As California passes a bill to raises the tobacco smoking age to 21, a bill also passes lowering the age to attain a medical marijuana prescription from 18 to 14 years of age.
“We have millions of kids on pharmaceutical medicine when marijuana could be better for them,” said medical doctor Tom Watkins. “They have to discuss it with a doctor to know for sure, but it should be a possible medical treatment.”
When asked about the long-term impact of the child’s growing brain Watkins replied, “Well, we don’t know the long-term impact of Prozac or other antidepressants either. Adderall is just prescription speed, so that can’t be good.
“They’ll probably be more likely to take the medicinal marijuana that a pill that makes them feel weird and not in a good way.
“We know tobacco has no medical benefit, quite the opposite. Marijuana does have medical benefits as the voters concluded in 1998.”
Since many drug laws disproportionately affect minorities, the legal weed at 14 would not derail as many black and Latino kid’s lives at such an early age.
Parents On The Fence
Parents are split on the controversial bill. “I know I smoked pot when I was 14,” said Santa Barbara resident Joe Bronson. “If they can do it legally, it solves potential problems down the road with getting in trouble at school and affecting their college future. So, it makes sense to me.”
“No kid is dying from weed. I’d rather have my kid smoke a little pot than drink a bunch of liquor and make poor decisions. I’d rather have my kid smoke a little weed than take a pill everyday and as parents we should have the right to decide what is best for our children, not the government. I think we should let kids of any age smoke weed if it helps them.
“My kid will think they have the coolest parents ever and isn’t that’s what important?”
Another parent is fuming mad with the bill. “We should never tell our kids drugs are okay. Just because it’s probably fine to do and kids will do it anyway, I’m stuck in my way and refuse to let kids have fun,” said Pasadena parent Susan Thompson. “It’s almost as bad as our schools teaching our children the dark side of American history. Yeah, we killed millions of Indians, but that was hundreds of years ago, absolutely no reason to teach that stuff now.”
“Nancy Reagan is rolling in her grave.”
