EDITORIAL: The High Cost of a “Recreational” Gamble: Why North Dakota is Right to Resist the Marijuana Floodgates
Steve Hallstrom
President/Publisher,
McKenzie County Farmer
I don’t often wade into social issues here. And that’s for good reason. We all have different values and views of right and wrong.
But I saw a study recently that made me feel like I had to say something out loud. To you.
It’s no secret that we live in an era defined by a national mental health crisis and a staggering addiction epidemic. Those who study these things tell me that 20 percent of the American public has a diagnosable mental illness.
20 percent.
Amid this comes an incessant push to legalize recreational marijuana across the United States. But more and more, this feels less like progress to me and more like a reckless gamble with our kids’ future. While I am a firm believer in the rights of free adults to make their own choices, true freedom requires being informed by reality, not marketing.
In North Dakota, we have consistently resisted the siren song of legalization, and as the data trickles in from states that “opened the floodgates,” our caution looks less like stubbornness and more like vital public gatekeeping.
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