“Marijuana has a complicated legal, social, and economic history in the United States, as well as an uncertain future. Marijuana has been consistently tied to racial minority groups since its arrival in the United States in the 1900s, and former Attorney General Jeff Sessions further propagated that notion. AG Sessions even recently wrote a memo that directly contradicted Obama-era policy, demonstrating that the current legal status of marijuana in both state and federal government is currently up for debate. While several states have legalized marijuana for medical or even recreational purposes, federal law still categorizes cannabis as a drug with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. The comparison between marijuana, opioids, and ketamine in this article demonstrates that marijuana has been unnecessarily withheld and stigmatized by the federal government. Also reviewed is the impact of stringent marijuana-based legal policies upon the racial makeup of prison populations. The implications of current policy upon potential and future research are also discussed, with the determination that current policy has stymied research and prevented a more accurate determination of the risks and benefits of medical marijuana.”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30593477
“Cannabis was initially marked as Schedule I for reasons related to race and class. The federal government has restricted access to marijuana on the basis of its unknown risks and lack of proven benefits despite the fact that synthetic cannabinoids have been demonstrated to elicit FDA-approved benefits. This article demonstrates that marijuana should be removed from the Schedule I listing, as would be consistent with the labeling of ketamine and opioids, and reclassified as a Schedule III or Schedule II drug. Given the beneficial medical use, possible side effects, and potential for abuse and addiction of each drug, medical cannabis has been unfairly kept from the public through its unnecessary classification as a Schedule I drug.”
“Throughout the millennia, the cannabis plant has been utilized as a recognized therapy for pain relief and symptom management.
Following the Prohibition-era stigmatization and criminalization of all forms of cannabis of the early 20th century, there has been a recent nationwide and worldwide resurgence in interest and use of the 
“Previous studies have shown that a cytosine (C) to thymine (T) single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) of the human cannabinoid receptor 1 (CNR1) gene is associated with positive emotional processing.
C allele carriers are more sensitive to positive emotional stimuli including happiness. The effects of several gene polymorphisms related to sensitivity to emotional stimuli, such as that in the serotonin transporter gene-linked polymorphic region (5HTTLPR), on emotional processing have been reported to differ among cultures-e.g., between those that are independent and interdependent. Thus, we postulated that the effects of the CNR1 genotype on happiness might differ among different cultures because the concept of happiness varies by culture.
We recruited healthy male and female young adults in Japan, where favorable external circumstances determine the concept of happiness, and Canada, where the concept of happiness centers on positive inner feelings, and compared the effects of the CNR1 genotype on both subjective happiness levels (self-evaluation as being a happy person) and situation-specific happiness (happy feelings accompanying various positive events) by using a questionnaire.
We found that the effect of CNR1 on subjective happiness was different between the Japanese and Canadian groups. The subjective happiness level was the highest in Japanese individuals with the CC genotype, whereas in Canadian participants, it was the highest in individuals with the TT genotype. Furthermore, the effects of CNR1 genotype on situation-specific happiness were also different between the groups. Happiness accompanied with being surrounded by happy people was the highest among Japanese individuals with the CC genotype, whereas among Canadian individuals, it was the highest in TT genotype carriers.
These findings suggest that culture and CNR1 polymorphism interact to influence the perception of happiness.”
“A small body of work has started developing cannabis use “typologies” for use in treatment and prevention.
Two potentially relevant dimensions for classifying cannabis use typologies are medical versus recreational cannabis use and the co-use of cannabis and alcohol.
Here we compare alcohol use and related problems between cannabis users with and without medical cannabis recommendations.
“Cannabis exerts its psychoactive effect through