Why Is Pot/weed Illegal?

impossible for government to gather tax money off it (easy to grow)

From a prohibition-based perspective, marijuana is illegal in the United States primarily for these seven reasons.

1. It is perceived as addictive.
Under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, marijuana is classified as a Schedule I drug on the basis that is has “a high potential for abuse.” What does this mean?

It means that the perception is that people get on marijuana, they get hooked and become “potheads,” and it begins to dominate their lives. This unquestionably happens in some cases. But it also happens in the case of alcohol–and alcohol is perfectly legal.

In order to fight this argument for prohibition, legalization advocates need to make the argument that marijuana is not addictive as government sources claim.

2. It has “no accepted medical use.”
Marijuana seems to yield considerable medical benefits for many Americans with ailments ranging from glaucoma to cancer, but these benefits have not been accepted well enough, on a national level. Medical use of marijuana remains a serious national controversy.

In order to fight the argument that marijuana has no medical use, legalization advocates need to highlight the effects it has had on the lives of people who have used the drug for medical reasons.

3. It has been historically linked with narcotics, such as heroin.
Early antidrug laws were written to regulate narcotics–opium and its derivatives, such as heroin and morphine. Marijuana, though not a narcotic, was described as such–along with cocaine.

The association stuck, and there is now a vast gulf in the American consciousness between “normal” recreational drugs, such as alcohol, caffeine, and nicotine, and “abnormal” recreational drugs, such as heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine. Marijuana is generally associated with the latter category, which is why it can be convincingly portrayed as a “gateway drug.”

4. It is associated with unfashionable lifestyles.
Marijuana is often thought of as a drug for hippies and losers. Since it’s hard to feel enthusiastic about the prospects of enabling people to become hippies and losers, imposing criminal sanctions for marijuana possession functions as a form of communal “tough love.”

5. It was once associated with oppressed ethnic groups.
The intense anti-marijuana movement of the 1930s dovetailed nicely with the intense anti-Chicano movement of the 1930s. Marijuana was associated with Mexican Americans, and a ban on marijuana was seen as a way of discouraging Mexican-American subcultures from developing.

Today, thanks in large part to the very public popularity of marijuana among whites during the 1960s and 1970s, marijuana is no longer seen as what one might call an ethnic drug–but the groundwork for the anti-marijuana movement was laid down at a time when marijuana was seen as an encroachment on the U.S. majority-white culture.

6. Inertia is a powerful force in public policy.
If something has been banned for only a short period of time, then the ban is seen as unstable. If something has been banned for a long time, however, then the ban–no matter how ill-conceived it might be–tends to go unenforced long before it is actually taken off the books.

Take the ban on sodomy, for example. It hasn’t really been enforced in any serious way since the 18th century, but most states technically banned same-sex sexual intercourse until the Supreme Court ruled such bans unconstitutional in Lawrence v. Texas (2003).

People tend to be comfortable with the status quo–and the status quo, for nearly a century, has been a literal or de facto federal ban on marijuana.

7. Advocates for marijuana legalization rarely present an appealing case.
To hear some advocates of marijuana legalization say it, the drug cures diseases while it promotes creativity, open-mindedness, moral progression, and a closer relationship with God and/or the cosmos. That sounds incredibly foolish, particularly when the public image of a marijuana user is, again, that of a loser who risks arrest and imprisonment so that he or she can artificially invoke an endorphin release.

A much better argument for marijuana legalization, from my vantage point, would go more like this: “It makes some people happy, and it doesn’t seem to be any more dangerous than alcohol. Do we really want to go around putting people in prison and destroying their lives over this?”

Pot will cause some short term memory loss. It’s harder to remember a 10 digit phone number. Beer causes the same memory loss as Pot. The effect is temporary and wears off completely. Pot has no long term affects on the brain. I have been smoking Pot for the last 25 years and I still test as a genius on IQ tests. My mental abilities have increased over the years.Pot will give you the Munchies. You may eat more than you would normally. If you are on a diet, you should factor this in when deciding to smoke Pot. It could cause you to gain weight. Pot is a sexual stimulant. It removes a persons inhibitions. You are more likely to agree to have sex when you are stoned. You are also more likely to not use birth control while stoned. Sometimes people get others stoned to try to get them to have sex when they normally wouldn’t. If you are getting stoned with members of the opposite sex, be aware of this and realize that it can have this effect on you. Pot has a much lesser effect on driving than alcohol, but it has some effect. You are more likely to pull out in front of someone or run a red light than lose control of the vehicle. Pot might also cause you to get lost. Don’t drive while stoned. Smoking Pot increases your risk of cancer. But most people smoke very little Pot. If you use Pot moderately you don’t have anything to worry about. Moderate means a joint every few days.Pot will give you dry mouth. Have something to drink when smoking Pot. The most dangerous thing about Pot is getting caught with it. You can go to jail. People get very weird about Pot and you can get in a lot of trouble over it. So if anyone asks if you’ve been smoking Pot, Just Say No!

Reasons for Why is Weed Illegal in US

The first reason that lead to illegalisation of weed in US was its classification as a Schedule I drug under the Controlled Substance Act of 1970. This was because it was perceived that once a person uses marijuana regularly, he turns into a ‘pothead’, that is addicted to the drug. The second reason for making weed illegal in America was that there were no accepted medical uses of marijuana. The benefits of medical use of weed, as claimed by people for weed legalization, has not been accepted on national level.Weed has been linked with narcotics kike heroin and morphine and therefore thought as a ‘gateway drug’. Many hippies and other social outcast have been known to use marijuana. This has lead to making marijuana illegal as the these people are thought to have a criminal streak. Marijuana has been associated with increasing insane behavior and thus made illegal. Also, people who advocated weed legalization, did not present a stronger case and this lead making weed illegal.

that is a very good question. People rarely become violent or destroy their liver when they smoke pot. Alcolhol is clearly more dangerous. I am sure it has something to do with the THC, and second hand smoke causing others to become high. against their will, being under the influence. alcohol can’t hurt anyone except the person drinking it (you know what i mean)