Smoke on the Water

It is tough to grasp what is a more amazing achievement: the re-emergence to the forefront of public debate the archaic and puritanical attitudes towards marijuana use among adults or the fact that the most decorated Olympian of all-time can win eight gold medals at a single Olympics and still enjoy a puff.

Anybody who has ever spent a day on the bongs can often find it difficult to even make the pizza order or get the Zooper Doopers from the freezer. It is often quite an effort to get The Mighty Boosh DVD in the machine as well. Winning eight gold medals at a single Olympic Games, breaking multiple world records, being named athlete of the year by Sports Illustrated and breaking into the Tiger Woods stratosphere of marketability and cross-demographic appeal while getting on the green is something to behold, akin to watching the bearded lady swallow twelve flaming swords with her hands and feet bound together and the fire sprinklers in full force!

That, of course, is by the by for the most part though it does serve, in a facetious way, to cut the balls off the myth that everyone who gets stoned is a non-functioning member of society, incapable of decency, virtue, normal conversation, achievement or the completion of every day tasks.

The real issue here is the puritanical and outdated attitudes of media wowsers, high-road walking politicians, backward-thinking sports administrators, jackboot police officers and out-of-touch sponsors towards marijuana consumption by a fully grown adult who just happens to be a high achieving athlete.

Michael Phelps, a twenty-three-year-old guy who has been put under the pump from a very young age, smoked a cone at a college party in a dorm room. What’s the beef? Phelps, after achieving his goals at the Beijing Games, decided to relax and engage in an activity that harms nobody but himself. Phelps’ decision to hit some green to wind-down and relax would put him in a distinct majority of adults under thirty and I dare say a majority of all adults. The only problem would have been if he popped the top or dropped The Black Lady when it all got a little much for him.

Yet Phelps has been savaged after some cheap pimp peddled photos of Phelps pulling back like a beast to a British tabloid rag.

Sportswriters and social commentators across the board have attacked Phelps for failing as a role model, his supposed moral corruption causing children and parents across the world to unite in grief for the self-wrought downfall of a modern day hero. He has been chastised by often hypocritical lawmakers and moral elitists. USA Swimming has suspended him for three months despite the fact it is not against the rules of the sport to consume marijuana outside of competition. A South Carolina sheriff is trying to make a name by talking heavy about arresting and charging Phelps for possession. Kellogg’s have dumped him as a spokesman. Another sponsor, Subway, have severely rebuked him.

It is a dramatic overreaction to an activity that, to most adults, is harmless and is certainly less dangerous to consume than alcohol and tobacco, both of which are legal because governments have a significant financial interest in the industries along with a tight grip on the testicles of both drink and cigarette smoke.

It is nothing but an historical anomaly that marijuana has been criminalised and alcohol and tobacco are not. These certainly aren’t the dark ages either and most adults understand that marijuana consumption is a relatively harmless activity that most of us have engaged in and is no longer just the domain of hippies and losers. Modern values simply don’t suggest that marijuana is a criminal offence or even a major problem when consumed by a grown adult. It is a matter of personal choice.

That isn’t to say marijuana doesn’t have a negative affect on some people just as alcohol, paracetamol and gluten can affect people negatively. Some people cannot function on weed. They can’t think, they can’t act, they get lazy, it sets off a condition. And those adults should probably not be rolling up a fatty. Everyone should have the choice, however, just like we should all have the choice to have a beer or eat gluten-laced food.

One would assume that the time and resources of politicians, law enforcement agencies, sporting bodies and newspaper columnists could be spent in a better way than pursuing an unwinnable war against a substance at least tried by a majority of adults and is generally accepted to be harmless.

One of the most jarring aspects of the disproportionate response to Phelps’ toke has been the hypocrisy in holding Phelps to a higher standard than most other members of society. Athletes are not role models in anything else but athletic achievement. Away from their coliseum, they are just as accountable to society as the rest of us. No more and no less. Even if we equate celebrity to role model, at least two of America’s last three Presidents have admitted to smoking weed and they were both elected to office while musicians, movie stars and magazine darlings are not glanced at twice if they smoke it up. There is no legitimate argument as to why athletes should be held to a higher standard. Are politicians and movie stars not role models if we consider athletes to be such? Even those who advocate the clearly debased role model argument have no retort as to why lawmakers are held to a lesser moral plane than sportsmen.

The only things Michael Phelps should be criticised for is his weak-kneed apology. Phelps took the cheap option and apologised for an activity he is most likely not the least bit sorry he partook in outside of the sickening public fallout. Phelps opted for damage control rather than taking the courageous route and admitting he was a recreational pot user and standing firm that he had done nothing wrong. He could have fought back against the tide of unfair moralising thrown his way and taken a libertarian stance, using the situation to argue for the decriminalisation of the drug. He didn’t however. He took the short road, the one that minimised personal damage rather than pushed a cause.

I am not advocating marijuana use. I am advocating an across-the-board decriminalisation of the drug and a general reassessment of attitudes towards the drug in public life so that they closer reflect the attitudes of the majority of society.

There is one benefit to seep from this whole public lynching. Now the issue of marijuana decriminalisation in the United States and Australia is firmly back on the agenda.

One would like to think that the anti-marijuana pushers will come to realise that prohibition is not a workable method of preventing drug use, that resources could be better spent on other problems and drug awareness and that, most importantly, the choice to consume marijuana should be an individual one, not one made by politicians, police officers or wowsers. I would suggest that may be wishful thinking at this stage, however.

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