The USA government has just upped its anti-marijuana stance by spending $715,000 on an app designed to encourage teens to work out instead of getting high. For some reason, I thought that it was parents’ jobs to dictate what teens should and should not be doing with their lives and not the government’s.

A grant was given to the University of New York at Buffalo for a study called, “Use of exercise to reduce young adult marijuana use there is an app for that.” In what many believe, even those who agree with marijuana prohibition, to be a colossal waste of tax money, the government is proving that it is really out of touch. Can they really see a teen using an App to keep them from smoking pot?

Attempting to Help Addicted Teens

Research has been done that shows that with moderate exercise, cravings for marijuana can be curbed. Exercise is great and all, but the research is unfounded entirely. While the amount of money represents only a small fraction of the money spent on the war on drugs and imprisoning those convicted of nonviolent drug related crimes, only 9% of users are actually addicted to Marijuana. I doubt many of those who are addicted are going to be using a cheesy government app to help them with a problem they are not likely to admit they have.

None of this even considers the fact that spending $715,000 on an app in general seems pretty ridiculous. High School kids can make apps these days, so it begs the question of how exactly this money is being spent on the study. The researchers claim the money is designed to learn more about how exercise reduces the desire for marijuana, so it sounds like there needs to be a group the researchers are getting stoned and a control group who does not get pot. Without marijuana being involved in the study, there is no way to get good results. What a good use of $715,000.

Well Intentioned but Bad Advice

It’s high time the government stops pretending it has our interests in mind, especially when most states are legalizing recreational and medicinal forms of marijuana. Sure keeping teens off of marijuana is a good thing, but they do not exactly have a good track record with these sorts of programs. This is just another example of government not knowing what its doing and pushing its own agenda instead of ours.