Weed legalized in Cali and age to buy Tobacco is raised to 21. Seems weird to celebrate both.

[CaliforniaLove]

IDK how much truth there is to this, but it almost seems to me like the same people celebrating the legalization of MaryJ are also celebrating the restriction of tobacco products.

It seems like a lot of the conversation around marijuana legalization comes down to discussion about how safe marijuana is compared to tobacco, a legal substance.

And that's true. And I personally have never done either, but if I was forced to hang around somebody who does one, I'd choose marijuana. I can agree that tobacco is a less healthy and less pleasant substance.

However, that's never been the reason why I've supported marijuana legalization. The argument I've felt was the most persuasive to me is simpler. Why should somebody else have a say in what I put in my body? That's really at the core of most of my political beliefs. People should have the agency to control their own lives when it doesn't have a negative effect on anybody else's.

And the same can easily be applied to tobacco.

But even more concerning to me than that is that with this law, it's all about age. The law seems to be saying that a 23 year old has agency over their own body, and a 20 year old does not.

As a 21 year old, this kind of hits a little close to home. It kinda freaks me out a little bit. I really start to think about slippery slopes. What are they really saying to me when they say that if I was 1 year younger I wouldn't be able to make the decision on whether I wanted to smoke tobacco? It was less than a half century ago when people ages 18-20 couldn't vote at all. And we all know that if that went back to being the case, Republicans would benefit significantly.

I've heard people talk about raising the age of adulthood because of something about the amygdala not being full size until you're 25. To me, that's a nightmare scenario. Not that I'd expect the average person of any age to be ok with that, but crazier things have happened.

So any time I see rights being restricted to people because they aren't a certain age, it makes me feel a little uneasy. And whenever I see that age being RAISED, it makes me feel very uneasy, because it makes me feel like it sets a standard for further restriction.

To me, raising the smoking age is a big step backwards. If smoking is a terrible unhealthy thing that 20 year olds shouldn't be doing, then it's a terrible unhealthy thing that 30 year olds shouldn't be doing as well.