Most 420-friendly folks are familiar with the different names for cannabis. Weed. Ganja. Kronic. Green. Bud. Pot. Wacky Tobaccy. Flower. Devil's Lettuce. Dope. Smoke. Hashish. I could continue, but we all get it. However, the word “marijuana" proliferates our lexicon, most notably as the term used in current legislation from state to state. Though most people readily use the word, few realize the blatant racism that created its popularity in the U.S.
To understand its origins, we have to first look at the evolution of cannabis from legal medicine to prohibition. According to a description from "The Indian Hemp," published in The Western Journal of Medicine and Surgery, from May 1843, "If [cannabis] resin be swallowed, almost invariably the inebriation is of the most cheerful kind, causing the person to sing and dance, to eat food with great relish, and to seek aphrodisiac enjoyment. The intoxication lasts about three hours when sleep supervenes. It is not followed by nausea or sickness, nor by any symptoms, except slight giddiness, worth recording."
Seems like an accurate description according to the vast majority of cannabis consumers. Throughout the 19th century, cannabis was used as a medicine and largely regarded as non-dangerous. Fast-forward to the beginning of the 1900s. The political upheaval in Mexico led up to the Revolution of 1910, resulting in an influx of Mexicans immigrating to the U.S. These immigrants brought more cannabis use into places like Texas and the American Southwest. We then began to see news outlets changing their tune, like the New York Times article in 1925: “KILLS SIX IN A HOSPITAL; Mexican, Crazed by Marihuana, Runs Amuck With Butcher Knife."
These immigrants were seeping into the country, taking jobs away from Americans, and bringing with them drugs, violence, and laziness. At least according to many white politicians and media outlets at the time.
Mexican immigrants weren't the only targets of cannabis-bashing. Eventually, films like “Reefer Madness" depicted young, black jazz musicians getting “doped up" and assaulting “poor, defenseless" white women (because who doesn't love a little sexism with their racism?). Cannabis became depicted as the drug of the poor, the black and brown, the prostitutes, and the violent.
During the Roaring Twenties, the U.S. made its (less than successful) attempt at alcohol prohibition. Soon after Harry J. Anslinger became head of the Prohibition Bureau. Despite his best efforts to expel alcohol from American communities, by the 1930s, alcohol prohibition was unraveling and Anslinger was about to be out of a job.
Despite Anslinger previously on record stating that cannabis was not a problem and that the idea that it made people mad or violent was an “absurd fallacy," he began ramping up public awareness of the “dangers" of consuming cannabis. This shift meant that when alcohol prohibition was repealed by 1933, Anslinger still had a spot on the Prohibition Bureau.
By 1937, Anslinger testified in front of Congress, including claims from Floyd Baskette stating, “'I wish I could show you what a small marihuana cigaret [sic] can do to one of our degenerate Spanish-speaking residents. That's why our problem is so great; the greatest percentage of our population is composed of Spanish-speaking persons, most of who [sic] are low mentally, because of social and racial conditions.'" His testimony centered on anti-immigration sentiments brewing among white Americans and directly lead to the first legislation restricting the use of cannabis, the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937.
Anslinger intentionally and specifically used the term “marijuana" to build up the “Mexican-ness" of the plant. After the Great Depression devastated most Americans, white people blamed immigrants and people of color for the struggles of the country (they also blamed “promiscuous" queer people and their “debaucherous" lifestyle, but that's a different rant). Anslinger saw the growing racial divide and ran with it.
Within the same testimony, Anslinger goes on to say, “Marijuana is the most violence-causing drug in the history of mankind... Most marijuana smokers are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers. Their satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage." Now, why does that sound like something Jeff Sessions would say?
As his xenophobic campaign continued, further legislation solidified the federal prohibition of cannabis, piggybacking on Anslinger's slang language. Even today Washington laws, along with other stoner states, uses the term “marijuana" rather than its scientific name, Cannabis sativa.
Recognizing the origins of these terms magnifies the way racism played a major role in the history of cannabis prohibition. According to the ACLU, even today people of color are disproportionately arrested and convicted for drug and cannabis-related crimes, like simple possession. And as legalization spreads, many states include stipulations requiring that no person can work in the cannabis industry with felony charges. But with black and brown folks getting targeted by law enforcement, this works to strategically and subtly block people of color from legally pursuing a career in this industry.
The evolution of the language we use provides a roadmap from where we've come. But it also influences where we go. The words we choose unconsciously create our understanding of our surroundings. It's crucial that we select these terms from an informed and critical perspective.
And basically, we need to retire “marijuana" from our vernacular.
