Every third adult has smoked marijuana as per recent report; even Presidents have tried, and many of the movies and songs are being based on it. Marijuana is not a thing to whisper about any longer; it is not hidden now in back rooms and basements anymore… Despite years of prohibition and decades of laws treating marijuana as a dangerous drug than cocaine and meth, it has now openly become part of American and European life.

When the editorial board of New York Times, in USA,  this week called for the U.S government to end its ban on weed letting states to decide on how to regulate it, majority of Americans supported that marijuana be legalized. According to the Editorial, the social costs associated with marijuana laws are huge. The FBI figures suggest that there were 658,000 arrests in 2012 for possession of marijuana as compared to 256,000 for heroin, cocaine, and their derivatives.

It has been found that marijuana legalization has more popular support than same-sex marriages. The most recent survey in Gallup’s in 2013 on this issue has 58% respondents stating that marijuana should be legalized. 55% this spring said that gay couples and lesbian couples should be allowed to marry.

In 2012, Colorado passed ballot measure for legalizing recreational marijuana; at that time more residents voted for the legalization of weed than for President Obama. The legalization effort of Washington State has also passed handily.

In January, in an interview Obama said that he doesn’t think that marijuana is more dangerous than alcohol. However, he worried that marijuana legalization would be creating a slippery slope for the legalization of more dangerous drugs.

While calling for clinical testing, the American Medical Assn. has expressed skepticism about cannabis on whether it meets the safety standards at federal level for prescriptions. The Association of American Psychiatrics suggested that the current existing evidences are in no way to support that marijuana is beneficial for psychiatric disorder.

The dissenters are also worried that a legalized marijuana industry would be equivalent to Big Tobacco and the legalization would motivate addiction and lead to mental problems. For legalization, Colorado and Washington are said to be de facto laboratories. Legal sales began on Jan 1 and experienced some stumbles. The fourth graders were known to be selling pot of their grandparents to children. The move of marijuana legalization would be an interesting one and something that millions of people would look forward to.