0:00NATALIE PAPILLION
0:00MPP
0:00We Change Laws
0:00We Change Lives
0:00REIMAGINING JUSTICE
0:00A CONVERSATION ON RACE, CANNABIS, AND POLICING
0:00Natalie Papillion
0:01NATALIE PAPILLION
0:01THE EQUITY ORGANIZATION
0:06African Americans are migrating to southern port cities,
0:46where they are introduced to cannabis by former slaves
1:35and a lot of Mexican immigrants into the southwest as well as Caribbean sailors.
2:17They are using this substance for social reasons,
2:58because to be totally frank, it was more accessible and cheaper than alcohol.
3:52This is the era of American alcohol prohibition. So that's just the context.
4:44One of the things that comes out of this movement that we're all very familiar with
5:24is jazz and jazz culture.
5:46And for those who don't know, there's a pretty tight relationship between jazz culture and cannabis usage.
6:49Louis Armstrong was arrested for possessing marijuana.
7:26There was a whole subculture around its consumption.
8:07It was thought to be a less harmful and more enjoyable social activity than alcohol
9:11which was the preeminent social activity of the time.
9:46And as this association with jazz rises up in the 20s and 30s,
10:44there tends to be a lot of fear coming from the Anglo-American power structure that be around the
11:45increasing enfranchisement of Black Americans we're seeing mixed race music venues,
12:44we're seeing more enlightened views around the integration of society,
13:43we're seeing people start to criticize this racial caste system that we had set up
14:30and the easiest thing for people in power to do was to sort of demonize the people
15:19who were thought to be encroaching on this sort of societal structure
16:06and those were Black people, specifically entertainers.
16:49And so we see this was multiple people were part of the early criminalization
17:48but there's one name I'm sure a lot of us have heard of, Harry Anslinger.
18:26and he was an avowed racist - I want to be very clear about that.
19:19He was censored on the Congressional floor several times for using racial slurs.
20:03He was formerly a prohibition officer.
20:36He realized that at the end of alcohol prohibition that he needed a job.
21:22He turned to marijuana with its association with Black American and Latinx Americans
22:12As this sort of new thing he was going to police to criminalize and brutalize minority populations
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