New Ad Campaign Urges Cannabis Consumers to Learn From Maureen Dowd's Marijuana Mistake
A new new public awareness campaign in Colorado, aimed at encouraging responsible use of marijuana edibles, features a billboard that alludes to New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd's famously unpleasant encounter with cannabis-infused chocolate:
Mason Tvert, communications director at the Marijuana Policy Project, which is sponsoring the ad campaign, explains:
For decades, efforts to educate people about marijuana have been led by government agencies and organizations that want to maintain marijuana prohibition. Their campaigns have been characterized by fear mongering, misinformation, and derision, and they have not made anyone safer. Like most Americans, Ms. Dowd has probably seen countless silly anti-marijuana ads on TV, but she never saw one that highlights the need to "start low and go slow" when consuming marijuana edibles.
Now that marijuana is a legal product like alcohol in some states—and on its way to becoming legal in others— it needs to be treated that way. That's where the Consume Responsibly campaign comes in.
MPP highlights how far we've come in "A Brief History of Marijuana Education in America."
I discussed the special hazards posed by cannabis-infused foods in a column last July. Short version: Edibles are indeed tricky, but consumers are not as helpless as Dowd portrays them.