Shapiro, Susan. “Cannabis crazy: It doesn’t just describe the move to legalize weed. It could happen to you.” latimes.com. LA Times. 03 January 15. Web. 15 July 2015.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-shapiro-marijuana-danger-20150104-story.html
Susan Shapiro, an award-winning journalism professor and the coauthor of the bestseller “Unhooked: How to Quit Anything” and the author of the memoir “Lighting Up,” sheds light on the controversy of marijuana legalization by arguing drug how addicting the drug can be. Shapiro claims she is ambivalent about the legalization of marijuana because she was addicted to it for twenty seven years and knows first-hand the destructive effects it can have. She argues that smoking pot is not worth it by asking her intended audience, “Is the high worth the low?” Shapiro goes on to explain her experience with the drug.
According to Shapiro, the country brought the number of states that decriminalized marijuana to eighteen. Shapiro argues that states such as Colorado and her hometown of New York are proudly showcasing their newly found laws. Shapiro claims that she is afraid that these newly found laws and recent screen glorification as “High Maintenance” and “Kid Cannabis” “send young people a message that getting stoned is cool and hilarious.” As Shapiro points out, she is very skeptical about the way marijuana is portrayed because she knows its ruinous effects. To illustrate the impact marijuana can have, she reminisces on the times she bought weed in bad neighborhoods at 3 a.m., confronted a dealer for selling her a dime bag of oregano, and let pushers she barely knew to deliver weed, like pizza, to her home. Shapiro goes on to describe her experience to be similar to that of Walter White’s self-destruction from meth on TV’s “Breaking Bad” and the delusional nightmares in the film “Requiem for a Dream.”
Shapiro remarks about the multiple times she has warned her students that getting stoned greatly increases the likelihood of something bad happening by reminding them that weed blurs reality, reduces inhibitions, and can regularly lead to tragedy. Shapiro refers to two incidents in Colorado that led to a 47-year-old fatally shooting his and a 19-year-old student jumping to his death that were both linked to pot. Shapiro argues that “the weed of today is far stronger than in the past.” As Shapiro points out, the strength of pot varies nowadays and it’s impossible to predict its effect. She admits that one hit from a pipe or bong would leave her reeling.
Shapiro admits that “being a stoner was easy. Quitting was hard but gave me more to live for.” In other words, getting high was easy for Shapiro because it was her way of “escaping”, but giving up her addiction paved the way for good health, marriage, and a thriving career. Shapiro believes that pot smokers shouldn’t be sent to prison, but that they also don’t belong on pop-culture pedestals either.
I found this article useful because it gives a perspective about marijuana usage from a person who actually went through the battle of addiction. It gave me insight to a viewpoint that differed from mine. Other people in the class might find this useful if they are thinking about the addictive aspect of marijuana and what it can do to those over a period of time.
This article really caught my attention because of the fact that the author was once addicted to pot herself. Some aspects of the article could be used in support of legalizing marijuana because it describes her dangerous experience with receiving drugs; this could be spun as a way to make marijuana legal so transactions like these won’t have to happen anymore. I also found it interesting that she believes that people who use the drugs shouldn’t be counted as criminals.
I found this article to be very eye-opening. I like that the author had once been addicted to marijuana herself and is now trying to help others refrain from making the same mistakes as she did. This perspective is different from all the other articles and makes it feel very real. The fact that she became aware of how ruinous this drug was on her body 27 years later makes us realize that marijuana is in fact more addictive than we are lead to believe.