Alex Garcia
Mr. Mallerne
Marijuana should be Legal In the year 2013 it had been a highly successful year for legalizing marijuana within the United States. Now that Colorado and Washington have accepted the drug 58 percent of American citizens are now accepting the drug as well. There are countless of reasons as to why marijuana should be legalized in all states. Marijuana should be legal in all states because it is much safer than other legalized drugs, can be used as a sleep aid, and can be used as an alternate for other medications. A drug is a drug; therefore it’s bad and it harms the user, as well as those around them. There was a study from the UK’s team of drug experts that had people take a survey in 2010 (Nutt, King, and Philips) about common illegal drugs/substance abuse (alcohol, heroin, cocaine, tobacco, etc.) It shows on the chart that more users and people around the users have a 50 percent higher chance of getting hurt than marijuana users. Marijuana wasn’t even on the list of drugs that have been abused. Not only was this substance not on the list of abused drugs, but it is also used as a sleeping aid. Cancer patients have said that after taking extract from this plant they have had a better night’s sleep. Marijuana is also used as a stress reducer. “’One group of marijuana users report… they use marijuana to help them sleep…marijuana users report negligible use of alcohol, sleeping pills, or other medicines to induce sleep.’” (Downs). More users say that certain strands of marijuana help them sleep better than others, but most strands of this drug will get the job done with and make the consumer fall and stay asleep longer than other remedies. Not only does marijuana help with insomnia, but this substance also aids with nausea. This is excellent for cancer patients that are going through chemotherapy because the treatment more than often makes the patients nauseous. When consuming this drug, it is known to make the user have an increase in appetite. This is a good drug to utilize with patients diagnosed with HIV/AIDS because this disease usually makes the patient lose their appetite. It is said that marijuana doses help with seizures and it will reduce the amount a patient has within the day. It also helps the muscles in one’s body relax, as well as muscle spasms and chronic pain. One of the biggest arguments someone will say is that this is a gateway drug to other, more harmful drugs. About 40 percent of Americans have already admitted to smoking marijuana at least once. “[As] Scientific American points out, the studies that show people who use marijuana first before trying other drugs is correlation and not causations.” (Jacques and Luling). Others might also claim that this drug can