I am a normal bloke in my fifties. It was never good for me to drink alcohol- it made me very unpredictable and sometimes dangerous- and I liked cannabis all my adult life. I used it occasionally and recreationally for about 35 years until I slipped two discs three years ago. Now I use it daily as pain medication and to help fight the insomnia which comes with chronic pain. It has replaced multiple types of medications prescribed to me. One of them synthetic opioids…
People talk about the psychological impact of cannabis, and I can tell you it exists, but it is greatly not the drug, it is that it's consumer is a criminal. I was scared all my life of the knock on the door… the knock of a police officer! Everything could change, any time, just because I am a stoner. I use a vaporiser so the health risk is measurably little. I grow myself as I do not like the illicit market and actually enjoy knowing what goes into the plant.
But I can’t give you my real name and photo because I fear problems at my workplace, with police and from immigration. Those are the implications of being seen as a criminal. Fear, anxiety and even paranoia. These feelings hurt a human's psychological well-being and make stoners' mental health vulnerable! It is my choice to use weed and I have never hurt anybody doing so, never posed a risk, but I have to fear loss of job, risk definite prosecution and have to dread even to be thrown out of the country…
Do you see why we have to vote yes?
I feel like all people of the LGBTQ community must have felt when being gay was still illegal. I am stigmatised and criminalised for a behaviour which hurts nobody but ‘maybe’ me!
Since 38 years! Please let’s take this weight of me and all the people who choose to use cannabis!
