{"id":5341,"date":"2015-04-06T09:58:05","date_gmt":"2015-04-06T14:58:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/citings\/?p=5341"},"modified":"2015-10-13T13:19:10","modified_gmt":"2015-10-13T18:19:10","slug":"toking-while-black","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/2015\/04\/06\/toking-while-black\/","title":{"rendered":"Toking While Black?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"This<\/a>
This 2013 Denver rally attendee probably still needs that note from his mom. Photo by Cannabis Destiny, Flickr.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cSpark it up!\u201d Sure, next time you\u2019re in Colorado, you might want to stock up on Cheetos and take advantage of the state\u2019s legalized marijuana. That is, if your skin\u2019s the right color.<\/p>\n

According to a new report by the Drug Policy Alliance, a pro-legalization collective, it\u2019s already apparent that there are still racial disparities in the enforcement of the new drug laws in CO. As explained in an Associated Press article<\/a>, laws that penalize carrying amounts in excess of 1oz of marijuana and the public use of the substance have disproportionately affected blacks compared to whites. Total marijuana arrests have dropped by nearly 95% since legalization, but blacks are twice as likely as whites to face sanctions under laws that criminalize illegal cultivation, public use, and excess possession. In Washington, the same phenomenon can be seen at work, the report states. In Seattle in 2014, one-third of the marijuana citations were issued to blacks, who only make up 8% of the city\u2019s population.<\/p>\n

According to University of Wisconsin sociologist Pamela E. Oliver<\/a>, this discrepancy is indicative of African Americans\u2019 overall treatment under the law, even after policy shifts: \u201cBlack communities, and black people in predominantly white communities, tend to be generally under higher levels of surveillance than whites and white communities\u2026 this is probably why these disparities are arising.\u201d This discrepancy shows up in nearly all crime policing, from homicide to drug laws to robbery. In Colorado, it\u2019s really killing the buzz.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  \u201cSpark it up!\u201d Sure, next time you\u2019re in Colorado, you might want to stock up on Cheetos and take advantage of the state\u2019s legalized marijuana. That is, if your skin\u2019s the right color. According to a new report by the Drug Policy Alliance, a pro-legalization collective, it\u2019s already apparent that there are still racial […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2027,"featured_media":5342,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[124,15,85,14],"tags":[29588,39116,39112,470,29586,39110,452,1368,9178,12882,39115,39111,9027],"class_list":["post-5341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crime","category-culture","category-politics","category-race","tag-colorado","tag-crime","tag-culture","tag-discrimination","tag-drug-laws","tag-inequality","tag-law-enforcement","tag-legalization","tag-marijuana","tag-policing","tag-politics","tag-race","tag-war-on-drugs"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/files\/2015\/04\/8673814869_47cc609900_z.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2027"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5341"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5341\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5350,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5341\/revisions\/5350"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/clippings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}