Propaganda. A wonderfully reliable go-to used by those with no real facts to share when trying to program and control the gullible. Throughout history, propaganda has been used for a thousand and one questionable purposes. And in most instances, it’s eventually been slated for the lame and lazy attempt to confuse and control it almost always is.

Unsurprisingly therefore, cannabis propaganda has also been used and abused to a pretty ludicrous extent. Why? It’s simple really – if you’d like (for whatever the reason) to convince a whole country not to touch pot, all you need to do is make them terrified of it. Back in the 1930s, the US government declared war on cannabis and decided to treat it with the same contempt and severity as the hardest narcotics the world had ever seen. Weed was associated with Mexican drug dealers and general lowlifes in the most remarkably racist way – racism having apparently been quite normal and acceptable back then.

It was the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (and its commissioner Harry J. Ainslinger) that made the decision to start a war on cannabis of epic proportions. Which was a painfully tragic part of American history for two very painful reasons. First of all, there was zero research into the properties of cannabis, meaning that every single claim made was effectively pulled out of thin air. Secondly, it was this moronic ‘call to arms’ campaign as they called it that paved the way for the ridiculous federal cannabis legislation that remains in place across the US today. Even though we now know that it was wrong and so was the whole damn campaign, we continue to live by the rules they set out.

Progress? That’s not really the most apt word to use.

On the plus side – and assuming you can actually see the funny side of it all – taking a look back at the kind of BS that was doing the rounds earlier in the 20^th century makes for interesting viewing to say the least. And if you’d ever wondered why so many older folks in particular have a rather blinkered view of the whole weed debate…well, just feast your eyes on the following: