No other drug can compete with cannabis for its ability to satisfy the innate yearnings for Archaic boundary dissolution and yet leave intact the structures of ordinary society.

― Terence McKenna

It had almost been a year since I had spoken to my 31 year old, Connecticut based cousin,Edward Greene; but Cannabis has a way of bringing estranged ties back together.

From the Nisenan lands in the west;to the Mohegan winds of the East. Weed transcends all sorts of barriers.

I tell him I’m asked to write an opinion piece on Equality & Cannabis and he is the first person who came to mind.

Not just because we both enjoy a nice Indica hybrid and conspiracy theory dialogues on how the government is trying to ban all things that bring optimal health to keep people sick and Big Pharma rich, but Edward has had his stint with incarceration since his late teens. As a free man who who has witnessed disproportionate affairs in jail,he confirms that he still smokes Cannabis and for good reason.

“I think Marijuana has kept me
Out of prison a lot. I feel like weed is my calm down thing. If I’m angry, it helps me relax, calm down, think it through..breathe.
It helps me with anxiety and doing things I don’t wanna really do. I smoke a blunt, I relax and realize everything is gonna be ok.”

I never missed 1 of his collect calls from jail andoften we shared the same sentiment that in the “real world” a lot of the jobs being offered to young POC didn’t nearly pay as much as what the streets were offering, sadly, illegally.

Highly intelligent street entrepreneurs at the forefront of a now billion dollar industry.

With inflation & gentrification rising in our cities,minimum wage staying stagnant, it seemed like a sure fire way to keep people behind bars and most of my friends pushing joy filled ziplock bags out of Nike duffel backpacks for survival.

We knew that it was a system designed to simply control a certain demographic.

“ I view this as a Race thing. Why give us what helps us? They pick and choose what’s best for us. Xanax or all these pills. But why not make Marijuana legal? Because it helps us. They don’t want to see us be productive in society or do anything that helps our brothers and sisters.”

Richard Nixon decisions still governing our primal need to connect with nature and tap into our own consciousness.

We speak on how the judicial system has been trying to trap “minorities” or POC since forever with weed as it’s scapegoat.

It’s that prominent sentence in Tupac’s legendary track, Changes.

“Instead of war on poverty, they got a war on drugs, so the police can bother me.”

We speak about Hip Hop culture, adopted trends and the romanticism of blunt smoking in Notorious B.I.G videos in the late 90’s. How every white kid we knew wanted to be included in every puff session and rap cypher in the hallways of the Chelsea Housing Projects of Lower Manhattan in 98’ but not take the charge if caught.

How someone knew an elite Lawyer or Doctor who would get someone, to bring them an 8th to their apartment, obscurely.

How if a white guy smoked he was a hippie, but if a black guy did, he was a problem. How anything that brought POC joy or even remotely made them feel good was debunked, destroyed, taken or given surplus amounts of jail time.

How Maya Angelou has even written poetry about how happy weed made her feel.

How Indigenous tribes and Egypt B.C. had a handle on Cannabis and were healing generations before it ever got into the hands of controlling officials.

How happiness and self esteem might be dangerous to the 1%.

How 80 percent of those folx in jail for marijuana possession by 2017 were Black & Latinx.

How some of them, still haven’t been released for petty dealings in 2020.

We speak about Mental Health.

How

Justin or “J the Don” was my first psychiatrist at 23. When my therapist suggested Prozac, it was his hand out with a “Yo,You Wanna Smoke?” That saved me and made me trust myself.

We speak on just how warped it is that alcohol and cigarettes were so freely available to consumers but cause the most damage not just psychologically & how we watched cigarettes kill our grandmother and alcoholism destroy our organs.

We pray for the ones who got out of jail and are so traumatized by their incarceration experience that after 10 years, the talk of Marijuana at a gathering sparks PTSD.

How somehow a plant they once adored,has become the one they have come to fear like the stigma imposed by baby boomers or Conservatives.

How they recall handcuffs instead of happy times and purple haze.

How the system or religion once demonized this medicine and it’s enthusiasts from ever seeking it’s remedy again

Only to now be glorified in handheld podcasts as rituals for new moons.

How it’s been appropriated from

The Himalayas of Asia to the Ethiopians in Africa and used against their same great great grandsons in courtrooms.

How many friends have a misdemeanor on their record still and can only get jobs at the local Nissan car dealership.

How weed has become as trendy as Yoga & Matcha Tea Lattes but has had a trail of pain & broken families behind it, and most new users will never have to endure or recall the trauma that came to families effected by it’s criminalization before legalization.

How every city should follow Oakland’s blueprint of bringing Equity and opportunity within the Cannabis industry to previously incarcerated folx.

How we can’t relive another

John Sutter-esque Gold Rush where so many people are uprooted from their place in prosperity.

We all deserve a piece of the pie.

How the government needs to stop being such a dam killjoy.

Because at the end of the day,

When we ALL sit down to split the nugget

dissect the seeds, and smoke the tree.

We all have the same innate need.

No matter the race, the color, the creed.

To just. Simply.

Feel good. Feel equal. Feel Free.

Skye Cabrera

Same Seeds: Equality & the Cannabis Industry