Is marijuana safer than alcohol? Marijuana is not a lethal drug, which means it is not toxic to humans, overdoses are nearly impossible and is not as addictive as tobacco or alcohol. Legalizing marijuana would have a beneficial impact on the U.S. Marijuana has been illegal for less than 1% of the time that it’s been in use. Legalizing marijuana also would cut taxes. Also legalizing it would get rid of government waste. The U.S should legalize recreational marijuana because marijuana is too expensive for the justice system and should be taxed. In the High Times article they state that, “Law enforcement has more important responsibilities than arresting 750,000 individuals a year for marijuana possession.” Statistics do show that the people arrested for marijuana, 90% of it is just for possession. This is unfair because people are not selling it, they are not criminals, and they are just smoking it for their own use. They also state, “Marijuana arrests make Justice more expensive and less efficient in the U.S…” It is expensive because the government is spending all this money on court cases for just smoking pot and wasting jail space on basically innocent people. The High Times article also states, “Furthermore, taxation of Marijuana can provide needed generous funding of many important criminal Justice programs.” A Harvard study estimates that legalizing recreational marijuana would save the U.S 7.7 billion dollars a year. The U.S should legalize recreational marijuana because marijuana has a positive attribute towards its consumers. The High Times article says, “Americans suffering from variety of serious ailments, marijuana provides relief from pain, nausea and spasticity.” This quote proves that marijuana is like a medicine for some people a lot of people use it to relax or relief stress. “Americans use marijuana because they choose to… most marijuana users develop tolerance to many of marijuana’s side effects.” This proves that it is the persons choice if they want to use recreational marijuana, even that the side effects develops a tolerance for its consumers. Many people think that legalizing recreational marijuana is bad because it is a dangerous drug. But evidence shows that marijuana is not dangerous. “Since the cannabinoid receptor system was discovered in the late 1980s these historical concerns about Marijuana’s dangerousness have not been infirmed with modern research.” Another quote from the High Times article proves, “adults have demonstrated over the last several decades that marijuana can be used moderately without harmful impacts on individuals or society.” In other words, when do you hear on the news that three people died in a car crash caused by a person that was high off the drug, marijuana doesn’t cause people to do reckless things like murder or rape which is mostly cause by alcohol. These are some of the many reasons why recreational marijuana should be legal in the U.S. One reason is that Marijuana is too expensive to be held against the justice system and should be taxed to put money towards government programs. Another reason is that Marijuana has positive attributes such as medical value to its consumers. Marijuana is not a dangerous drug because a lot of people use it and usual people’s actions because of the drug is not dangerous towards individuals or society.
