They told us legalization was freedom. Headlines, campaigns, dispensary ads: “Weed is legal now.” But that’s not how it started.
DEA vs. DEI
It started with pity. Pity for veterans. Pity for cancer patients. Pity for people who looked sick enough to deserve it. And pity isn’t justice. Pity is conditional. Pity asks you to prove yourself. That’s what legalization was built on. Not rights—pity. And pity always puts you on trial. Are you sick enough? Respectable enough? Desperate enough?
That trial never ended. It just changed shape.
The Legitimacy Test in Everyday Life
That pity framing made people embarrassed to be stoners. Look at work: people can talk about beer or wine all day long. That’s normal. But say you smoke weed? Everyone clams up.
Even in legal states. It’s still treated like you’re crossing a line. I felt that. Most people I worked with didn’t even want to mention weed. But I wanted friends who knew the plant, who could teach me something. That’s what got me writing about it. Learning and sharing is my way of fighting the shame they want us to carry.
Built on the Backs of the Vulnerable
The Brill family in Georgia: many people remember them. Their son had seizures every day until they let him smoke. Seventy-one days, no seizures. For the first time, the kid had relief. But the state didn’t care. His parents were arrested. He was taken from them. Without weed, he had one of his worst seizures. That’s what this pity system does. Even when the plant works, even when it saves a life, it still isn’t “legitimate” enough.
Marijuana Is Only as Protected as Our Most Vulnerable Stoners
Marijuana Has Always Been a Civil Rights Issue
The War on Drugs has always been about race. Black people are almost four times more likely to get arrested for weed than white people. Latinos too — higher arrests, harsher sentences. And when legalization came? The same people who got hit hardest were left out of the industry. Licenses cost too much. White investors dominate the market. Weed might be “legal,” but it’s not freedom for everyone.
Racism feeds the fear of this plant. Since the beginning, Blackness has been painted as dangerous, criminal. Black women got it the worst—masculinized, treated as threatening just for existing. Weed laws became another way to police their bodies and their families. That hasn’t gone away. The stereotype of the “angry Black woman” is still alive in how the system treats Black stoners: harsher, less forgiving, never “deserving.”
That’s why weed has always been tied to civil rights. If civil rights fall, cannabis rights fall right behind them.
Cannabis and Counterculture
Weed has always been in queer spaces. Harlem in the 1920s and ’30s? The Hamilton Lodge balls had thousands of people, queens walking, joints being passed while cops sat outside. Later came houses like LaBeija, Xtravaganza, Ninja—not just ball teams, but families for people whose real families kicked them out. Weed was there too. Part of the night, part of survival.
Then the ’90s hit, and people started saying smoking weed was “gay.” Like that was supposed to sting. But honestly? They weren’t wrong. Queer folks had already made weed part of their culture for decades. From Harlem drag balls to LaBeija’s runway, weed was community. If “gay” means chosen family, joy in the middle of struggle, finding a way to laugh and dance when life says you can’t—then yeah, weed’s gay.
And outside the ballroom, counterculture kept pushing. The ’70s women’s rights revolution—weed was braided into it, fueling protests and giving women a way out with no-fault divorce. The ’90s grunge scene—Kurt Cobain in dresses, lipstick, smoking, tearing down toxic masculinity. But Black queer artists had already been doing that for decades. Gladys Bentley in tuxedos singing about her women lovers. Sylvester on disco floors, glitter and falsetto, with weed floating in the background. They showed what liberation looked like first: loud, unapologetic, Black, and queer.
Love Wins—Except When It Doesn’t
When same-sex marriage passed, people shouted, “Love Wins.” But disabled people? They didn’t get the same freedom. If you’re disabled and rely on Medicaid or Social Security, marriage can mean losing your healthcare. Imagine choosing between your partner and your survival. That’s not equality. That’s punishment.
In 2022, 40% of disabled adults reported discrimination in healthcare, benefits, or work. For disabled LGBTQ+ folks, it was over half. Marriage equality was celebrated as right, but disabled people were left with pity. It’s the same system cannabis lives under: prove you’re legitimate, or lose everything.
Who Gets Your Money?
Here’s what people don’t say: not every cannabis company is on your side. Some of the biggest names? They’re funding conservative PACs for tax breaks. In 2024, a cannabis PAC gave a million dollars to Trump’s super PAC. Trulieve and Curaleaf poured money into his inaugural committee. They also spent millions making sure they controlled state legalization. That’s not solidarity. That’s profit.
And while they’re cashing in, they’re ripping people off. Those $50 vape cartridges? Same ones you can find on AliExpress—100 pieces for $134. Pennies on the dime. And the distillate they fill them with? Not that expensive either. They’re flipping a miracle plant for obscene profits, while the original dealers are still behind bars.
How Do We Take It Back?
Support local. r/trees on Reddit has been connecting people for years. Seeds can be bought online, depending on your state. Best case? Grow it yourself. Hydroponics makes it simple—drop a germinated seed in water with an aerator and nutrients, and it grows. You can get fancy with lights and tents, but you don’t have to.
Don’t stop at smoking. Learn what the plant can do. THCa, THCV, CBD, CBDV—understanding those is rebellion too. Education breaks the myth that weed is one-dimensional.
This is how we fight back: we learn. We grow. We share. We take control.
The Respectability Trap
And while we’re here—why do we always have to be the “good” ones? The good stoners. The good Black people. The good Brown people. The good queer people. The versions that make it easy for others to say, “See, they deserve rights.”
That’s not freedom. That’s a trap. Being digestible won’t save us. Proving ourselves won’t save us. The problem was never us—it’s the system built to doubt us from the start.
Breaking the Legitimacy Test
Weed isn’t just a plant. It’s a mirror. It shows how this country treats its vulnerable. And here’s what it shows: we’re only as protected as our most vulnerable stoner.
If Black and Brown people are still arrested more, we’re not free. If disabled people are punished for marrying, we’re not free. If queer and trans people are losing rights, our cannabis rights are next.
Legalization built on pity is fragile. Progress built on conditions can be taken away.
It’s time to end the trial.
