Politics
Changes in policy and reduced policing of drug laws has impacted users of psychedelics, as has the Covid-19 pandemic, which is increasing the need for mental health and addiction treatments.
The resolution calls for decrim throughout California and protection for community-based healing ceremonies, in line with a bill being drafted in the state Senate.
President-elect Joe Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris have pledged major reforms of drug laws to shift the criminal justice system away from incarceration towards still controversial mandated treatment and drug courts.
Global anti-drug conventions now recognize the therapeutic value of cannabis and no longer consider it “particularly liable to abuse and to produce ill-effects.”
Oregon Measures 109 and 110 broke new ground in drug reform by legalizing psilocybin for therapeutic use and decriminalizing all drugs. The chief petitioners behind these bills, Tom and Sheri Eckert and Anthony Johnson, discuss their federal and local impact.
The police action is part of a larger trend of increasing detentions and prosecution of ayahuasca providers across Europe.
Three major ballot initiatives were approved by voters on Tuesday, signaling a significant shift in public attitudes toward drug policy.
The drug war hasn’t made drugs less accessible to youth, but instead, we get a lot more people incarcerated and dying of drug use. The more we criminalize it, the more dangerous it becomes.
Measure 109, a ballot initiative to legalize psilocybin-based therapy state-wide, could become a model for the nation.
The Ann Arbor City Council voted unanimously to pass the resolution, adapted from Decriminalize Nature. Now the County Prosecutor is on board, too.
