California is not so much split between north and south as it is between marijuana advocates and opponents of a bill to make it legal in the financially battered state.
As a Christian, “New Day Talk” radio show host Lynette Jones definitely opposes any form of a bill to decriminalize marijuana and would support some city officials’ efforts to outlaw the hundreds of marijuana outlets.
“But I’m old fashioned, I’m a Christian. And I ask ‘is this really good for the human body?’ Probably not. So if I had a choice, I would vote against it.
Jones doesn’t subscribe to what she believes are dubious rationales for legalizing marijuana to enable people suffering from medical maladies to use it on the regular. Besides, passing laws to enable casual users to grow, cultivate, smoke it and sell it would have hidden social consequences that cannot be fathomed.
“I’m not a marijuana smoker. If you say you need marijuana for medical reasons, you’re pushing a fine line. If you make it legal, you’re going to have a lot more problems,” she says. “Yah, you have people who steal it and sneak it now. But if it passes, it’s going to be worse because you are giving people a free pass and people would sell it who wouldn’t have sold it before.”
While Jones sympathizes with actor Danny Glover [of the ultra-popular “Lethal Weapon” franchise], who said in a recent press conference that he wants weed legal to stop selective prosecution of young black men and Hispanics who fill the state’s jails and prisons, she doesn’t think passing the bill is the answer.
“I think the small people are being impacted. But in terms of the small people you get more money for crack than you do with marijuana. I don’t buy it, but I’m no dummy to life, either. I just think if it passes, you just give people a pass to run rampant with it.” Besides, Jones said, there are going to be physical costs associated with marijuana usage in the long term.
“I know that tobacco may be more harmful. But you can’t tell me that if someone smokes marijuana for 20 years that they won’t also get lung cancer. Smoke is smoke.”–terry shropshire
