Cannabis Health Journal
March/April 2005
www.cannabishealth.com
Dominic Cramer
Dominic Cramer founded Toronto Hemp
Company (THC) in 1994. Since then he’s been
an integral part of many organizations, events,
and advances within the Canadian cannabis
community, including the Toronto Compassion
Centre, Sacred Seed exotic seed and houseplant
shop, The Herb Collective garden supply shop,
Green Truth drug policy conferences,
Dominizer herbal vaporization technology, the
Canadian Cannabis Coalition, Canadians for
Safe Access, NORML Canada, the Canadian
Cannabis Society, various press conferences and
television productions, and Fill The Hill.
Details: www.torontohemp.com.
An Even Brighter Future
The past couple of years have
brought phenomenal advancement
in the acceptance and
understanding of cannabis in
Canada and beyond. Calls for an end to our
outrageous prohibition are not coming from
just a handful of radicals or visionaries.
People from all backgrounds, beliefs and
walks of life are finally speaking out to
encourage drug policy modification based
upon logic and compassion.
Unfortunately, we still face enormous
uncertainty and resistance to positive change.
There seems to be no end in sight to the ignorance
and propaganda, or to deceptive policies
full of counter-productive half-measures.
Our courts and leaders continue to repeatedly
let us down, and many steps forward seem
to inevitably cause a backlash of fear, lies and
back-stepping. Progress has been a very slow
and difficult exercise in patience, persistence
and, far too often, futility.
As the ‘cannabis community’ has grown
in size and diversity, our unavoidable and
often underappreciated differences have given
us great strength, but have also increasingly
threatened to detrimentally divide us or
damage our credibility. Competing
commercial interests and egos, minor
personal disputes blown out of proportion,
lapses in judgment and tact, built-up frustrations
and stress, and unexplainable
negativity cannot be permitted to confuse
or muffle our message.
It is time, more than ever before, for us
to embrace our differences. That supporters
of cannabis compassion are so diverse
is a clear indicator of the importance and
enormity of our efforts. We must all, individually
and collectively, strengthen and
sharpen our efforts with a major focus on
unity, co-operation and mutual respect.
Many among us wisely feel that
cannabis prohibition has been, from the
start, a massive and counter-productive
blunder and that we must do whatever it
takes to demand full legalization-eradication
of this injustice once and for all. Others among us are, perhaps equally wisely,
more accepting of (or unconcerned about)
the greater inadequacies and inconsistencies
in our established traditions, protocols and
industries; and are quicker to allow compromise
and accept step-by-step measures in the
negotiation and carrying-out of drug-peace
treaties.
Some faithfully
believe that prohibition
of nature’s
creations is obviously
contrary to
God’s will, while
others analytically
detest the damage
done by drug prohibition
and the
hypocrisy of a
system that creates
and magnifies the
very ills it is
purportedly protecting
us from.
Some feel that
cannabis is such an
important plant
that it should not be
used for financial
gain, while others
feel that it’s high
time for legitimate
business people and
our tax revenue to
profit from this
plant instead of
only ‘criminals’
having that ability.
Some argue that
marihuana is an
important source of
chemicals to be used
in the manufacture of pharmaceuticals;
others refuse to disrespect the plant or ‘play
god’ by using anything except the highest grade
sun-nurtured and organically grown
unadulterated flowers.
Some fight for the rights of even their
children to benefit from the medicinal effectiveness
of cannabis products, while others
fight for an end to prohibition so that we can
realistically protect our children from an
unregulated black market.
While many of these opinions seem
incompatible, it must be recognized that we
cannot and have not made much real
progress without the support of a wide crosssection
of our general population. However,
we must also be vigilant and cautious of
efforts (including those unintended) whose
effect might be to cause conflict and distract
from or diminish our progress.
While our Controlled Drugs and
Substances Act remains ridiculous, and our
government’s Marihuana Medical Access
Regulations remain inaccessible - a hugely
disappointing boondoggle with most medicinal
users left out in the cold and most doctors
left scared, unwilling and cautioned not to
cooperate - both mainstream medicine and the herbal ‘underground’ are still somehow
making amazing progress. And while this
effort has stretched on for decades, time is of
the essence; millions of people, many of our
loved ones, are suffering and even dying
unnecessarily and prematurely.
With recent drug and research approvals,
Prairie Plant Systems and GW products are
gaining pharmaceutical acceptance in Canada.
At the same time, Compassion Centres and
similar organizations have been established in
more and more cities and small towns across
the nation to meet the immediate medical
necessities of our population. The scope of
services offered, the range of people assisted,
and the level of support and collaboration are
growing at an almost incredible rate. Also,
some kind of ‘decriminalization’ for personal
recreational/medicinal/spiritual use and cultivation
is definitely looming on the political
horizon, and many challenges to the constitutionality
of prohibition continue in our courts
and the courts of public opinion. As productive
and momentous as the past few years have
been, the next few likely hold even greater
potential for positive change.
It is clear that a major diversification is
occurring. As capitalism and our health-care
establishment finally run with the mainstream
marketing of cannabis-based prescription
medicine, cannabis is also gaining some
of the respect it deserves as a medicinal herb,
a ‘natural health product’ and as an option
for use and experimentation for whatever
purpose by any adult Canadian who so
chooses. As the diversity of cannabis
supporters brings us strength, so too does the
diversity of uses, products, revenues, and
markets for cannabis.
While it has become ever more apparent
that the fears and threats of the administration
of the United States have held us back,
those same States and organizations within
them have made remarkable moves forward
with medicinal and more general decriminalization.
Many States, notwithstanding
contradictory federal policy and action, are
far more advanced in this regard than we
Canadians even believe ourselves to be. This
is a sad situation, considering the opportunity
Canada has had to help lead the way on
this issue, the chance to further and to
strengthen our international reputation as a
human-rights and peace-keeping superpower
and forward-thinking sovereign nation.
With so many frontiers for us to work on,
and so special a long-standing tradition of
harmony and cooperation within our ranks,
the future couldn’t be much brighter for
unifying organizations such as the Canadian
Cannabis Coalition, NORML Canada,
Educators for Sensible Drug Policy, Law
Enforcement Against Prohibition, and the
Canadian Cannabis Society. Groups like
these are allowing alliances of Compassion
Centres, Cannabis-related businesses and
organizations, medical and civil liberty associations,
and all sorts of Canadians with an
interest in this issue to connect, communicate,
and support each other. Our message is
being presented with ever more volume and
clarity, and is reaching audiences and strata
of society that were previously mostly out of
our reach.
We must ensure that this momentum
continues – keep educating ourselves and
those around us, joining and supporting
unifying organizations, participating in
events and campaigns, contacting our leaders
and media, and encouraging positivity, cohesiveness
and collaboration.
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