Law & Politics

Stoned Rabbits: The DEA's Latest Fear Mongering Tactic, Source: http://countercurrentnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/rabbit-stoner.jpgIt’s become increasingly clear that most people who outright reject cannabis and tout it as an evil from which society will never recover know almost less than nothing about the plant.

In fact, if they knew nothing and admitted as much, we might actually have a reasonable place to start this conversation. But the problem is that these people who obviously know precisely crap about cannabis cruise around making negative and untrue statements about it.

Case in point — Matt Fairbanks, core member of the Utah DEA’s “marijuana eradication” team, recently testified before a Senate panel. Fairbanks, who was there to oppose a bill that would allow medical cannabis in Utah, told the panel that he feared the environmental risks of any form of legal cannabis.To be fair, irresponsible grow operations often do jeopardize local environments. Is that what Fairbanks was referencing?

Stoned Rabbits: The DEA's Latest Fear Mongering Tactic, Source: http://www.fishki.lv/uploads/67/211.jpgSadly, no. That would have been a legitimately good point to bring up. Instead, Fairbanks, who told the Senators, “I deal in facts; I deal in science,” actually said that he feared passage of the bill would lead to an epidemic of stoned rabbits.

Sit with that a moment. I didn’t mistype and you didn’t misread. This DEA agent who deals in “facts” and “science” told lawmakers that stoned rabbits will become a real problem if this bill passes. Citing a personal recollection of a weed raid wherein Fairbanks witnessed these fuzzy layabouts, he stated that, “one of [the rabbits] refused to leave us, and we took all the marijuana around him, but his natural instincts to run were somehow gone.”

For reference, this is the same DEA who a few weeks back raided the home of a Georgia man because they didn’t know the difference between okra and cannabis.

Basically, he’s claiming that rabbits who nibble on growing weed plants lost all their motivation and self-preservation skills. He’s more than loosely implying that cannabis has instilled an apathy and loss of instinct in the rabbits. He doesn’t really get into why stoned rabbits are a problem. Rabbits, though fluffy and adorable, breed like rodents (in fact, they are very closely related to rodents). A few stoned bunnies is hardly going to affect the health of the whole rabbit population.

Also, his claims are suspect in and of themselves. I grew up in the country around what felt like millions of rabbits. They are not the shrewd survivalists Fairbanks would like us to believe. These are creatures that wait by the side of the road and only run out to cross it at the exact moment you’re driving by them. I worked for a chef who once quipped, “If rabbits were any dumber, they would grow on trees.”

Stoned Rabbits: The DEA's Latest Fear Mongering Tactic, Source: http://www.zerofiltered.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/rabbit1.jpgI am an avid environmentalist and animal lover. I have nothing against rabbits and certainly don’t seek to harm any creature. But the fact remains these are not highly motivated problem solvers who have been inextricably changed into lazy pot heads.

I have an idea. DEA (hell, all law enforcement agents) should be required to pass a basic scientific knowledge exam. I’m not talking quantum mechanics and astrobiology here. But knowing the difference between cannabis and okra and understanding that baked bunnies aren’t going to ruin nature seem like fairly basic things that they ought to know.

However, that further exposes a glaring issue with the DEA and a lot of modern drug policy: ignorance is rampant among those who make the laws and enforce them.

You need at least a GED to work in the DEA, right?