The Angry Stoner
By Trev Coleman
Every day, my first job is to wake and bake. Cup of rosy, nice joint of whatever I may have at that time, and go for a walk in the countryside with my dog. It’s quite a beautiful area where I live, all mountain high and river low, vast forests and a horizon that stretches forever. It’s a stoners paradise.
Every day I look at that horizon, that landscape, that view, as I smile wryly to myself and think…what the hell are we playing at??
Let me explain. I regard myself as both a recreational and medicinal user. I suffer a number of degenerative conditions that give me a great deal of physical pain all of the time, which as you can imagine plays on my mental health quite a bit. You don’t call someone who can’t leave the house without an asthma inhaler a recreational drug user, why should I be treated any differently for my choice of substance??
Just like anyone else I’ve done my research on cannabis and its various strains and blah, blah, bollocks I’m blue in the fucking face talking about it!! Maybe its my upbringing……….. maybe its my cultural heritage……… but I can’t fail to look at every joint I have at present as a wasted opportunity!!
Every day I go through my news feed and I see people pissed off about the breakdown of the NHS, the stripping of the welfare state, fracking, and just about every other infuriating issue that plagues us all on a daily basis!! And every single day I know I am not alone; people like you and I try to engage with those affected and we’re dismissed out of hand as soon as we mention the word “cannabis”.
I just want to scream most of the time as it drives me f*cking insane!! One word, and you’re instantly dismissed!! All of a sudden you’re “a tin foil hatted f*cking loon”!!!
Let me give you my most recent example, one that has been plaguing me ever since!
Because of my conditions I’ve been signed off on the sick for some time. Like so many others, I’m being subjected to benefits regime that is of absolute no benefit! After having been recently kicked off ESA once again, I visited my local job centre so that I could file an official complaint. It was taken by a really sweet elderly lady. As we talked, I asked her if she had a contractual obligation to uphold human rights as my complaint was going to be based on them. Obviously, just like every other advisor I’ve asked the same question, I was told that she didn’t need to answer that question.
You’re public servants!! Of course you need to answer the bloody question!!!
As I proceeded to list the human rights violations involved, a chink in the armour appeared and she crumpled. It was one of the most pitiful and heartbreaking moments I’ve experienced so far in being what most would consider to be an activist.
So here I am with this old dear listing all of these abuses that have been confirmed by the UN and sheepishly, in a soft voice, she told me, “We’re doing this to cancer sufferers too.”
In that moment I saw what this Tory government is doing to the people desperate enough to “just follow policy”. From my perspective, it was absolutely fucking gut wrenching!! Here I am, knowing all I know about cannabis and what this industry is doing, sat in a room with an old lady who clearly doesn’t want to be doing her job and can barely look me in the eye, listing off human rights abuses while feeling like I’m being coerced into committing benefit fraud to get a fucking handout when by any sense of common decency, I should be in a fucking grow room, making a wage, providing meds for those cancer sufferers so we don’t have to have old women perform the indignity of stripping people of their means of fucking survival!!!
Its f*cking disgusting that I even have to talk about this when I know there’s a legit industry out there in wait, that has a massive multibillion dollar workforce working in grow rooms and fields across the globe providing enough meds for all while the Tories and their henchmen talk about making weed class A. Class A!!! Get Stuffed! It just goes to show how absolutely f*cking removed from reality that hagard, [May] really is.
And the people she’s expecting to enforce that class A penalty, they may not have time to process their paperwork when they’re at the foodbank alongside our hungry nurses!! Are we going insane??
All In This Together?
Every day we’re told everyone has to tighten their belts so the banks can stabilise the economy and all the rest of the utter BlueKip bollocks that’s spread all over the news. Every day we’re told austerity is our only option. Every day, I call “bullsh*t”!!! You know how I know?? COS I DO MY HOMEWORK!!! Screw supporting the Conservatives, bought and paid for by HSBC. Cut the corrupt bastards out of the loop with mutual banks!
Austerity??? If you’re dumb enough to believe that pile of old bollocks then you deserve to be wherever you are!! It’s a blatant rip off that’s bending you over as an industry that could be bringing about an era of redistribution of wealth growing all around you – and yet, you accept your f*cking sanction!!
I’m just going to sit on this rock, admire this stunning landscape of farmsteads for miles around with my joint of Chem 91, as you crack on slagging off us ‘cannabis addicts’. Cos you know what, our every joint, is your f*cking wasted opportunity as well!!
Trev Coleman writes for Teesside Cannabis Club where you can find his regular musings on the emerging cannabis industry and how it all ties into the politics of today. Teesside Cannabis Club have been instrumental in bringing about change in the North East region of the UK where they are active. You can become a member of their club, Exhale if you are a friend of a member and are open weekly.
