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Having spent some time in

by Prometheus 6
May 3, 2003 - 5:34am.
on Old Site Archive

Having spent some time in Cali, I can vouch for this

And having spent time in the USofA, I can vouch for this:
"A society that can punish a marijuana offender more severely than a murderer is caught in the grip of a deep psychosis," he concludes. "Black markets will always be with us. But they will recede in importance when the public morality is consistent with our private one. The underground is a good measure of the progress and the health of nations. When much is wrong, much needs to be hidden."

With pot and porn outstripping corn, America's black economy is flying high
Illegal migrants provide the muscle for US black market
Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles
Friday May 2, 2003

Marijuana, pornography and illegal labour have created a hidden market in the United States which now accounts for as much as 10% of the American economy, according to a study. As a cash crop, marijuana is believed to have outstripped maize, and hardcore porn revenue is equal to Hollywood's domestic box office takings.

Despite laws that punish marijuana cultivation more strictly than murder in some states, Americans spend more on illegal drugs than on cigarettes. And despite official disapproval of pornography, the US leads the world in export of explicit sex videos, according to Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs and Cheap Labour in the American Black Market, by Eric Schlosser.

Excerpts in order of decreasing moral significance:

… "Migrant work in California has long absorbed Mexican surplus labour, while Mexico has in effect paid for the education, health care and retirement of California's farmworkers," writes Schlosser. "Maintaining the current level of poverty among migrant farmworkers saves the average American household around $50 a year."
Understand this well. We're not talking about the average American industrial farmer. We're talking about the average American. Makes me wonder how much the average American family saves per year due to the current level of poverty and unemployment in the Black and Latino communities.

I need to say this. When you're a member of the mainstream, you benefit from the various 'isms' whether you hold the position or not. All white people benefit from racism. Just as you don't have to be a farmer to receive the $50 per year savings that poverty among migrant farm workers gives you, you don't have to be a racist to benefit from the existance of racism.

This is a hard, hard thing, because it means that people who think they have never done a racist thing will still be impacted by anti-racism measures. This is the very thing that haters have used as a lever to shorten the focus of civil rights discussion - looking at the local impact of global strategies allowed the right to shift the discussion from enhancing the position of minorities to protecting the position of the majority.

… No aspect of farming has grown faster in the US over the past three decades than marijuana, with one-third of the public over the age of 12 having smoked the drug.

… the majority of the marijuana now cultivated domestically is being grown in the nation's mid-section - a swath running from the Appalachians west to the Great Plains. Throughout this Marijuana Belt drug fortunes are being made by farmers who often seem to have stepped from a page of the old Saturday Evening Post." [p6: Keep this in mind next time you be packin dat bowl a chronic.]

… Some estimates suggest 3 million Americans grow marijuana, although mostly for their own or their friends' use, but between 100,000 and 200,000 are believed to do so for a living.

The laws against the drug are strict. There were 724,000 people arrested for marijuana offences in 2001 and about 50,000 are in prison. Commercial growers can serve sentences far longer than those for murder, but the high risks appear to have had little effect on production or availability: 89% of secondary school students surveyed indicated that they could easily obtain the drug. [p6: Emphasis added]

Did you know William F. Buckley thinks weed should be legalized?

exiguous adj limited: scanty or meager (formal)

(thought I'd save you the trouble …)" Taking pot can be risky, and stoned-while-driving should never be permitted. The scientific question - does pot harm? - is simply unsettled. It can be said that its ingestion has negative effects, and that there are positive effects. But experience is overwhelming the discussion, and it is teaching that however ill-advised it may be to take the drug, it is less well-advised to continue to arrest ten thousand people every week for a practice or indulgence of such exiguous social consequence."

… Hardcore pornography in the shape of videos, the internet, live sex acts and cable television is now estimated to generate around $10bn, roughly the same amount as Hollywood's US box office receipts.

… Americans spend more money at strip clubs than at Broadway, regional theatres and orchestra performances combined.

… Now the US leads the world in pornography; about 211 new films are produced every week. Los Angeles area is the centre of the film boom and many of those in the trade are otherwise respectable citizens.

Nina Hartley, a porn star, told Schlosser: "You'd be surprised how many producers and manufacturers are Republicans." [p6: no I wouln't]

posted by Prometheus 6 at 5/3/2003 05:34:52 AM |

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