Media Hypocrisy in the Marijuana Debate

I am seriously thinking of burning my tv. It's mostly a propaganda tool or diversion from real issues.

www.pissedoffpothead.com

This past weekend I attempted to record the documentary airing on Showtime, "American Drug War..the Last White Hope and had strange problems. Though being a regular Showtime subscriber for several years when I tried to schedule the program to record on my receiver, I received the message that I was not authorized to record this event. I subscribe to Dish satelite and have been getting Showtime without any problems. I finally was able to record the program from the program guide but, lo and behold, the next day the program had mysteriously disappeared from my list of recorded events without me deleting it. The program airs again today, and I have it set to record and will see if it magically disappears again. The receiver with involuntary "delete" is connected to my phone line. My other receiver, not connected to a phone line recorded the program and the documentary remains on the list of my recordings.
Has anyone else experienced this?

One thing we learned from the Phelps/Kellogg's saga was that corporate America engages in drug war grandstanding for the same reason it does everything else: to make money. For decades, corporations have maintained "zero tolerance" policies simply because they believe that it makes them look good in the eyes of the public. More than anything, they just want to avoid negative publicity. I feel that we as a movement should consider making boycotts a regular part of our strategy. Send the message that what happened to Kellogg's will immediately happen to any corporation that crosses us, then keep following through until they're ready to listen. Corporations are much easier to persuade than governments; threaten their bottom line and they will snap to attention.

If it's legalized it won't be as interesting and attractive and controversial, and so they won't be able to make as much money off of it. They're in it for the money, just like the cartels and the prison-industrial complex.

The funny part about using social taboos (like the casual use of marijuana and other drugs) to sell your product, is that as the demand for your product increases, so increases permissiveness of the taboos associated with your product. Just like "gangsta-rap" brain-washes inner-city teens into believing that the "thug-life" is somehow glamorous and desirable, shows like "Weeds" convince people with otherwise pedestrian lives that growing, and selling marijuana is a decent way to make money. Proof of which being the rash of suburban homes being turned into vast grow-ops by financially distressed middle-income 30-somethings.

In their casual pans across smoke filled living rooms, occupied by giggling adults, they make the case for us that marijuana is not the same incredibly dangerous drug you were told about in high school DARE classes. With every smoke-out scene in a movie, they openly display the viciousness of the lies told about marijuana and it's users.

-Oz