It was high times against hard times last night in the Lenhart Grand Ballroom, as the University Activities Organization presented “The Great Debate,” an open-forum discussion about the legalization of marijuana.
The debaters, Steve Hager, editor-in-chief of High Times magazine and Bob Stutman, 25-year veteran of the United States’ Drug Enforcement Agency, debated in front of 1,000 people. The debate was moderated by Loren Lomasky, a professor in the Philosophy department.
The debate began with each presenter giving an approximately 15-minute opening statement, which was followed by a question-answer session between the two men and the audience. The debaters ended the event with closing arguments, in which they got a chance to sum up their arguments.
Hager began his opening statement with five reasons why he believes marijuana should be legalized. He began with reasoning that marijuana is good medicine, and argued that the pharmaceutical companies in this country have the highest profit ratio of any other in the nation.
He also said that the other parts of the plant, besides the leaf, can be used to make thousands upon thousands of products that we use on a daily basis, from paper to oil. He continued to explain that we have the biggest prison system in the world — but that the prisons are not the place for marijuana users.
“Incarcerating non-violent marijuana users is not solving anything,” Hager said. “These peaceful people are coming out of their 15-year or 20-year prison terms hardened criminals — psychopaths.”
He also cited corruption in the drug war as a reason for the drug to be legalized, as the same pharmaceutical companies he cited earlier have long been against the legalization of marijuana. His final reason for the legalization of marijuana was that the drug is part of his spiritualization, part of his religion. He said he left the Lutheran faith when he was younger and found a counterculture in the drug.
“If we’re going to have freedom of religion in this country, then marijuana should be legal,” Hager said. “Marijuana is a religious culture to a lot of people, including myself.”
Stutman took the podium after a long ovation for Hager, and wasted no time in rebuking what Hager had said. Much of Stutman’s portion of the debate centered around the fact that three groups in this country — the people, the scientists and courts — have the decision to make as to whether marijuana should be legalized, and they haven’t yet.
He also challenged Hager’s claim that marijuana is a religion, that has many followers.
“Steve would argue that 10 guys smoking a doobie on a Saturday night is a religion,” Stutman said.
Stutman also used a fundamental argument that if marijuana was legalized, use would go up dramatically. He said in the last 30 years, adolescent use in the United States by 20 percent, while in Amsterdam, where use of the drug is legal, adolescent use has jumped by 170 percent.
The following question-and-answer session was highlighted by an attack on Stutman by the man known as tie-dyed-Tom, who is occasionally seen on the Education building’s steps on campus. Tom, in the process of asking Stutman about the choices of law-enforcement agencies to pursue drugs in the “mountains of West Virginia,” referred to those agents as “wusses,” a term not taken kindly by Stutman.
The closing statements centered around the priorities of drug legalization in the country. Stutman faced many questions about the difference between alcohol and tobacco and marijuana, which he answered vehemently.
“The major difference I see is that we already have two psychoactive chemicals legal,” Stutman said. “That does not mean we need three. It’s a slippery slope, because the next generation may want to legalize ecstasy. Obviously, that’s where problems begin.”
Hager argued the priority problem lies not within the differences between marijuana and alcohol, but between marijuana and other drugs that are prescribed regularly to adolescents.
“The problem is when you have these doctors and pharmaceutical companies giving these kids ritalin, and other drugs that have much worse side effects than marijuana,” Hager said.
UAO’s Nick Gurich, who organized the event with the help of UAO president Jordan Ohler and the rest of the organization, said the event was a big success.
“We were real excited about bringing the event,” Gurich said. “We weren’t real sure of what the turnout was going to be, but all the students came out real well and behaved them well for the most part. … You can tell that from the questions being asked and the questions being asked from those questions that a real discourse was being established, that hopefully brought out ideas that informed people.”
