Now that Allard is over I have a confession: I know of MMAR growers who “divert” and supply dispensaries and compassion clubs with medical cannabis.
But it’s okay, if prohibition taught us anything, it’s that human beings can be left alone and the sky won’t fall. Why would medical laws need strict regulation?
For 10 years or so, the Canadian government took a hands-off approach. They used their monopoly of violence to enforce prohibition on recreational cannabis, but eventually, especially in British Columbia, civil disobedience hit critical mass.
By accusing MMAR growers of “organized crime” the Harper government had a point, they just argued it poorly.
Certainly, there were registered growers technically violating the criminal code.
But who is hurt by patients sharing, even profiting, off their cannabis?
BC Bud homegrown is unique, because MMAR growers are peaceful.
Designated farmers, often patient themselves, are the original dispensaries. They form a culture, one that started in the mountains and is now urban, at the edge of city regulations and pushing.
But even with the Allard win, Ottawa’s regulatory corporate-landscape still poses a threat to MMAR growers.
With the Trudeau government, regulatory rules could loosen up. An apparatus could emerge where anyone can register to grow and the long march from an industry with immaturity status to self-regulation begins.
Does that mean the era of “unregulated” cannabis is coming to an end? Of the associations fighting for “cannabis rights” only the Cannabis Growers of Canada specifically mention MMAR growers as worthy of grandfather status.
And why not? These people homesteaded the BC Bud brand, the homegrown model, but rarely have they been at the drawing table with Ottawa’s planning committees.
And when they have, their advice has been ignored.
When did “activism” cease to influence public policy? And why?
A large activist group represents a sizeable minority of Canadians, and a ruling Liberal Party, built on votes from these people, should technically take their opinion into account.
This is the problem of collectivism, especially of modern democracy, where Scarborough MP Bill Blair makes life-changing decisions for thousands of people in British Columbia, and with no financial costs regulating his actions.
Democracy is an insidious form of communism.
But as a liberal democracy, Canada was built on Lockean precepts that recognize the right to private property and the fruits of one’s labour.
When people live together in society, disputes inevitable arise and so laws are needed.
“Peace, order, and good government,” is where monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy come together as means to an end: conflict resolution.
Cannabis is not alcohol or tobacco and, even if it were, there’s no reason to strictly regulate people’s behaviour.
An orderly society doesn’t rest on forcing people to do things and preventing them from ingesting things into their body.
BC Bud farmers, dispensaries and compassion clubs, extract crews and other value-added third-parties aren’t being violent.
Through consensual exchange with buyers and sellers, they’ve demonstrated the moral bankruptcy of having cannabis in the criminal code.
What would John Locke say about Bill Blair’s power or Vancouver’s crackdown on small businesses?
Homesteading property is a legitimate path to ownership. BC farmers, dispensaries, extract crews and other value-added third-parties have established their private property rights in the market.
It would be unjust to take it from them.