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St. Cloud State University
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Grass grabs media
By Anthony Hauck
Published:
Thursday, April 22, 2004
There's a new starlet in the American media. Please give a big round of applause, ladies and gentlemen, for marijuana.
On "That '70s Show," Kelso, Hyde, Fez and the rest of the gang repeatedly have smoke-outs in Foreman's basement, not to mention Tommy Chong's recurring role as a burnout.�
Musicians such as Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, Redman and Method Man, 50 Cent, Chad Kroeger from Nickleback, Aaron Lewis from Staind and others are not bashful about their use of marijuana.�
It's even fashionable in the world of sports (just ask basketball star Lamar Odom, running back William Green, or any member of the Portland Trail Blazers).
Marijuana cost the United States over $110 billion in treatment, enforcement, incarceration and social damage, according to Partnership for a Drug-Free America. As seen above, it is now an A-list star.�
But, isn't America still in a war on drugs?
"I think it's a case of corporate America using whatever means necessary to sell products," SCSU senior Mary Palmer said.� "It all seems very hypocritical to me, because one minute you'll be hearing why not to do it, and the next you'll hear a song about how glamorous using pot is."
Programs such as DARE and the Partnership for a Drug-Free America and new ad campaigns such as Truth/Parents. The Anti-Drug still preach the dangers of drug use in schools across the nation and they claim to be succeeding.
For example, the 2003 Partnership Attitude Tracking Study indicates a growing anti-marijuana sentiment among teens.�Nineteen percent of teens perceived a great risk in using pot in 2003, compared with 16 percent in 1998.
Perceived risk and actual usage, however, are at two completely different ends of the spectrum.
Although studies like this one seem encouraging to some, the National Institute on Drug Abuse states about 10 million people use marijuana regularly, and 69 million people over the age of 12 have smoked it on at least on occasion.
"It seems to me that pot isn't viewed as a dangerous drug anymore, like it's lost its illegal stigma," Palmer said.
She isn't the only one who's noticed.�
The Department of Justice cites two main reasons why a sort of "pot renaissance" is occurring throughout the nation.�First, media, from television to film to music, is controlled largely by baby boomers, a generation that lived during the pot smoking era of the 1960s and '70s.
Second, teens and young adults are pushing more than ever to legalize the use of marijuana through organizations such as the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML).�The Department of Justice has coined this current trend "The New Marijuana Epidemic."
Jake Huebsch, a sophomore at SCSU, has definitely noticed a change in how marijuana is portrayed by the media and perceived by the public.
"When I was growing up, people who used pot were shown as low-lifes, people who were dangers not only to themselves, but to society as well," Huebsch said.� "Now it's as if you're not cool unless you do it, like it's as casual as smoking a cigarette and having a beer."
The biggest problem the media have in portraying marijuana may be consistency.
"You watch TV and one minute you see a commercial showing you how weed will make you act stupid or lazy or sexually promiscuous, and the next thing you see is some movie or program showing people using it and going about their normal daily lives," SCSU sophomore �Coleman Schelitzche said.
Huebsch said that MTV is the largest culprit.
"It amazes me how they'll show one of those cheesy commercials, like the one where the girl gets run over in the fast food drive-thru and their next program will be a show about how dangerous drugs are and then the next music video will have Snoop Dogg toking up. It really doesn't make much sense," he said.
Is marijuana in mainstream society here to stay?
"It's not a taboo subject anymore, you don't even need to be secretive about it," Schelitzche said. "We'll probably be seeing more about it, that's for sure."
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