structuralist Views
13.
Economical Issues / Functionalist Approach
14.
Medical Marijuana Issues vs. Medicinal, Emotional,
and Spiritual Freedom
15.
Cannabis and the Timing of Change
16.
Further Research
- Suggested Areas of Further Research
Endnotes
References
2.
Cannabis sativa L.
Appendix II: Documents (Legal,
Political)
A. The
History of the Non-Medical Use of Drugs in the United States
Introduction
I would
like to take a look at this issue through the multi-faceted lens of a Cultural
Anthropologist. Both the Arts and
Sciences will be represented in this debate.
My resources for information and theory have a wide base; chemical,
botanical, medicinal, political, legal, historical, economical, emotional,
spiritual, structural, functional, whimsical, and practical concerns will be
addressed to varying extents throughout this work. Further research would deepen the argument, and should be focused
on the origins of the Cannabis spp. and the Vedic Soma plant
candidates. A deeper understanding of
the workings of the ancient Soma plant(s), and its subsequent use in
religious ceremony would benefit this study.
Over 1,028 hymns were written, in praise, as a result of the consumption
of Soma by Vedic priests (~3000-1100 B.C.). What did this botanical concoction contain to have inspired such
a dramatic response? Does this present
us with an ancient plant-based, culturally linked shift of consciousness? If so, how deeply were the “products” of
this shift: language, religion and song, affected by the virtues of this divine
elixir, Soma?
I will present [1] the theory that
(the Ancient ingestion of) Soma sparked a plant-based “evolutionary”
movement and may have shifted cultural consciousness significantly, as
evidenced through the creation of the Vedic hymns and the Sanskrit language,
and this ancient model set the precedence for this type of shift to occur
again; [2] my argument is that the time for another significant cultural shift
of consciousness is approaching (now), and [3] I will submit evidence in favor
of Cannabis as a practical modern-day Soma plant.
I will use the term, Cannabis,
to represent those species of Cannabis (indica and sativa) which
contain significant quantities of psychoactive constituents, namely THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol),
and are cultivated and appreciated for those constituents. I will use the term Cannabis in place
of the more common, Marijuana, because I believe it is more accurate and
appropriate. I will continue to refer
to Medical Marijuana as such because it is an accepted societal term. I will not refer to Cannabis as a
drug[i]
because this is misleading; Cannabis is a plant, which produces
substances that humans (and some animals) have learned to use as a “drug.” Drug is a heavy word, heavy with intonation,
connotation and links to civilization.
I feel that the use of accurate, positive language is essential to
understanding this issue.
When I wish to deal specifically
with one species or the other, I will address the plant of topic (e.g. Cannabis
sativa L.) by genus and species or common name (e.g. Indian Hemp). There are so many strains/variations of the
two psychoactive species that an entire lifetime could be spent recording them;
so, for simplicity, Cannabis will denote the entire spectrum. I will use the term, Hemp, to represent
those species, or variations of species, of Cannabis (indica, sativa and
ruderalis) which do not contain significant quantities of psychoactive
constituents and which are cultivated and appreciated for their long stems, producing
some of the strongest and most useful fibers from the plant kingdom.
Basic Botany: Cannabis spp.
Flowering Plants Division – Dicotyledon Class – Witch Hazel
Subclass – Stinging Nettle Order
Family: Cannabaceae
Habitat:
Eastern India, Persia, U.S., Central America, Europe (cultivated). Cannabis currently enjoys global
distribution due to cultivation.
Lamarck first botanically
described Cannabis indica, Indian Hemp, whose macroscopic features are
further outlined by Felter and Lloyd in the King’s American Dispensatory 18th
Edition. This herbaceous annual
typically grows from 3 to 10 feet tall.
Fine hairs cause it to be sticky to touch. The stem is erect, branched, luminescent green, and angular. The leaves are “alternate or opposite, on
long, lax petioles, digitate, and scabrous, with…sharply serrated leaflets,
tapering into a long, smooth entire point; stipules subulate” (Felter and
Lloyd, 422). The flowers are born in auxiliary clusters; the male flowers are
droopy, branched and leafless at the base, while the female flowers are erect,
simple, and leafy at the base. The
calyx of the male is downy, and the female calyx is covered with brownish
glands. The seeds are from 1/8 to 1/6
of an inch, and “subglobular, somewhat compressed, possessing a marginal keel,
whitish in color” (Felter and Lloyd, 424).
The testa is brownish or olive-gray, smooth and shiny, and marked with
veins. The enclosed seed is greenish
and oily.
There is a great deal of taxonomic
debate on whether there are more than one species of Cannabis. Richard Evans Shultes and co-workers
conceived of three species, Cannabis
indica, sativa and ruderalis, as
mentioned above. There is some
evidence to suggest that there are actually more than one species of Cannabis,
although this is still under debate. These
scientists designated Cannabis
indica as a short and very densely
branched plant, Cannabis sativa as tall and laxly branched, and Cannabis
ruderalis as very short and not/or sparsely branched (Ott,
386). These three species were observed
to contain differing amounts of psychoactive constituents as well. I included a detailed botanical description
of Cannabis indica (above) because this was the only species for which I
was able to find solid botanical information.
The Shultes group seems to have designated the opposite height of growth
parameters for C. Indica and C. sativa, suggesting that C.
indica is actually the shorter of the two.
This contradicts scientific and practical research, unless I have
misunderstood the Shultes group’s assertions.
I once heard of a Cannabis indica plant growing in Florida that
reached 11 feet tall! Cultivators I
have spoken with concede that C. sativa tends to be shorter (~3
feet maximum), than C. indica.
Perhaps the height of different Cannabis plants stems from
growing conditions (e.g. elevation, indoor vs. outdoor) and/or breeding
practices, rather than scientific classification systems.
Cannabis sativa L. and its
many variations are similar to C. indica, in regards to many botanical
characteristics, but tend to have multiple branches and slighter stems
(laxly-branched). This species is
reported to contain a high concentration of THC and other cannabinoids,
making it a cultivar that has seen enhanced THC production due to the joyous
care of Cannabis connoisseurs.
Please see Appendix I: Image 2, for a botanical sketch of Cannabis
sativa L.
There is far less published
material about Cannabis ruderalis.
This species seems to be used for hemp production partly because it is
reported to contain a low percentage of psychoactive constituents.
Cannabis: Dried flowering tops of pistillate plants, Cannabis
sativa L. and Cannabis sativa var. indica Authentic, Moraceae
Constituents: Isomeric
tetrahydrocannabinols, cannabinols, cannabidiols*
1. NAME: Cannabidiols, CBD (Cannabis sedative)*
CHEMICAL NAME: 2[3-Methyl-6-(1-methylethenyl)-2-cyclohexen-1-yl]-5pentyl-1,
3 benezenediol
ALTERNATE CHEMICAL NAMES: (3R, 4R)-2p-mentha-1, 8-dien-3yl-5
pentylresorcinol
CHEMICAL FORMULA: C21H30O2
MOLECULAR WEIGHT: 314.47
SOLUBILITY: Practically insoluble in water or 10%NaOH
2. NAME: Tetrahydrocannabinols, THC (Isomeric tetrahydrocannabinols)*
--primarily Δ9-THC, also
Δ6-3,4-trans isomer present only up to 1%)
CHEMICAL NAME:
Tetrahydro-6,6,9-trimethyl-3-pentyl-6H-dibenzo[b,d]pyran-1-ol
CHEMICAL FORMULA: C21H30O2
MOLECULAR WEIGHT: 314.47
BOILING POINT: 200°F
LD50: 1270 mg/kg (male rats), 730 mg/kg (female rats) oral
in sesame oil
LD50: 42 mg/kg (rats) inhalation
SOLUBILITY: Practically insoluble in water
3. NAME: Cannabinols, CBN (Cannabis psychotropes)*
CHEMICAL NAME:
6,6,9-Trimethyl-3-pentyl-6H-dibenzo[b,d]pyran-1-ol
ALTERNATE CHEMICAL NAMES: 3-amyl-1-hydroxy-6,6,9-trimethyl-6H-dibenzo[b,d]pyran
CHEMICAL FORMULA: C21H26O2
MOLECULAR WEIGHT: 310.44
SOLUBILITY: Practically insoluble in water
*As Quoted From the Merck Index 12th Edition
Cannabidiol, CBD, is
believed to be the biosynthetic precursor to THC. CBD is said to be the “body” part of the high, but is dependant
upon the THC to function ideally. Cannabinol
(CBN) can be understood as the degradation product of THC. CBN, and CBD, are psychoactive, but with
less potency than THC (Pendell, 189-190).
CBNs function to degrade the potency of improperly stored Cannabis,
over time.
THC is the major psychoactive
ingredient of Cannabis, and was detected to occur in percentages,
adjusted for weight, from between .61(1994) and 3.96 (1984) as measured by PMP,
the Potency Monitoring Project at the University of Mississippi, over the years
1980 to 1994.[ii] This runs contrary to most current urban
mythology surrounding Cannabis.
We have all been told that the potency of Cannabis is
rising. This PMP data is the result of
years of testing the THC content of Cannabis seized by the police
(Zimmer and Morgan, 137). This project was designed to reflect the potency of
“commercial grade” Cannabis (the grade available primarily from Mexican
imported Cannabis [iii]). Independent tests conducted by PharmChem in
1973, reported the average potency of Cannabis to be 1.62% THC content
(which was four times the PMP for that year).
Additionally, many samples were over 4% THC, and the highest single
reading was 9.5%, which we would have thought inconceivable as gauged by the
pot they measured in Mississippi. The
highest sample measured by PharmChem in 1975 contained 14% THC (Zimmer and
Morgan, 137). This surely rivals the
potency found in some of the experiments conducted by independent analyses
today. And, as has been demonstrated
through the black market and counter-culture (e.g. High Times Cannabis
Cup in Amsterdam), there are some Cannabis cultivators who have
nearly perfected the art of THC production.
There are certainly well-cultivated strains of Cannabis with THC
content that adequately exceeds the mainstream, low-grade samples turned in by
police raids and busts. Those who
cultivate their herb with the greatest care also take the greatest steps to
protect it from the enforcers of dominant culture.
CANNABIS, High Potency (Smoked)*
Light: 1/30th gram
Medium: 2/30th gram
High: 3/30th gram
MARINOL, Synthetic THC*
Appetite Stimulant: 2.5 mg
Chemotherapy Dose: 5 mg (3x daily)
Cannabis dosage is
fairly easy to manage. A “threshold” dose has been observed at 0.5% THC, though
placebo effects have been measured by persons receiving a 1% dose of THC. One method for determining dose is to smoke
a small amount (1-2 "hits"), wait 5-15 minutes, and repeat as
desired. The slang for a single intake of smoke is called a hit. Generally, an
average hit from a pipe, water bong, bubbler, chillum, hookah, splif, joint, blunt,
bat, fanta (sp?) or one-hitter equates to approximately 1/20th
gram of Cannabis. This one hit,
depending on the potency of the Cannabis, could be enough for first time
smokers and persons who do not partake of the herb often, to experience
psychoactive effects. Heavy smokers may
be able (or may need) to smoke an entire joint to catch a buzz. Tolerance builds with increased smoking of
the flowers.
Herbalists continue to suggest
that the “polypharmacy” of botanical medicines provides advantages over
single-ingredient drugs. It is believed
that the primary active ingredients in herbs are synergized by secondary
compounds, and these secondary compounds also act to mitigate the side effects
caused by the primary active ingredients. In an experiment designed to examine
this claim, Medical Marijuana was compared with its primary active ingredient,
THC. The results seem to support the
polypharmacy theory.
Good evidence suggests that some side effects of tetrahydrocannabinol are mitigated by other volatile compounds present in the essential oil of marijuana. Inhaling tetrahydrocannabinol, which avoids first-pass hepatic metabolism, has advantages over ingesting it. Other cannabinoids, terpenoids, and flavonoids can reduce tetrahydrocannabinol-induced anxiety, cholinergic deficits, and immunosuppression. Other compounds increase cerebral blood flow, enhance cortical activity, kill respiratory pathogens, and provide anti-inflammatory activity. The hazards of marijuana smoke can be reduced with appropriate technology” (J.M. McPartland and P.L. Pruitt, 57-62).
For this reason, the case for Marinol use as a substitute for Medical Marijuana appears weakened, and seemingly, the argument that we do not need to legalize Medical Marijuana because we have the synthetic drug, Marinol, is also subject to serious criticism.
In the high elevations of India,
from 6,000 to 8,000+ feet above sea level, the natives grew (and grow, though
not as much today) Cannabis indica; the plant rarely reaching above 3
feet tall (due to elevation). They were
said to dress in leather apparel and run amidst the plants, beating them, and
then gathering the resin that stuck to their garments (Felter and Lloyd,
426). Waxen Charas, highly
coveted in India, was made by rubbing the flowering tops in the hands, then
using the hands to form balls of the resin.
Cannabis indica is indigenous to Persia and Northern India, and
is cultivated (everywhere) else. Cannabis
indica and Cannabis sativa have been naturalized in North America,
Brazil, and Europe, according to Felter and Lloyd in the King’s Dispensatory
18th Edition. They go on
to say, rather loosely, “the hemp of this country [India] is identical with the
Eastern plant [Persia] in its botanical characters, but differs somewhat from
it in its physical qualities, the India plant being more powerful in its
effects on the system, and which is probably owing to the influence of climate,
cultivation, etc” (426).
Here are some specific ethnobotanical
aspects of Indian Hemp. The leaves have
been used in cooking as an inebriant.
The fibers have been used for cordage, and as pulp for paper. The seeds
produce food and oil; Cannabis has long been used as bird food.[iv] Ganja refers to the inflorescences of
the female plant, freed of their small leaves (as cultivated in the
Himalayas). The charas, or hashish,
or kif, is the highly active, mildly stimulating, psychoactive resin
(Rätsch, 95). The charas can be
made into a more potent form, hashish oil, and has received the most
demand in this form in traditional medicinal use. The bhang is puzzling to me; bhang (pronounced
bung) has been used as a slang term for Cannabis, has been described as
almost tasteless, dark green in color, and is said to have been smoked with
tobacco, and made into majun[v]
(Felter and Lloyd, 427). Bhang
also refers to a cold-water infusion of hemp, used since at least the time of
Zoroaster. This is a somewhat elusory
detail because cannabinoids are nearly insoluble in water. This leads me to believe that more potent
concoctions were also made, perhaps using ghee or milk to extract the THC from
the ganja, which could then be added to the tea. I later found a recipe for traditional bhang
in Christian Rätsch’ book, Plants of Love.
Cannabinoids, which are considered volatile oils, are lipid-soluble
and can be extracted in fats such as ghee, olive oil, butter, etc.
The Ŗgveda:
Ancient Origins
A collection of 1,028 hymns, known
as the Ŗgveda Samhitā, is the oldest and, reputedly, the most
important source of Indian religion.
This sacred document follows a long oral tradition that regarded the
hymns as too sacred to write down (Keith, vol. 31:1). The Ŗgveda is thought to have its origins in a
sizable area of country, for it contains hymns from a wide variety of families.[vi] When the collection of hymns reached seven
or eight books, the ninth was devoted to gathering and consolidating all the
hymns, from previous books, that dealt with Soma Pavamāna, “the Soma
as it was poured through the filter” (Keith, vol. 31:2). According to A.B. Keith, who first published
The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads in 1925, the Ŗgveda
has not been successfully chronologically mapped; the hymns, and the original
compilers of the hymns, seem to elude a pinpointed date location, although
interpretive attempts to date the hymns have been made by scholars.
The Ŗgveda Samhitā, as
an entire work, contains no historical date, though scholars have placed it at
1100 B.C., 1800 B.C., and as far back as the 3000 B.C. There is an especially interesting reference
to the presence of several gods in the Ŗgveda that have been placed
chronologically at ~1400 B.C. (Keith, vol. 31:5). The Ŗgveda is probably not the oldest literary
achievement of the Vedas, but “the practically exclusively religious character
of its contents, makes it unique in its revelation of the religion of the Vedic
tribes” (Keith, vol. 31, 8). The argument over dates seems mute since the hymns
were preserved through oral tradition for uncounted years prior to being
recorded.
“The
language of the Veda is essentially akin to Iranian as seen in the Avesta,
and more remotely to the other tongues which make up the Indo-European
family” (Keith, vol. 31:9). The Vedic
tongue is thought to be the parent of classical Sanskrit (Wasson, 3). There is debate whether the language of the Veda
is the result of the banning of the Vedic tribes, their invasion of
Northwestern India, carrying with them the Vedic culture and religion and which
they then developed in India under the practical constraints of climate and
elevation. The language of the Ŗgveda
has thus been attributed to the degradation of sounds created by
generations of intermarriage, and the mixing of the Aryan invaders with the
aboriginal tribes in Northern India.
The alternative hypothesis claims that the Dravidians, a prominent early
aboriginal tribe in India, adhered to the religion of the Ŗgveda
Samhitā. This alternate theory pronounces that the aboriginal
Dravidians civilized the invading Aryans.[vii]
The religion, like the language, has been termed, Aryo-Dravidian, or Indo-Aryan,
depending on individual taste; this denotes the result of the syncretism of the
two cultures (and religions), due to the invasion, and the legacy of the Ŗgveda
which has passed through the Brahmans to modern-day India.
Soma: A god, a plant, an elixir
The Ŗgveda
Samhitā contains an entire book, and six hymns in other books, with
poetry about the Soma sacrifice.
The god Soma clearly held importance to the Vedic people. “Soma was at the same time a god, a
plant, and the juice of that plant. So
far as we know, Soma is the only plant that man has ever deified”
(Wasson, 3). Yet another trilogy, or
Trinity, Soma is an unlikely cog in the wheel of religion. We imagine: The god, The plant, and The holy
essence. Finally, a concept good
Christians could fathom. Soma is
invoked repeatedly throughout the Ŗgveda, and treated as a joint
deity with gods such as Indra, a Soma drinker, and Agni,
a god of ritual like Soma (Keith, vol. 31:166). Because of the unique physical connection
that Soma ritual gave the priests with this central god in their
pantheon, Soma was forever celebrated in detailed, ecstatic song. It is said by modern-day readers of the Ŗgveda,
“this surely was composed under the influence of a divine inebriant” (Wasson,
4). Elaborate, perhaps succinctly
practical, audial imagery was created to explain the reportedly simple
operations of processing, pressing and filtering the Soma plant for
ritual consumption. Soma is often referred to in connection with the
Sun, giving him supremacy among gods.[viii]
Soma was
not alcohol, as is sometimes proposed in Western interpretations of the Ŗgveda. There are specific references to the plant Soma
as “a creeper…an inflexible bush with dense, upright, leafless stalks”
(Wasson, 140-141). One of the earliest
Vedic beliefs about the origin of Soma is that it was brought to people
by a bird. Soma was believed to
extend and improve life, produce happiness (máda), and even
immortality. Súrā, another
concoction, possibly fermented, produced evil intoxication (durmáda). Delli Roman Regni argued further that Soma
is not a fermented beverage, but a non-alcoholic ‘syrup-like thing’ (Regni qtd.
in Wasson, 136). This suggests to me
that either the Soma plant itself was sweet, the brew had added
sweeteners to mask a bitter taste, or the extraction of the active constituents
of the plant were accomplished through the use of a glycerin base. Regardless, the brew was not fermented,
since there is reference to the completion of one to several extractions of the
plant per day for ritual use. The
highly psychoactive constituents of the plant(s), Soma, appear to have
been easily extracted, lending the plant(s) to extensive praise and,
supposedly, extensive use.
For the
purposes of this paper, we will focus on Soma as a concept and as an
example of a successful, plant-inspired cultural shift in consciousness, and
not as a specific plant or combination of plants. I do not wish to offer Cannabis, per se, as an ancient Soma
candidate. The bhang
theory, which suggests that Zoroaster used Cannabis to achieve some
state of heightened awareness, has compounded the issue of Cannabis as a
Soma candidate.[ix] There are certainly arguments to be made for
Cannabis indica as a potential Soma,[x]
as there are for several other plants, such as Peganum harmala (Syrian
Rue) and even Rhubarb.
Soma: Far more than just a plant
In my eyes,
Soma provided (some of) the inspiration needed to live beautifully, and
seemed to lend the muse necessary to create a hymnic recording of this way of
living virtuously (as outlined by Vedic priests who were the primary consumers
of Soma). Soma was praised and
exalted as a bringer of heightened, often ecstatic, awareness. This heightened awareness could have helped
form the cosmological and/or mythological structure of the Vedic culture, first
through religious awareness (the advent of Soma rituals) and then
through language (the hymns).
Many have pondered the possibility
that a plant was the original carrier of consciousness to our species, Homo
sapiens var. sapiens. This is a
worthy debate. Why else would human
nervous systems have receptor sites for nearly all the psychoactive
constituents of today’s illegal compounds and plants, including THC?[xi] There are certainly plants (and one
documented animal[xii]),
throughout the world, that have psychoactive properties in quantities
significant enough to have been metabolized though ingestion, and other
so-called primitive methods of preparation.
In that case, experimentation, originally for food sources, might have
inevitably led to an unexpected shift in consciousness, induced by a plant ally
such as Cannabis. Imagine
stumbling upon a wild hemp plant, while gathering roots in the high elevations
of the Himalayas, and nibbling on the beautiful, sticky, vibrant green
flowering top. If this didn’t provide a
pleasant, albeit novel, experience later in the day, surely the buds gathered,
and cooked in animal fat later might have delivered a not-so-sobering call to
consciousness. I do not mean to
discredit the possibility of this hypothesis by poking fun, to the contrary, I
am under the assumption that experimentation with plant allies yielded nothing
short of divine states of enlightenment for the first “psychonauts,” the
original voyagers of the spiritual beyond.
Snapshots of the Origins and History of Cannabis
I believe
it is safe to say that the use of Cannabis predates written history, and
that is probably all that it is safe to say about its origin of use. To pinpoint the date of the plant’s arrival
in Central Asia, where it is almost certain to have sprung forth into life, is
even more difficult. The plant's
natural homeland is thought to be the regions north of Afghanistan and the
Altai mountains of Southern Siberia. Cannabis’ now widespread
distribution is undoubtedly due to a combination of cultural and natural
factors. Christian Rätsch, an expert on
aphrodisiacs, of which he claims Cannabis is renowned as the greatest on
Earth, also gives us this figure: there have been 9,000 years of Cannabis use,
however he does not give specific support for this argument.
Hemp is thought to be the oldest
cultivated fiber plant. The cultivation
of hemp in China spans 5,000 years, and it is speculated that hemp fibers were
woven into fabric at least as early as 8,000 B.C. (Balick and Cox, 93). This leads me to assume, supposing that the
plant was first attempted as a food source before it was tested for use as
cordage (which seems logical), that the use of Cannabis as an inebriant
outdates the use of hemp fiber. This
would help support Christian Rätsch’s date (with several hundred years to
spare). A somewhat less publicized
theory on the evolution of consciousness involves the “co-evolution” of the
human race and the plant kingdom.
Plants have always supported our physical mechanisms, giving humans what
we need to survive here on Earth. At
the same time, they do not come to us blind, without asking for
reciprocity. The interaction between
the plants we eat and our own internal chemistry is quite dramatic, even today,
by FDA standards. Some plants poison,
but, as we know, poison in measured doses is medicine. These first “poisonings” surely produced
some fantastic results. In the end, it
seems that some plants won the attention and devotion of great numbers of
individuals and, consequently, entire cultures.
If we assume that the use of Cannabis
as a “divine inebriant” outdates the use of hemp as fiber, then we may also
look at whether the use of Cannabis actually led to other uses of the
plant. Plants have often acted as
teachers to those who have ingested them with intent, purpose, and integrity. Certain plants are thought to educate people
in the ways of their uses, and their potential combinations with other plants
in the bioregion. Professor Richard
Evans Schultes, the director of the Botanical Museum at Harvard University,
wrote an article titled Man and Marijuana in which he states:
...early man experimented with all plant materials
that he
could chew
and could not have avoided discovering the proper-
ties of cannabis
(marijuana), for in his quest for seeds and
oil, he
certainly ate the sticky tops of the plant. Upon eat-
ing hemp,
the euphoric, ecstatic and hallucinatory aspects
may have
introduced man to an other-worldly plane from which
emerged
religious beliefs, perhaps even the concept of deity.
The plant
became accepted as a special gift of the gods, a
sacred
medium for communion with the spiritual world and as
such it
has remained in some cultures to the present.
-
Shultes (qtd. in Brown, 1980)
Another historical reference to the ally of Cannabis can
be found in Dale Pendell’s PHARMAKO/POEIA, Plant Powers, Poisons, and
Herbcraft, where Pendell quotes:
Of all
that Orient lands can vaunt
Of marvels
with our own competing,
The
strangest is the Haschish plant,
And what
will follow on its eating.
- John
Greenleaf Whittier,
The Haschish
One final contributor to this theme of the spirituality of
the Cannabis experience must surely be Aleister Crowley, infamous for
his reported gift of clairvoyance.
Crowley is credited with writing, The Psychology of Hashish
(1908), when opposition to Cannabis was mounting in the United
States. In this section Crowley
pronounces the “religious tendencies” of some users of hashish:
If hashish-analogy be able to
assist us here, it is in that supreme state in
which man has built himself up
into God. One may doubt whether the
drug
alone ever does this. It is perhaps only the destined adept who,
momentarily
freed by the dissolving action of
the drug…, obtains this knowledge which is
his by right; totally inept as he
may be to do so by any ordinary methods.
- Aleister
Crowley, 1907
Legal Issues and the Practical Solution
U.S. FEDERAL CANNABIS & THC LEGAL STATUS*
CLASSIFICATION: Cannabis (this includes all species
because it is so non-specific)
LEGAL STATUS: Controlled
SCHEDULE: Schedule I
U.S. FEDERAL SYNTHETIC THC LEGAL STATUS*
CLASSIFICATION: Marinol
LEGAL STATUS: Controlled
SCHEDULE: Schedule III
Cannabis is illegal to grow, sell, buy or possess, according
to the U.S. federal government. Cannabis is classified under DEA
Schedule I in all forms (hash, hash oil, cannabis, THC), excepting that
synthetic THC (Marinol) is classified as Schedule III. Marinol was moved from
Schedule II to Schedule III in July of 1999.
Schedule I is federally defined as drugs which:
• Have a high potential for abuse
• Have no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the
United States
•.Have a lack of accepted safety for use of the drug under
medical supervision*
*As quoted from www.Erowid.org,
Cannabis Vault
The federal
government recognizes Cannabis as a Schedule I Controlled Substance,
meaning there is NO CURRENTLY ACCEPTED MEDICAL USE, while several independent
States (including Colorado) have legalized and are in the process of providing
legislation for the accepted medical use of Cannabis, not just
Marinol. This should naturally send up
the red flag, so to speak, for the federal government who have refused to
re-evaluate their current scheduling due to trends across the country. Some of our own policy makers know less
about the federal scheduling of controlled substances than we do. This is the sad state of affairs in our
country.
The Clinton era has seen
unprecedented government spending on the “War on Drugs,” commonly touted as the
“War on People” by drug reform networkers.
We’ve all heard that war is good for the economy. Maybe Clinton should have inhaled after all.
In the 2000 election, Colorado
surprised the nation by passing Amendment 20, thus providing theoretical legal
protection for patients who are prescribed Medical Marijuana for chronic
illness, glaucoma, etc. Provisions for
care-givers include legal protection to grow Cannabis plants, with
varying stages of usable and/or curing Cannabis flowers. The wording of the Amendment is confusing,
and difficult to explain. Further
proofreading of the material must be accomplished to provide a working model
for Medical Marijuana patients, their care-givers, and their lawyers.
There are literally hundreds of
reasons why Cannabis should be legal.
In the United States, where Cannabis prohibition occurred shortly
after Alcohol prohibition and has obviously lasted longer, the
persecution of the plant happened so swiftly, and so thoroughly, that many people
here do not think to question it any longer.
DARE to think for yourself, some say. In fact, most people are so uninformed that they do not even know
when the tables have turned on them, as in the case of the Arizona legislature,
which:
Late in ’95…goofed and made pot
legal. People were actually able to
purchase a cannabis-dealer license
and escape prosecution. Thousands
acquired the license. Some even sold pot openly. At the ’96 Super Bowl,
a few brazen dealers set up shop
right outside Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe.
One such entrepreneur named his
product “Supherb Bowl.”
-
High Times, Best of Issue 2000
The most
culturally imperative reason to legalize Cannabis, in my own opinion, is
so that the uninformed majority of U.S. Cannabis consumers will stop
buying herb that was grown at gunpoint in Mexico and other areas of Latin
America. Rosenthal and Kubby report
that the DEA estimates that half the Cannabis used in the U.S. is
imported (81-82). Most of this is grown
in Mexico. Not only are villages
throughout naturalized Cannabis growing regions of Mexico coerced by
“drug runners” to grow the herb in areas that might otherwise produce food
crops, but they are also punished, sometimes with their lives, for refusal to
cooperate (Salmon, Lecture notes, 2000).
Here we run into the crux of the matter, demand. In the United States, production of Cannabis
is sometimes punishable by state and federal law, therefore, to alleviate some
of the stress of paranoid Americans, Mexico has been called to supply the
needed herb. Unfortunately, their
cultivation and storage practices are unsatisfactory. “Marijuana is harvested, and then dried in the open. Coca Cola is poured over the dried pot, and
the mass is pressed into bricks” (Rosenthal and Kubby, 82). It then takes weeks for this shipment to
cross the border and even longer to circulate, thus leaving the door open to
contamination. If Americans were
allowed to grow Cannabis again we could surely alleviate some of the
stress our forced demand has placed on Mexico.
Can there
be any greater reason to Legalize It than common sense? Plants are wonderful, we consume them every
day, they change our chemistry, we are thankful (most of the time). The measure of duality with which we have constructed
our society is evident in the separation of plants and plant products into
categories, Good and Bad, Legal and Illegal, Right and Wrong. However, this is an insufficient explanation
of the situation, and reflects a narrow-minded approach to the nature of
consciousness. If the U.S. government
thinks, that after approximately 9,000 years of use, they can overturn the
destiny of Cannabis, they are surely mistaken. What the federal government has demonstrated, through their laws,
is that they want control of our freedom of choice and religion, not to mention
our own indigenous ligands (some of the chemicals our brains produce are
actually federally scheduled). The
practical solution to this dilemma awaits the scrutiny of the people, however,
in the future may we remember a few simple catch phrases that most eloquently
summarize this debate:
--Legalize Life
--Grow your own Stone (a cultural adaptation of the
Philosopher’s Stone, as devised by anonymous)
For Propaganda and inaccurate information
on Cannabis (Marijuana) please see this U.S. Government site: www.nida.nih.gov/MarijBroch/Marijintro.html. I will not waste ink reproducing this
information in my paper, although I believe that familiarity with the approach
the government takes in response to Cannabis is valid and can be helpful
in countering their narrow-minded and destructive drug policies. I highly recommend anyone interested in
Popular Culture to check out this site: www.yahooka.com. Ya-Hooka, “The Guide to Marijuana on the
Internet,” is in no way associated with Yahoo!, unfortunately, though the
reference is clever, and the site is well done.
I do not wish to delve too deeply
into the nature of Politics and the repression of Cannabis, for much has
been written about the politics of drug prohibition. Please see Appendix II: A, an essay by Charles Whitebread,
Professor of Law, USC Law School, entitled The History of the Non-Medical
Use of Drugs in the United States. Whitebread’s
article is especially interesting because, in 1971 and 1972, he and a colleague
were given access to both the open and closed files of what was then called the
Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs and what is now called the Drug
Enforcement Agency (DEA). Based upon those files Professor Richard Bonnie and
Professor Whitebread wrote a book called, The Marihuana Conviction-The Legal
History of Drugs in the United States, and that book went through six
printings at the University of Virginia Press before it sold out (to the
FBI). One of the main points of the
article is that we need to remember that the initial Cannabis prohibition
movement began in this country for financial reasons, it was initiated with the
Harrison Tax Act of 1914, but really set in stone in The Marihuana Tax Act of
1937. The Federal Bureau of Narcotics,
created by the Hoover Administration in 1930, saw Harry J. Anslinger as its first
commissioner. The bureau, interestingly
enough, was part of the Treasury Department, because the government’s only
avenue into the private sector was through taxation, which the previously
enacted Harrison and Marihuana Tax Acts legally supported.
The prohibition of Cannabis,
when viewed from a structural anthropological perspective, presents a subtle
male / female dichotomy that demands attention. Cannabis in ancient, probably kin-based societies, was
represented as a goddess. Paternalism,
Patriarchy and the Capitalist Mode of Production have insidiously attempted to
destroy the goddess in mythology and in practical applications in our
superstructure, structure and infrastructure.
Faith, belief, and ideology, the cornerstones of structuralism, come
into play, and are played with, for the purpose of conveying practical,
experiential information, in Pendell’s prose from PHARMAKO/POEIA:
Like the ska
pastora ally, the Cannabis ally can assist with augury.
In fact,
that is one of its greatest strengths.
But the euphoria is very seductive.
The little
leaves, they are for professionals: who would keep doing that for pleasure?
But the
ganja ally soothes.
In her
palace she presents you with many delights:
pleasant
sounds and bright colors, graceful movement, hilarity, and poignancy,
all of
which can distract from the true goal – the Queen herself.
The Queen
is the vatic whispering of crossing branches in a tree,
knots in
the warp of time where the obvious no longer hides beneath the expected.
She can
advise you. Usually fairly soundly, in my experience.
Still, as
with any ally, it doesn’t hurt to follow the custom of the Persian kings
and wait
for a second opinion in the light of the next morning.
Pendell does not hesitate to refer, quite casually, yet in
calculated measure, to Cannabis as a female entity, a queen, a
goddess. This has been the experience
of many of the people I have interviewed on this subject. This may also rule out Cannabis as
the sole plant god Soma, as recognized in Vedic times (Soma was
considered male). There are other
botanical descriptions that also count Cannabis out of the ancient
debate, however, new theories arise every day, based on newly encountered
evidence. This does not, however,
discount Cannabis from the current call for Soma. There are several reasons, which could be
supported by data, in favor of the re-introduction of Cannabis into mass
culture. Pendell’s demonstration of the
plant ally, Cannabis, in light of her female essence, provides
structural fodder for the fire of civilization, creating a new ideological
model for the world with the concerns of the goddess in mind. With the simple step of legalizing Cannabis,
we could begin to successively topple the prohibitions against plants and
consciousness across the spectrum.
Femaleness, women and families could again be elevated to their proper
position of respect in our global environment.
The goddess, Cannabis, whispers about how to treat a woman, and
it is time that men who are ruled by ignorance, stop to listen. Let’s be reasonable, and give her the Green
Light! If it sounds like I am reaching
beyond my limits here, good, that is the power of inspiration. I see a better world, and then I walk out my
door and help to create it.
“I think it is all money, “ says
Jeff Brown of the Ethiopian Zion Coptic Church. “I think big corporations will lose money were cannabis
legalized, because of its many uses.” (qtd. in Damuzi, 68). Brown has a valid point, one that has seen its
sharp edge pierced into many well-intentioned ventures. What I mean is, the industries with the
largest funding, Plastics, Paper, Oil and Gas, the extractive industries, have
cut Hemp out of the equation, definitively and methodically. The exact procedure has been mapped by brave
souls, seeking to expose the “witch hunt” that has ensued because of the
interests of the chemical development and extractive industries. Here is some of the information that
corporations like Dow Chemical, Hearst Papers, and even Texaco, would probably
rather you didn’t know.
Hemp Fiber
Types:
~long,
strong strands that are very desirable for textiles
~anti-mildew
and anti-microbial properties
~biodegradable
~low
lignin levels; ideal for paper
~antimildew
and antimicrobial properties
~twice as
absorbent as wood shavings
~sturdy,
wood replacement
~biodegradable
--Roulac,
12-13
Hemp spread across China to Korea,
Japan, and on to the Mediterranean and Europe (Roulac 27-30). In the New World, Bibles, maps, and linens
were made of hemp. We have almost all
heard that George Washington and Thomas Jefferson grew hemp, and the first two
drafts of the Declaration of Independence were written on hemp paper (Roulac,
32).[xiii] About a century later, hemp and Cannabis
began to slip out of the newly acquired grasp of the people. Cannabis prohibition began in 1937
and drug hysteria heightened during the Depression with the infamous reports of
“reefer madness” beginning to surface in media coverage around the
country. One unchecked distributor of
this baseless hype was the Hearst Press (Pendell, 195). All manner of crime was presented through
“true stories,” as having been the result of Cannabis use. “Hearst’s paper and timber companies had
recently developed a new way to bleach wood pulp for paper making. About the same time, a machine was invented
for extracting the fibers from hemp, which suddenly made the Cannabis
plant potentially serious competition in the paper business” (Pendell, 195).
Why use up
the forests which were centuries in the
making and
the mines which required ages to lay down,
if we can
get the equivalent of forests and mineral products
in the
annual growth of the fields?
I know
from experience that many of the raw materials of
industry
which are today stripped from the forests
and the
mines can be obtained from annual crops grown
on the
farms.
...Industrialization
of crops will also have the advantage of
making a
considerable saving to the manufacturer who
learns how
to accomplish it.
...The
best possible working plan for any man in our
civilization
is to have one foot on the soil and
the other
in industry.
- Henry Ford
Uses of
Hemp:
Hemp was used to make the sails of
ships in the 5th century. Hemp fibers
have been used to make Bibles, cordage, lighting oil, building materials, and
even plastic pipe (Balick and Cox, 94).
Hemp was our paper fiber of choice in the United States until 1883. In addition, hemp has many modern uses:
textiles, technical textiles, paper, building material, technical products,
foods, personal hygiene products, and other industrial products (Roulac,
15). “Hemp may have a commercial impact
in the future in the areas of agriculture, automobiles, body care, construction
materials, feed, food, furniture, industrial resins, paper, plastic, and
textiles” (Roulac, 115). Hemp can be
used to make anything currently made with cotton, timber, or petroleum. In fact, it is said to have over 50,000
commercial applications.
Research and development of the
Hemp plant has provided the foundations of a movement that is functionalist in
nature. The basics of functionalism
state that social institutions and practices serve to fill the individual’s
needs, and help reaffirm a culture and its ways (Kozak, Lecture Notes,
2000). In our country today, many are
sick and need a new myth, one that is inclusive, as opposed to exclusive, and
one that works for everyone, not just the elite at the top of the class
structure.
We face a dilemma here on Earth,
we have abused our privileges and have seriously jeopardized our well-being and
our future. We, in the American
culture, need to adopt more sustainable ways of living, or get off the planet
(which, for some, is on the agenda).
Hemp is not the only answer, but there is little doubt that the Cannabis
plant can contribute to the renewed sustainability of the U.S.
My hope is that at this point I need not persuade any further, that the evidence speaks for itself. However, there are a few key points left unspoken, that will indeed serve to close the argument. Our species has, through its own folly, poisoned the waters, the food, the land, and anything we could get our hands on. There are few healthy cultures yet represented across the lands. Multi-national corporations have planted their operations in developing countries in order to most effectively create the largest profit margin, often by paying off third world governments and their people, and after their “work” has been accomplished, they pull out without providing retribution, having laid waste to the land, scattered the inhabitants to the four winds, and left an unsafe, toxic environment for the human, animal, and plant life forms to adapt or succumb to. In light of the experimental practices unleashed en mass during the last 50 to 100 years by the United States and other industrial nations we have seen a rapid and rather alarming rise in what we know of as “diseases of civilization” (Kozak, Lecture Notes, 2000). Immuno-suppression disorders, cancers, cold and flu bugs, birth defects, AIDS, ADD and ADHD, etc. have emerged, spread and mutated before our eyes, and