Marijuana Majority website boosts Amendment 64 with power of celebrity, social media
Last week, we noted that actress Susan Sarandon is voicing robocalls on behalf of Amendment 64, the Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol Act. Now, a new website, MarijuanaMajority.com, is pushing such measures here and elsewhere using the words of other notables who've questioned drug policy, including Fox News' Bill O'Reilly, seen here. And the man behind the site thinks social media pressure will lead to more recruits.
Big pics below.
"Think marijuana laws will never change in the U.S.?" asks the introductory passage at the top of the site's main page. Immediately below, the text sites statistics ("81 percent support medical marijuana, 72 percent support no jail time for marijuana, 50 percent support legalizing marijuana") that suggest such a shift is not only possible but inevitable.
That's followed by an enormous gallery of celebrities, politicians, media figures and more, all of whom have made public comments critical of the war on drugs. And they're not all progressive figures. For instance, the following comments from NAACP president and CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous....
...are juxtaposed against remarks by David Koch, a millionaire investor in conservative causes who's typically demonized by the left:
Click to enlarge.
What's the idea behind these messages? According to Marijuana Majority chairman Tom Angell, a longtime marijuana-reform activist (he's also the spokesman for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition), the site is meant to reassure voters in Colorado, plus those in Washington and Oregon, where marijuana measures are also on the ballot, that legalization has become a thoroughly mainstream position.
Click to enlarge.
"The other well-established organizations in the drug-policy-reform movement do a very good job of making the policy-focused case on why these laws need to change," Angell says. "Most sensible-thinking people already realize that. But the problem is, they perceive this as some dangerous, third-rail issue, and that speaking out will somehow harm them politically. So what we've decided to do is supplement all the other good work of the other organizations with this important social cue -- letting people know that when they speak out, they're not sticking their neck out. They're joining a majority of Americans, including some of the most prominent voices from across the political spectrum.
"When people like [Christian broadcaster] Pat Robertson and [progressive comedian] Bill Maher agree on something, that's probably something lawmakers should take a look at," he adds. "And it lets people know that if they speak out on this, they're not going to be attacked by the far right or by the far left. They'll be applauded by people across the political spectrum."
Continue to read more about MarijuanaMajority.com, and see more celebrity and politician comments.
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