Cannabis Journalism Day #2
This morning we listened to Jane West, (@theJaneWest) talk about her occupation, and relationship with cannabis. She introduced us to a program that she co-founded, @WomenGrow, which strives to connect and educate leaders in various aspects of cannabis. It empowers women to succeed in the marijuana industry, and expand their presence in the business. It was inspiring to see how much the program has grown nationally, and how much support it’s been shown from diverse groups of people.
WomenGrow has been promoted and tweeted about by Cannabis Industry Journal, which is a business journal “dedicated to legitimate news coverage on regulation & compliance, testing & analytical labs, upcoming innovations in cannabis tech, and more.”
Research Progress…
I’ve decided to narrow my research topic down a bit more to focus on racial disparities among those who are currently incarcerated for marijuana related crimes. According to the Washington Post, it’s been proven that black and white people use marijuana at roughly the same rates. However, the black arrest rate for marijuana possession is evidently higher than the white arrest rate.
In my research I intend to analyze the reasoning behind this, and discover how these trends have impacted our society in a political and social sense.
“In the three years from 2011 to 2013, annual possession arrests by Virginia law enforcement went up by about 2,000 a year, and black Virginians accounted for 82 percent of the increase.”
