I hated taking those ridiculous drug awareness classes in elementary school.
- It was the 1990s and the Reagan-era drug policies were still in full effect in many states nationwide, regardless of the brief change in guard in Washington D.C.
at the time. No matter what, a recurring theme that came up repeatedly was how dangerous marijuana was as a “gateway drug” to much more dangerous drugs like meth, cocaine, or heroin. One of the things that frustrated me the most was their desire to put alcohol in a separate category from “drugs” when it is in fact a drug itself, just like coffee or cigarettes. But the alcoholic school administrators were more than happy to keep feeding the narrative that alcohol is acceptable at a cultural level when the other “drugs” are not. I think that these anti-drug classes are still taught, but they’re not under the same curriculum that we were subjected to back in the day. Thankfully it’s a lot easier these days than ever before to find clear facts about the benefits of medical cannabis and its various forms. Aside from pain and stress reduction, there is research that suggests various constitutive ingredients in the cannabis plant might contribute to tumor reduction in patients with cancer. Cannabis products are sometimes prescribed to patients with severe epilepsy to great effects. Whenever researchers learn about new benefits of the cannabis plant, they’re published so that the public can consume them for their own purposes. I personally use cannabis as an antidepressant and find that sativa strains in particular are more effective than SSRIs for treating my chronic depression.