So when a single week like this one sees both theJustice Department back states' medical marijuana laws, and a Gallup poll showrecord-level support for pot legalization, we can look to two superjocksLanceArmstrong and Michael Phelpsfor the key lesson about our absurd drug policy.
This Tale of Two Supermen began in February whenPhelps, the gold-medal swimmer, was plastered all over national newspapers in aphoto that showed him hitting a marijuana bong. Though he was smoking inprivate, the image ignited a public firestorm. USA Swimming suspended Phelps,Kellogg pulled its endorsement deal and the Associated Press sensationalizedthe incident as a national decision about whether heroes should "beperfect or flawed."
The alleged imperfection was Phelps’ decision toquietly consume a substance that "poses a much less serious public healthproblem than is currently posed by alcohol," as a redacted World HealthOrganization report admits. That's a finding confirmed by almost everyobjective science-based analysis, including a landmark University of Californiastudy in 2006 showing "no association at all" between marijuana useand cancer.
Alcohol, by contrast, causes roughly 1 in 30 of theworld's cancer cases, according to the InternationalJournal of Cancer. And a new report by CancerEpidemiology journal shows that even beer, seemingly the least potentdrink, may increase the odds of developing tumors.
Which brings us to Armstrong. This month, the Tourde France champion who beat cancer inked a contract to hawk Anheuser-Busch’salcohol. That's right, less than a year after Phelps was crucified for merelysmoking weed in private, few noticed or protested the planet's most famouscancer survivor becoming the public face of a possible carcinogen.
"Apparently, it’s perfectly acceptable for aworld-class athlete to endorse a substance like alcohol that contributes tothousands of deaths each year, as well as hundreds of thousands of violentcrimes and injuries," says Mason Tvert, a co-author of the new book"Marijuana Is Safer." "Yet a world-class athlete like MichaelPhelps is ridiculed, punished and forced to apologize for marijuana, the use ofwhich contributes to zero deaths, and has never been linked to violent orreckless behavior. Why the double standard?"
The data prove the answer isn't about health, andour culture proves it isn't about widespread allegiance to "Just SayNo" abstinence. After all, whether through liquor commercials, winemagazines, beer-named stadiums or cocktail-drenched office parties, our societyis constantly encouraging us to get our liquid high.
No, the double standard is about know-nothing statutesand attitudes promoting the recreational use of alcohol and banning the similaruse of marijuanaall thanks to retrograde mythologies of post-Sixties Americana. In ournow-dominant backlash folklore, the patriots are the straight-laced Joe andJane Sixpacksand the Armstrongs who encourage their drinking. Meanwhile, thesupposed evildoers are the pot-smoking Cheeches, Chongs and Phelpses, whosemarijuana use allegedly underscores a dangerous hippie-ness.
Ergo, the moral of this Tale of Two Supermen: To endcontradictions in narcotics policy and permit safer recreational drug choices,we have to first reject the outdated Silent-Majority-versus-Countercultureiconography that defines so much of our politics. We must, in other words,replace caricatures with scientific facts and mature into something more thanan Idiocracy.
We should all be able to imbibeor inhaleto that.
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