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4 Ways Using Even Legal Marijuana Makes You a Second-Class Citizen

amanda88

Well-known member
Marijuana is now legal in nine states constituting about one-fifth of the U.S. population, and medical marijuana is recognized in a total of 29 states. That means people in those states can possess and use marijuana without fear of criminal prosecutions (if they have a doctor's recommendation in the medical marijuana-only states).
darrin_harris_frisby_group-adults-marijuana-watching-movie_7515.jpg

But even in legal marijuana states, pot smokers face restrictions that in effect turn them into second-class citizens, unable to do things non-drug users or users of legally sanctioned drugs, such as alcohol, can do, or somehow punished for doing them. While legalizing marijuana is a giant breakthrough, as long as marijuana users face stigma, discrimination, and worse over their choice of substances, the job is only half-done.

Here are four ways even legal marijuana users get screwed.

1. Employment Rights

You may be able to smoke pot legally, but it can still cost you your job. Even in legal marijuana states, legalization laws generally are careful not to intrude on the rights of employers to conduct drug testing for pot and to fire people who test positive—even if they're not high or impaired at work.

Legal cases in California, Colorado, Montana, and Washington have all upheld the right of employers to fire or refuse to hire workers who test positive for marijuana even if they have a medical marijuana recommendation. But the law is rapidly evolving, and a recent case from Connecticut, a nursing home that refused to hire a medical marijuana patient after he tested positive for THC was ordered to reinstate the job offer.

A thriving economy and growing social acceptance of marijuana may also bring some solace to pot smokers. As Bloomberg noted just last month, we are now seeing a "slow decline in pre-employment drug screening," with some major employers abandoning the practice in the face of a tight job market. That trend, unsurprisingly, is being led by companies in the marijuana legal states. In Colorado, for instance, the percentage of employers using pre-employment drug tests declined from 77 percent in 2016 to 66 percent last year.

But still, if you smoked a joint on Friday night, Walmart still doesn't think you're fit to stock its shelves on Monday morning.

2. Gun Rights

If you smoke pot, you can't legally purchase or own a gun. As more states move toward legalization, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms (ATF) has clarified its Form 4473, the federal Firearms Transaction Record that purchaser must fill out to buy a gun: "Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?" the form asks.

And just so you stoners get it, ATF has added the following language: "Warning: The use or possession of marijuana remains unlawful under Federal law regardless of whether it has been legalized or decriminalized for medicinal or recreational purposes in the state where you reside."

That means pot smokers who want to legally purchase a weapon have to lie on Form 4473. And that's a federal crime. (Unlikely to be caught and prosecuted, but still.)

In August 2016, a federal appeals court upheld the ban on gun sales to medical marijuana patients. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled that the federal government's ban on gun sales to medical marijuana cardholders does not violate the Second Amendment. The decision came in the case of a Nevada woman turned away from a gun shop after obtaining a medical marijuana card. The ruling sets precedent for all nine states in the circuit, including California, Oregon, and Washington.

There have been proactive efforts by law enforcement in a handful of states to, for example, order registered medical marijuana patients to turn in their guns, but those have so far been aborted in the face of loud opposition. In Pennsylvania, the state Health Department is no longer providing the names of patients to law enforcement after newspapers there reported the patients would not be able to buy firearms; in Illinois, regulators removed a rule that would have barred legal gun owners from becoming patients; and in Hawaii, police had to walk back a plan to force patients to hand in their guns.

Still, as long as the federal government maintains marijuana prohibition and as long as ATF considers marijuana a controlled substance, pot smokers' gun rights are at risk. And the NRA doesn't seem to care.

3. Parental Rights

In both medical marijuana states and full-blown legal pot states, parents have lost custody of their children over their marijuana use. Part of the problem is that marijuana remains federally illegal, turning the pot-using parent into a criminal in the eyes of courts of child protective services workers. Another part of the problem is discrimination and subjectivity about what constitutes "the best interest of the child." If a child protective bureaucracy or even an individual caseworker harbors anti-marijuana sentiments, even non-problematic recreational use of pot can be used to take children from the home or deny custody to the offending parent.

Marijuana use is especially likely to pop up in divorces where custody of the child or children is contested. If your spouse griped about your pot-smoking while you were married, be prepared for him or her to try to use it against you in a nasty divorce case. Divorce attorneys warn parents facing this prospect to quit smoking pot now, well ahead of any court dates and court-ordered drug tests.

That's another way pot-smoking parents get hammered. Courts may demand onerous drug testing for months or year or require that visits with children be supervised.

Medical marijuana support groups report hundreds of cases of parents losing custody of their kids, some merely for having registered as medical marijuana patients. But there are small signs of positive change on the horizon: California's Prop 64, for instance, includes a provision saying courts can no longer rescind or restrict a parent's custodial rights solely because they have a medical marijuana recommendation.

That's a start, but we still have a long way to go before pot-smoking parents can rest easy.

4. Housing Rights

You can be kicked out of your home for using marijuana if you are poor and live in HUD, Section 8, or other federally subsidized housing. Under a 1999 HUD Memorandum Regarding Medical Marijuana in Public Housing still in effect, any activity relating to controlled substances, including even medical marijuana, can get you evicted.

And it doesn't have to be just you. If you live in federally subsidized housing and your grandson gets caught smoking a joint in the parking lot, you can find yourself tossed out on the street.

Even people who don't live in federally subsidized housing face problems, especially if they live in rental housing. Landlords can prohibit tenants from using marijuana, and rental apartment industry associations typically counsel their members that "banning the use or possession of marijuana on site does not violate any landlord/tenant or fair housing laws, even when marijuana has been legalized by local ordinance or state statute." Nor, they argue, is allowing the use or cultivation of medical marijuana a "reasonable accommodation" required by law, even if it is medically recommended.

Marijuana is increasingly legal and accepted, but the progress is uneven and the battle to be treated like normal citizens remains unfinished.
(https://www.alternet.org/drugs/4-ways-using-even-legal-marijuana-makes-you-second-class-citizen)
 

Dropped Cat

Six Gummi Bears and Some Scotch
Veteran
No children.
Self employed.
No gun ownership.
Live in a non government housing.

Got it.
 

Biosynthesis

Member
Veteran
No Children
Dissabled
Hate Guns
Live on Privately owned land

Thanks for the perspective. Never gave it any thought.
 

Satyros

Member
That means pot smokers who want to legally purchase a weapon have to lie on Form 4473. And that's a federal crime. (Unlikely to be caught and prosecuted, but still.)

I've personally handled many thousands of these forms. Although the FBI does deny some of them, it is rare for them to respond to it, in the sense that someone probably lied. If anything, such a lie would hardly ever be anything more than an "add on" charge to something else.

In some cases, a few people who have submitted these things, have invited a shark fest of LEO to restrain their freedom of movement.

In more cases, many people are too stupid to fill it out correctly.

I can think of a female who acquired a pistol in a manner resembling the quote, and just a few weeks ago, was able to use it in self defense versus one of the neighbors who was apparently freaked on something called Flockers. From the rap sheet I saw, she should have killed him.
 

St. Phatty

Active member
My first Cannabis doctor advised me never to discuss marijuana use with the Federal government, or basically ANY government.

Since Honolulu recently used medical marijuana databases to seize weapons in Hawaii ... oh well they all have spear-guns for spear-fishing so I guess they're covered ? /sarc

I wonder when the obvious Cannabis - firearms contradiction in American law will be settled. I would guess 10 to 15 years, and that it might have to make 1 or 2 trips to the Supreme Court.

EDIT - I suggest listening to the interview with Robert Whitaker at
https://www.peakprosperity.com/podcast/113921/robert-whitaker-americas-prescription-drug-epidemic

He talks about the statistics of causation vs. correlation between SSRI drugs and school shootings. I thought he was a neuro-scientist, because he does such a good job explaining how SSRI drugs interact with the human brain.

Basically there's a positive correlation between SSRI use and school shootings, between SSRI use and homicidal and suicidal behavior.

The obvious implication is that that line on the ATF form should be amended to include, "are you currently taking any SSRI substances ? "


But Big Pharma wouldn't like that !

As far as the Cannabis restriction on the ATF form, it's their meager attempt to control.

The other drug correlation which is not mentioned in the 'Firearms Violence' debates is the use of Alcohol. If the ATF form were logical, it would also ask a question or questions about the applicant's Alcohol use, and history of non-firearms violence.

The webcast with Robert Whitaker does a better job explaining that.
 

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