January 13, 2019
Wait, what? We are going to re-victimise Māori AGAIN?
Wait, what? We are going to re-victimise Māori AGAIN?
Martyn 'Bomber' Bradbury
As New Zealand gears up for a referendum on Cannabis, some of the ideas being floated right now look to re-victimise Māori. National are suggesting that only "fit and proper persons" should be allowed to grow legal cannabis. That means anyone with a criminal conviction won't be allowed to benefit from a legal cannabis market.
When you consider how cannabis prohibition has punished Māori more disproportionally than anyone else in New Zealand, what National are in fact asking for is that after decades and decades of harsh punishments under cannabis prohibition, the community who has suffered most shouldn't be allowed to economically benefit from lifting that prohibition.
We would be punishing Māori twice over by such cannabis laws.
If we are going to legalise cannabis production in this country, it should be so that those communities that have suffered the most from criminalisation, incarceration and addiction be given not only the taxed funds to run addiction services, but they should also be first and forefront in the production and economic benefits from an end to prohibition.
To punish Māori disproportionately for decades for smoking cannabis is racist, to disqualify them participating in a legal industry because of that racism is obscene.
Martyn Bradbury
Editor – TheDailyBlog.nz
twitter.com/CitizenBomber
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