I want to tell you a story.

Picture a darkened, half-full parking lot, street lights shining, the distant yells of twenty-somethings out at a bar. A girl with tangled hair walks across the lot and bangs on the window of a car. Her friend turns with surprise and rolls down the window. They exchange words, and she puts her hand inside the car as if she's resting her arm there. Money exchanges hands, and the girl walks back to her car.

Next scene, the girl walks up the sidewalk to an open front door, and enters the premises alone. She heads down a quiet hallway, and meets with another friend for a while. They talk over a blunt, about politics, the weather, the discovery channel. She studies the choices and makes a selection. Money exchanges hands, and the girl pockets her goods and walks back to her car.

Back to the parking lot, the girl walks back to the car of her friend, and gets into the passengers seat. They talk for a moment, catching up on what the other had been up to since last they met. The girl hands her friend their package, and they part ways.

That girl is a criminal.

When I first came to college, I joined NORML/SSDP (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws/Students for a Sensible Drug Policy). I learned a lot about what's going on in this country with the drug war. It's horrendous. Let me tell you right now, weed is only illegal because the big industry of cotton said let it be so, and it was also great to use to reinforce racism when it came to Mexicans. Dirty browns sneaking their drugs over the border. Same thing happened later with crack and black people. There are more black men between the ages of 18-21 in prison than in college in this country. And a huge percentage of them are there for drug crimes. Consider for a moment the amount of tax dollars spent on the prison system each year.

And I would like to point out the shocking number of white people who use drugs of all kinds. Cocaine was the white business mans' drug. Pot is smoked by dirty white hippies everywhere. And let's not even get started on the housewife prescription drug epidemic. Or college kids snorting ritalin during exam time. Everyone uses drugs, but not everyone is punished equally for it.

Drugs are glamorous, and them being illegal only makes it more so. It creates a culture of wealth, if you can get away with selling it. And when it's hard to find a job, I bet you'll find a way to make it work.

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