Legalization of Marijuana: Benefits and Impacts

This essay discusses the benefits and impacts of legalizing marijuana. It covers topics such as the potential health benefits, job opportunities, and impact on the criminal justice system. The essay also acknowledges potential challenges that may arise from legalization. The course code, course name, and university are mentioned.

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LEGALIZATION OF MARIJUANA
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Essay title Legalization of Marijuana
It is true that ‘The legalisation of cannabis would be more beneficial for society than
prohibition’. There have been numerous researches carried out over the past years that have
tried to identify the benefits associated to the use of marijuana by people. Some of these
studies have come to the conclusion that the legalization of marijuana would be beneficial to
the society than its prohibition. Due to such studies, different states and countries around the
world have legalized the use of marijuana. These states include; Washington DC, Colorado,
Alaska, Washington State, and Oregon (Campbell, Twenge, & Carter, 2017).
The legalization of marijuana would have very many beneficial to the people as well
as to the community as a whole. It is important to analyze some of these benefits that come
along with the legalization of marijuana. One of the most significant concerns in relation to
the legalization of marijuana is whether or not is the drug harmful. A huge percentage of the
people today claim to have smoke or do smoke marijuana although coming out to the public
has not been possible due to the illegal status f the drug, research shows that most of the
people who use marijuana hardly share this information (Crockett, 2014). This has been a
major challenge to the science world since studies on whether the drug is harmful or not
becomes hard due to the lack of freedom to conduct these researches. With this in mind, the
legalization of marijuana gives the scientist and researchers the legal ticket to carry out

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multiple studies in relation to the side effects of the consumption of marijuana. According to
an article by (Dioun & Haveman, 2016) consumption of marijuana is not as addictive as some
of the legal drugs we have around for example alcohol or cigarettes. These studies will help
the people learn more about the drug hence a clear decision on whether its worth to have the
drug illegalized can be addressed.
The smoking of controlled amount of marijuana has bee known to help with health-
related problems. These include problems such as the epileptic seizures and glaucoma. The
legalization of marijuana shows a significant impact to the lives of the people who ae
suffering from such conditions and the process of accessing the marijuana while it being
illegal becomes extremely hard. This is a factor that the health sector clearly needs to
embrace and build on as n argument for the legalization of the drug. Human nature response
with care for the suffering people which is the condition of the epileptic patients or the
glaucoma patients. The consumption of marijuana has also not been associated with any lung
impairment conditions as compared to the consumption of cigarettes. Scientific evidence
proves that the consumption of marijuana helps in decreasing the symptoms of Dravet’s
syndrome which is a severe seizure disorder.
The legalization of marijuana also creates more jobs opportunities for the community.
This shows a positive community impact as a result of the legalization of marijuana. Most of
the people involved in the selling of the drug in different countries or states that have not yet
legalized the drug are arrested, this leads to the increase in the crime rates in these
communities. With the legalization of the drug all these changes and the community trucks in
relation to crimes changes, the legalization of marijuana saw a high turn up of community
members coming forward to receive marijuana education on hoe to get their criminal charges
in relation to marijuana offences dropped. The changes brought in a new wave of
opportunities for the people in the state. This is an example of what would happen in case of

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the legalization of marijuana. On the bigger picture, the legalization of marijuana means that
the government will have control over the business and it will be able to generate revenue
from the business. In the current setup of most of the countries, the financial control of
marijuana is off the hands of the government since the drug operations are done off the
government book. The government should focus on such a perspective here the use of the
drug can be taxed just lie other legal drug hence increasing the governments revenue. With an
increased government revenue, different measures and projects are achieved.
The legalization of marijuana will also impact the security sector of our communities,
the police officers will have to shit their attention to other crimes such as robbery or gun
violence among other crimes since there focus will be shifted from the marijuana hunt
mission. The government will also be able to direct the funds that have been directed to
fighting marijuana to other productive channels in the community. This will also affect the
rehabilitation centres in the country (Monte, Zane & Heard, 2015). The government uses a lot
of revenue in the maintenance of the prisons where some of the people imprisoned are
charged with marijuana related charges are held, the government can cut down on such
expenses as well and utilize these funds in other sectors that have been affected due to
underfunding.
According to a survey from Gallup, support for the legalization in US has rose from
12 percent in the year 1969 to 31 percent in the year 2006 and in 2017 the percentage has

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rose to 64 percent. This was also seen from a survey by the civil science poll and the general
social survey. The graph below represents the changes in the survey conducted over the year
hence indicating the views of the public in relation to the use of marijuana.
Figure1: changes in people opinion in relation to the legalization of marijuana (L. 2014,
March 27).
The graph shows that over time the perception and understanding of marijuana keeps
changing over time, this brings us down to the point as to whether our laws should be
changing. DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education Program) one of the largest anti-drug
group in the world has taken marijuana off the list of getaway drugs. The get away drug
theory basically states that the use of soft drugs such as marijuana would lead one to harder
drugs such as cocaine. Research carried out by the group has proved that marijuana does not
lead the users to hard drugs
The legalization of marijuana also affects the criminal justice system. In different
countries the number of cases filled in relation to marijuana charges have significantly
slowed down the efforts of the criminal justice system, over 700,000 arrests are to be elevated
hence easing the work of the criminal justice system that is to handle other matters, in line to
this it has been proven that most government spend a lot of money in the fight against
marijuana, these funds are then relocated to other sectors within the government jurisdiction
(Dioun & Haveman, 2016).
With all the covered research in relation to the legalization of marijuana it is
important to realize a few problems that also may be brought about by its legalization. The
legalization of marijuana means that people will be free to use the drug any time they please
but other research has shown that the excessive use of marijuana affects the health of a person
as well as their wellbeing. There may be rise of a few challenges but also the use of other
drugs such as alcohol and cigarettes also have their impacts. Excessive use of alcohol affects

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the brain among other organs of the body, also the excessive use of cigarettes affects a
person’s lungs as well as the other organs of the body (Estoup et al., 2016). The other
possible challenge is adapting to the new rule that stipulates marijuana a drug that has been
illegal for decades becomes legalized, the drug policies of different states would be
significantly impacted. Conclusively, the legalization of marijuana is one of the most
discussed topics in our current generation, its legalization has both its pros and cons but it
legalization paves room for more studies into the effects of the drug to the human body as
well as the society. For all this to be accomplished the policy makers should revise the
current state of legalities for the use of marijuana.
Reference List
Campbell, W., Twenge, J., & Carter, N. (2017). Support for marijuana (cannabis)
legalization: untangling age, period, and cohort effects. Collabra: Psychology, 3(1).
Crockett, T. (2014). Legalization of Marijuana. Substance use & misuse control and
avoidance, 5(7), 181-887.
Dioun, C., & Haveman, H. A. (2016). The Price of Marijuana: Legal Institutions,
Uncertainty, and Risk in New and Contentious Markets.
Estoup, A. C., Moise-Campbell, C., Varma, M., & Stewart, D. G. (2016). The impact of
marijuana legalization on adolescent use, consequences, and perceived
risk. Substance use & misuse, 51(14), 1881-1887.

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L. (2014, March 27). Marijuana has been legalized in nine states and Washington, DC.
Retrieved from https://www.vox.com/cards/marijuana-legalization/where-is-
marijuana-legal
Monte, A. A., Zane, R. D., & Heard, K. J. (2015). The implications of marijuana legalization
in Colorado. Jama, 313(3), 241-242.
Essay word count: 1500
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