The most laughable part about the crusade against marijuana legalization is that, while weed’s opponents devote their time and energy towards fighting a plant, young people – particularly college students – are spending their weekends partaking in real drugs. Drugs with names that are more periodic table than the English alphabet. Ever heard of 2ci? 25i? N,N-Dimethyltriptamine (DMT)? Molly?

Do you know where your kids are right now?

This isn’t an exposé; you can’t expose something as blatantly obvious as co-eds’ drug consumption, whether they’re taking sketchy laboratory substances, off-the-street drugs like cocaine, or pharmaceuticals as easily accessible as prescription pills.

Drugs will be consumed. Since the advent of alcohol distillation, drugs have been consumed. But these college kids aren’t reckless creatures wildly putting anything and everything into their bodies without a second thought.

One would be surprised to discover just how knowledgeable they are. Through a strangely educated drug culture (perhaps as a response to the negativity that narcotics and youth elicit, especially when combined) these eighteen-to-twenty-two-year-olds are transforming themselves into back-alley pharmacists, with more savvy than the generation before them could ever imagine.

They are dorm-room scientists. They are searching for spirituality and meaning just like everyone else – only, they find what they’re looking for, in their pills and lines. They’re consuming hard drugs, and many of these students are navigating their vices quite well. Yet all anybody in Congress can think about is marijuana and how it will apparently send the whole nation to hell in a hand basket.

Yes, certain drugs should not be legal, and yes, there should be consequences for individuals caught dealing or partaking in said drugs.

A good portion of the narcotics drifting around campuses are dangerous; however, some, like weed, are not. Drug usage will always be prevalent and certain narcotics will always be punishable by law. But if law enforcement and America’s legislative bodies want to get things right, they need to become as sophisticated as the college students they’re persecuting. They need to stop dedicating energy to penalizing weed smokers and halt living in a cloud of misinformation. America’s War on Drugs, amongst other issues, needs to enter the twenty-first century.

Kate Watson can be reached at [email protected]